After winning their first Stanley Cup Championship in franchise history back in June, the Florida Panthers will be prime contenders to run things back this season. But despite how the Tampa Bay Lightning made it look recently, returning to the Stanley Cup Final in three consecutive seasons is no easy feat. There will be plenty of teams in the Eastern Conference looking to get in their way, chief among them being the New York Rangers.

On a recent edition of TSN’s SportsCentre, host Bryan Hayes pointed to the Rangers as the biggest challenge to the reigning champs in the East.

“The Rangers have a ton of talent and a ton of depth,” Hayes explained. “They have a good fusion up front of veterans like [Mika] Zibanejad and [Artemi] Panarin and younger players. They have a great top-four defense, and on any given night, Igor Shesterkin can be the best goaltender in the world.”

That combination was enough for the Blueshirts to win the Presidents’ Trophy last season, reaching the Eastern Conference Final, where they lost to the Panthers in six games.

The Rangers were outclassed in that series, thoroughly out-shot and unable to match up with Florida’s relentless physicality, winning two games largely thanks to spectacular goaltending from Shesterkin and two clutch overtime goals.

On the other hand, they managed to reach Game 6 despite getting just two combined goals from their top quartet of Panarin, Zibanejad, Chris Kreider, and Adam Fox as Florida, led by Selke-winner Aleksander Barkov, shut down the Blueshirts stars.

No matter which prism you look at it through, the fact remains that the Rangers didn’t have enough to get past the Panthers last season. And it’s looking like Florida will be the favorite in the East going into this season.

Bringing back Sam Reinhart, who scored the game-winning goal in Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final and 57 goals in the regular season, on a massive eight-year deal, was a key offseason move. The Panthers return their top eight scorers from last season.

But nonetheless, there are notable roster departures to speak of, particularly on defense.

Brandon Montour signing a huge deal with the Seattle Kraken and Oliver Ekman-Larsson hitched up with the Toronto Maple Leafs. That leaves the blue line thinner and less explosive than last season.

They still have one of the best defensemen in the NHL in Gustav Forsling and reliable pieces like Aaron Ekblad, Dmitry Kulikov, and Niko Mikkola, But the Panthers lost their ATOI leader in Montour and two of their top three scoring defensemen from last season.

The top-six forward group remains intact. But the departures of Vladimir Tarasenko, Ryan Lomberg, and Kevin Stenlund, possible retirement of Kyle Okposo, and with Nick Cousins and Stephen Lorentz still unsigned, leaves Florida with a much different-looking bottom six. That’s especially so of losing all five members of the tenacious tone-setting fourth line from the postseason.

Even Anthony Stolarz signing with the Maple Leafs, one of the best backup goalies in the League last season, paints some question marks about their situation behind Sergei Bobrovsky.

Make no mistake, the Panthers should still be an absolute force. There’s still the star-studded core of Barkov, Reinhart, Matthew Tkachuk, and Carter Verhaeghe as well as a rising star in Anton Lundell, and one of the League’s best goalies in Bobrovsky, even at age 36. This is going to be a very hard team to take out in a seven-game series.

Rangers have best shot in East to knock off Panthers

Knocking out the Panthers is going to be a difficult task. Few teams know that better than the Rangers after this past postseason But they’re still shaping up to have the best chance of dethroning the reigning champs and representing the Eastern Conference in the Stanley Cup.

Though they didn’t make any dazzling adds during the offseason, the Rangers similarly return all the prominent pieces of a core that led them to a franchise-record 55 wins and 114 points, boasting the best regular-season record in the League.

Unlike the Panthers, however, there aren’t many significant departures to speak of. The most impactful is likely Barclay Goodrow, who was placed on waivers prior to the start of free agency and claimed by the San Jose Sharks. Goodrow played a vital role on the fourth line and penalty kill. He notably scored six goals in the postseason, including the Game 2 OT winner against the Panthers at Madison Square Garden.

Erik Gustafsson, Alex Wennberg, Jake Roslovic, and Blake Wheeler were allowed to walk in free agency, but the Blueshirts traded for Reilly Smith and signed Sam Carrick. Zac Jones will assume an everyday role on the bottom defense pairing after a promising second half last season.

With Smith aboard and Filip Chytil healthy, that really leaves only two forward spots — on the fourth line and as 13th forward — for someone within the system, whether that be an exciting prospect like Brennan Othmann or Brett Berard, or more likely someone who got run last year like Matt Rempe or Johnny Brodzinski.

Either way, it leaves New York in a relatively similar position to last year — perhaps even better.

Smith is an upgrade over Roslovic and Wheeler as the projected right wing next to Zibanejad and Kreider. A healthy Chytil gives the Rangers much-needed scoring talent in their bottom six. And if Kaapo Kakko can find his game on the third line, the Rangers are as deep offensively as any team in the NHL.

