Laviolette, who led Carolina to the Stanley Cup championship in 2006, said he knows how he wants the Rangers to play as they pursue their first title since 1994.

“When you watch the the teams that find success, they’re pushing the pace, they’re pushing forechecks, they’re pushing pucks with speed, they’re quick to defend,” he said. “We can compete hard on pucks, we can have a great work ethic. That’s what I’m looking for.”

It’s a change that has been welcomed and embraced by the players after their stinging first-round exit that resulted in Laviolette replacing the fired Gerard Gallant.

“The attitude he brings, the energy, enthusiasm,” captain Jacob Trouba said of the new coach, “There’s a little direction he brings. I think that is good for us. ... There’s some adjustments for sure. Just getting comfortable making the reads is going to take a little bit of time, but we know our roles and how we’re supposed to do it, just getting the hang of doing it more frequently and more consistently.”

The Rangers had high expectations a year ago coming off a 110-point regular season and run to the conference finals in the 2022 playoffs. They followed that up by finishing third in the Metropolitan Division, but were ousted by New Jersey in seven games in the first round — including shutouts in two of the last three games.

“Obviously that’s a tough one to swallow,” Trouba said. “I think everyone was stunned for a while in the summer maybe more than past years. ... You got to turn the page, it’s a new season.”

Forward Vincent Trocheck agreed, adding: “We believe that we have the ability to be a team that can contend for the Stanley Cup. ... We know how awful it was last year. We’re coming in (this season) to try to make a really long push.”

The Rangers averaged 3.33 goals per game last season — ninth in the NHL — and have the potential to be a high-scoring team again. Artemi Panarin (29 goals, 63 assists) and Mika Zibanejad (39 goals, 52 assists) both topped 90 points, and Chris Kreider (36 goals) joined Zibanejad in the 30-goal club.

However, the top two lines accounted for the bulk of the production, and when they struggled the team had a hard time scoring. With plenty of skilled puck handlers, the team tended to always look for the perfect pass when the lanes were clogged. Laviolette wants to the team to play an up-tempo pace to counter that.

He’s also been mixing up the lines and defensive pairings during training camp and preseason games. The Kid Line of Kaapo Kakko, Alexis Lafreniere and Filip Chytil that provided energy during the playoff run in 2022 and at times last season will be broken up this year with each player getting slots on the top two lines. Longtime linemates Kreider and Zibanejad will likely be separated as well.

“You don’t always know the chemistry and how good something can be if you don’t try something new,” Zibanejad said. “You want to be able to play with everyone, you want to be ready.”

Ron Francis knows how important last season was for the present and future of the Seattle Kraken.

Seattle found success on the ice by making the playoffs in just its second season. The Kraken developed a footing in a crowded sports marketplace where the hockey team became the focal point during an unexpected playoff run. And by doing so, the team turned the novelty of being the newest NHL franchise into the reality of being a solid team worthy of respect around the league.

Now, they have to do it again and prove the second-year version of the Kraken is the one the NHL can expect to see with regularity.

“We’re not going to surprise anybody. I think they understand that we’re for real,” said Francis, the Kraken’s general manager. “So it’s a tough leap. We hopefully can pick up and do what we did last year. I think our guys are hungry to do that.”

The process begins for Seattle on Tuesday night in its season-opening game at Vegas. The Kraken will be out to ruin the evening for the Golden Knights, who raise their Stanley Cup champions banner.

Seattle will be in the spotlight plenty this season, beginning with the opener. The next time the Kraken see Vegas, it will be the Winter Classic on Jan. 1, hosted by Seattle at T-Mobile Park. Seattle will have 13 games currently for national broadcasts among the league’s TV partners. That’s the same as Chicago with rookie sensation Connor Bedard, and the New York Rangers.

But that kind of attention means proving last season wasn’t a fluke when Seattle went 46-28-8, finished with 100 points in the regular season and knocked out defending champion Colorado in the first round of the playoffs before losing to Dallas in Game 7 of the Western Conference semifinals.

Buffalo Sabres rookie Devin Levi has a mind for analytics and an methodical approach in preparing to become among the league’s first goalies to make the giant leap from the college ranks directly into the NHL.

The Sabres believe the 21-year-old is ready after Levi left Northeastern to sign with Buffalo and closed last season posting a 5-2 record in the midst of the team’s late-season playoff push.

Levi is accustomed to turning negatives in his favor. The 6-foot player from Montreal has used questions about his relative lack of size to focus on improving his agility and foot speed.

Levi will have help on defense. The Sabres locked up defenseman Rasmus Dahlin on Monday to an eight-year, $88 million extension.

Dahlin emerged as a team leader and one of the NHL’s top offensive blue-line threats last season. The 23-year-old becomes the Sabres highest-paid player in terms of annual salary, and has one season left on a three-year, $18 million contract.

Paul Maurice’s two training camps as coach of the Florida Panthers have been brutal. End-of-practice laps that leave most players doubled over in agony. Sessions on the stationary bike that tend to make people wobble. Days are long, demands are many, smiles are few and any praise is earned.

Everything has a purpose. And as the Panthers learned last year, there also can be a payoff.

The Panthers are coming off a season where they won the Eastern Conference, went to the Stanley Cup Final and shed any notion that the franchise can’t contend for hockey’s biggest prize. The journey to all that started in camp last fall, and Maurice almost took glee in making this year’s camp even tougher.

“The reinvestment,” Maurice said, “has to be made.”

The Panthers are entering this season with one goal, and everyone knows what it is. Florida’s season starts Thursday night at Minnesota, when the Panthers’ 56-year-old head coach – quietly, one of the most accomplished in NHL history — will resume his quest to finally get to hoist the Stanley Cup. He came close last spring. His mission now is to finish the job, and that’s why camp was again no cakewalk.

BRIEFLY

BLACKHAWKS: Taylor Hall and his wife, Rachel, welcomed their first child on Sunday, a boy. Then Hall went right back to work with the Chicago Blackhawks. Hall said he is looking forward to a possible boost as a first-time dad. It’s a season of new beginnings for Hall after he was acquired in a trade with Boston in June. The winger, who turns 32 in November, had 16 goals and 20 assists in 61 games with the Bruins last year.

BRUINS: Matthew Poitras is a 19-year-old second-round draft choice who led Boston in scoring this preseason. He is one of two rookies expected to make the opening night roster. Forward Johnny Beecher is a 2019 first-round draft choice who played three seasons in college at Michigan. Bruins general manager Don Sweeney said no one can predict how quickly a player will develop but Poitras forced the team’s brass to make some hard decisions.

AVALANCHE: Colorado made a series of moves, including a claim of goaltender Ivan Prosvetov on waivers from the Arizona Coyotes. Prosvetov is a contingency plan with backup Pavel Francouz being placed on the injured, non-roster list. Starter Alexandar Georgiev is coming off a season in which he won a career-best 40 games.