The next five years for hockey will be a very active period for the sport. Expansion being imminent (sources say Vegas is done, the League won’t allow for a one-team expansion very long, Seattle will follow when the NBA gets its act together), every team will need to assess their roster for what they value and what they don’t. Teams will lose good players, and LV and Seattle will add new rivalries and new complexities into the game.

But there are teams that will be excellent, regardless of foreseen obstacles like expansion or unforeseen obstacles like the election of Donald Drumpf and consequent economic collapse of the United States.

Presented here are these teams. The teams that come hell or high water should be the leaders of the NHL in the foreseeable future. That have the brightest futures and the most likely paths to the Cup. And yes, most of them are from the East.

1. Philadelphia Flyers

The Flyers are undoubtedly a team on the rise.

With their bevy of defensive prospects, their top 2 forwards – Jake Voracek and Claude Giroux – still under 30, and their generally youthful roster, the Flyers are set going into the future.

While they will have to contend with a tight cap, ridding themselves of contracts like that of MacDonald, Umberger, Streit, and Schultz will ultimately save them money.

This is a team with power, speed, and capability. It is one that has been rebuilding while also being one able to make the playoffs. They have excellent goaltending in the form of two goaltenders that could be the only tandem that would work with 41 games a piece.

Again, their defense is changing, and once it has transformed it will be one of the youngest and best in the League.

This team will win at least one Cup within the next five years, mark my words.

 

2. Winnipeg Jets

The Jets look like a powerhouse – in a division of powerhouses. They’re the young guns, looking to win, and will be great very soon. With the second round pick in this year’s draft, they will be taking Patrick Laine. This inserts Laine into a roster already including Nikolaj Ehlers, Blake Wheeler, Mark Scheifele, Mathieu Perreault, and numerous others.

The team has a stacked four lines. So stacked in fact, that Marko Dano, brought in from the Andrew Ladd trade, is unlikely to remain in Winnepeg long, if only for the fact that the only spot for him is a fourth line spot.

This is a team likely to follow in Pittsburgh’s footsteps, with speed and skill on every line instead of the usual grinders and bashers. And that’s the winning model going forward.

The team has center depth down the middle. They have defense, with Dustin Byfuglien, Jacob Trouba, and Ben Chiarot.

Where this team is suspect is goaltending. And they’ve never done anything about it. And that will ultimately be their downfall, until they turn that aspect around. And then this team will be nearly perfect.

3. Chicago Blackhawks

“Oh, homer pick!” you all exclaim.

Well, what do you expect, in the end this is a Blackhawks blog. One that tries to be optimistic at that.

And that’s only one of the reasons I’m going with the Blackhawks.

They have their core intact. They have their key defensemen locked up for a while, and they have Kane and Toews and Anisimov locked up long term. They need extensions for Shaw, Teuvo, and Panarin, the young core, but after that they are a team with capable players on every line.

They need a fourth defenseman. The hope is that Michael Kempny will provide that, and with Erik Gustafsson, Trevor Van Reimsdyk, Gustav Forsling, and Ville Pokka, the Hawks have a young defense ready to take over once Keith, Seabrook, and Hjammer all exit their primes.

The Blackhawks will remain excellent, and it’s not just the current core that gives me faith.

It’s having one of the best GMs in Stan Bowman. It’s having the best coach in Joel Quenneville. It’s having both these guys locked up long term. It’s having one of the best owners in sports, who survived a re-building period under his father, saw how it was done, and now has a winner. It’s knowing that if the Hawks ever have to rebuild, Rocky saw how. Bowman knows how. The team will do it quickly and do it well.

The Hawks are going to be good for a long time, cause when your GM is one of the best members of your franchise, you have a long time to win – GMs don’t exit their primes til their 90’s, as the elder Bowman is proving.

Again, another team guaranteed to win another one.

4. Florida

The Panthers won the Atlantic division this year. Not bad for a team where the first line is made up of two early twenty year olds and the ageless Jaromir Jagr.

This team only gets younger. They have depth down the middle. They have cap space, and having made the playoffs they should be bringing in more fans. They have talented wings and a very young core.

This team also has one of the better GMs overseeing all of hockey ops. They have Gerard Gallant at coach, and he’s proven he can do remarkable things with a young roster.

The team’s downfall is their aging veterans. Jagr is in his forties. Derek MacKenzie, one of the Panthers’ depth centers, is 34. Brian Campbell, who the team is likely to bring back, is 37. Their former captain, Willie Mitchell, retired at 39.

But again, this is a roster getting younger, with great players already and with good players in the system. The Atlantic is going to look bad in a few years and for a few years. The Panthers should continue to be able to take this division, and if they’re able to capitalize on their regular season success they should be a deep playoff contender.

5. Buffalo

The Buffalo Sabres have Jack Eichel. They have Ryan O’Reilly. They have Evander Kane. They have Rasmus Ristolainen. This team could be stacked moving forward.

With a healthy Robin Lehner, this Sabres team is likely a contender. I think a consistent netminder changes the outlook of this team.

Everybody’s young. Like Seriously, look how young this team is. Kane is 24. O’Reilly is 25. Eichel is 19. Sam Reinhart is 20. The team needs some leadership, and they’re looking deep.

The defense needs a few more good players, but again, this is a young unit. They could still develop into something special, but they’re not the Flyers unit.

The Sabres are another team who should make consistent deep runs within a few years.

Honorable mentions:

Toronto Maple Leafs, Carolina Hurricanes, Ottawa Senators, New York Islanders, Arizona Coyotes.