Chicago Blackhawks
NHL Central 2026-27: A Blackhawks Fan’s Guide to the Division
The Central has been the NHL’s toughest division for a while, and 2026-27 is shaping up as a genuine four-team fight at the top. Colorado won the Presidents’ Trophy. Minnesota finally won a playoff series. Dallas has the deepest roster and a contract problem. Winnipeg has the best goaltender in the world and questions about how long he stays.
Chicago is at the bottom of it, spending money for the first time in years.
Colorado Avalanche
2025-26: Presidents’ Trophy — the best record in the NHL.
The Avalanche got the regular season exactly right and didn’t finish the job, and the offseason reflects a team retooling rather than reloading. They signed Jayden Schwartz and extended Sam Malinski, while moving on from longtime winger Valeri Nichushkin to Columbus and getting younger in the bottom six by sending Jack Drury and Ross Colton to Nashville.
Cale Makar remains the best defenseman in the league and Nathan MacKinnon remains Nathan MacKinnon. Colorado is a top-three favorite to win the Cup and, by most reads, still the division favorite — but nobody expects them to run away with it the way they did last October.
The Blackhawks’ angle: The measuring stick, and the one team Chicago has no realistic path to beating four times.
Dallas Stars
2025-26: Second in the Central, eliminated in six by Minnesota in the first round.
The most complete roster in the division and the one with a countdown clock attached. Dallas re-signed Jason Robertson to a one-year deal, which walks him directly into unrestricted free agency next summer — the same shape as the Mikko Rantanen situation in Colorado, and the question of whether the Stars trade him midseason or let him play it out will define their year.
They’re also still over the salary cap, meaning another move is likely, and they already sent center Mavrik Bourque to Nashville.
The core is intact: Jake Oettinger in goal, Miro Heiskanen and Thomas Harley as two legitimate No. 1 defensemen, center depth behind Roope Hintz and Wyatt Johnston, and Rantanen on the wing.
The Blackhawks’ angle: The team most likely to be sellers at the deadline if things go sideways, which matters for a Chicago club with cap space.
Minnesota Wild
2025-26: 104 points, third in the Central, and a first-round win over Dallas — their first series win since 2014-15.
Minnesota went all in during fall 2025, extending Kirill Kaprizov at a $17 million cap hit and then trading a package including top prospect Zeev Buium to Vancouver for Quinn Hughes, the 2023-24 Norris winner. Matt Boldy has become a genuine driver.
That window is open now and won’t stay open indefinitely. Beating Dallas was the validation; the second round against Colorado was the reminder of the gap.
The Blackhawks’ angle: The clearest example of a franchise deciding its rebuild was finished and paying accordingly — which is the decision Chicago is edging toward.
Winnipeg Jets
Presidents’ Trophy winners two seasons ago, and still built around Connor Hellebuyck, who remains the best goaltender in hockey.
Winnipeg extended Cole Perfetti with the hope he helps drive a playoff push. The larger question hanging over the franchise is Hellebuyck’s future — if he stays, the Jets can make the division genuinely interesting. That uncertainty is doing a lot of work in every projection.
The Blackhawks’ angle: The reminder that elite goaltending covers a multitude of sins, which is relevant to a Chicago team hoping Spencer Knight takes a step.
Nashville, St. Louis, Utah
Nashville was the busiest buyer in the division’s internal trade market, adding Jack Drury and Ross Colton from Colorado and young center Mavrik Bourque from Dallas.
Utah is the division’s other ascending young team, led by Logan Cooley, and is the most direct comparison to Chicago in terms of timeline — a team whose next step is proving the young talent translates.
St. Louis rounds out a division where sixth place still requires a real roster.
Chicago Blackhawks
2025-26: 29-39-14, 72 points, 31st in the league — an improvement on 61 points the year before, and not the one the organization wanted.
The uncomfortable underlying number: Chicago had the worst 5-on-5 expected goal differential in the NHL last season. That’s the gap the offseason was aimed at.
The moves were aggressive by this front office’s standards. Bowen Byram arrived from Buffalo for the No. 4 overall pick, the No. 45 pick and Louis Crevier, then signed for $12.5 million a year. Patrick Kane returned on a two-year, $16 million deal. Jordan Greenway and Cole Smith fill out the bottom six. Roman Kantserov crossed over from the KHL.
The prospect base is genuinely deep — beyond Connor Bedard, Frank Nazar and Anton Frondell, the secondary tier of Marek Vanacker, Sacha Boisvert and Xavier Villeneuve would headline several other systems. What it hasn’t done is win NHL games.
Bedard, now on a five-year deal after his first point-per-game season, will miss the opening six weeks or so following July shoulder surgery.
The bottom line
Four teams can win this division and a fifth has the best goaltender alive. Chicago isn’t one of them.
What’s realistic is the thing the organization has been chasing for three years: moving out of the basement. With Byram stabilizing the blue line and Kane holding the offense together until Bedard returns in November, that’s a reasonable ask — in the hardest division in hockey, which is the part that makes it hard.
Chicago Sports Wire covers the Blackhawks and the Central Division all season. See the Blackhawks schedule for puck drop times and broadcast info.