NHL Power Rankings: Looking back at each team's 2023

After one more weekend of hockey, we’ll say good-bye to 2023.

The past 12 months, naturally, brought different things to different teams. From the Vegas Golden Knights being validated by a championship to the Chicago Blackhawks drafting the generational player they hope will one day put them back in Cup contention, some clubs experienced incredible happenings in 2023.

At the other end of the spectrum, the Toronto Maple Leafs felt the same ol’ playoff disappointment — just delayed by one round — and the Edmonton Oilers fired a coach in Jay Woodcroft who had a .643 points percentage with the club.

Between those poles, every team had something significant occur in the year that was. With that in mind, we’re using the final power rankings of 2023 to highlight a moment, event or general vibe that defined the past 12 months for all 32 NHL squads.

1. New York Rangers (24-8-1) It feels like things became urgent for the Rangers in 2023. Despite a .662 points percentage in two seasons as Blueshirts coach, Gerard Gallant was dismissed after a first-round loss to the New Jersey Devils. Under new bench boss Peter Laviolette, New York has the best power play and fifth-best penalty-kill in the league. The first order of business in 2024, though, is doing something about their minus-2 goal differential at five-on-five.

2. Vancouver Canucks (23-10-3) Has any team’s outlook changed more from the start of 2023 to the end? The Canucks seemed to be in — or something close to — organizational crisis 12 months ago. Rick Tocchet was hired as coach in late January and Vancouver has a .646 points percentage since then. Vancouver has a No. 1 centre in Elias Pettersson, a Norris- and MVP-worthy blue-liner in Quinn Hughes and a leading Vezina candidate in Thatcher Demko, who — having just turned 28 a couple weeks ago — is the oldest member of the group. What a story.

3. Winnipeg Jets (20-9-4) If Vancouver’s fortunes turned most from the start of 2023 to the finish, you could probably make a case the Jets’ swung the most from the end of last season to the present moment. Winnipeg was blasted by its own coach following a flimsy five-game exit in the first round after backing into the playoffs. At that point, it was a lock Pierre-Luc Dubois was leaving and felt very in play that the likes of Mark Scheifele and Connor Hellebuyck might be right behind him. Flash forward to the day before the 2023-24 campaign, when Winnipeg announced twin contract extensions for Scheifele and Hellebuyck. That turned out to be a harbinger of great things to come, as Manitoba’s boys have outstripped external expectations by posting the fifth-best points percentage (.667) in the league so far.

4. Boston Bruins (20-7-6) You could certainly make the case Boston’s 2023 headline is one of colossal disappointment after the club established a new points record in the regular season, then choked away a 3-1 series lead in Round 1 to the Panthers. Honestly, though, this is hockey and monster upsets always happen in the first round. The defining aspect of the Bruins’ year has to be how the team kept on winning games at an impressive rate following the retirements of Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci in the summer.

5. Los Angeles Kings (20-8-4) The all-in vibe around L.A. went to a whole new level in 2023 with the Pierre-Luc Dubois trade. The Kings have pushed in their stack and nothing short of a deep run will cut it anymore.

6. Vegas Golden Knights (22-10-5) They finally got it done in 2023, which is an odd thing to say about a team that’s only been playing in the NHL since 2017. Remember, Vegas missed the 2022 Stanley Cup Playoffs and we’d all really latched onto the idea the Knights were no longer a team of misfits, but rather disjointed mercenaries gathered by a cutthroat front office that had lost its ability to build an actual team. Then what defined the Cup win? Cohesion and depth. What a year in Vegas.

7. Dallas Stars (20-9-4) The Stars kept pushing forward. A trip to the final-four validated what this team is building and Matt Duchene may wind up being the best free-agent signing of the summer.

8. Florida Panthers (20-12-2) The past 12 months surely represent the best year in franchise history. Sure, the run to the 1996 final was fun, but that was a completely out-of-the-blue surge made by a goalie-backed bunch of lunchpail guys who were never going to evolve into a year-over-year contender. Yes, the Cats made their 2023 surge from the last Eastern Conference playoff spot, but this team had real guys in place who had achieved great regular season success in the preceding years. Making the Cup final validated the potential for this crew and Florida has shown great resilience in the first few months of this season by remaining firmly in the playoff chase despite starting the year without top D-men Aaron Ekblad and Brandon Montour.

9. Toronto Maple Leafs (17-9-6) Enough time has passed that you almost forget how stunning it was in the moment to learn former GM Kyle Dubas and the Leafs were parting ways. With Brad Treliving coming in, change at the top — and a different vision of how to get over the hump — became the big story of 2023 for a team that experienced the usual playoff pain.

10. Philadelphia Flyers (19-11-4) Meet the accidental contenders. All signs pointed to 2023 as the first year in a long rebuild for Philly, but the Flyers have shown they’re far more competitive than even their management group suspected. This could also be the year we look back at and marvel about Philly getting Russian winger Matvei Mitchkov with the seventh-overall pick.

11. Colorado Avalanche (21-11-3) There’s almost an incomplete feeling to 2023 for Colorado because captain Gabriel Landeskog didn’t suit up for a single game with the squad. Being upset in the first round of the playoffs is never good for a high-end team, but — especially given Landeskog’s absence — it’s hard for the 2022 champs to beat themselves up too much over it.

12. Carolina Hurricanes (19-13-4) Injuries defined the early part of the year, as Carolina lost Max Pacioretty five games and three goals into his Canes career, then lost leading goal-scorer Andrei Svechnikov for the season to a knee injury in March. The past 12 months have just ratcheted up the pressure on a team.

