In the NHL's Atlantic Division, the Battle for Playoff Position Has Already Begun

There are no games to waste in the NHL's Atlantic Division. Here's what's going right and wrong for each team in a division already battling hard for the playoffs.

For the last several years, the biggest question surrounding playoff positioning in the Atlantic Division wasn't which teams were getting in, but their order of finish in the standings.

Since the 2017-18 season, we've seen some combination of the Boston Bruins, Toronto Maple Leafs and Tampa Bay Lightning in the top three spots nearly every year — except the shortened 2020-21 campaign when the divisions were switched up, of course. 

In more recent years, the Florida Panthers have also muscled their way into the mix — and took utmost advantage of their wild-card berth last spring.

Meanwhile, three of the other four teams in the Atlantic have been dealing with some pretty lengthy playoff droughts:

If the first two weeks of the 2023-24 campaign are any indication, there will be no coasting allowed in the Atlantic this year.

Despite personnel changes and questions about their center depth, the Boston Bruins remain unstoppable. The Red Wings and Senators both look vastly improved. At 2-1-1 through four games, even Montreal might be punching above its weight even though injuries are once again a dominant early-season storyline. 

After all eight teams hit the ice on Saturday night, including two head-to-head matchups, the Panthers and Sabres are running the biggest risk of being left behind in what might be the NHL's most competitive division this season.

Sorted by points percentage, here's a look at what's going right — and wrong — in the Atlantic.

It's easy to forget that plenty of people doubted the Bruins heading into the 2022-23 campaign, with Brad Marchand and Charlie McAvoy sidelined with injuries. 

New coach Jim Montgomery rode that adversity to a Jack Adams Award and the best regular-season record in NHL history. Now, after losing Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci to retirement, he's at it again. And so is their Jennings Trophy-winning goalie tandem. 

Through four games, the Bruins have given up just six goals, giving them the lowest goals-against average in the NHL. They gave up their first goal this season while shorthanded in garbage time of their 4-2 road win in Los Angeles on Saturday night. 

And while David Pastrnak is calmly on pace for 102 goals this season, he's being supported by a reborn James van Riemsdyk who has three goals in four games, including two game-winners, at a bargain-basement cap hit of just $1 million.

In order to re-write the script after their first-round playoff upset last spring, the Bruins first need to make it back to the dance for an eighth-straight year — tied with Toronto as the NHL's longest streak.

The way they've started, Boston might get to the post-season with an 82-0 record.

We heard a lot this summer about the Buffalo Sabres and Ottawa Senators being ready to take the next step back to contention. 

But it's the Detroit Red Wings who lead that trio early on. And with their convincing 5-2 win in Ottawa on Saturday, they may have even more going for them than their rivals.

The Senators and Sabres get a lot of respect for building their high-caliber young offenses. But it's Detroit that's currently leading the NHL with an average of 4.80 goals per game. 

Alex DeBrincat was an instant hit, with five goals in four games. But when he was held off the scoresheet in Ottawa, others stepped up, including power-play specialist Shayne Gostisbehere, who's already up to six points.

With that kind of firepower, the Red Wings just need their goaltending to be OK. And so far, it has been. Ville Husso had a winning record last season and has improved his personal numbers slightly, while James Reimer pitched a 23-save shutout against the Columbus Blue Jackets in his first start in a Detroit uniform.

Based on this start, this may be the year the Yzerplan pays off, and the Red Wings finally get to host playoff games at Little Caesars Arena.

They've played fewer games than any other Atlantic squad, and they have a minus-2 goal differential after four games. But after Cole Caufield delivered the overtime-winner against the Washington Capitals on Saturday night, the Montreal Canadiens have upset the apple cart by nestling themselves into an Atlantic Division playoff berth going by points percentage.

Can it last? They're already up against it injury-wise, again, with Kirby Dach's season-ending knee issue and Kaiden Guhle out day-to-day. Special teams have also been shaky: Montreal is just 2-for-17 on the power play so far (11.8 percent) and 19-for-24 on the penalty kill (79.2 percent).

But the Canadiens' depth looks better. Up front, especially, Alex Newhook and Tanner Pearson are making contributions, and a healthy Sean Monahan is picking up where he left off before he was shut down last year. 

Goaltending is also holding up so far, with Jake Allen and Sam Montembeault splitting the duties.

After a 28th-place finish last season, this is a solid start for Martin St-Louis' group. There may be more growing pains as the season wears on, but the Canadiens have served notice they're not going quietly into the night. 

Montreal could play spoiler and steal some crucial points as the season rolls on.

Before Saturday's setback against the Red Wings, the Sens had a good thing going. They rebounded from a disheartening opening loss against the Carolina Hurricanes by reeling off three impressive wins, outscoring their opponents 16-5 while limiting them to an average of 23 shots per game. 

