The 2025 NHL trade deadline has come and gone, so now the race for the playoffs is fully on.
No more outside additions. No more Plan Bs. What you have is what you’ve got and these next few weeks will determine who’s in, who’s out, and who’s got the toughest road through the post-season.
We’ll begin taking a more regular look at the playoff races and begin today with some questions that linger from the fall-out of last week’s deadline day.
Can Seth Jones be more effective in Florida than he was in Chicago?
The initial question that followed Seth Jones’ arrival in Florida was if it would change the Panthers’ approach to Aaron Ekblad who, like Jones, is a right shot. Jones makes $7 million against Florida’s cap through 2029-30, whereas Ekblad’s $7.5 million expires after this season and could lead to him becoming a UFA.
Through three games with the Panthers Jones doesn’t have any points yet, but he also hasn’t been on the ice for a goal against and Florida has out-chanced its opponents 60-46 when he’s been out there at 5-on-5.
Jones has averaged 21:03 of ice time per game with Florida, down from 24:30 with Chicago. In one of his three Panthers games he finished with less than 19 minutes of ice time, which happened only two other times over the past three years. The thought was that perhaps with a little less ice time and focus on his salary Jones may find himself again.
Now that Ekblad has been suspended 20 games for a PED program violation (and will miss two playoff games because of it) Jones is jumping up to the top pair to replace a player who was averaging 23:31 per game. How will he respond to that and will he still thrive on a better all-around Panthers team?
Will Tampa be the team to beat by the time playoffs roll around?
The 2-3 playoff matchup in the Atlantic Division will be a heck of a series with Florida, Toronto and Tampa Bay battling to avoid it by winning the No. 1 seed. Right now the Lightning have the most work to do to climb out of it. Sitting five points out of first means they’re most likely to be one of these two teams.
The Lightning went more all-in on offence at the deadline, acquiring both Yanni Gourde and Oliver Bjorkstrand from Seattle. Gourde is a feisty player for the bottom-six and can kill penalties, but the Lightning are using him on their second power play unit only for now and he has a 20-goal upside. Bjorkstrand is an offensive producer with a career-high 28 goals that could be achieved again in a better lineup. He’s already scored once in two games with the Lightning.
Tampa has the league’s second-best offence, sixth-best power play, and generate the eighth-most high danger chances at 5-on-5 per 60 minutes. Andrei Vasilevskiy is still one of the NHL’s best goalies and he’s having a monster of a bounce-back season. Tampa has the NHL’s fifth-best points percentage over the past two months.
The Capitals have been the East’s best all season. The Panthers are the defending champs. But by the time April comes, we could be thinking about Tampa Bay as the awakening beast of the conference.
How do Carolina and New Jersey respond to disappointing trade deadlines?
Everything was setting up nicely for the Devils to have the kind of deadline that puts a team over the top. They were primarily looking for a centre, or a scorer, and had plenty of assets to work with. With so many of the types of players they were looking for available, it was setting up nicely.
But Jack Hughes’ season-ending injury and Dougie Hamilton’s week-to-week lay up altered New Jersey’s outlook altogether. A Stanley Cup contender depleted, their March 6 trade for Brian Dumoulin was the most notable move they made. Cody Glass, who has four goals this season, was the centre they brought in and Daniel Sprong (two goals in 19 games) was the scorer.
Meanwhile Carolina went from adding the biggest score in Mikko Rantanen, to replacing that player with rookie Logan Stankoven — a fine young scorer with potential, but not one likely to make you a better team when it costs a 100-point player.
These teams may end up playing against each other in the first round, though we should note the Columbus Blue Jackets are closing in on the Devils. Both these teams had high hopes earlier this season, but now we wait to see how they react to disappointment in March.
Will the Rangers be a scary first-round opponent?
It’s been a very turbulent season for the Rangers, but at least now all the trade rumours are in the past. This is the team they’ll at least finish the season with — after which, we’ll brace for a more interesting summer.
New York is 15-8-5 in 2025 and are showing some signs of bouncing back. J.T. Miller has been a great fit since coming in. Mika Zibanejad has been putting up more points. They aren’t perfect — the Rangers still struggle to defend high quality chances and haven’t defeated a team inside the playoff cutline since returning from the 4 Nations break — but they do have Igor Shesterkin, who alone could be the great equalizer.
This team, though it has experienced some change, won the Presidents’ Trophy and went to the Conference Final last year. Now they could be a wild card team that may give a division winner a more difficult out than they’d like.
Did Detroit do enough?
The Red Wings only missed out on last year’s playoffs by the tiebreaker and seemed ready to take another step this season. That hasn’t been so smooth.
