Ranking the NHL's 10 Best Rivalries

They make players' and fans' blood boil every time out. They get entire cities jawing at each other. They ramp the intensity of every meeting. Yep, theres noting like a good, bitter rivalry, and these are currently the NHL's 10 best, ranked in order. BY ALLAN MUIR

Author:
SI Staff
Publish date:
Apr 7, 2016

Ranking the NHL's 10 Best Rivalries

10. Oilers vs. Flames

The 35-year-long Battle of Alberta typically brings out the best in both sides. And even as both sides are in the midst of long rebuilds, this rivalry is on the verge of returning to its past glories. The arrival of exciting young talent like Edmonton's Connor McDavid and Calgary's Sam Bennett, former linemates as kids growing up in Toronto, might even escalate it to the levels of Gretzky and Fuhr vs. Fleury and Vernon.

9. Canadiens vs. Maple Leafs

The granddaddy of all NHL rivalries never goes out of style. While today's meetings lack the frisson of the good ol' days when the Rocket was up against Tim Horton or Wendel battled Big Bird, there's still something magical about the Leafs and the Habs on a Saturday night. “You know what it means,” said Montreal's P.K. Subban. “You never want to lose to those guys. Ever.”

8. Kings vs. Sharks

It might not boast the history of other rivalries on this list but this one has grown quickly, nourished by the traditional NoCal/SoCal hate and three playoff battles in four years, including San Jose's epic seven-game meltdown in 2014. Both sides like to play it heavy, so tensions tend to rise rapidly when these two get together.

7. Blackhawks vs. Blues

It might not match the fever pitch of the early '90s when brawls like the St. Patrick's Day Massacre often occurred, but this rivalry that was born and bred in the old Norris Division has taken on new, delicious urgency. Both sides can play it any way you want, and that ability to dominate with skill or physical presence makes for a thrilling head-to-head matchup. It says something that Hawks captain Jonathan Toews has been in just four fights in the past five seasons, and two of them have been against his Blues counterpart, David Backes.

6. Ducks vs. Kings

Two teams that share a market, a heavy style of play and the ability to win it all. No wonder they don't like each other. As the two SoCal teams have established themselves among the NHL's best, the Freeway Face-off has become one of the top rivalries in the game. The Ducks have dominated in the regular season, winning 11 of the past 14 games, but the Kings claimed their only playoff meeting, a bruising seven-game set that paved the way to their 2014 Cup. It seems inevitable that they'll meet up again this spring.

5. Blackhawks vs. Kings

“I wouldn’t say it’s a rivalry in terms of bitter,” Kings coach Darryl Sutter said of his team's unique connection with the Hawks. “It’s a rivalry because of respect.” That mutual admiration is understandable. The two Western foes have combined to claim five of the past six Stanley Cups, with two of those journeys seeing one team take out the other along the way. The epic seven-game tilt won by the Kings in 2014 might have been the finest and most intense playoff series in two decades.

4. Bruins vs. Canadiens

No rivalry in NHL history has provided more signature moments—think “too many men,” Ken Dryden's debut or Glen Wesley's comeback clincher in 1989—than Boston-Montreal. Among the more recent: the devastating hit that Zdeno Chara laid on Max Pacioretty back in 2012 that led to 911 calls in Montreal and a plea for criminal charges to be filed against the Bruins captain. Both sides can have fun with it as well, though. Chara and Pacioretty both were used to taunt opposing fans in McDonald's commercials during the past year.

3. Capitals vs. Penguins

For years, this rivalry has been viewed as a referendum on the superiority of the game's two brightest stars, Sidney Crosby and Alex Ovechkin. That head-to-head battle produced one of the greatest playoff moments in recent memory: the dual hat trick game that opened the 2009 Eastern semi-final. Now, though, it takes on broader importance as both sides see the other as the roadblock that stands between them and a berth in the 2016 Stanley Cup Final.

2. Islanders vs. Rangers

Even as it loses the suburb-city dynamic that powered it for nearly nearly half a century, the rivalry between New York's two teams shows no signs of diminishing. “I think there’s genuinely some hatred between the two teams,” Isles forward Cal Clutterbuck said earlier this season. “It's never just another game when they're in the building,” said Rangers goalie Henrik Lundqvist. The hostility that defines their regular-season battles makes it easy to forget they haven't met in the playoffs in more than two decades.

1. Flyers vs. Penguins

It's more than just in-state convenience that's fanned the flames of hatred between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. It's the head-to-head showdown between two of the best players in the game. There's a genuine animosity that exists between Sidney Crosby and Claude Giroux, one that was fully realized in the opening shift of Game 6 of the 2012 Eastern quarter-Final when the Flyers captain destroyed Crosby five seconds in and then gave Philly a 1-0 lead with a post-in snipe 27 seconds later. “I don't like him, and he doesn't like me,” Crosby said later, keeping the fires burning.