The second round of the 2026 Stanley Cup Playoffs finally concluded Monday night with the Montreal Canadiens defeating the Buffalo Sabres in overtime of Game 7. The result sets the stage for the conference finals, with the Canadiens taking on the Carolina Hurricanes in the Eastern Conference Final. In contrast, the Colorado Avalanche are set to battle the Vegas Golden Knights in the Western Conference Final.
The Western Final starts on May 20, while the Eastern Final begins on May 21. The conference finals could run through June 2, when a potential Game 7 in the Eastern Final would take place.
With the matchups now set, let’s dive into each series and highlight the trends and players most likely to make a significant difference in the outcome.
Eastern Conference Final: Carolina Hurricanes vs. Montreal Canadiens
Let’s start with the East, where the conference-leading Hurricanes take on the fourth-place Canadiens for the right to play in the 2026 Stanley Cup Final. This is their third playoff series since the Hurricanes moved to Carolina, with the two other matchups taking place in 2002 and 2006. Montreal hasn’t appeared in the conference finals since losing the 2021 Stanley Cup Final to the Tampa Bay Lightning, while Carolina is appearing in the Conference Final for the fourth time in the Brind’Amour coaching era (since 2018), and for the third time in four seasons. They haven’t returned to the Stanley Cup Final since 2006, with a 1-16 record in the Eastern Conference Final since that time.
The rust factor will be a major storyline heading into Game 1, with the Hurricanes’ last playing on May 9, nearly two weeks ago. Montreal has also gone to seven games in both of the team’s first two series, while Carolina has yet to lose a game, playing in only eight games to Montreal’s 14.
The Hurricanes have been the league’s best defensive team over the first two rounds of the playoffs, allowing a minuscule 1.25 goals per game against the Ottawa Senators and the Philadelphia Flyers. The Canadiens will pose a greater threat than either of Carolina’s first two opponents, with Cole Caufield (second in the league with 51 goals), Nick Suzuki (sixth in league scoring with 101 points), and Juraj Slafkovsky (30 goals) forming a strong trio up front. That’s without mentioning offensive defenseman Lane Hutson (fourth among all blueliners in points) and wild-card rookie Ivan Demidov.
While Carolina has stars such as Sebastian Aho, they do most of their scoring by committee. Seth Jarvis (32) topped a league-leading group of seven players with at least 20 goals this season, making it difficult for opponents to devise an effective defensive game plan.
Funnily enough, two unlikely names in Alex Newhook (Montreal) and Logan Stankoven (Carolina) are leading each team in goals, tied for third in playoff scoring with seven goals apiece. As is the case with any successful playoff run, unsung heroes must step up and contribute when the stars are being haggled and harried at every turn.
In net, Canadiens goaltender Jakub Dobes is doing his best impression of former Habs netminder Jaroslav Halak, whose performances during the 2010 Playoffs remain the stuff of legend. Halak posted a .923 save percentage (SV%) over 18 games in the 2010 Playoffs as the heavy underdogs in Montreal came within three wins of the Stanley Cup Final. Dobes ranks second, behind only Carolina goalie Frederik Andersen, in total playoff goals saved above expected (GSAx). That duel will define the series if Montreal is to pull off an upset.
Carolina has controlled 54% of the expected goals at five-on-five (fourth in these playoffs) while Montreal sits 13th at 45.5%. It’s a trend that played out over the bigger sample of the regular season, and the Canadiens will have to find a way to wrestle the territorial advantage away from the league’s second-best team in the overall standings.
X-Factor: Canadiens goaltender Jakub Dobes
Prediction: Hurricanes win series in five games
Western Conference Final: Colorado Avalanche vs. Vegas Golden Knights
This is the second playoff series between these two teams, with the Vegas Golden Knights beating the Avalanche in six games in 2021. The Western Conference juggernauts had tied for the league lead in points percentage that season. This is the Avalanche’s eighth appearance in the Western Conference Final and first since they won the Cup in 2022, while the Golden Knights have now reached the NHL’s unofficial final four for the fifth time in nine seasons of existence.
