The Nashville Predators’ season has not gone as intended. Aside from some easy-squeezy games against the San Jose Sharks, Nashville has not looked like a playoff team with veteran players eager to chase a Cup. We’re getting fairly close to December, and the typical rule-of-thumb is that if a NHL team is not in playoff contention at American Thanksgiving, they have a very low likelihood of going on a heater and ending up in the playoffs. Obviously, there are always exceptions to this—the 2019 Blues went on a massive heater after New Year’s and got to hoist the Cup.