13. Minnesota Wild (16-13-4) Even with an awful start to the year that cost former coach Dean Evason his job — and the subsequent surge under new bench boss John Hynes — 2023 may wind up being defined by the arrival of two rookies in the State of Hockey. Brock Faber is a Minnesota native who looks like he could be a blueline stud for the next 15 years, while Marco Rossi has overcome serious health concerns to become the type of promising freshman centre the Wild have long been in search of. 

14. New York Islanders (16-9-9) It’s tempting to say the Isles are in a perpetual state of status quo, but they did make a bold move by trading for and signing Bo Horvat — who’s a point-per-game player on a 35-goal pace this season — early in 2023. New York also got way ahead of some business and inked team backbone Ilya Sorokin to a $66 million contract extension that keeps him in the Isles crease through 2031-32.

15. Washington Capitals (17-10-5) 2023 really hammered home the notion nothing is forever in Washington. Nick Backstrom has potentially played his last game with the club and Alex Ovechkin is sitting on six goals through 32 contests this year. And yet, somehow, the Capitals — with the fourth-worst goal-differential in the East — remain in a playoff spot.

16. New Jersey Devils (18-13-2) There’s an inclination to let the uneven first half of this season define the Devils, 2023 was all about affirming the fact they have a mega star in their midst in Jack Hughes and winning their first playoff series in 11 years (and just their second since 2007).

17. Pittsburgh Penguins (16-13-4) Even with Kyle Dubas coming in as GM and Erik Karlsson amplifying the star power on this club, this past year highlighted the Groundhog Day vibe in Pittsburgh. And it feels like the same old story —  riding it out with the team legends surrounded by an inadequate supporting cast — could play out for a couple more years yet.

18. Edmonton Oilers (16-15-1) 2023 hammered home the idea you can’t take anything for granted. The Oilers’ awful start cost Jay Woodcroft his coaching job and downgraded them from pre-season Cup talk to scrambling to get into the playoffs.

19. Tampa Bay Lightning (17-14-5) This is the first real beginning-of-the-end feeling we’ve had with this incredible group. From Steven Stamkos openly expressing disappointment over a lack of contract talks to kick off training camp to the Bolts being in or out of a wild card spot on any given day, this past year has signaled some sort of transition in Tampa — even despite Nikita Kucherov’s Art Ross campaign.

20. Arizona Coyotes (18-14-2) There’s legit hope brewing in the desert, as the Coyotes currently occupy a playoff spot. Even if its underlying numbers aren’t great, Arizona has made meaningful gains in 2023 as some semblance of a real core forms.

21. Nashville Predators (19-16-0) It is kind of funny that even when there’s ground-shifting change in Nashville, it still has a highly familiar feel to it. When the Preds replaced David Poile — the only GM in the team’s 25-year history — they tabbed Barry Trotz, who coached the Preds for more than 60 per cent of the games they’ve ever played. Also, stop us if you’ve heard this before: Nashville is a fringe playoff squad that will go as far as goalie Juuse Saros can carry it.

22. St. Louis Blues (18-15-1) There’s certainly been more disarray in St. Louis in 2023 than we’re used to. The first two weeks under new (interim) coach Drew Bannister have looked good, so we’ll see where things go early in 2024.

23. Montreal Canadiens (15-14-5) Unfortunately for Montreal, 2023 was a continuation of previous years in terms of the team’s awful injury luck. Still, the past 12 months have been about meticulous building and small gains for the Habs.

24. Seattle Kraken (13-14-9) Seattle notched not only its first playoff appearance but first post-season series win last spring. Regardless of the early-season struggles this year, 2023 will always be the year the Kraken officially arrived.

25. Detroit Red Wings (16-15-4) The Wings went for it in 2023, adding pretty significant star power to the roster with Alex DeBrincat and Patrick Kane coming on board. The issue is, with only a few days left in the year, it’s still unclear how much this squad has improved.

26. Calgary Flames (14-16-5) 2022 was the year things really started to change with the departures of Johnny Gaudreau and Matthew Tkachuk; 2023 feels like a simmering pot that’s going to boil over in 2024 with the departure of several high-profile veterans from Southern Alberta.

27. Buffalo Sabres (14-18-4) Ugh. A team that was supposed to be playing for a playoff spot this season is closing out 2023 playing for coach Don Granato’s job.

28. Ottawa Senators (13-17-0) Cue the Bob Cole classic, “Everything is happening!” New owner, Shane Pinto suspended half the season for betting-related reasons we’re still not fully clear on, GM fired for a transaction that happened in 2021, D.J. Smith out as coach and confirmation time is a flat circle because Jacques Martin is once again behind the Senators bench. In other words, probably the nuttiest year on record for Ottawa.

29. Columbus Blue Jackets (11-18-7) The Mike Babcock fiasco certainly stands out, but hopefully, over time, Jackets fans will come to view 2023 as the year Adam Fantilli arrived.

30. Anaheim Ducks (13-21-0) For some teams, missing out on the chance to pick first overall when a generational player is available could be the kind of thing fans look back on and lament for years. However — even if the wins are hard to come by right now — the Ducks may have the clearest path to contender status of any current bottom-feeder in the league. A big part of that is drafting Leo Carlsson six months ago and knowing he can pair with Mason McTavish for a 1-2 down the middle that should kill it for years.

31. Chicago Blackhawks (11-22-1) Drafting Connor Bedard is the kind of thing that can define your organization for a generation. Unfortunately, off-ice storylines continued to plague Chicago in 2023: Corey Perry’s speculation-filled departure from the team and a lawsuit by a second player from the 2010 Blackhawks in early November over an alleged coverup of sexual assault.

32. San Jose Sharks (9-24-3) All the pain of 2023 is about the hope 2024 will bring the inaugural first-overall pick in team history. If that happens, it will all be worth it.