Short Conference Finals Adding to NHL’s Playoff Format Frustrations

The NHL’s biggest stage is returning to the spotlight. The 110th Stanley Cup Final should be a great one, with two teams among the preseason favorites to reach it. The Carolina Hurricanes finally broke through the glass ceiling; their fourth trip to the Eastern Conference Final under Rod Brind’Amour was finally the charm. The Vegas Golden Knights possess one of the league’s most talented rosters and have been nearly unbeatable since a late-season change to John Tortorella. It’s all shaping up for a thrilling start on Tuesday.

But that’s not how it should be. No, it isn’t the teams that are the issue, but once again, it’s how we got here. The conference finals could have lasted another week, ending as late as June 2. For the sixth time in the last 10 series (since 2022), and the fourth time in the last two years, a conference final series ended in five games or fewer. This year’s Western Conference Final was the third sweep during that time. The last Game 7 on this stage in a full season came back in 2018.

In classic I Think You Should Leave fashion, all eyes are on the NHL’s playoff format once again. Commissioner Gary Bettman has defended it countless times over the years. Still, another short run to the Stanley Cup Final raises familiar questions worth investigating and comparing with the strengths Bettman and its proponents believe in.

What the Paths Tell Us

One interesting thing about this year’s Stanley Cup Final is the gap in regular-season performance between the finalists. The Hurricanes had the league’s second-best record, while the Golden Knights were down at 13th, tied at 95 points with an Eastern Conference team that failed to make the playoffs (the Washington Capitals).

Excluding the 2020 and 2021 playoffs, when COVID-19 forced format changes, this year’s 18-point gap is the second biggest since the first playoff conducted under the current format in 2014. Ironically, the Golden Knights were the favorites in the only bigger mismatch, when they beat the East’s eighth-seeded Florida Panthers in 2023. The only other comparable margin came in 2017, when the Pittsburgh Penguins beat another eight seed, the Nashville Predators, after finishing 17 points ahead of them.

Other than that, there’s never been a delta more than 10 points between finalists, with an average gap of 7.9 points. You would think two teams with vastly different regular seasons would have very different roads getting here, but in reality, they were pretty similar.

Carolina beat the Ottawa Senators, Philadelphia Flyers, and Montréal Canadiens to reach their first Stanley Cup Final since 2006. Those teams ranked sixth, eighth, and fourth, respectively, in the Eastern Conference regular-season standings. Right away, there are red flags. As the number one seed, the Hurricanes should have faced the eight seed, and they did… but not until the second round. That team, the Flyers, beat the seventh-seeded Pittsburgh Penguins before being bounced.

Meanwhile, the Canadiens had to play the East’s three seed, the Tampa Bay Lightning, followed by the second-seeded Buffalo Sabres. Playing two great teams required an exhausting seven-game series to advance, with the second going all the way to Game 7 overtime. Of course, they deserved a harder path than the Hurricanes, but two series that Carolina was able to almost autopilot through is a significant, if not lopsided, advantage.

But the real issues come out west. Like Montréal, Vegas was the four seed in its conference, only to play a path much more comparable to Carolina through two rounds, beating the sixth-seeded Utah Mammoth and seventh-seeded Anaheim Ducks to begin their playoff journey (yes, like Carolina, they also played a lower seed in the second round than the first). That drew a tough task in the conference finals against the President’s Trophy-winning Colorado Avalanche.

Vegas played extremely well in the series and earned the victory. Colorado was also significantly banged up, with Cale Makar missing the first two games and Nathan MacKinnon hampered in Game 3. The Avalanche, meanwhile, received the easiest first-round matchup of all, a Los Angeles Kings team with just 90 points, the fewest by a playoff team in a full season since (more irony) the 2019 Avalanche.

But their reward for sweeping them was a fierce battle with the 104-point Minnesota Wild, who finished 12 points ahead of Vegas’ second-round foe. In fairness, the argument that the Avalanche had a harder time dispatching the Wild than the Golden Knights did with the Ducks is a bit subjective. Colorado advanced in one fewer game with a plus-six goal differential compared to plus-eight for Vegas. Makar’s injury in Game 5 does add more fuel to that narrative, but that could’ve happened against any opponent.

However, when put into the broader context, it sure seems like the toll of playing the Wild carried over more into round three than beating the Ducks. The Avs scored just seven goals in the series, two fewer than they managed against Minnesota in Game 1 alone.

