7 greatest expansion success stories in NHL history and where the Golden Knights rank

The Vegas Golden Knights set a high bar for NHL expansion teams, but they are not the first new kids who crashed the league’s party ahead of schedule.

From early Original Six challengers to Sun Belt success stories, expansion clubs reshaped what “starting from scratch” actually means. This list looks at seven of the best success stories and stacks them up against Vegas to figure out where the Golden Knights really belong in the expansion pecking order.

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MORE: 7 best all-time Carolina Hurricanes and Hartford Whalers

Las Vegas is one of two expansion teams to play in a Stanley Cup Final during its inaugural season. The other, the 1967-68 St. Louis Blues, had an advantage. The six expansion teams that year were bunched into one division. Whichever team won the division headed to the Final.

The Golden Knights did not stop at the expansion fairy tale. They turned the early momentum into a sustained window. Vegas has made multiple deep playoff runs, including a Stanley Cup championship in 2023 that validated the front office’s aggressive approach in trades and free agency, from acquiring Mark Stone to landing Jack Eichel.

Now, Vegas is back in the Stanley Cup Final for the third time in its ninth year of existence.

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So where do the Golden Knights rank in this list? Here’s a hint: You won’t have to wait long to find them, just like Vegas fans got a free pass to the Final.

An expansion team, in this context, is a new franchise added to the NHL as opposed to an existing club that relocates.

2017-18 Vegas Golden Knights

The Vegas Golden Knights did what every expansion club dreams about and nobody rationally expects. They went to the Stanley Cup Final in their first season. Built under modern expansion rules that gave them a better shot at NHL-caliber depth, Vegas still shocked the league by winning the Pacific Division and rolling through the Los Angeles Kings, San Jose Sharks and Winnipeg Jets in the playoffs. Ultimately, the Washington Capitals ended the amazing run in a five-game Stanley Cup Final.

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The inaugural team leaned heavily on players other clubs misjudged, from William Karlsson’s breakout to Marc-André Fleury’s resurgence. Vegas quickly turned that surprise into an identity, and their instant relevance in a brand new market became the new benchmark every future expansion bid will be measured against.

When the NHL absorbed four World Hockey Association clubs in 1979, the Edmonton Oilers brought with them a 19-year-old center who changed everything. Within a few years of joining the league, Edmonton turned from a former WHA experiment into a dynasty built around that young center, Wayne Gretzky, and Mark Messier, Paul Coffey and an offensive style that rewrote the record book.

The Oilers made the playoffs in each of their first 13 years in the NHL. They made the Final in their third year and won their first Stanley Cup in 1984. Then, Edmonton took four titles in a five-year stretch, giving a relatively new franchise the kind of sustained dominance usually associated with decades-old clubs. Even after trading Gretzky, Edmonton managed one more Cup in 1990, cementing their expansion-to-dynasty arc as one of the most dramatic in league history. While some historians treat the WHA merger teams differently than traditional expansion clubs, the Oilers’ trajectory remains a benchmark for what a young franchise can become.

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The first modern expansion boom came in 1967, when the NHL doubled from six to 12 teams. The St. Louis Blues, one of those six expansion entries, immediately became the standard for early success by reaching the Stanley Cup Final in each of their first three seasons. In 1967-68, they clawed through the newly formed West Division and pushed the powerhouse Montreal Canadiens to four one-goal losses in the Final.

The format helped; the six expansion teams were walled off in their own division, which guaranteed one of them a spot in the Final every year. But St. Louis still had to beat their peers, and they did it with veteran star power and tight, defensive hockey. Early stalwarts like Glenn Hall and Al Arbour gave the team instant credibility. Their quick stability in a non-traditional market for that era also helped convince the league that going beyond the Original Six footprint could work. The young Blues never claimed the Cup, but the franchise won it all in 2018-19.

1979-80 Hartford Whalers

The Hartford Whalers never lifted the Cup, but they are still one of the better examples of a young franchise punching above its weight. Coming over from the WHA as well, Hartford found its footing in the early 1980s and reached the playoffs multiple times, including an impressive run to the second round in 1985–86 that included a sweep of the heavily favored Quebec Nordiques.

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They became one of those niche hockey success stories: a smaller market that built a real identity and a loyal fan base, powered by players who still have cult status today, like Ron Francis and Kevin Dineen. The Whalers never cashed in fully on that foundation before relocation, but as an expansion-era project, they showed how quickly a team could become central to its city and how a passionate fan base could outlive the franchise itself.

1991-92 San Jose Sharks

The San Jose Sharks were a classic expansion punching bag in their first two seasons, piling up losses while they figured out what they were. Year 3 changed the conversation. The 1993–94 Sharks not only made the playoffs, they stunned the Detroit Red Wings in a seven-game first-round upset that sits high on the list of all-time postseason shocks.

San Jose became a model for how a new franchise could grow into a consistent playoff presence without the benefit of an expansion draft stacked in their favor. Over the next two decades the Sharks became a regular contender, reaching multiple conference finals and a Stanley Cup Final appearance in 2016. Their long run of relevance, given how ugly the first years were, is one of the strongest arc-to-arc expansion stories.

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As part of the early 90s push into Sun Belt markets, the Florida Panthers entered the league in 1993-94 and were supposed to be a long-term project. Instead, they made the playoffs in their third season and rode hot goaltending and disciplined defense all the way to the 1996 Stanley Cup Final, where they finally ran into the Colorado Avalanche buzzsaw.

The Panthers became famous for the plastic rats fans threw onto the ice after goals, but the underlying story was an expansion club that hit on its identity early. They did not sustain that level in the late 90s and 2000s, yet that quick rise to a Final in such a young hockey market helped the league justify its southern strategy and foreshadowed the franchise’s more recent resurgence.

The Minnesota Wild entered in 2000-01 as a consolation prize for a state that had lost the North Stars in 1993. By their third season, they gave that fan base something tangible: a run to the 2003 Western Conference Final that included series wins over the Colorado Avalanche and Vancouver Canucks, both in seven games after trailing 3–1.

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Even when they settled into more modest results, the Wild proved the point that a carefully managed expansion roster could compete before long. They became one of the league’s more stable organizations in terms of attendance and regional presence, which matters when you look at expansion success beyond pure trophies. Their ability to reconnect Minnesota with NHL hockey also underscored how powerful an “expansion” can be when it restores a traditional market.