Winding road to the Cup begins

Lightning mounts bid for three-peat, Kraken released for first game

There is more high-level hockey on tap over the next nine months than ever before.

Thanks to the addition of the Seattle Kraken as the NHL’s 32nd franchise and the return to a full schedule, 1,312 regularseason games are set to be played before the start of the playoffs next spring. Add 30 games in Beijing as the league’s players return to the Olympics and the road to the Stanley Cup is a marathon.

The season gets under way Tuesday night when the backto-back champion Tampa Bay Lightning raise another banner and host the Pittsburgh Penguins, the last team to win the Cup twice in a row, in 2016 and 2017. The Kraken also play their first regular-season game — at Vegas, four years after the Golden Knights were the league’s last expansion team.

AP Hockey Writers Larry Lage, John Wawrow and Stephen Whyno get you ready for the season.

What’s New

Unleashing the Kraken brings the NHL to the Pacific Northwest with a team that’s selling merchandise at a rapid pace and should contend right away like Vegas did. Seattle would have to reach the Stanley Cup Final to match the Golden Knights.

The two teams that get to the final will again go the traditional way through the Eastern or Western Conference, after the 56-game 2021 season was played entirely within four divisions until the semifinals. Cross-border play is back, too, and every team is scheduled to play the other 31 at least twice — once at home and on the road.

Those games will air on ESPN’s networks, ABC and TNT in the U.S. in the first season of a new TV deal. Puck movement will be tracked with microchips for the first time, opening the door for a load of new data and gambling opportunities.

Barring a turn for the worse by the pandemic, the league will take a three-week break in February for players to participate in the Olympics for the first time since 2014.

On the hot seat

Three teams changed coaches

last season, including Montreal, which went to the final as a longshot last season after replacing Claude Julien with Dominique Ducharme.

The Canadiens eventually fell to the Lightning.

More than a few coaches should be looking over their shoulders between now and the spring, but whose seat is hottest?

Lage: Philadelphia Flyers coach Alain Vigneault took a step back as his team finished sixth in the division last season in his second year. He faces pressure, leading a franchise that hasn’t made the playoffs in five of the last nine years and whose last Cup Final run came in 2010.

Wawrow: Flyers GM Chuck Fletcher did his part in retooling the roster following Philadelphia’s second-half meltdown last season. It’s on Vigneault to make it work. Jeremy Colliton in Chicago has an 86-83-24 record since replacing Joel Quenneville.

Whyno: Colliton will need to take the next step with the Blackhawks shifting into contender mode, or he could be in trouble. Darryl Sutter just got Calgary’s head job after replacing Geoff Ward last season, but the heat is on if the Flames struggle early and former Canadiens coach Kirk Muller is on staff if things go haywire.

Tuesday

Pittsburgh at Tampa Bay, 5:30 p.m., Seattle at Vegas, 8:15 p.m., ESPN

The playoffs

EASTERN CONFERENCE Lage: Tampa Bay, Carolina, N.Y. Islanders, Boston, Florida, Washington, Toronto, N.Y. Rangers

Wawrow: Florida, N.Y. Islanders, Tampa Bay, Carolina, Toronto, N.Y. Rangers, Washington, Montreal

Whyno: Tampa Bay, N.Y. Islanders, Boston, Washington, Florida, Toronto, Carolina, Philadelphia WESTERN CONFERENCE Lage: Colorado, Vegas, Dallas, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Calgary, Minnesota, Chicago

Wawrow: Colorado, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Vegas, Minnesota, Calgary, St. Louis, Los Angeles

Whyno: Colorado, Vegas, Winnipeg, Seattle, St. Louis, Edmonton, Dallas, Minnesota

Who wins the Cup

Lage: Tampa Bay over Colorado. Lightning are first NHL team to threepeat since the Islanders dynasty in the early 1980s.

Wawrow: Islanders over Winnipeg. The Cup returns to Long Island for the first time since 1983.

Whyno: Colorado over Islanders. Nathan MacKinnon earns Olympic gold and makes sure the Cup is lifted a mile high in Denver.