2023 Stanley Cup Playoffs: Round 2 series picks

Well, that sure was something. The first round of the 2023 Stanley Cup playoffs will not soon be forgotten. It gave us two of the biggest upsets in NHL history, with the bottom-seed Florida Panthers taking out the 65-win Boston Bruins and the playoff newcomer Seattle Kraken dethroning the defending Stanley Cup champion Colorado Avalanche. We saw a wildly entertaining Edmonton Oilers/Los Angeles Kings series in which three of six games went to overtime. And, of course, the Toronto Maple Leafs won three overtime games on the road to end their 19-year playoff series win drought and defeat the Tampa Bay Lightning.

Round 1 was so unpredictable that it wreaked havoc on our brackets, and the Round 1 prediction slate wasn’t pretty. Incredibly, just one of our eight DFO prognosticators, Frank Seravalli, had a record above .500 on first-round picks. I brought up the rear with a pitiful 2-6 record.

Interestingly, while three of five series were split down the middle for Round 1, we have a strong group consensus for each series in Round 2. The Kraken are a great story, but they beat a badly depleted version of the Avs, so we all expect the fun to end against the Stars. Every one of us likes the Edmonton Oilers to take out the Golden Knights, and some of us even expect a short series. Not everyone agrees on the winner for the Leafs vs. Panthers, but most of us lean Toronto’s way, and we all predict a long series. Meanwhile, there’s little confidence that the Canes, without two of their top forwards, can keep up with the New Jersey Devils, who made an impressive comeback from a 2-0 series deficit to take out the New York Rangers in seven games.