Where will the Pens finish?
If you need to catch up, check out yesterday’s season preview and predictions for the Atlantic Division here. But with due respect to the other division in the Eastern Conference, it’s time for the main event and that’s where the Penguins stand going into 2024-25 within the Metropolitan Division.
To know where you’re going, you need to know where you’ve been as the saying goes. Last year the eight teams of the Metropolitan Division collected a total of 732 points (which is a 91.5 point per team average). But while six teams had at least 87 points, there was a big breakaway with the Rangers and Hurricanes both finishing 17+ points above third place.
2024-25 Metropolitan Division Predictions
- New Jersey Devils (53-24-5, 111 points)
- New York Rangers (49-25-8, 106 points)
- Carolina Hurricanes (48-28-6, 102 points)
- Washington Capitals (42-30-10, 94 points)
- Pittsburgh Penguins (41-34-7, 89 points)
- New York Islanders (38-13-13, 89 points)
- Philadelphia Flyers (40-36-6, 86 points)
- Columbus Blue Jackets (26-48-8, 60 points)
It’s a whopper, isn’t it? The total here is for 737 points between the division, thanks to a metric ton of overtime games coming up. (That wouldn’t be unusual, the Pens/Islanders/Capitals/Flyers combined for 50 [!!!!] OT losses between the four of them last season).
Starting at the top, we’re joining the common chorus projecting a big step back forward for the Devils. They looked the part over in Czech in the first two games, new goalie Jacob Markstrom made the save of the year. Sheldon Keefe is the coach. Dougie Hamilton is healthy. Those three items (goaltending, coaching, health) derailed New Jersey last year and now it’s all fixed. This should be a year where they can do a lot of damage with Jack Hughes, Jesper Bratt, Nico Hischier and Timo Meier all healthy and in their primes.
Much like Toronto in the other division, the Rangers are an easy pick to comfortably make the playoffs. They’ve been 107+ point teams in each of the last three seasons and they should be right about in that range again with the same cast of characters in the mix. Not too much drama or intrigue there, but that will soon change.
I’m perhaps a little more down on Carolina than I should be, perhaps out of fatigue. They are a good team, well-coached and constructed. But they’ve lost some serious pieces (Teuvo Teravainen, Brett Pesce, Brady Skjei and Jake Guentzel). The replacements (Jack Roslovic, William Carrier, Sean Walker and Shayne Gotisbehere) aren’t as inspiring on paper. And they’re running back the oft-injured Frederik Andersen and Pyotr Kochetkov, which may or may not work out so well. I don’t have the nerve to predict they’ll fall back into the pack, but this season it wouldn’t be an extreme shock if they backslide to a degree.
My next pick won’t be a popular one, but on the surface the changes Washington made should vastly improve their team. They have two new top-six forwards (Andrew Mangiapane and Pierre-Luc Dubois), two new top-four defensemen (Matt Roy and Jacob Chychrun) and a new goalie (Logan Thompson). And a revamped bottom-six (Brandon Duhaime, Taylor Raddish). They are all upgrades, significantly so when replacing tremendous underachivers (chiefly late day Evgeny Kuznetsov and Darcy Kuemper). The Caps got a wonderful opportunity when T.J Oshie and Nicklas Backstrom got put out to pasture with injuries and opened up a ton of cap space, and they took advantage of it well.
The Penguins will slot in fifth, though landing a spot higher or lower wouldn’t be a surprise. The team hasn’t improved much from last season, mainly taking on redemption candidates and/or outright salary cap dumps to gain extra draft capital. The Bryan Rust injury shows how delicate the balance on the team is, a loss of any star player for even 10-20 games could well derail the season.
Tying the Pens, but behind on the win total is the Islanders. Most predictions have NYI a spot or two higher, and maybe I’m sleeping on them. I see a team teetering on the edge of combustion with Patrick Roy behind the bench. Roy tripped and fell miserably in Colorado in his second season, is a similar fate going to happen here? Maybe they’ll find a way to be boring but successful enough to claw into the playoff picture, but I don’t see it this season.
Much like NYI and Pittsburgh, the Flyers had an unusually quiet summer. They’ve brought on practically no one, save the additions teenage rookies in Jett Luchanko and Matvei Michkov. Those two will add some excitement, but their net looks like a disaster (Samuel Ersson, Ivan Fedotov, Cal Petersen). Can’t see them going anywhere in 2024-25, but with three first round picks on the horizon next summer a slower build awaits.
Bringing up the rear is Columbus. And hey, let’s hope they exceed everyone’s baseline for them this year. It would be a wonderful story if they can find a way to rally and play competitive hockey. But even under the best of circumstances it never seems to work out for them, and now they’re dealing with the worst of circumstances in the wake of Johnny Gaudreau’s passing.
Given an expected variance of (hopefully) 10 points or so per team, the middle of the division could be mixed up. Truly for teams 4-7 you could put WSH, PIT, NYI and PHI in a hat then pick them at random and be just as likely to get the order as what could play out. That will make for a fun chase down the stretch.
Based on the Atlantic preview, my projected first round matchups are:
New Jersey (Metro 1) vs. Tampa Bay (WC 2)
NY Rangers (Metro 2) vs. Carolina (Metro 3)
Toronto (Atlantic 1) vs. Washington (WC1)
Florida (Atlantic 2) vs. Boston (Atlantic 3)
However, much like last year, the race for the Wild Card spots should be hot and heavy until the end. All of Ottawa, Detroit, Pittsburgh and NY Islanders should be hunting and legit possibilities to sneak in if a few games break in unforeseen ways.
From the start, you can always predict a handful of playoff teams (NYR, CAR, TOR and FLA) would be my safest bets) but I would say there are only two teams pretty much out before it begins (MTL, CBJ). That leaves a lot of movin’ and shakin’ around the middle of the conference to figure out which three teams can clinch playoff spots and which ones are watching at the best time of year. It’s also going to lead to a bunch of disappointment, since probably about 12-13 teams have legit hopes and dreams of qualifying, which by the numbers are going to leave several disappointed to come up empty.