The NHL's Sun Belt teams went from punchline to powerhouse. They've won six of the last seven Stanley Cups, and the Carolina Hurricanes and Florida Panthers have each roughly quadrupled in value over the past five years, according to Sportico. But the most valuable teams in hockey are still the old northern brands, led by the Toronto Maple Leafs at $4.8 billion.
Winning in the south is real now. Being worth the most is still a northern game.
Sun Belt teams have won six of the last seven Stanley Cups
For about 20 years, southern hockey was an easy target. The Los Angeles Kings were the only team in the south until the Tampa Bay Lightning arrived in 1992. Teams followed in Miami, Dallas, Nashville, Raleigh and Las Vegas, and plenty of them struggled on the ice and at the gate.
That's over. Tampa Bay won in 2020 and 2021. Vegas won in 2023. Florida won in 2024 and 2025. And in June, Carolina beat Vegas in six games for its second Cup and first since 2006. Colorado in 2022 is the only exception in that stretch.
The last Original Six champion was the Chicago Blackhawks in 2015. That's a long drought for the league's legacy markets.
Why Sun Belt NHL teams are winning now
A few things changed. These franchises are older now, with real development systems and stable ownership. The Lightning, Panthers and Hurricanes all built through smart drafting and trades, not just free agency.
But northern fans are right about one thing. Taxes and weather help. Florida, Texas, Tennessee and Nevada have no state income tax, so a player keeps more of the same salary there than in Ontario, Quebec or New York. Under a hard salary cap, that's a real edge. It's also a lot easier to sell a family on a home in Tampa than a winter in Winnipeg.
I don't think that's the whole story. Plenty of teams with tax advantages still lose. But when two teams offer the same cap hit, the one in Florida is offering more money. That matters at the margins, and in a capped league, the margins decide a lot.
How much the Carolina Hurricanes and Florida Panthers are worth
Winning shows up on the balance sheet. Sportico values the Hurricanes at $2.22 billion, 15th in the league, and the Panthers at $2.15 billion, 19th. When Sportico started its NHL rankings in 2021, Carolina ranked 28th at $545 million.
Tampa Bay ($2.2 billion) and Dallas ($2.17 billion) sit right there with them. Nashville is 24th at $1.85 billion. Southern teams aren't the cheap end of the league anymore. They're the middle, and they're climbing.
That growth comes from what winning brings. Deep playoff runs mean extra home gates, and each one is a big payday. Sponsors want in. Local TV and streaming deals get easier to sell. And a championship makes a market that people once doubted look like a safe investment.
Why the Toronto Maple Leafs are still the NHL's most valuable team
Here's the part that hasn't changed. The Maple Leafs are the most valuable NHL team for the sixth straight year at $4.8 billion, up 13% from 2025. They haven't won the Cup since 1967.
The New York Rangers are second at $4.15 billion, followed by the Montreal Canadiens at $3.8 billion. The Kings and Boston Bruins are both around $3.3 billion, and the Chicago Blackhawks are sixth at $3.24 billion. That's five Original Six teams in the top six. The Kings are the only exception, and their value gets a big lift from the economics of Crypto.com Arena, which their ownership controls.
The reason is simple. Value comes from market size, arena economics and decades of fans, not last June. Toronto and New York fill expensive seats and sell sponsorships no matter how the team plays. A Sun Belt title adds value. It doesn't create a hockey market the size of Toronto's overnight.
NHL team values are up 160% in five years
The whole league is getting richer. The average NHL team is now worth $2.43 billion, up 16% from 2025. The average is up 160% over five years, which trails only the NFL's 166% and beats the NBA at 122% and MLB lives down at 44%. All 32 teams together are worth about $78 billion, including real estate and related businesses like AHL teams and practice rinks.
That's a big shift for a league that used to be the cheap seat in North American sports. A record 20 NHL teams are now worth more than $2 billion.
It also raises the price of any new team. Sportico reported last year that the NHL expects an expansion fee of at least $2 billion for its next franchise, plus about $1 billion more if a new arena is needed. Whoever buys in next is paying for what the Sun Belt teams proved: hockey can work almost anywhere if the team wins.
Southern NHL owners bought cheap and are now worth billions
For southern owners, this is the payoff for decades of losses and doubters. Their teams were bought cheap and are now worth billions.
For northern fans, it stings. Their teams still sit at the top of the money list, but the trophy keeps heading south. If I'm a Leafs fan, being the most valuable team in hockey for six straight years doesn't help much.
For the league, it's the best possible outcome. The expansion bet worked. Now the NHL can sell its next team at a price nobody would have believed in 1992.
