State Your Case: Are Rangers favorites to win Stanley Cup?

The NHL holiday break starts Sunday, and no matter how the New York Rangers do in their games on Friday and Saturday, they will head into the three-day gameless window as one of the top teams in the NHL.

Heading into their home game against Connor McDavid and the Edmonton Oilers on Friday (7:30 p.m. ET; HULU, ESPN+, SN), the Rangers are 22-7-1 and lead the Metropolitan Division with 45 points. Their .750 points percentage leads the NHL.

But at this point in the season, should they be considered the favorites to win the Stanley Cup?

That’s the question before NHL.com Editor-in-Chief Bill Price and senior director of editorial Shawn P. Roarke in this installment of State Your Case.

Price: A scary thing happened for the rest of the NHL this week -- Igor Shesterkin got his groove back. Shesterkin looked nothing like one of the best goalies in the League the past few weeks, but in consecutive wins against the Boston Bruins and Toronto Maple Leafs on Saturday and Tuesday, he allowed a total of three goals, making 52 saves. The Rangers were already at the top of the standings despite Shesterkin going 10-7-0 with a 3.02 goals-against average and .902 save percentage before Saturday, but if he finds the formula that led to him winning the Vezina Trophy as the best goalie in the NHL in 2021-22, a Rangers team that is already at the top of the League certainly should be considered the favorite to win it all.

Roarke: Man, I got the easy end of this assignment, arguing the field (31 teams) against the Rangers, but I won’t do that. Are the Rangers a favorite? Of course they are. Are they the favorite? No. You know who the best team in the NHL was one year ago, on Dec. 22, 2022? The Boston Bruins, about one-third of the way into the best regular-season performance by an NHL team. Come the Stanley Cup Playoffs, the Bruins were out in the first round, upset in seven games by the Florida Panthers. The second-best regular-season team? The Carolina Hurricanes, ousted by the Panthers in a four-game sweep in the Eastern Conference Final. But arguing the field is the easy way out. I’ll pick the team that is most deserving of the “favorite” designation at this moment. It’s the Vegas Golden Knights. Their points percentage is .691 and they've returned almost the same team as last season and have the know-how to go through four rounds of playoffs -- no easy task. Ask this group of Rangers, most of whom were around for the first-round loss to the New Jersey Devils last season.

Price: Leave it to Captain Obvious to pick the defending Cup champions, or use the Bruins and Hurricanes as examples of why the Rangers shouldn’t be considered Cup favorites. Shawn mentions the Rangers’ loss to the Devils last season as a knock against them, but he fails to mention they now have Peter Laviolette as coach and that Artemi Panarin is playing out of his mind, leading New York with 43 points (17 goals, 26 assists). Everyone, including Panarin, knows his playoff performance against New Jersey last season was a disappointment. So what did he do? He shaved his head and grew his game. He’s shooting the puck much more this season (126 shots on goal through 30 games this season, compared to 72 at the same point last season), and leading a power play that is tied with the Devils for tops in the NHL at 31.3 percent. As for Laviolette, he has found playoff success pretty much everywhere he’s gone, and his ability to adjust on the fly – something New York didn’t have last season -- should be a big help in the postseason. Add to the mix a physical leader in defenseman Jacob Trouba, a sniper in Mika Zibanejad, an all-world defenseman in Adam Fox and the Rangers’ past willingness to go for it at the NHL Trade Deadline (March 8), and I don’t see how they can’t be considered the favorites to win the Cup right now.

Roarke: Captain Obvious? I like it. I think the most obvious statement that has been made in this exchange is that the Rangers are a good team. Duh. They have a .750 points percentage. They take three of every four points they contest. That’s a good way to live in the NHL. Laviolette has had a huge impact on their success. I’m just going to look at playoff history. Rarely has the best team at the holiday break been the last team standing in the middle of June (see the Bruins last season or the Hurricanes the season before). There is a long way to go, and a few surprises are likely to be encountered on the journey. The Rangers are a favorite, not the favorite. It’s that simple.