The Carolina Hurricanes are making a late charge for the Presidents' Trophy, going 7-3-0 over their last 10 games and sitting six points behind the Colorado Avalanche with less than two weeks remaining in the 2025-26 NHL season. However, it likely is too late for that objective to be reached.
Colorado leads the league with 110 points and has six games left on its regular-season schedule, while Carolina has just five contests remaining. The Avalanche can extinguish the Hurricanes' slim hopes Tuesday with a regulation victory over the St. Louis Blues and a regulation loss to the Boston Bruins by Carolina.
Week 24 Recap
Colorado began Week 24 with an 8-6 setback against the league-worst Vancouver Canucks, rallying from a four-goal deficit before ultimately succumbing. The Avalanche ended the week with a 3-2 loss to the Blues, who are five points back in the race for the second wild card in the Western Conference.
In between those defeats, Colorado extended its road winning streak to five games with a 2-0 triumph over the Dallas Stars, who are eight points behind the Avalanche in the Central Division. Colorado can clinch the division title and the No. 1 seed in the West with a win at St. Louis on Tuesday.
Only three teams were perfect in Week 24: the Minnesota Wild won all three of their games, while the Vegas Golden Knights and Utah Mammoth both went 2-0-0. Vegas sits in third place in the Pacific Division, and Utah holds the first wild-card spot in the West.
The Los Angeles Kings earned seven of a possible eight points (3-0-1), leading the Nashville Predators by one point for the second wild card. The Anaheim Ducks allowed the Edmonton Oilers to catch them for first place in the Pacific by losing all three contests, while the New York Islanders and Columbus Blue Jackets damaged their postseason hopes by going 0-3-0.
No team had a worse week than the Seattle Kraken, who suffered four regulation losses to fall to 3-11-2 over their last 16 games. The downward spiral has put Seattle eight points behind Los Angeles for the second wild-card spot in the West with six games remaining.
Week 25 Power Rankings
1. Colorado Avalanche (1-2-0 in Week 24; 50-16-10 overall)
The Avalanche's subpar week can partly be attributed to the absence of Cale Makar, who missed all three games with an upper-body injury and is likely to be sidelined for at least a few more contests. Valeri Nichushkin also was absent for last Sunday's loss to St. Louis but is expected to return on Tuesday.
Scott Wedgewood was one of the few bright spots, making 17 saves against the Stars for his third shutout of the season. The 33-year-old netminder leads the NHL in both goals-against average (2.13) and save percentage (.918).
Brent Burns recorded a goal and an assist in both of the Avs' losses while playing in his 1,000th consecutive game last Saturday in Dallas. The 41-year-old defenseman joined Phil Kessel (1,064) as the only players in NHL history to accomplish that feat.
Nathan MacKinnon scored two goals to increase his league-leading total to 51, matching his career high.