Stanley Cup storylines: 1 key question for each Western playoff squad
The quest to hoist the Stanley Cup begins Monday. These storylines will affect the championship hopes of the eight teams in the Western Conference playoff bracket. (Click to read our breakdown of the Eastern qualifiers.)
Vegas Golden Knights
Will Eichel seize the moment?
Through the ankle sprains and the herniated disk that estranged him from the Sabres, Jack Eichel made 476 appearances over eight years without ever touching the ice in the playoffs.
He finally got there. Eichel mostly stayed healthy as the Golden Knights won the Pacific Division to atone for falling short of the 2022 playoffs. Buffalo's erstwhile captain sparked Vegas offensively with 66 points in 67 games. That made up for trusty load-bearers Mark Stone and Shea Theodore missing months apiece.
The Golden Knights strung together two spells of elite play. They opened the regular season 13-2-0, then compiled a 22-4-5 record after the All-Star break. Their points percentage with Eichel in the lineup was .694. That extrapolates to a 114-point pace over 82 games and positions Vegas for a Stanley Cup push if Eichel can be clutch.
Winnipeg Jets
Can scorers build on late-year resurgence?
Winnipeg's decline from February onward was steep. The Jets played .500 hockey over their final 30 games to rank 12th in the West in that span after placing second at the All-Star break, only outshining teams that tanked for Connor Bedard. Their per-game goals rate plunged from 3.19 before the break to 2.67.
Winnipeg's top forwards slumped en masse. Pierre-Luc Dubois produced 2.05 points per 60 minutes ahead of the break, then managed 1.07 afterward. Nikolaj Ehlers' per-60 splits were 3.49 points and 2.28. Kyle Connor (2.32, 1.48) endured an 11-game goal drought. Blake Wheeler (2.10, 1.95) scored once in his last 27 appearances.
A recent uptick restored momentum and hope. The Jets won five of seven games to end the season as Connor, Dubois, and Ehlers combined with Mark Scheifele to net a dozen goals. Fresh off setting a career high in goals saved above expected (33.62), Connor Hellebuyck could steal a series if he gets enough offensive help.
Edmonton Oilers
Will Ekholm be the best deadline acquisition?
Splashy midseason trades routed many of the top forwards on the market - including Bo Horvat, Timo Meier, Ryan O'Reilly, and Patrick Kane - from Western Conference also-rans to Eastern contenders. The West's Cup hopefuls were comparably quiet, but Edmonton's biggest move has been transformative.
Mattias Ekholm, the grizzled longtime Predators blue-liner, has impressed since he swapped places with Tyson Barrie. He ranked fifth on the Oilers in points since the Feb. 28 deal and tilted the ice in the top-pair minutes he shouldered. Edmonton outscored teams 27-8 during Ekholm's five-on-five shifts with partner Evan Bouchard, per Natural Stat Trick. Darnell Nurse's workload lightened, which was a welcome bonus.
Anemic secondary scoring and shaky defensive play in recent postseasons prevented Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl from engineering Cup runs. That could change this spring. Edmonton's .881 points percentage and plus-37 goal differential in Ekholm's 21 games were NHL highs, affirming that these Oilers are a force to fear.
Los Angeles Kings
Will they win the special-teams battle?
There's a chasm in quality between the Kings' fourth-ranked power play in the NHL (25.3% conversion rate) and their penalty kill, which operated at 75.8%. No Western playoff team's kill was worse.
Contributors abound on L.A.'s power play. The Kings led the NHL in 20-point-scorers (six), 10-point-scorers (eight), and seven-goal-scorers (six) in that phase, democratizing who could make a difference. On the PK, the Pheonix Copley-Joonas Korpisalo tandem's .852 save percentage is praiseworthy because it dwarfs the combined .804 mark that Jonathan Quick and Cal Petersen posted before Korpisalo was acquired.
How they fare on special teams could shape the Kings' playoff destiny. Edmonton's power play outscored L.A.'s unit 7-3 in the teams' first-round clash a year ago, when the Kings were shut out and lost narrowly in Game 7.
