![My new company offered me a car & Fuel card in my contract. Made me redundant after 5 months and never supplied me with a car. When are my rights? [closed]](https://cdn.sstatic.net/Sites/workplace/Img/apple-touch-icon@2.png?v=d39b333f5c58)
Forecasting the NHL’s Atlantic Division in weird playoff race
With six or seven teams still very much alive in the playoff race from the Atlantic Division, it’s looking like it will be tight all the way to the end. Justin Bourne looks at the full picture in the East and shares his thoughts and projections for the Atlantic.
When you’re trying to make sense of who’s who in the NHL standings, “games in hand” are a funny thing. At this time of year I’ve always thought it most logical to sort the standings by points percentage, given the usual disparity in games played. But in discussing that on Real Kyper and Bourne, my co-host made a salient point: in a year with a condensed schedule thanks to the 4 Nations Face-Off, I’m not sure you want to be the team that’s counting on “games in hand” to make up points, even if it’s just a small number of them.
Being light on games played implies that somewhere in the coming weeks a team’s schedule is going to get bogged down, maybe with back-to-backs, and those points become tougher to win. And further to that, with a congested schedule, injuries become more likely. Getting through the NHL’s schedule is part of the battle.
However you feel about games in hand, it’s impossible to avoid the reality that the Atlantic Division is tight. That’s made clear just by how different the order looks when you toggle between raw points and points percentage.
I’ve done us all the courtesy of cutting off the Sabres (they’re done), and have included the Habs juuuust in case, but their miracle needs to start right about now, or they may not be in these graphics next week.
For the playoff race, let’s bring the Metro into the conversation:
Let’s pick through some thoughts and work our way towards conclusions:
1. Columbus is in trouble. They just lost Kirill Marchenko to a broken jaw after he took a puck to the face, and if we’re calling a spade a spade their season to date has felt like an accomplishment already. They finished at the bottom of the East by 10 points last year, suffered the tragic loss of Johnny Gaudreau, and find themselves already only seven points behind their 2023-24 point total. It’s hard to see them powering through all these teams above them and into the playoffs. I’ve got them missing out, unfortunately.
2. The Rangers are a very real threat. Last season they won the Eastern Conference with 114 points, and they aren’t so different from that team. The addition of J.T. Miller emphasizes that they’re going for it. They have talent and goaltending. It’s not hard to imagine them flipping the switch and getting hot.
3. The Islanders remind me of the old “Why won’t you die?” scene from Austin Powers, or if you wanna go back way further, the Monty Python “Black Knight” sketch which ends with the limbless knight saying “Come back here and take what’s coming to you! I’ll bite your legs off!”
At some point, being a fairly average team with a constant deluge of injuries has to force them into being sellers, but Ilya Sorokin has been the best goaltender in the league since the start of 2025. He’s better the more work he faces, and of late he’s faced a pile. Sorokin’s last seven starts: 7-0-0, 1.16 GAA, .960 SV%.
Still, it’s hard to imagine the Islanders continuing to win at a rate that outpaces all these other teams. But you never know what a hot goalie can do.
And so…
4. The Atlantic could see five teams make the playoffs if the Rangers don’t get hot over their final 29 games. There are six teams who right now think they’ll get in, and in alphabetical order they are: Boston, Detroit, Florida, Ottawa, Tampa Bay, Toronto.
5. The Panthers and Leafs are a pretty solid nose above the pack and would have to fall off significantly to tumble clean out of the playoffs, so let’s call them “in.” The Athletic has both their odds at over 97 per cent, with multiple other websites listing the Leafs as the team with one of the few easiest remaining schedules in the NHL.
6. It’s really hard to see Tampa Bay missing. They have too many elite, veteran (but not old) talents and a great coach, with a good goalie. The Athletic has their odds at 87 per cent, third-highest in the division.
7. And so, the dog fight is this: You have Ottawa, Detroit, and Boston fighting for two spots — and maybe just one if the Rangers get hot.
8. The longest odds in this group via The Athletic are that of the hottest team in the NHL, the Detroit Red Wings, who are listed at an astonishingly low 24 per cent. The Bruins are a breath higher at 26 per cent, while the Senators — right there with those teams in points — are listed with a whopping 78 per cent chance to make the post-season.
9. The thing about these odds is that they’re not assessing these teams as neutral in a points race, they’re assessing the talent levels of the roster and what games each team has remaining. That means Ottawa’s big advantage there isn’t built on having one more point than Detroit, it’s built on their good players (who have to live up to expectations), and eating up a softer schedule.
In the two sites referenced earlier covering “remaining strength of schedule,” both have Detroit with the hardest remaining schedule in the league. Both also have Ottawa at 29th, or the fourth-easiest if you want to flip that perspective.
10. And so what we’re left with here are the Bruins. Their remaining schedule is middling-to-hard (average rank of 13.5), and they’re kind of a strange animal this year. After a garbage start (he’d say the same) Jeremy Swayman had a .904 SV% in January (better than league average) and he’s been above .950 in three of his past four starts, so he could be rounding into form. And they do have top-end talents, as we know.
But they’re also in trade rumours as sellers, from Trent Frederic to Charlie Coyle to Brandon Carlo. They’re frustrated and don’t feel like legitimate Cup contenders. They’re ninth in the conference Thursday morning and have played the most games. There’s reason to believe they’re in real peril here.
11. I check a scatter plot graph on Sportlogiq that uses the simple XY axis and drops teams in based on expected goals created for and against. By now, the good teams are clustered in the top right (high expected goals for, and low against), and the bad at the bottom left. Some quick notes from that:
• The Habs are the only team we’ve discussed that’s bottom left (bad).
• Florida and Tampa are the only teams top right (good), while the Leafs are just a breath outside that quadrant because they give up too much against (relying too much on their goaltending).
• Ottawa is the next-best looking team, as they defend well. They just need to create a bit more offensively to get in the right section.
• Detroit and Boston score even less than Ottawa, and defend worse than the Sens too. Again, this is Ottawa’s spot to lose.
12. In conclusion: as of Thursday, Feb. 6, I’ve got it as the Leafs, Panthers, Lightning and Sens in the playoffs. One of Detroit or Boston will need to get (or in the Wings’ case, “stay”) hot to beat out the Rangers for the final wild card spot.
The other thing to watch is that the trade deadline is on the horizon: how do these teams see themselves, and how dramatically do they plan to change their rosters?