Debunking the Counters

Bettman has routinely cited two main reasons he prefers the current system. The first is that he believes the division-based format increases the number of rivalry matchups in the playoffs, producing extra excitement and animosity that can build over multiple years.

Reality doesn’t always play out that way, though. Yes, this year’s format did reintroduce the Battle of Pennsylvania and add to a budding Central Division rivalry between the Dallas Stars and Minnesota Wild, who met in round one for the second time in three years. But under the old conference-based format, we would’ve gotten another installment of arguably the sport’s most classic matchup, the Canadiens against the Boston Bruins.

It’s not like all of the other rivalry matches we’ve gotten in recent years would disappear. In 2024, there still would’ve been Florida Panthers vs. Lightning and Bruins vs. Toronto Maple Leafs showdowns, just with more appropriate seedings for the rounds ahead.

It would also help avoid matchup fatigue, which everyone had with the Oilers and Kings facing off for four straight years; three more Kings points this year, and there would’ve been a fifth. The first series between the teams was a seven-game thriller, but the drama lessened each time (other than the type that comes from coaches’ challenges).

The other point in favor of the status quo is the increasing excitement for the opening round (if not two). One way (but admittedly not the only way) to measure that is a seven-game series. This year, only one opening round in the NHL made it to seven games (Canadiens-Lightning). Meanwhile, in the National Basketball Association (NBA), a league chastised for its lack of parity in recent years but one sticking with a 1-8 playoff format, there were three Game 7s in the first round, including two 3-1 series comebacks.

Only in 2022 has the NHL had more than three first-round series go the distance. Since 2014, when the NHL’s format took place, both leagues have had exactly one year without a Game 7 in the opening round (excluding the shortened 2020 and 2021 seasons).

Saturday night marked the NBA’s first conference final Game 7 since 2023, when the Miami Heat fended off the Boston Celtics’ bid for the league’s first reverse sweep. Despite airing on a cable network (TNT), the game averaged a seismic viewership of nearly 12 million. This year’s matchup brought similar intrigue, with the defending-champion Oklahoma City Thunder facing the San Antonio Spurs and generational superstar Victor Wembanyama.

First-round series are great, but casual fans are naturally more likely to tune in later in the playoffs when the stakes are higher. Those are the games that matter most, not just in terms of winning for teams but viewership for TV networks, ticket sales for teams, ad reach for sponsors, and countless other stakeholders. They are the ones that should be prioritized.

What It Means for the Final

So, how do these journeys affect each team entering the biggest four to seven games of the season? Carolina played three fewer games than Vegas en route to this point, the largest gap since 2022. That rest advantage benefited the Avalanche, allowing them to deny the Lightning a three-peat and end a 21-year championship wait.

The last time there was a larger gap in a full season was 2018, when the Golden Knights played four fewer games through three rounds than the Washington Capitals. Though the Capitals won the series, both the 2022 Avalanche and 2018 Golden Knights won Game 1. The Avs also took Game 2, and Vegas would’ve been a goal away from doing so if not for one of the greatest saves of all-time.

So, it will be imperative for the Hurricanes to start strong, especially since they have home ice to begin (as did those Colorado and Vegas teams). But there’s more good news for Carolina. In full seasons under this format, teams with an easier path through three rounds (defined by average opponent point total) are 6-3-1 in the Final and 5-0-1 in 2018 (the Oilers and Panthers had the same average opponent point total in 2024).

It was a small margin, 102 points to 101, driven solely by the conference finals. In fact, Vegas had the easier path through two rounds for any team under the current format during a full season after facing two 92-point teams. The difference between 106-point Montréal and 12-point Colorado is the largest disparity in conference finalists under the format by a healthy margin; the previous high was 10 points in 2016.

The Penguins had the easier round three that year, perhaps helping them become one of three Cup-winning teams to play a harder path through three rounds (the 2017 Penguins also charted a very similar journey on both fronts) in today’s structure. That means there’s some uncharted territory we’ll be venturing into over the next two weeks.

What has been well charted, however, is the current playoff format. It does what it says, sometimes, but those things happened before this system, and they happen in the only other major North American pro sports league with four best-of-seven rounds under a simpler, more logical setup.

The Stanley Cup Playoffs are a treat to enjoy. So, everyone deserves to enjoy them in the best possible fashion. It sure feels like there’s a way to enjoy them better than what we’ve had for the last decade-plus.