On top of an excellent core led by Panarin, Zibanejad, Fox, Kreider, and Vincent Trocheck, Alexis Lafreniere seems primed for a leap after a career-best season and a fantastic postseason, tying a team-high eight goals, including four against Florida in the conference final.

Despite mounting frustration about the team’s inability to reach the Stanley Cup Final in recent years, it’s once again a roster loaded with talent that should be one of the last teams standing next postseason. Considering the Rangers have premiere talent and depth with their forwards, defensemen, and goaltenders, they’re one of the few teams that can match up with Florida at all three levels.

If they can get better production from their stars, perhaps a postseason rematch against the Panthers ends differently. If all else fails, having Shesterkin, who NHL Network named the top goalie in the League, isn’t the worst failsafe.

Other threats to Florida’s reign in East

The Rangers won’t be the only team looking to end Florida’s two-year run in the Eastern Conference. They might have the best shot at stacking up against the 2024 Stanley Cup Champions, but there are a few other teams that make an interesting case too.

Boston Bruins

Like the Rangers, the Boston Bruins had their season come to an end against the Panthers last spring, falling in six games to Florida in the second round.

The Bruins responded with a very aggressive offseason, signing the best center available on the open market, Elias Lindholm, to a big contract and bringing in the big-bodied Nikita Zadorov to bolster their blue line.

After recording back-to-back 110-plus point seasons, David Pastrnak is one of the best wingers in hockey, heading a core that includes Brad Marchand and defenseman Charlie McAvoy. It’s a core that led the Bruins to the fourth-best record in the Eastern Conference last season, despite the retirement of Patrice Bergeron and the lack of an elite top-line center.

They may not quite have the depth of other teams in the East, but they have talent at all three levels, particularly goaltending. They won’t have the best goalie tandem in the League after trading Linus Ullmark, but Jeremy Swayman has been one of the top netminders for the past two years and led all postseason goalies with 13.3 GSAA.

Carolina Hurricanes

The loss of forwards Jake Guentzel, Teuvo Teravainen, Evgeny Kuznetsov, and Stefan Noesen leaves this group a little less exciting than previous seasons. But that won’t stop coach Rod Brind’Amour from getting the most out the Carolina Hurricanes.

Thanks to his successful system that seems to draw the most out of his group, the Hurricanes have finished in the top two of the East in each of the past four seasons. The forward group is likely weaker compared to the past few years, but it’s still tough to bet against this Carolina team being in the mix when it’s all said and done.

Even with a hit to their scoring depth, Sebastian Aho, Seth Jarvis, Martin Necas, and Andrei Svechnikov still give this squad a talented top six. Not to mention, arguably the best defensive corps in hockey, led by Jaccob Slavin and Brent Burns and featuring new free agent additions Sean Walker and Shayne Gostisbehere.

As has been the case in past seasons, it feels like the Hurricanes could use stronger goaltending and an elite goalscorer to get them to their first Stanley Cup Final since 2006. They don’t quite match up to Florida on paper, but sleeping on Carolina rarely ends well.

Tampa Bay Lightning

The Panthers disposed of the Lightning rather easily in the first round of the 2024 playoffs, defeating them in five games. Outside of Steven Stamkos, now a member of the Nashville Predators, who scored five goals in the series, all of Tampa’s stars were shut down by the reigning champs.

The Lightning won the Guentzel sweepstakes in the offseason, landing the most highly coveted free agent, whose elite scoring ability and postseason resume should help to minimize the loss of Stamkos.

No longer the powerhouse that appeared in three consecutive Stanley Cup Finals from 2020 to 2022, they still boast a perennial Hart Trophy finalist in Nikita Kucherov, fresh off a League-leading 144-point season, and the talented veteran Victor Hedman on the blue line.

The biggest X-Factor is netminder Andrei Vasilevskiy. His typically excellent postseason play has slipped the past two seasons, posting a 3-8 record with a 3.41 goals-against average and .885 save percentage since the start of the 2023 postseason.

Their days of dominance may be behind them, but they’re still a threat if they get hot, particularly if Vasilevskiy can tap in to what made him a Conn Smythe Trophy winner as playoffs MVP in 2021.

New Jersey Devils

The New Jersey Devils were supposed to be a Stanley Cup contender in 2023-24, but things quickly fell apart thanks to injuries and shoddy defense and goaltending. Shockingly, New Jersey finished with the fourth-worst record in the Eastern Conference, 10 points shy of the final wild card.

The additions of Jacob Markstrom in net and Brett Pesce and Brenden Dillon on the blue line, along with a healthy Dougie Hamilton, should rectify some of those issues and allow for a much more competitive squad.

The Devils were a 112-point team in 2022-23 and still feature an exciting offense led by Jack Hughes and Jesper Bratt, and have gotten a bit tougher in the bottom six thanks to reunions with Noesen and Tomas Tatar.

It’s too early to tell if they’ll immediately revert back to their dominant ways, but their offseason has all the makings of a bounceback year and a return to the playoff mix.