NHL Playoff Picture 2023: Bracket Standings, Wild-Card Race Before Final Games (2024)

The 2022-23 NHL regular season is winding down, and the teams that will vie for the opportunity to call themselves Stanley Cup Champions are solidifying their spots in the postseason, including the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Chasing their first Stanley Cup since 1967, the team hopes to shake off what has been excruciating early exits in each of their last seven trips to the postseason.

Can Auston Matthews, Mitchell Marner and Co. end that trend and propel the Leafs past the dominant Boston Bruins to compete for the most coveted prize in professional hockey?

Find out where the Leafs and every playoff team stand as the regular season draws to a close with this look at the division and wild-card standings, and the playoff brackets, as they stand.

If the Stanley Cup Playoffs began today, the Eastern Conference bracket would look like this:

The Boston Bruins have been the best team in hockey throughout the 2022-23 season and have done nothing to suggest that is not the case entering the playoffs.

The indisputable top seed in the East, the Bruins became the fastest team in NHL history to 80 points then, Tuesday night, set the record for most points in a season with 133. They have lived up to the billing at a time in which some teams are limping into the playoffs (looking at you, Tampa Bay). They are soaring.

Boston has won nine of their last 10 and seven in a row. Four of those wins have come against fellow playoff teams Toronto, New Jersey, Carolina and Tampa Bay.

The Maple Leafs gave their arch-nemesis a battle on April 6, taking them to overtime, but the Bruins proved superior, as they have throughout this campaign.

The playoffs are an entirely different beast than the regular season, with records resetting and all eight teams essentially starting over, but one would be hard-pressed to have to pick against Boston at this point.

Maybe the curse of the Presidents' Trophy comes back to haunt them, as only eight of its 36 recipients have gone on to win the Stanley Cup, but even that feels far-fetched. The last team to accomplish that feat was the 2012-13 Chicago Blackhawks team that, similar to the Bruins, dominated the season.

The aforementioned Maple Leafs may have the best shot of knocking off coach Jim Montgomery's record-setting squad, especially given the abilities of Auston Matthews and Mitchell Marner to score at any given point, and the veteran presence of Ryan O'Reilly and John Tavares, but it will take the best hockey they have played all year to make that happen.

The same can be said for the other six teams in the field, though the Islanders are not officially in at this point. That second wild-card spot is up for grabs, with just one point separating them and Pittsburgh for the final playoff spot in the East.

It will not matter, though, as neither team has been consistent enough to pose any real threat to the Bruins in the first round.

If the Stanley Cup Playoffs started today, the Western Conference bracket would like this:

The Western Conference remains as wide open as it gets.

Defending Stanley Cup champions Colorado have roared back to the top of the Central Division, while Las Vegas is in the driver's seat in the Pacific.

Edmonton may be the hottest in the conference, though, having won eight in a row and nine of their last 10. Led by the great Connor McDavid and amassing 41 more goals than the next most prolific scoring team in the West (Dallas), the team can outshoot any opposition.

That McDavid, a generational player, is fueled by his pursuit of a Stanley Cup that has thus far eluded him only makes the Oilers that much more dangerous.

Dallas enters the playoffs having won four in a row, rekindling the fire that once had them atop their division. Not only can they score, but they are tied for fourth in the NHL for the fewest goals allowed. They are first in their conference.

Unlike the East—where it is a one, maybe two, horse race—the Western Conference can plausibly be won by any of the eight teams that have clinched their spot in the playoffs.

Maybe Seattle and Winnipeg are tougher sells just because of the inconsistency that has defined them, but it would not at all be surprising to see Minnesota go on a run that takes them to the finals and a shot at hoisting the Stanley Cup.

With that said, Edmonton bears the closest watching, while Dallas—just because of the strength of their defense and ability to score with their peers—are one of the more interesting squads left in the dance.