NHN East Division Picks: Philadelphia Flyers Beasts Of The East

Are the Philadelphia Flyers poised to win the first-ever Mass Mutual East Division title? 

The 2021 NHL Season kicks off in Philadelphia tonight when the Flyers host their longtime rivals, the Pittsburgh Penguins in the first-ever East Division game, and out of our four National Hockey Now writers that cover teams in the East Division, two of the four picked the Philadelphia Flyers to be the top seed out of four playoff teams from the East.

Due to the COVID pandemic and travel restrictions and the Canadian-United States border being closed for the foreseeable future, the NHL had to have all seven Canadian NHL teams remain in Canada throughout the season in the Scotia North Division. The rest of the league will play their 56 regular season games south of the border in the East, Central, and West Divisions.

The eight-team East Division consists of the Boston Bruins, Philadelphia Flyers, Pittsburgh Penguins, New York Rangers, New York Islanders, New Jersey Devils, Washington Capitals, and the Buffalo Sabres will all play each other eight times each. As they say, familiarity breeds contempt and with the skill and physical play of these teams, new rivalries are expected to develop fast and old ones, like the Flyers and Penguins tonight, will be taken to another level!

So without further ado, here are the National Hockey Now East Division predictions:

Jimmy Murphy (Boston Hockey Now)

Division Winner: Philadelphia Flyers

Surprise Playoff Team (If any): New York Rangers

MVP of Division: Carter Hart

Best Defenseman: Ivan Provorov

Best Goalie: Carter Hart

Joe Haggerty (Boston Hockey Now)

Division Winner: Philadelphia Flyers 

Surprise Playoff Team (If any): New York Rangers

MVP of Division: Brad Marchand

Best Defenseman: Ivan Provorov 

Best Goalie: Tuukka Rask

Dan Kingerski (Pittsburgh Hockey Now)

Division Winner: Washington Capitals 

Surprise Playoff Team (If any): New York Rangers

MVP of Division: Sidney Crosby

Best Defenseman: John Carlson

Best Goalie: Tristan Jarry

Christian Arnold (NYI Hockey Now)

Division Winner: Boston Bruins

Surprise Playoff Team (If any): New York Rangers 

MVP of Division: Artemi Panarin 

Best Defenseman: Adam Pelech 

Best Goalie: Ilya Samsonov