Off the top, both Cale Makar and Mark Stone have either been confirmed or rumored to have suffered significant injuries during these playoffs. Makar is likely to play in Game 1, while Stone’s availability remains uncertain.
Colorado (first in xGF%) and Vegas (third) have been two of the most dominant five-on-five teams in these playoffs, though Colorado has lost only one of its first nine postseason games. Vegas was pushed to six games by both the Utah Mammoth and the Anaheim Ducks, two notably weaker teams than the West’s third-best team, the Minnesota Wild, which Colorado vanquished in five games.
It will be interesting to see how Golden Knights head coach John Tortorella decides to defend Colorado’s top line of Nathan MacKinnon, Martin Necas, and one of Gabriel Landeskog or Artturi Lehkonen. Just that line itself would be a handful, but they will have to contend with the ridiculous depth of the Avalanche, with Nazem Kadri, Brock Nelson, Nic Roy, and Jack Drury filling out the spine of the forward group.
Mitch Marner (18 points in 12 games) and Jack Eichel (15 in 12), who are first and second in playoff scoring, respectively, often combine with Stone to create a dominant two-way line, but Stone’s absence has forced some reshuffling, with Ivan Barbashev moving up. Vegas can also count on contributions from Pavel Dorofeyev (who has a playoff-leading nine goals) and Brett Howden (second with eight goals) behind their main stars.
Yet neither Utah nor Anaheim represents the same level of opponent as the Avalanche. Vegas’ adversaries ranked 15th and 18th in the overall league standings, while Colorado ranked first in points, goals for, goals against, and goal difference in the regular season.
One edge that the Golden Knights could have is in net, where Carter Hart has shrugged off an inconsistent regular season to post the second-highest SV% of netminders still alive in the playoffs (.917 in 12 games). While Colorado’s tandem of Mackenzie Blackwood and Scott Wedgewood won the Jennings Trophy for the lowest goals-against average in the regular season, they struggled against the Wild with a combined .866 SV% in five games.
The Golden Knights don’t have a Kirill Kaprizov (sixth among all skaters in points-per-game since 2023) or a Quinn Hughes (second among all defensemen). Still, they’re a more physically engaging squad who will challenge Colorado’s speed-based game.
X-Factor: Health of Cale Makar and Mark Stone
Prediction: Avalanche win series in six games
Legacies On the Line During 2026 Conference Finals
Of the teams still in the playoffs, the Montreal Canadiens are facing the least amount of pressure. Their best players are all aged 27 or younger, with the majority being younger than 25. Despite graduating a ton of prospects, The Athletic’s Scott Wheeler still ranked the Habs prospect pool as the ninth-best in the league, promising even more youthful reinforcements down the line. Going this deep in the playoffs this early in the core’s development is an irreplaceable experience and will only benefit the franchise down the line.
The Hurricanes are undoubtedly under the most pressure of the other three teams. They rank third in regular-season points percentage over the last 10 seasons and have also appeared in the sixth-most playoff games over that span. What the Avalanche and Golden Knights have that they don’t is a Stanley Cup Final appearance and a championship in the last 20 years, leaving the Hurricanes with the choker label, as evidenced by their terrible record in the Eastern Conference Final since 2006. They’ve long been a model franchise in a small market, but until they win the big one again, they won’t be considered as anything more than a perennial Cinderella.
Both the Avalanche (2022) and the Golden Knights (2023) have won a championship in this decade and are constantly paraded about as model franchises, given that they rank first and sixth in points percentage since the start of the 2020s. Both teams have mortgaged their futures, with the teams combining for two picks across the first two rounds of the 2026 through 2028 drafts, and with both ranking in the bottom 10 of Wheeler’s league-wide prospect rankings.
In the end, only one Stanley Cup is awarded per season, and 31 teams will go home disappointed and unsatisfied. Who will be the odd one out this season?
Data courtesy of Hockey Stats, Natural Stat Trick, and the NHL.
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