Jake Oettinger wants it this way. Or, at least, the starting goaltender for Dallas is embracing it.
The path through the Central Division to the Western Conference Final for his team and the Minnesota Wild is just about as treacherous as it gets. The Stars and Wild had the third- and seventh-most points in the NHL this season and they will meet in the first round — with the winner potentially facing the league-best Colorado Avalanche in the second.
“If you can get through that and win it all, I think it just makes it that much better,” Oettinger said. “It just makes it more fulfilling.”
Maybe not so much for the team going home early. But the Stanley Cup does not come easy, and even the Pacific Division side of the bracket is no cakewalk with Edmonton, the Stanley Cup runner-up the past two years, in the mix along with the Vegas Golden Knights, who won seven of their final eight games since hiring John Tortorella.
“It’s the most exciting time because everybody’s playing at a different level, and it’s a good test to see how high you can get as a team,” Tortorella told reporters in Las Vegas after the regular season finale. “Everything’s going to be amped up. As each game goes by in the series, it’s going to be harder and harder, and so it’s a great challenge ”
The teams to beat
— The Presidents’ Trophy-winning Avalanche are the favorites to win the West, and with good reason. They’ve been the best team since October, have two of the best players in the world in Nathan MacKinnon and Cale Makar, and filled their center void by reacquiring 2022 Cup champion Nazem Kadri at the trade deadline.
Home-ice advantage is a plus, but being the team to beat also comes with pressure. The Avs, who open against Los Angeles, say bring it on.
“Pressure is a privilege — it’s the old cliche, but it truly is,” forward Logan O’Connor said. “You just have to be dialed in the whole time, and I think that’s the challenge for any team. There can’t be any lapses. You can’t have any passengers. Everyone all in, all the time. I think we obviously have the capability to do that.”
— Vegas won the Pacific after replacing Bruce Cassidy with Tortorella, who is coaching in the NHL playoffs for a 13th time with his fourth team.
— Dallas has made three consecutive trips to the West final. They have all the weapons, certainly if they get standout defenseman Miro Heiskanen back healthy.
“It’s never a straight line to win all these things,” said first-year coach Glen Gulutzan, who was an Edmonton assistant when the Oilers made back-to-back trips to the Cup final. “You keep getting yourself back in the dance and win a round and win two rounds, and then finally you break through. Hopefully that experience is going to allow us to do it.”
— Minnesota had Kirill Kaprizov grabbing headlines for years, and next season he will begin the richest contract in hockey history. Now Matt Boldy is sharing the load on a team that lacks only center depth to keep them from being a solid favorite to reach the West final.
The underdogs
— Calling Connor McDavid and the Oilers underdogs is rich — they took Florida to seven games and then six games in the Cup Final the past two years — but they have played a lot of hockey They are going to need key saves in net along with Leon Draisaitl in good form whenever he returns from his regular season-ending injury.
— The Utah Mammoth are the feel-good story in the West, making the playoffs in the franchise’s second season since moving to Utah from Arizona. They could play like they have nothing to lose because just making it is cause for celebration in Salt Lake City.
— Los Angeles fired coach Jim Hiller and righted the ship under interim replacement D.J. Smith. Acquiring Artemi Panarin in a February trade also makes the Kings dangerous.
— Will we get an LA story? Joe Quenneville and his three Cup rings have gotten Anaheim into the playoffs, and with his experience the young Ducks are not only fun to watch but have the goaltending with Lukas Dostal to potentially pull off an upset or two.
Storylines to watch
— The two-year, $25 million contract extension McDavid signed without a raise essentially put the Oilers on notice that they have two more chances to show they can win the Stanley Cup. It’s entirely possible he puts the cape on and carries them back to the final for a third year in a row.
— Colorado’s window as a Cup favorite remains open, with captain Gabriel Landeskog a year removed from his emotional return back after dealing with a chronic knee injury to assist MacKinnon and Makar. Perhaps they go on another title run like four years ago.
— Can Minnesota win a playoff series for the first time since 2015? The Wild have lost their last eight opening-round series, but for the first time they went an entire season without getting shut out and their offense with Quinn Hughes added on the blue line provides some confidence.
“There’s a lot of pushback with our team,” coach John Hynes said. “We have guys that can score. One of the things we talk about is trying to create offense in multiple ways.”
Predictions
First round: Colorado sweeps Los Angeles in four games; Minnesota beats Dallas in six; Vegas beats Utah in five; Edmonton beats Anaheim in five.
Second round: Colorado beats Minnesota in five; Vegas beats Edmonton in six.
Conference final: Colorado beats Vegas in seven.
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AP Sports Writers Pat Graham in Denver and Dave Campbell in St. Paul, Minnesota, contributed.
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AP NHL: https://apnews.com/hub/nhl
