You’ve heard the stat. If a team is in a playoff spot by American Thanksgiving, they have about a 75% chance of staying there. It’s a terrifying number for fans of teams on the bubble. But honestly? It's January 2026, and the old math is starting to feel a little shaky.
The Western Conference is basically a high-speed car crash where everyone is still driving. The Eastern Conference is a mosh pit where twelve teams are separated by what feels like a single overtime goal. If you're staring at the standings and sweating over the chances of making the playoffs NHL models, you aren't alone. Even the experts are getting it wrong this year.
Take the Colorado Avalanche. They are currently wrecking the league with 74 points, sitting on a record-breaking pace that has statistical models like MoneyPuck literally breaking. They’re at a 100% lock. But for everyone else? It’s chaos.
The Brutal Reality of the 95-Point Bar
For years, the magic number was 95. Hit 95 points, and you’re probably safe. Recently, that bar has crawled up toward 98 or even 100 in the East.
Right now, the Detroit Red Wings and Montreal Canadiens are holding onto divisional spots in the Atlantic, but they’ve got the Buffalo Sabres and Boston Bruins breathing down their necks with 56 and 54 points respectively. One bad week—one three-game losing streak—and those playoff percentages don't just dip. They crater.
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The math is simple but cruel:
- There are 16 spots.
- 32 teams want them.
- Half of you are going home in April.
In the West, the "middle of the pack" is a massive group. You’ve got the Utah Mammoth, Los Angeles Kings, and San Jose Sharks all hovering around that 50-point mark. The Sharks, in particular, are the surprise of the 2025-26 season. After years of being the league’s basement dwellers, Macklin Celebrini has them legitimately fighting for a Wild Card. Their current chances are floating around 42%, which is wild considering where they were twelve months ago.
Why Your Team’s "Chances" Might Be a Lie
Analytics are great, but they can't account for the "human" stuff. The Columbus Blue Jackets are a perfect example right now. They’re trying to learn a brand-new coach’s system in the middle of a playoff race while Boone Jenner and Zach Werenski try to keep the locker room from spiraling. You can’t put a "new coach adjustment period" into a spreadsheet and get a perfect percentage.
Then there’s the Edmonton Oilers. They started the year like a disaster. Everyone wrote them off. But Connor McDavid just went on a 20-game point streak, and suddenly their chances of making the playoffs NHL went from a dismal 2% in November to a solid 92% today.
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The Strength of Schedule Factor
If you want to know if your team is actually going to make it, stop looking at the current points and start looking at the calendar.
- The Chicago Blackhawks are only four points out of a spot. Fans are hyped. Connor Bedard is flying. But they have the 14th most difficult remaining schedule in the league.
- The Seattle Kraken are in a similar boat. They’ve got a lot of games against the Avalanche and Stars coming up.
- The St. Louis Blues have a lighter load, which is why models still give them a puncher's chance despite a mediocre December.
The "Loser Point" is Killing the Separation
The biggest reason the race feels so tight is the Bettman Point—that single point you get for losing in overtime. It keeps teams artificially close.
Look at the Vegas Golden Knights. They have 12 overtime losses. Twelve! That’s 12 points they earned while technically losing the game. Without those, they’d be buried. Instead, they are sitting comfortably in the Pacific. This "parity" makes the chances of making the playoffs NHL much harder to predict because nobody actually falls out of the race until March. You can be five games under .500 and still be "only three points out." It’s an illusion that keeps ticket sales up but gives fans heart attacks.
Predicting the Fall-Off
Who is going to drop? History says at least 25% of the teams currently in a spot will choke.
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- The New York Rangers: They are currently struggling significantly, with models giving them less than a 1% chance to recover. It’s been a nightmare season in Manhattan.
- The Toronto Maple Leafs: They’ve rallied lately, winning 7 of their last 10, but the Atlantic is so top-heavy with Tampa and Detroit that the Leafs are basically living on the Wild Card bubble.
- The Vancouver Canucks: Sitting at the bottom of the Pacific with only 37 points. For them, the "chances" are basically zero. They’d need a literal miracle to jump over six teams.
How to Track the Race Like a Pro
If you're tracking the chances of making the playoffs NHL, don't just look at the "P" column in the standings. Look at "Regulation Wins" (RW). This is the primary tiebreaker.
If two teams are tied at 96 points at the end of the year, the team that won more games without needing OT or a shootout gets in. Right now, the Carolina Hurricanes are the kings of this. They don't just win; they win clean. That makes their playoff spot much "safer" than a team like the Islanders, who rely heavily on overtime points to stay relevant.
Actionable Insights for the Second Half
If you want to accurately judge if your team is a pretender or a contender, follow these three steps over the next month:
- Check the "Games in Hand": If your team has 54 points in 48 games, but the team they're chasing has 52 points in 44 games, you're actually behind. Those four extra games for the opponent are massive.
- Monitor the Backup Goalies: The schedule gets compressed in February and March. If your starter is elite but your backup is a sieve, you will drop points on back-to-back nights. The Oilers’ refusal to fix their goaltending depth is exactly why some analysts still think they could miss out despite McDavid's heroics.
- Watch the Trade Deadline (March 2026): This is the ultimate "tell." If a bubble team like the Flyers or Predators starts selling off expiring contracts, their front office has already run the math and decided the chances aren't worth the investment.
The race for the 2026 Stanley Cup Playoffs is going to be a bloodbath. Between the Avalanche's historic run and the absolute dogfight for the final Wild Card spots in the East, there is no such thing as a "safe" bet until the "X" appears next to a team's name in the standings. Keep your eyes on the Regulation Wins and pray your goalie doesn't catch the flu in March.