NHL Stanley Cup Pool Cheat Sheet: Best 2026 Postseason Draft Rankings

It won't be long before the NHL playoffs start, so it's time to get ready for your Playoff Pool drafts. To serve as a companion for those drafts, we've assembled a cheat sheet.

These rankings aren't just about highlighting which players are the best, it also factors in the chances of each player's team enjoying a long postseason run. That can cause a good forward on a team with strong odds of winning at least a couple of rounds to rank above a great forward on a team projected to lose in the first round.

In the interest of transparency, we're using DraftKings' Stanley Cup Champion Odds as our primary guideline when determining which teams to value over others. You can view those odds here. Do note that less emphasis was put on the odds for teams that have similarly difficult paths. For example, while Boston is given far worse odds than Ottawa, both teams face an uphill battle to advance beyond the first round, so those squads were consequently given close to the same weight. Buffalo, which won the Atlantic Division, also had its players weighted a bit more favorably than the DraftKings' odds.

Centers

1. Nathan MacKinnon (COL)

2. Connor McDavid (EDM)

3. Leon Draisaitl (EDM) (lower body)

4. Sebastian Aho (CAR)

5. Wyatt Johnston (DAL)

6. Jack Eichel (VGK)

7. Brock Nelson (COL)

8. Tage Thompson (BUF)

9. Nick Suzuki (MON)

10. Sidney Crosby (PIT)

11. Nick Schmaltz (UTA)

12. Nazem Kadri (COL) (finger)

13. Tim Stutzle (OTT)

14. Leo Carlsson (ANA)

15. Tomas Hertl (VGK)

16. Ryan McLeod (BUF)

17. Brayden Point (TBL)

18. Ryan Nugent-Hopkins (EDM)

19. Anthony Cirelli (TBL)

20. Evgeni Malkin (PIT)

21. Roope Hintz (DAL) (lower body)

22. Matt Duchene (DAL)

23. Trevor Zegras (PHI)

24. Dylan Cozens (OTT)

25. Morgan Geekie (BOS)

26. Pavel Zacha (BOS)

27. Josh Norris (BUF)

28. Logan Stankoven (CAR)

29. Joel Eriksson Ek (MIN)

30. Logan Cooley (UTA)

31. Christian Dvorak (PHI)

32. Jordan Staal (CAR)

33. Ryan Hartman (MIN)

34. Peyton Krebs (BUF)

35. Elias Lindholm (BOS)

36. Mikael Granlund (ANA)

37. Thomas Novak (PIT)

38. Casey Mittelstadt (BOS)

39. Anze Kopitar (LAK)

40. Oliver Kapanen (MON)

41. Jack Drury (COL)

42. Quinton Byfield (LAK)

43. Ridly Greig (OTT)

44. Ross Colton (COL)

45. Justin Hryckowian (DAL)

46. Fraser Minten (BOS)

47. Mason McTavish (ANA)

48. Sean Couturier (PHI)

49. Ryan Poehling (ANA)

50. Yanni Gourde (TBL)

51. William Karlsson (VGK) (lower body)

Wingers

1. Nikita Kucherov (TBL)

2. Mikko Rantanen (DAL)

3. Martin Necas (COL)

4. Jason Robertson (DAL)

5. Mark Stone (VGK)

6. Jake Guentzel (TBL)

7. Andrei Svechnikov (CAR)

8. Brandon Hagel (TBL) (lower body)

9. Mitch Marner (VGK)

10. Kirill Kaprizov (MIN)

11. Cole Caufield (MON)

12. Matt Boldy (MIN)

13. Seth Jarvis (CAR)

14. Nikolaj Ehlers (CAR)

15. David Pastrnak (BOS)

16. Alex Tuch (BUF)

17. Pavel Dorofeyev (VGK)

18. Cutter Gauthier (ANA)

19. Zach Hyman (EDM) (undisclosed)

20. Brady Tkachuk (OTT)

21. Clayton Keller (UTA)

22. Artemi Panarin (LAK)

23. Ivan Barbashev (VGK)

24. Dylan Guenther (UTA)

25. Drake Batherson (OTT)

26. Juraj Slafkovsky (MON)

27. Adrian Kempe (LAK)

28. Mats Zuccarello (MIN)

29. Travis Konecny (PHI)

30. Artturi Lehkonen (COL)

31. Valeri Nichushkin (COL)

32. Jason Zucker (BUF)

33. Josh Doan (BUF)

34. Bryan Rust (PIT)

