Top 10 bold NHL offseason predictions for Nashville Predators

The opening puck drop of the 2024-25 NHL regular season is still just over two months away, and the Nashville Predators are a team on the rise and expected to make a major jump forward.

Compared to this time last year, the Predators have much larger expectations. In August of 2023 the fanbase was certainly energized thanks to the new hiring of Head Coach Andrew Brunette, Barry Trotz taking over as General Manager, and newly-acquired Ryan O'Reilly. But the expectations were much more tempered than they are currently.

The pressure is on for the 2024-25 Nashville Predators. Here are my 10 bold predictions for the upcoming season, which will be the 26th in franchise history.

#10: The Preds will finish with a top-5 power play

There has been a lot of offseason buzz surrounding the Predators potential power play, thanks to Steven Stamkos and Jonathan Marchessault joining the mix. Let's not forget that Brunette is a power play specialist as a head coach.

The Predators made a noticeable improvement on their power play success under Year 1 of Brunette, going from 27th at 17.6 percent success rate to 16th at 21.6 percent. A strong improvement in terms of success rate thanks in large part to the 2023 offseason addition of Ryan O'Reilly and Gus Nyquist, who are of course returning this season.

What gives me the confidence to make this bold prediction of a top-5 finish, no easy feat, is the Predators should have not only a dominant top unit, but also a very strong second unit. It will be very interesting to see how Brunette chooses to spread the weapon out to each unit, or does he load up heavy on the top unit?

For perspective, the top-5 power play units last season (Tampa Bay, Carolina, New York Rangers, Edmonton, Colorado) all made the playoffs and has success rates ranging from Tampa's 28.6 to 5th-place Colorado having a 24.5 percent rate. So Nashville likely has to improve three or four percentage points to meet this lofty prediction.

#9: Stamkos will top 40+ goals

Many critics don't think Stamkos can translate his enormous individual success, Hall of Fame worthy, to the Nashville Predators. The overall thought is Stamkos is another year older and is moving to a team with not as many elite weapons around him.

As I've repeated since the Stamkos acquisition, it's not as if Stamkos is going to a team full of scrubs and is going into a quiet ending to his career. If anything, this switch to a hungry Nashville team could spring a new jolt of energy into his illustrious career.

While predicting 40-plus goals for Stamkos is a bold and lofty prediction, I don't think it's that crazy to expect. Forsberg just put up 48 goals the previous season, and in 2021-22 both Forsberg and Matt Duchene crossed the 40-plus goal mark. Stamkos can easily do the same with quality weapons around him, and the aforementioned power play which should be a major strength for this team.

I can see Stamkos once again piling up the goals on the power play, while also having a decent presence at 5-on-5 if of course Tommy Novak can flourish in the 2nd line center role and feed Stamkos the puck effectively.

Stamkos has reached 40 or more goals seven times in his NHL career, including two of the last three seasons. Can he do it with his new team in Year 1? That's a big ask, but certainly doable.

#8: Saros gets another Vezina Trophy nomination

First off, I'm not saying he's going to win it in 2025. That would be an enormous bold prediction, but I am predicting he has a bounce back year from 2023-24, and get his second Vezina Trophy nomination of his career. He finished third in the voting in 2021-22.

For this prediction to come true, Saros will first need to improve his win/loss record. Myself included, I'm not a fan of judging goalies on their win/loss record, but it does matter that a goalie is playing for a successful team when it comes to Vezina Trophy nominations.

With what is expected to be much better goal support, I'm planning on Saros maybe even setting a career high in wins for a season and win over 40 games. His current career high is 38 wins in a season in 2021-22.

Saros will also need to drastically improve his Goals Saved Above Expected, which was in the negative this past season. The year before he was the NHL leader. If he can return to being one of the top goalies in the NHL for stealing games and making those ridiculous saves no human should be able to make, I give him a strong chance to at least finish top-3 in the Vezina voting again.

#7: Zachary L'Heureux makes NHL debut

It might be a bit harder than past years for the prospect pool to make the jump into the Predators regular starting lineup. That's what typically happens when the general manager goes heavy on the free agency market like Trotz has done with Stamkos, Marchessault and Skjei.

However, injuries are inevitable and more trades could be incoming that will clear more of a pathway for a player like Zachary L'Heureux to get their first taste of NHL action.

If you're asking me who in the prospect pool is most NHL-ready right now, I'm going with L'Heureux. He plays a hard, aggressive style that should suit him well immediately upon arrival in the NHL.

L'Heureux just completed his first professional season in the AHL with the Admirals and posted an very impressive 48 points in 66 games, and really showed up in the Calder Cup Playoffs with 10 goals in 15 games.

With two more years left on his two-way entry level contract, L'Heureux has plenty of time to finetune his game in the AHL. But if injuries arise or a couple bottom six forwards get traded, then I can realistically see L'Heureux appearing in a few games at some point in 2024-25.

#6: Andrew Brunette wins the Jack Adams Award

With of course an elevated amount of pressure, and the first year honeymoon phase over, Head Coach Andrew Brunette is looking to take this team not only back to the postseason, but obviously have a deep run.

Brunette coached a team that finished ahead of schedule according to most analysts out there. He took the Predators to a 47-30-5 record for a point percentage of .604. They ran into an offensive wall in the first round of the playoffs, but the overall sentiment around the team was a positive one for Brunette's first year.

With Trotz emptying the bank account in free agency, Brunette has to deliver this team to even more success. Brunette finished 2nd in the Jack Adams voting this past season, behind Canucks Head Coach Rick Tocchet. Brunette also finished runner-up in the Jack Adams Award voting in 2021-22 leading the Florida Panthers.

