NHL 26 Predicts The Canadiens To Win The Stanley Cup
The Montreal Canadiens won the Stanley Cup according to NHL 26 during EA Sports’ yearly playoff simulation. According to EA Sports’ simulation, the Habs will beat the Minnesota Wild in a 7-game series to capture the franchise’s 25th Stanley Cup and first championship in 33 years. However, is this a good sign for the Canadiens’ chances this year, or is it some sort of curse?
According to @EASPORTSNHL simulation…
The Canadiens are your 2025–26 Stanley Cup Champions 👀
Selon la simulation de @EASPORTSNHL les champions de la Coupe Stanley 2025–2026…
les Canadiens de Montréal 👀#Habs #GoHabsGo #thesickpodcast @TonyMarinaro pic.twitter.com/ph7Vog0DoC
— The Sick Podcast with Tony Marinaro (@thesickpodcasts) April 17, 2026
Seeing the Habs win the Stanley Cup in the NHL 26 Playoff Simulation is always exciting to see at first, as it shows that the video game algorithm is set up to see the Canadiens as a legitimate contender that should be taken seriously. On the other hand, many fans consider it to be the ultimate jinx considering how often the team actually wins the Cup. It’s honestly not a surprise that video games can’t get the right winner most of the time, but how far do the algorithm winners actually make it in real life? Many people feel this could be a jinx for a short playoff run, but that may not be the case at all.
Here is what I was able to find based on EA Sports website:
As for NHL 12, I can see they definitely couldn’t have had LA Kings:https://t.co/S9qH09lzYD pic.twitter.com/G207N1ZEbE— Nick (@NickL2500) April 18, 2026
I was able to track each simulation all the way back to NHL 13, and my findings were that 10 of the 13 teams that the algorithm had winning made it to at least Round 2 of the playoffs. Two of three teams that didn’t make it were the 2018-19 Tampa Bay Lightning and the 2022-23 Boston Bruins, who are boys known for having the two best regular seasons in the salary cap era only to fall flat come playoff time. The other team that failed to make it was the Edmonton Oilers during the 2020 playoffs, which took place in the COVID bubble. With that being said, it was hard to predict anything given the break that all the teams had heading into those playoffs.
Of the 10 who made it to the second round of playoffs, only three made it to the Conference Finals: the Anaheim Ducks in 2015, the Nashville Predators, who lost in the Stanley Cup Finals in 2017, and the Winnipeg Jets (best season in franchise history).
Finally you guys get it right. The streak of being wrong is over
— Michael – x (@DemidovHabs) April 17, 2026
Thus, the results prove that more than half of these teams would go on to last exactly 2 rounds in the playoffs. Meanwhile, most of those who couldn’t last more than a single round were oddly the biggest favourites to win the Cup. Yet they couldn’t deal with the pressure from their terrific regular seasons. Then, there is the odd case of the Oilers and the 2020 bubble; no algorithm could ever predict how teams would look after a 3-month break.
If we were to look at the EA Sports curse and judge what it means, the numbers tend to show that unless you had a crazy good regular season, you are likely cursed to lose in the 2nd round, which for the Canadiens at the end of the rebuild at this point would be a very successful season. The scariest thing could arguably be that the two previous algorithm teams imploded and missed the playoffs the next season.
#Habs are a very tight knit group, which explains why they fight so hard for each other and are playing consistent hockey! And it’s only going to get better once Dach, Newhook, Laine and Guhle return to the lineup #GoHabsGo https://t.co/Scz9FiUOJu
— Habs Nation (@Habzter) January 5, 2026
Luckily for the Habs, that was because of obvious internal issues that followed the teams into that season. The Canadiens are a team that is both on the rise and seems to have a solid leadership group that should allow that to continue. For the Vancouver Canucks, there were serious cracks between their star players for a while, and it overloaded. Meanwhile, the Toronto Maple Leafs lost a major piece in Marner that led to an implosion after their best playoff performance in 23 years. Although any could happen and something could always turn the Habs situation going forward but that is unlikely as many other EA Sports predictions would eventually go on to win a Stanley Cup a few years later.
Hopefully the new EA jinx isn’t that it tears apart your team the very next season, but otherwise, the Habs are looking like a good bet to beat the Tampa Bay Lightning, who have lost in the 1st round in 3 straight years, based on the EA Sports prediction. Who knows maybe the Habs end the years of incorrect predictions EA Sports as well.
Do you think the EA Sports curse is a real thing, or is it just more about how unlikely a video game algorithm is to predict real-life results?
