The NHL returns next week — here are some things to follow

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The 2025-26 NHL season opens in six days, Canadian teams start hitting the ice in a week, and the Olympic men's hockey tournament begins 134 days from today (not that we're counting).

Here's a quick catchup on a few big storylines around the league:

Florida's threepeat hopes are on thin ice.

No team has hoisted the Stanley Cup three consecutive times since the New York Islanders won four in a row from 1980 to '83. After defeating Edmonton in back-to-back Cup finals, the Panthers were able to keep their vaunted depth intact by re-signing Conn Smythe Trophy winner Sam Bennett, fellow star forward Brad Marchand and key defenceman Aaron Ekblad.

But Florida will be without its two best players as forward Matthew Tkachuk is sidelined until December after core-muscle surgery while Aleksander Barkov is likely out for the entire regular season due to a severe knee injury. And remember that the NHL closed the long-term injured reserve loophole that the Panthers (and other teams) cleverly exploited in recent years to beef up their roster for the playoffs.

Connor McDavid still hasn't committed to the Oilers.

The three-time MVP and five-time scoring champion is now exactly nine months away from becoming the most coveted unrestricted free agent in NHL history. The price for Edmonton to prevent the world's best player from hitting the open market went up yesterday when Minnesota signed Kirill Kaprizov to an eight-year, $136-million US extension — the richest contract in NHL history in terms of both total money and average annual value ($17M, easily surpassing Leon Draisaitl's $14M