If the Predators can surge into the 100-plus point range in the standings and finish in a top-three division spot, while also at least coming close to claiming a division title, then Brunette will be an easy choice to vote for and win.

The Predators have never had a Head Coach win the Jack Adams Award, so this franchise is due. Trotz finished in the top-three twice, and Peter Laviolette finished third in the voting in 2010-11.

#5: Preds will reach 105 points, Finish in the Top-3 of Central

The Predators rallied for 99 points in the standings last season wheh just a couple months before things were looking grim at even making the playoffs. An 18-game point streak, a franchise record, changed all of that.

Now the hope is that there will be more consistency so that an 18-game point streak isn't needed to rally into the playoffs, and that will mean a need for a better start which won't be easy with new players being introduced to the lineup.

The Predators have only reached the 105-point mark three times in their history (05-06, 06-07, 17-18). They have reached 104 points twice. With the way this team looks on paper, it will be a letdown and underperformance if they don't at least reach 100 points or more. But I'm going a little further than that and putting my mark at 105 points.

Even at 105 points, that probably won't be enough to win the division. I expect Dallas and Colorado to be over 105 points. The Stars won the division last season with 113 points, the Jets had 110 and the Avalanche 107.

#4: Preds break their 1st Round curse dating back to 2018

When you look back at Predators history in the playoffs, it's pretty grim once you remove the 2017 Stanley Cup Final appearance. One that shocked everyone. Very few times in their history have they entered a season with elevated odds to make the Stanley Cup Final before the season starts.

Trotz has said that he wants "serial winners". It plays a primary role in which players he wants to sign, and you see that with his signings of Ryan O'Reilly and Luke Schenn in 2023, and this current offseason with Stamkos and Marchessault.

Stamkos also said that the goal is to get into the playoffs and then go deep. Ultimately the measurement of this team isn't going to be how they do in the regular season, as long as they obviously get in, but what they do once they're in.

All of these free agency moves will quickly be second-guessed if the Predators have another first round exit, or quite frankly even a second round exit. The realistic expectation should quite frankly be a Western Conference Finals appearance, which the franchise has only achieved once.

The ultimate factor that puts the Predators over-the-top to finally get past the first round again is they're going to have a championship level power play. I predicted top-5 earlier in this piece, and that carries over in a big way into the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

#3: Evangelista Reaches 50-point plateau

Luke Evangelista has looked like a naturals scoring winger right from his NHL debut on February 28, 2023. He scored a power play goal in his second career NHL game, and he's coming off a 39-point campaign in 80 games played this past season.

So essentially Evangelista is going into his second fulltime NHL season, and it's not a crazy stretch of the imagination to predict he'll reach 50 points. The only thing that gives me some pause is he'll be in the bottom-six now that Marchessault is in the mix.

Regardless, Evangelista is such a naturally gifted offensive playmaker that as long as he stays healthy, 50 points should be easily attainable. I'm looking for more of a power play presence from him, and increased confidence on the puck to see his point output spike up to that 50-point range.

It's unclear who Evangelista's linemates will be if he ends up on the third line. Juuso Parssinen, who is still unsigned as a RFA, is a popular choice to put at center with Evangelista.

#2: Preds add another big piece at 2025 Trade Deadline

This is going way into the future so forgive me if this prediction ends up being a swing and a miss, but looking at current contracts it wouldn't surprise me at all if Trotz goes big game hunting again at the 2025 Trade Deadline. He has already revealed to us that he's not afraid to take bold risks to make the roster championship caliber.

First you have to take a look at some big ticket free agents in 2025, because those players will possibly be moved by their respective teams when that deadline approaches. Some of your highest profile 2025 free agents include Leon Draisaitl, Brock Boeser, Sidney Crosby, and then of course Mitch Marner who was already speculated in trade buzz with the Predators before free agency.

I'm not saying any of those blockbuster players who going to be traded to the Predators, but what I am saying is it's a pretty fair bet to make that Trotz will do something. It's impossible to know where the Predators will be in the standings to sway that decision, but assuming the Predators are entrenched in the playoff race, Trotz will be looking to boost the lineup even more if he a game-changer is available on the trade market.

I'll call my shot here and say that Trotz looks for another center if Novak isn't working out. I've got attention on a 2025 UFA like Sam Bennett or Carter Verhaeghe, both on the Florida Panthers currently.

#1: Cody Glass is traded before regular season starts

This seems inevitable when you look at the Predators' current cap restraints. I just don't see a pathway for Cody Glass to be anything more than a healthy scratch, occasional starter. At $2.5 million cap hit, that's just not going to work. Especially with the Predators sitting at under $600,000 of projected cap space and still needing new deals for RFAs Juuso Parssinen and Phil Tomasino.

The trade return isn't going to be anything glamorous because the Predators aren't really going to hold the leverage in a trade. They need to unload Glass more than a team's possible desire to acquire Glass.

Glass deserves a fresh start somewhere else. He has gotten squeezed out of the starting lineup with the free agency moves and he only played in 41 games last season. Down from 72 games the season before.

There was once high hopes that Glass could be the future top-six center for the Predators, but other factors have put that at a screeching halt. There are teams out there, probably a rebuilding team with the cap space available, to take on Glass for basically very little in return to send to Nashville. A cap casualty looks like the only way out for both parties.

If this happens, I wish Glass the best. A standup and classy player with still a lot of potential at age 25. But he's not going to get his fair shot to prove that with the Predators anymore.