Built for the regular season versus built for the playoffs.
In 2022, Dan Dukart wrote about the differences between building a 'playoff team' and a 'team that can win the Stanley Cup.'
I've thought quite a bit about that concept over the last few years, and the types of players you see that are an engine when it matters this time of year. Jordan Staal, a 2009 Stanley Cup champion with the Penguins, is 37 years old and one win away from lifting his second Stanley Cup with the Hurricanes.
His NHL.com player profile page starts with Staal "embodies what it means to be a Hurricane." Don Waddell, the former general manager of the Hurricanes, said that in 2023, when Staal signed a four-year contract extension. In this year’s playoffs, Staal has 12 points (eight goals, four assists), with six of those goals coming against the Golden Knights in the Final. He's the first player in 70 years to score goals in the first five games of a Cup Final.
Legendary performance. Conn Smythe-level execution.
The Columbus Blue Jackets are trying to break through and surpass the playoff dividing line for the first time since 2019-20, when John Tortorella last coached Columbus to the playoffs. When watching the Stanley Cup playoffs year in and year out, it's not hard to see the skill that separates pretenders from contenders.
Of course, these are the Stanley Cup playoffs where the best shine on the brightest stage.
There were times this past season when the Blue Jackets under head coach Rick Bowness looked like a juggernaut. When they were scoring goals and winning with regularity in January before the Olympic break, they could do no wrong.
Two points in the standings mean as much in January as they do in March and April.
The NHL schedule is grueling. Next season, the schedule will increase to 84 games from 82. Maybe that benefits the Blue Jackets, who missed the playoffs two seasons ago by two points and by six points in the division this past season. Slumping at the wrong time of the year cost them again.
Columbus is improved now versus where they were three years ago. Going from last place in the Metropolitan Division in 2022-23 and 2023-24, before the surprise season with 40 wins and 89 points under Dean Evason in 2024-25, and finishing with 40 wins and 92 points this past season.
In actuality, the year under Evason was a surprise story that ended strong. The past season under Bowness ended in a whimper. Two different ways to miss the playoffs. The players said all the right things through the highs and lows of 2025-26. Now they have to back up their words on the ice.
Just as Waddell helped put together a winner with the Hurricanes, a team that has become a power in the league and made the playoffs every year since 2018-19, Waddell is tasked with adding to and fine-tuning his Blue Jackets roster for the season ahead. Bowness has to put into practice what he preached at the end of the season to ultimately change the culture and get the most out of his players at the most critical time. The players have to come through in March and April, just as they do in the months leading up.
Kirill Marchenko, one of the Blue Jackets' best players and their best forward, finished the 2025-26 season with 67 points (27 goals, 40 assists) in 76 games. He had three goals over the final month of the season.
Rick Bowness said he spoke with Kirill Marchenko this morning and told him to just go out and have fun. “I’d like to see him smile a little more, loosen up a little more.” Marchenko had a natural hat trick against Buffalo in a 9-4 #CBJ win in December of 2023.
— Dave Maetzold (@DMaetzMedia) April 9, 2026
As the season wore on and the playoff races intensified, teams increasingly targeted Marchenko, shutting him down and rendering him ineffective at critical moments down the stretch. The result is twofold: a testament to the respect he's earned around the league and a valuable lesson as he continues to evolve into the superstar he's shown he can become.
As a whole, the Blue Jackets slogged their way through a 3-9-1 stretch to close the season, fighting through a prolonged scoring malaise. The team scored 10 goals over a five-game stretch to close out March, going 1-4-1. That stretch came on the heels of a four-game winning streak in which Columbus scored 18 goals.
In April, The Athletic's Aaron Portzline referenced the end-of-season scoring slumps by the team, notably, both Marchenko and Zach Werenski. A team desperate for offense wasn't getting its usual offensive firepower from its two best players. Werenski, this year's Norris winner, is the engine on the back end for Columbus. When he's involved in the play and producing offensively, the team has a good chance to win on most nights.
Columbus goes as he goes.
Throughout the season, it was rare for Werenski to go more than three consecutive games without a point — it only happened twice. But he was a different player after the Olympics and only registered six points (two goals) between Mar. 22 and the season finale on Apr. 14. His shootout goal on Apr. 7 helped end an 0-5-1 losing streak in Detroit.
ZACH WERENSKI THE MICHIGAN NATIVE SCORES THE SHOOTOUT WINNER VS THE WINGS!!!! pic.twitter.com/gSMqVJFvqR
— B/R Open Ice (@BR_OpenIce) April 8, 2026
Columbus could use more high-end talent to pair with Marchenko and Werenski, but those players don't just grow on trees. When we talked about Werenski's year in review last week, we said the time was now to build a contender around Werenski. He has two more years before he's an unrestricted free agent. Marchenko is a restricted free agent next summer.
The Blue Jackets have elevated themselves from the doldrums of the league standings into late-season playoff races. Now they're at a point where they have to show consistency from October through April.
The foundation is in place — now it's about turning incremental progress into true contention.
