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Tampa Bay’s 2025-26 season produced individual hardware that few rosters can match in a single year. Nikita Kucherov won the Hart Trophy as league MVP, Andrei Vasilevskiy won the Vezina Trophy as the NHL’s top goaltender, and Jon Cooper won the Jack Adams Award as coach of the year. The Lightning backed it up with a 50-26-6 record, 106 points and second place in the Atlantic Division. None of it changed the ending. Montreal eliminated Tampa Bay in seven one-goal games in the first round, the fourth consecutive season the Lightning have gone out in the opening round despite fielding one of the league’s most talented rosters. The schedule doesn’t offer a gentle reintroduction \u2014 Tampa Bay opens 2026-27 on the road against the New York Rangers on October 1<\/a>, then comes home two days later to face the Washington Capitals, the team John Carlson left to sign in Tampa this summer.<\/p>\n General manager Julien BriseBois spent the offseason treating the last two years as proof the core is good enough rather than a reason to blow it up, telling NHL.com<\/a> that the past two seasons have featured two of the best teams the franchise has had during its current run as a Stanley Cup contender, even if it hasn’t translated into playoff success yet. Whether a healthy Victor Hedman and a two-year deal for Carlson are enough to finally get Tampa Bay out of the first round is worth comparing across FanDuel<\/a>, Hard Rock Bet<\/a> and BetRivers<\/a> before puck drop.<\/p>\n Lightning Stanley Cup Odds: +1100 to +1200<\/p>\n Hard Rock Bet<\/a> and FanDuel<\/a> both price Tampa Bay at +1200 to win the Cup. BetRivers<\/a> is the shortest of the three at +1100.<\/p>\n Odds current as of Friday, Sept. 18. Futures shift once the preseason wraps up and the roster is finalized, so check the best betting apps<\/a> for the live number before committing.<\/p>\n A $100 ticket on Tampa Bay returns $1,200 at Hard Rock Bet or FanDuel against $1,100 at BetRivers on the identical outcome \u2014 a 9% gap on a team every book treats as a top-eight contender. The conference market actually flips the order: FanDuel is the longest price at +650 to win the East, while BetRivers and Hard Rock Bet both sit at +600. That kind of split, where the same book is the best value on one market and the worst on another, is exactly why the full board is worth checking before a futures ticket goes in.<\/p>\n BET LIGHTNING FUTURES AT FANATICS<\/a><\/p>\n Captain Victor Hedman missed the final 22 regular season games and all seven playoff games last season after stepping away to prioritize his mental health. He hasn’t played in a game since March 19, but he has been skating regularly since August 1 and said he is feeling great heading into training camp. His 2025-26 line \u2014 17 points in 33 games \u2014 was a fraction of the 66 points he posted in 79 games two seasons earlier, and getting him back to that level, or even close to it, is the single biggest swing factor for a defense corps that otherwise skews older. Victor Hedman put it plainly<\/a>: losing in the first round for four straight years is not good enough.<\/p>\n The other major change on the back end addresses the roster’s clearest departure. Darren Raddysh set a career high with 70 points last season before a sign-and-trade sent him to Toronto, and Tampa Bay replaced that production with John Carlson, a 36-year-old with more than 1,000 NHL games who signed a two-year, $17 million contract on July 1 after posting 60 points in 71 games split between Washington and Anaheim. Carlson’s NHL Edge shot profile \u2014 five long-range goals in the 96th percentile, six mid-range goals in the 94th percentile and 15 high-danger shots on goal in the 97th percentile \u2014 suggests he can anchor the power play the way Raddysh did, even if he isn’t a direct stylistic replacement. J.J. Moser is expected to take on more responsibility alongside him, Charle-\u00c9douard D’Astous \u2014 who is paired with Hedman after a breakout rookie season \u2014 is the biggest question mark among the projected top-six defensemen, and veterans Erik Cernak and Ryan McDonagh round out a group that should still be among the league’s best if the health holds.<\/p>\n Kucherov’s Encore and Point’s Bounce-Back<\/p>\n Kucherov’s MVP season was not a fluke built on one hot stretch. He finished with 130 points and a plus-43 rating, missing only 11 games total over the past four seasons, and his NHL Edge numbers back up the eye test across the board \u2014 18 high-danger goals in the 95th percentile, an average shot speed of 62.49 mph in the 95th percentile, and 244.04 miles of total skating distance, also 95th percentile. Jake Guentzel scored 26 high-danger goals, third in the league, and Brandon Hagel added 20 high-danger goals of his own in the 97th percentile, giving Tampa Bay three legitimate finishers on the wings even before the middle of the lineup is factored in.