Colorado Avalanche
Can Byram maintain his scoring touch?
Concussion issues and other ailments limited Bowen Byram to 42 appearances this season and 91 NHL games over his first three years. But he was a pivotal part of Colorado's Stanley Cup defense corps. Byram excelled as the No. 3 guy on the depth chart last year when Samuel Girard was knocked out of the playoffs with a broken sternum.
Almost every key Colorado player missed extended time this season, including Cale Makar recently. Byram stepped up when healthy. Skating for 22 minutes a night, he scored in three straight games toward the end of March to increase his goal total to 10 and rise to fifth among NHL defensemen in goals per contest. The lion's share of his production (17 of 24 points) came at even strength.
Offseason departures and the injury bug didn't stop the Avalanche from reaching 50 wins again. Internal growth in the form of Byram's offensive spark gives them unique scoring depth on the back end. Opponents can't relax even when Nathan MacKinnon, Mikko Rantanen, and the Makar-Devon Toews pair are off the ice.
Seattle Kraken
Will they keep scoring prolifically?
Seattle's offense is historically balanced. No team in the cap era iced more 30-point-scorers (13) or more 25-point-scorers (17) than Dave Hakstol's club, per Stathead. Zero Kraken point-producers finished in the top 50 league-wide, but the entire lineup can threaten to light the lamp on any shift.
Seattle ranked 10th in shot attempts and was first by a wide margin at five-on-five in shooting percentage (10.3%), per Natural Stat Trick. Clinical finishers, the Kraken scored 32.6 goals above expected, as tracked by MoneyPuck, the NHL's sixth-highest figure over the past 10 seasons. Burying chances at that rate is paramount because the Kraken's goaltending is the worst among playoff qualifiers (.886 team save percentage).
Only five squads that advanced past Round 1 shot better than 10% at five-on-five over the past 15 postseasons. It'd be abnormal if the Kraken remain this hot, though maybe that's to be expected from a unique team with depth that's a safeguard against individual slumps.
Dallas Stars
Is Robertson ready for his close-up?
Even when Mike Modano was at the peak of his powers, no Stars skater ever racked up 100 points in a Dallas uniform. Jason Robertson's 109-point breakout season pushed boundaries and established the superstar winger as a multidimensional offensive weapon.
Robertson's 46 goals, the NHL's seventh-most, constitute a new career high. His 63 assists shattered his previous personal best. Dallas' first line - Roope Hintz between Robertson and Joe Pavelski - generated a splendid 59.2% expected goals share over a league-high 765 minutes together, according to MoneyPuck. Over the past two seasons, Robertson's been on the ice for 44% of Stars tallies at even strength, per Natural Stat Trick.
The offense runs through him, but Robertson only scored once on 16 shots when the Flames bounced Dallas in seven games last postseason. A second Cup Final appearance in four years is attainable if Robertson averts another untimely slump and Miro Heiskanen and Jake Oettinger, fellow pillars of the Stars' sublime 2017 draft class, shine in their roles.
Minnesota Wild
Will Gustavsson flourish in playoff debut?
Acquired from Ottawa last summer for a veteran in decline, Filip Gustavsson outplayed his aging tandem partner in Minnesota this season. Gustavsson's save percentage over 39 games was .931. He saved 24.54 goals above expected, per Evolving Hockey, to rank seventh in the league. Gustavsson made a stingy defensive team even harder to beat.
Nominal Wild starter Marc-Andre Fleury saved 0.86 goals above expected. Cam Talbot, who went to the Senators, saved 0.30. They put up pedestrian numbers while Gustavsson flashed star potential at 24 years old, rewarding general manager Bill Guerin's foresight.
Gustavsson made three straight starts twice this year and twice before that in his career, according to HockeyGoalies.org. He's appeared in 66 regular-season games to Fleury's 985 and has no playoff experience. That might prompt head coach Dean Evason to keep rotating his goalies, but Gustavsson has earned the chance to monopolize the crease.
Nick Faris is a features writer at theScore.