35. Jack Quinn (BUF)

36. Troy Terry (ANA)

37. Anthony Mantha (PIT)

38. Beckett Sennecke (ANA)

39. Jackson Blake (CAR)

40. Ivan Demidov (MON)

41. Viktor Arvidsson (BOS)

42. Gabriel Landeskog (COL)

43. Owen Tippett (PHI)

44. Chris Kreider (ANA)

45. Egor Chinakhov (PIT)

46. Marcus Johansson (DAL)

47. Taylor Hall (CAR)

48. Zach Benson (BUF)

49. Rickard Rakell (PIT)

50. Shane Pinto (OTT)

51. Vladimir Tarasenko (MIN)

52. Marcus Johansson (MIN)

53. Jamie Benn (DAL)

54. Claude Giroux (OTT)

55. Parker Kelly (COL)

56. Matvei Michkov (PHI)

57. Noah Cates (PHI)

58. Jack Roslovic (EDM)

59. Vasily Podkolzin (EDM)

60. JJ Peterka (UTA)

61. Mavrik Bourque (DAL)

62. Sam Steel (DAL) (hip)

63. Matt Savoie (EDM)

64. Lawson Crouse (UTA)

65. Jordan Martinook (CAR)

66. Gage Goncalves (TBL)

67. Oliver Bjorkstrand (TBL)

68. Michael Amadio (OTT)

69. Justin Brazeau (PIT)

70. Alex Laferriere (LAK)

71. Fabian Zetterlund (OTT)

72. Ben Kindel (PIT)

73. Connor Dewar (PIT) (lower body)

74. Danila Yurov (MIN)

75. Marat Khusnutdinov (BOS)

76. Patrik Laine (MON) (abdomen)

Defensemen

1. Cale Makar (COL)

2. Evan Bouchard (EDM)

3. Rasmus Dahlin (BUF)

4. Darren Raddysh (TBL) (undisclosed)

5. Miro Heiskanen (DAL) (lower body)

6. Quinn Hughes (MIN)

7. Lane Hutson (MON)

8. Shayne Gostisbehere (CAR)

9. Erik Karlsson (PIT)

10. Brent Burns (COL)

11. Brock Faber (MIN)

12. Mikhail Sergachev (UTA)

13. Charlie McAvoy (BOS)

14. Jake Sanderson (OTT)

15. Jackson LaCombe (ANA)

16. K'Andre Miller (CAR)

17. Alexander Nikishin (CAR)

18. Shea Theodore (VGK)

19. Bowen Byram (BUF)

20. Mattias Samuelsson (BUF)

21. Thomas Harley (DAL)

22. Mattias Ekholm (EDM)

23. Noah Dobson (BUF) (upper body)

24. Josh Manson (COL)

25. Sam Malinski (COL)

26. Sean Walker (CAR)

27. Devon Toews (COL)

28. Mike Matheson (MON)

29. Noah Hanifin (VGK)

30. Esa Lindell (DAL)

31. Charle-Edouard D'Astous (TBL)

32. J.J. Moser (TBL)

33. Thomas Chabot (OTT)

34. Brandt Clarke (LAK)

35. Kris Letang (PIT)

36. Ryan Shea (PIT)

37. Jordan Spence (OTT)

38. Travis Sanheim (PHI)

39. Jacob Trouba (ANA)

40. Artem Zub (OTT)

41. Jamie Drysdale (PHI)

42. Owen Power (BUF)

43. Parker Wotherspoon (PIT)

44. Jared Spurgeon (MIN)

45. Hampus Lindholm (BOS)

46. John Marino (UTA) (upper body)

47. Sean Durzi (UTA)

48. Logan Stanley (BUF)

49. Cam York (PHI)

50. MacKenzie Weegar (UTA)

51. Victor Hedman (TBL) (personal)

Goalies

1. Scott Wedgewood (COL)

2. Andrei Vasilevskiy (TBL)

3. Jake Oettinger (DAL)

4. Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen (BUF)

5. Carter Hart (VGK)

6. Brandon Bussi (CAR)

7. Filip Gustavsson (MIN)

8. Jeremy Swayman (BOS)

9. Connor Ingram (EDM)

10. Jakub Dobes (MON)

11. Linus Ullmark (OTT)

12. Karel Vejmelka (UTA)

13. Dan Vladar (PHI)

14. Stuart Skinner (PIT)

15. Darcy Kuemper (LAK)

16. Lukas Dostal (ANA)

17. Mackenzie Blackwood (COL)

18. Alex Lyon (BUF) (lower body)

19. Arturs Silovs (PIT)

20. Anton Forsberg (LAK)

21. Casey DeSmith (DAL)

22. Jacob Fowler (MON)

23. Adin Hill (VGK)

24. Jesper Wallstedt (MIN)

25. Frederik Andersen (CAR)

26. Tristan Jarry (EDM)

27. Akira Schmid (VGK)

28. Jonas Johansson (TBL) (undisclosed)

29. James Reimer (OTT)

30. Vitek Vanecek (UTA)

31. Joonas Korpisalo (BOS)

32. Ville Husso (ANA)

33. Samuel Ersson (PHI)

34. Colten Ellis (BUF)

35. Sam Montembeault (MON)