At last year’s deadline, GM Steve Yzerman was quiet, still unsure if his team was ready for the big in-season investment. They got to this season’s deadline outside of the playoff cutline again, but right in the middle of a heated race again. The team had also lost four games in a row heading into the deadline, though, which either screamed a need for an upgrade, or would give caution once again to the front office.
In the end, the Red Wings basically swapped out goalie Ville Husso for another goalie Petr Mrazek and Craig Smith, who has nine goals and 16 points this season. Mrazek joins Alex Lyon and Cam Talbot in Detroit’s crease, which maintains its three-deep depth chart. Is that going to end up being enough to hang in the race, or will they fall short again?
Detroit has lost another two games in regulation since the deadline passed.
Will missing out on acquiring a centre bite the Winnipeg Jets?
Winnipeg’s divisional rivals went big and bold. Dallas won the prize of the day in Mikko Rantanen, after previously acquiring Mikael Granlund from San Jose. Colorado completed its roster renovation with Brock Nelson and Charlie Coyle to give it a three-deep centre group that is its best since winning the Stanley Cup three years ago.
Winnipeg also needed a centre at this deadline, seeking an upgrade to Vladislav Namestnikov, and someone who could form a deep trio with Mark Scheifele and Adam Lowry. they came out of the deadline with winger Brandon Tanev and defenceman Luke Schenn, who will both make the Jets an even tougher team to play against, but did not address the team’s primary positional need.
The Jets have been the team to beat in the West all season. But will they be able to knock off these teams that have had more substantial upgrades?
Will Mikko Rantanen gel better, quicker in Dallas?
It really never worked with Rantanen and the Hurricanes. Whether it was the initial shock of being traded out of Colorado that never wore off, the fact he had little time to get used to the local scene or his teammates, or the knowledge he was never going to be a long-term part of this team, Rantanen — a 100-plus point scorer the past two years — scored just two goals and six points in 13 games with Carolina.
So, off to Dallas he went, to join a scary group of Stars forwards that is dangerous from top to bottom. Rantanen is playing with Wyatt Johnston and Jason Robertson on the top line and already has two goals and three points in two games.
Dallas has been close, eliminated in back-to-back Conference Finals, and now have added the biggest name available on this year’s market. There’s also stability built in this time, as Rantanen signed an eight-year extension with the Stars that made him the highest-paid winger in the league.
When will Kirill Kaprizov return, and can he help Minnesota stop the slide?
There was a time much earlier this season when the Wild were sort of hanging around with the Winnipeg Jets in that they kept their regulation losses down. But one big thing changed their entire outlook: Kirill Kaprizov’s injury.
Kaprizov is the Minnesota Wild, and while optimism abounds that the team can take its giant amounts of cap space this summer and become a real contender, there is no way this plan comes to fruition unless Kaprizov re-signs. He has one more year on his contract, after which he could become a UFA. Kaprizov is eligible to sign an extension as of July 1.
In the month Kaprizov missed in late December and January, Minnesota went 7-5-0. He returned for three games, but now hasn’t played since Jan. 25 and in that time the Wild are 8-7-0 and have slipped from second in the Central down to the first wild card spot.
Is Los Angeles any better equipped to take down Edmonton?
The Kings have been eliminated in the first round by the Oilers three years in a row and the two could meet there once again in 2025. While the Oilers aren’t playing their best hockey right now — and several players are having down seasons — are the Kings any better equipped to take them on in a playoff series?
Los Angeles struggles to score, 18th in goals per game and 28th in power play percentage. Their defensive numbers are strong, however, as they lead the NHL in expected goals against per 60 minutes of 5-on-5 play and have the second-lowest shots against per game.
The Kings’ primary need at the deadline then, was to add another scorer or someone who could help their power play. Their one addition was Andrei Kuzmenko, who has just six goals on the season between Calgary and Philadelphia.
Can St. Louis steal a wild card spot?
Just a few weeks ago the Blues were seen as a deadline day seller and potential kingmaker in the playoff race. Names such as Jordan Binnington, Jordan Kyrou and Pavel Buchnevich came up on Nick Kypreos’ trade board. They lost six of their last eight games before the 4 Nations break and were chasing the playoff race from distance.
Things have quickly changed, however. The Blues are 6-1-2 since returning from the international break and have beaten playoff teams Dallas, Los Angeles, Washington and Colorado in that time. Rather than sell off, St. Louis instead stood pat at the deadline and now have a somewhat easier schedule coming up in a run of games that includes Pittsburgh, Nashville and Chicago.
The Blues have some built-in disadvantages still. One is that as they trail the last wild card spot by one point, they have played two more games than the teams in front of them. Another is that, despite playing more games, they still trail Vancouver and Calgary in the first tiebreaker (regulation wins).
But where the race for the West’s second wild card seemed to be between the Canucks and Flames once upon a time, the Blues are now a team to watch closely, catching fire at the right time and recalling memories of their run in 2019.
