Stanley Cup Playoff Roundup: Atlantic uncertainty, Pacific chaos dominate early storylines

MONTREAL, CANADA - APRIL 26: Jake Guentzel #59 of the Tampa Bay Lightning crashes into goaltender Jakub Dobes #75 of the Montréal Canadiens during the second period in Game Four of the First Round of the 2026 Stanley Cup Playoffs at the Bell Centre on April 26, 2026 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The Tampa Bay Lightning defeated the Montréal Canadiens 3-2. (Photo by Minas Panagiotakis/Getty Images) | Getty Images With the month of April about to be in the books, we’re nearing the end of the first round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

Six of the eight series have been incredibly hard fought with either high levels of quality hockey, entertaining hockey, or burning hatred between the two sides. The Carolina Hurricanes have been idle for four full days going on five days after completing a sweep of the Ottawa Senators, and while we now know their first round opponent will be the Philadelphia Flyers, we still don’t know much else about who will be in the mix in round two. Here’s the state of play around the league outside of Carolina’s four-game sweep: Eastern Conference Philadelphia Flyers def.

Pittsburgh Penguins, 4-2 The Flyers became the third team to advance to the second round on Wednesday night with a 1-0 overtime win over the Pittsburgh Penguins, meaning they will be Carolina’s opponent in round two. Philadelphia avoided becoming the fifth team in NHL history to blow a 3-0 series lead in the playoffs, as Pittsburgh was just one more goal away from forcing a decisive Game 7 on home ice. More coming on the Flyers later today, but this sets up an interesting off-season in the Steel City, as Evgeni Malkin is set to be an unrestricted free agent, and while he turned back the clock in the regular season, the tone about extending his career in Pittsburgh has been noncommittal from both sides since training camp.

Kyle Dubas did a good job putting a solid team together this year, but he will have his work cut out for him in his bid to give Sidney Crosby another shut in the playoffs next year. Buffalo Sabres lead Boston Bruins, 3-2 Speaking of being on the verge of blowing leads, things looked over and done for the Bruins after a humiliating 6-1 loss at home in Game 4 to go down 3-1. Then, Jeremy Swayman and David Pastrnak did what they usually do in Game 5 in Buffalo, as Swayman bounced back from Game 4 and Pastrnak delivered a silky smooth overtime winner to quiet the Buffalo crowd and send the series back to Beantown for Game 6 Friday night.