Jake Sanderson has quickly silenced anyone who asked questions about his big second contract, putting up six points in five games. Having a healthy and productive Josh Norris back on the ice and scoring goals is another win for Michael Andlauer's group.

A couple of key areas of concern remain for Ottawa. The Shane Pinto contract stalemate continues to drag on, and Anton Forsberg has been handily outdueling $20-million man Joonas Korpisalo in the crease in the early going.

After three strong regular seasons and their first playoff series win in nearly two decades, the Toronto Maple Leafs can be forgiven if their main focus in the regular season is just making sure they secure a playoff spot. 

Home-ice advantage hasn't meant much lately, and last spring, they got a first-hand lesson from the Florida Panthers in how momentum is everything. And while the Leafs still haven't made it through a game without giving up at least three goals, their Matthew Knies-fuelled third-period comeback on Saturday against their archrivals in Tampa is a positive building block.

The Leafs are generating more shots than any other team in the league (38.6), and their 5-on-5 numbers are also strong — ninth in the league at 54.94 percent, per naturalstattrick.com.

But with all that, and on pace for over 98 points, they're stuck in fifth place in the divisional rankings — only good for a potential wild-card spot if the season ended today. 

That's a perfect illustration of why every point is already so critical in the Atlantic Division race.

After their first six games, the Tampa Bay Lightning are sitting at .500. Not good enough to grab a golden ticket to the playoffs but not bad, either, considering their goaltending crisis.

Riding a platoon of Jonas Johansson and Matt Tomkins while Andrei Vasilevskiy recovers from back surgery, that's not a bad place to be. Especially when the 2020 and 2021 champions also lost captain Steven Stamkos to injury for two games and saw free-agent signing Tyler Motte go down with a hand injury in Game 1 after less than eight minutes of action with his new team. 

Yes, the Lightning roster looks different this season, but Julien BriseBois has been making substantial changes since the day he sat down in the GM's chair in 2018. Now, younger faces like Brandon Hagel and Nick Paul are just as important up front as the long-timers like Nikita Kucherov, Brayden Point and Stamkos. 

If the Lightning can tread water until Vasilevskiy returns at 100 percent, they'll have every opportunity to push for another playoff spot. They just need to stay close and keep finding ways to optimize their current lineup.

The narrative around the Panthers this summer was similar to what we heard about the Bruins last year. With Aaron Ekblad and Brandon Montour on the shelf until probably December, Florida needs to concentrate on keeping pace until it can get back to a relatively full roster. 

Bruising forward Sam Bennett also hasn't played yet this year — sidelined with a lower-body injury.

The Panthers also opened with one of the tougher schedules in the Atlantic Division: road games in Minnesota, Winnipeg and New Jersey before the home-opener against the Maple Leafs on Thursday.

Paul Maurice's group dished out a strong showing in that four-pointer at the newly named Amerant Bank Arena, skating away with a 3-1 win. And the Panthers pushed hard in the third period against Vancouver on Saturday, erasing a two-goal deficit before falling 5-3.

Off-season pickup Oliver Ekman-Larsson is doing yeoman's work on the blueline, averaging nearly 25 minutes a game and anchoring the first power-play unit. Evan Rodrigues has also been a nice addition, with seven points, and contract-year Sam Reinhart is tied with three other players for the NHL scoring lead with six goals.

For all the talk about how Sergei Bobrovsky plays better when he's rested, he has been in the net for every second of the Panthers' season so far and delivered a solid 0.9 goals saved above expected.

An expected goals rate of 51.59 percent at 5-on-5 also suggests brighter days lie ahead for the Panthers. But will that sunshine be enough for a playoff berth?

We may have gotten ahead of ourselves yet again with the Sabres. Or do they just need to figure some things out?

Their most recent outing on Saturday suggests Option B is the correct answer: a solid 3-1 home win over the New York Islanders where they outshot the visitors 43-25 and controlled 66 percent of expected goals at 5-on-5. 

It was a strong season debut for Eric Comrie in net, with rookie Devon Levi listed as day-to-day with a lower-body injury. But Buffalo has had a hard time delivering run support so far, averaging just 2.40 goals-for per game. And their only point-per-game player is Rasmus Dahlin (0-5-5).

If they hope to keep a playoff spot within sight, the Sabres need to get their offensive stars going. Tage Thompson has just one goal to date but was buzzing on Saturday with 10 shots. Meanwhile, his linemate Alex Tuch was most notable for his second-period fight with Adam Pelech. He also, uncharacteristically, has just one assist to date.

Tick tock, Buffalo. There's no time to waste.