Are the Florida Panthers the best team of the cap era? Ranking the 6 contenders
The numbers from the Florida Panthers' playoff run this year are pretty incredible.
The Panthers didn't just repeat as Stanley Cup champions this year, becoming only the 10th franchise to do so in NHL history; they were completely dominant, racking up many of the best statistical marks of any team in the past 30-odd years.
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With Tuesday's decisive 5-1 win in Game 6 over the Edmonton Oilers, for example, Florida finished with 94 total goals scored, the fourth-highest mark in a postseason in league history — and the highest since the Mario Lemieux-led Pittsburgh Penguins in 1991.
The Panthers weren't just an offensive powerhouse, either. They allowed only 56 goals over 23 games, giving coach Paul Maurice's team a plus-38 goal differential that is the fourth best in NHL history.
The only three teams ahead of them? A few of the greatest playoff teams ever: the 1981 and 1983 New York Islanders and the 1985 Oilers.
Even the final itself was ultimately lopsided, with captain Aleksander Barkov and company finding ways to limit Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl to a combined two goals and six points over the final four games.
The Panthers spent more time leading during this Stanley Cup Final than any previous team in history: 255:49
— Chris Johnston (@reporterchris) June 18, 2025
This Cup run by the Panthers, in other words, was very likely the most impressive single-season playoff performance of any NHL team in the past 20 years. But if we look at a bigger sample size — including their three consecutive years going to the final — is it enough for the Panthers to rank as the best team of the salary-cap era?
Here are our top six, ranked in order of the best three-season playoff runs since 2005-06.
Record: 41-22
Goal differential: 1.14 per game
Top players: Nicklas Lidstrom, Henrik Zetterberg, Pavel Datsyuk, Johan Franzen, Chris Osgood
Conn Smythe winners: Zetterberg (2008)
Stanley Cups: 2008
This team included the final Stanley Cup win in a stretch of four in 11 years for those dominant, largely pre-cap Red Wings teams. Detroit went deep three consecutive years here, but ultimately won only one title after getting upset by a young Sidney Crosby and the Penguins in Game 7 of the 2009 final.
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But this was still an impressive, memorable team to cap a special era for an Original Six franchise, a run highlighted by 38-year-old Nicklas Lidstrom winning his first championship as Red Wings captain.
Record: 38-23
Goal differential: 0.76 per game
Top players: Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Kris Letang, Phil Kessel, Matt Murray
Conn Smythe winners: Crosby twice (2016, 2017)
Stanley Cups: 2016, 2017
Crosby and Malkin in their primes were certainly something, weren't they?
These Penguins battled through all kinds of adversity, including injuries that at times left them with a makeshift blue line. But they had tour de force performances from their future Hall of Famers, great goaltending from Murray and Marc-Andre Fleury, and remarkable scoring depth thanks to the 2015 offseason addition of Kessel down the lineup.
Maybe this wasn't the best team of the cap era, but it was certainly one of the most fun to watch. Losing in Round 2 to the Cup-bound Capitals in 2018 holds them back from the top spots, however.
Record: 41-23
Goal differential: 0.75 per game
Top players: Anze Kopitar, Jonathan Quick, Drew Doughty, Justin Williams, Jeff Carter
Conn Smythe winners: Quick (2012), Williams (2014)
Stanley Cups: 2012, 2014
They started by not qualifying for the playoffs until the 81st game of the season and then going on to win the Cup as an eighth seed in 2012, the first NHL team to accomplish that feat.
They ended up on one of the most dominant three-season runs we've seen in the last few decades, thanks to a lethal combination of size, defensive acumen, scoring depth and amazing goaltending. These Kings were so well-coached and disciplined that they allowed just 2.09 goals per game over these three postseasons and had a ridiculous 87.2 percent penalty kill, one of the best marks ever.
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A five-game loss in the 2013 Western Conference final to the next team stands as the only blemish. If you can call it that.
Record: 43-22
Goal differential: 0.43 per game
Top players: Jonathan Toews, Patrick Kane, Duncan Keith, Marian Hossa, Corey Crawford
Conn Smythe winners: Kane (2013), Keith (2015)
Stanley Cups: 2013, 2015
If we were expanding our window here to six seasons instead of three, Chicago would likely come out on top, as their win in 2010 was part of one of the most dominant stretches since those 1980s dynasty teams.
In these three seasons, the Blackhawks dispatched of a Boston Bruins team (2013) that was not far removed from its own Cup in 2011 and an up-and-coming young Tampa Bay Lightning team (2015) that ended up being a major contender as their young stars matured.
Only the aforementioned 2014 Kings kept Chicago from winning three in a row, which obviously would have shifted them to the top of this list.
Record: 45-23
Goal differential: 0.62 per game
Top players: Matthew Tkachuk, Aleksander Barkov, Sergei Bobrovsky, Sam Reinhart, Carter Verhaeghe
Conn Smythe winners: Sam Bennett (2025)
Stanley Cups: 2024, 2025
It started with a plucky eighth-seeded Cinderella team going on a run in 2023 but falling short in Game 5 of the final against the Vegas Golden Knights. It ended on Tuesday night in Sunrise with yet another Stanley Cup celebration.
One of the main storylines of this Panthers team has been their incredible depth every year, thanks to consistently brilliant maneuvering by GM Bill Zito that included airlifting in Seth Jones and Brad Marchand at the 2025 trade deadline. They both played starring roles in this year's win.
'The depth of this team is remarkable,' Bennett said after being named MVP. 'It truly could have went to anyone.'
I came close to putting the Panthers first, given how they limited McDavid and the Oilers in the past two finals. But that will have to wait on how they fare a year from now, as there's one cap-era team that had a more impressive three-season run.
Record: 46-22
Goal differential: 0.65 per game
Top players: Nikita Kucherov, Andrei Vasilevskiy, Victor Hedman, Steven Stamkos, Brayden Point
Conn Smythe winners: Hedman (2020), Vasilevskiy (2021)
Stanley Cups: 2020, 2021
Maybe a controversial choice, but the Lightning are the only other cap-era team — and only other team since the 1980s Oilers — to make three finals in a row. And the Lightning were a powerhouse every year, pushing a game closer to winning three championships in a row than the Panthers did by getting to Game 6 against the Colorado Avalanche in the 2022 final.
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How we judge the fact the Lightning won in strange pandemic-era seasons — locked in a bubble, playing games at strange times of year, and against odd opponents (the Canadiens?!) — is up for debate. But led by one of the best NHL coaches ever in Jon Cooper and a cast of likely future Hall of Famers, in my view this Tampa Bay team won't be dethroned as the cap era's best until the Panthers make another deep run.
Which feels entirely possible, given how much of their team is likely to be kept intact next season.
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