And just like that, the 2021-22 NHL season is upon us.
Over the past few months, we've watched contenders try to bolster their Stanley Cup aspirations or scramble to keep their band together. The Tampa Bay Lightning lost their entire third line, for example.
We've seen middling clubs commit to hard rebuilds. We've witnessed stars try to force their way out of unhappy situations.
We all spent hours reading over projected protection lists, wondering which players the Seattle Kraken would get a shot at taking. We wondered how the NHL draft would unfold. Which way the lotto balls would fall, which prospects would rise and so on.