Last Updated:
On this page we provide team rankings for each round of the 2019 Stanley Cup Playoffs. Table 1 provides a ranking summary for each of the 16 teams in round 1 of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Further details about rankings can be found in the captions of each table. Note the ranking discrepancies between teams that advanced to round 2 of the Stanley Cup Playoffs (white backgrounds), and teams that were eliminated from round 1 (grey backgrounds). You may be wondering why some of the better ranked teams did not advance to round 2. If so, consider these statements:
- our ranking models are not perfect, no models are.
- the ranking table is not organized in a manner that depicts who played who. For instance, CBJ played TBL and accoring to our rankings, CBJ outplayed TBL. VGK played SJS. According to our rankings, VGK performed better than SJS in all 3 of our ranking categories. but SJS advanced to round 2 and VGK did not. Keep this in mind for the next bullet points
- officiating styles are different in the playoffs than during the regular season. A single penalty could change the entire outcome of the game, e.g., game 7 between VGK and SJS; and
- compared to all other professional sports, the outcomes of hockey games are less representative of true differences in skill between teams. In other words, the influence of luck is notable. For more info on luck in sports, check out Michael Mauboussin's book, The Success Equation.