<\/p>\n The name to watch is Brayden Point, who is projected to center the top line alongside Kucherov after a down year limited by a right knee injury \u2014 63 games played, 18 goals that tied his rookie-season low, and just six power-play goals after topping 15 in most healthy seasons. His underlying speed metrics never disappeared, with 315 skating bursts over 20 mph ranking eighth in the league, which points to a bounce-back if the knee cooperates rather than a genuine decline. Anthony Cirelli, a Selke Trophy runner-up, remains the team’s primary matchup center, and Ilya Mikheyev arrives on a four-year deal bringing elite straight-line speed \u2014 a 95th-percentile 23.54 mph top skating speed \u2014 to a bottom six that also has to absorb the loss of Yanni Gourde, out until December following hip surgery, and Dominic James, sidelined by a broken hand suffered in training camp.<\/p>\n Vasilevskiy’s Vezina Season, By the Numbers<\/p>\n Andrei Vasilevskiy’s Vezina Trophy was earned rather than awarded on reputation. He posted 35 quality starts, tied for second in the NHL, along with a .912 mid-range save percentage that tied for sixth and an .844 high-danger save percentage that tied for seventh. Those are the numbers of a goaltender who is still performing at an elite level entering his age-32 season, and they matter more than usual for a team whose margin in close playoff games \u2014 Tampa Bay’s series against Montreal featured seven one-goal games \u2014 has been the difference between advancing and going home in April.<\/p>\n The Prospects Behind a Win-Now Roster<\/p>\n Sam O’Reilly, acquired from Edmonton in a July 2025 trade, is the prospect most likely to make an immediate impact. He won Memorial Cup MVP with 28 points in 18 playoff games, helped Canada to a bronze medal at the 2026 World Juniors, and is viewed internally as a future Anthony Cirelli-type center; he is expected to arrive in 2026-27. Dylan Duke, a two-way bottom-six energy forward who posted 59 points across 72 AHL games, is also in the mix for this season. Ethan Gauthier, Ethan Czata and Benjamin Rautiainen \u2014 the last of whom led Finland’s Liiga in scoring and was named league MVP \u2014 are further behind, with 2027-28 or 2028-29 timelines. None of them move the Cup number, but a healthy pipeline gives Tampa Bay more margin to absorb the injuries that have already hit the bottom of the lineup.<\/p>\n BET NHL FUTURES AT HARD ROCK BET<\/a>Best Bets and Predicted Finish<\/p>\n Best Bet: Lightning to win the Eastern Conference (+650 at FanDuel<\/a>) \u2014 Tampa Bay finished third in the East last season with a compromised blue line for the final quarter of the year, and FanDuel pays out 8% more than BetRivers or Hard Rock Bet’s +600 for the identical outcome. A full season of Hedman and a healthy Point make the longer FanDuel price the better way to back a team every book already rates near the top of the conference.<\/p>\n Value play: shop the full board. FanDuel is the best price on the conference market but the worst on the outright Cup price, and Hard Rock Bet and BetRivers split the same way in reverse. Comparing the complete list of online sportsbooks<\/a> before placing a futures bet is the only way to know which number is actually the best one available.<\/p>\n Fade: Lightning Stanley Cup at BetRivers’ +1100. At an 8.3% implied probability, that price assumes Hedman returns to form immediately and a defense corps that skews older stays healthy through 82 games and a full playoff run. Hard Rock Bet and FanDuel both pay 9% more at +1200 for the same bet, and the age and health questions on the back end argue for taking the longer number if a Cup ticket is going in at all.<\/p>\n Predicted finish: second or third in the Atlantic Division, 100-104 points, and \u2014 the number that actually matters after four straight first-round exits \u2014 at least one playoff round win.<\/p>\n Check the current sportsbook promos<\/a> available at Florida sportsbooks<\/a>, compare the number across the full board of US sportsbooks<\/a>, and always stay within your limits.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tampa Bay’s 2025-26 season produced individual hardware that few rosters can match in a single year. 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