The longest anyone has led an NHL race without winning it: the Montréal Canadiens ended 91 of the 1954-55 NHL race's 100 playing days in first place, 91% of them, and finished behind the Detroit Red Wings. The longest unbroken spell of that lead ran 50 days. At the other end, the Colorado Avalanche won the 2002-03 Northwest race having led on two of its 154 playing days, never more than one in a row. Both lists below rank by the share of a race's playing days a team spent in first place. How that is counted is spelled out under the tables.
Companion pages: Closest NHL races and Biggest NHL comebacks and collapses.
| Rank | Race | Team that led | Days in first | Playing days | Share | Eventual winner |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1954-55 NHL | Montréal Canadiens | 91 | 100 | 91% | Detroit Red Wings |
| 2 | 2007-08 Southeast | Carolina Hurricanes | 136 | 150 | 91% | Washington Capitals |
| 3 | 1920-21 NHL | Ottawa Senators (1917) | 23 | 26 | 88% | Toronto St. Patricks |
| 4 | 2023-24 Atlantic | Boston Bruins | 136 | 157 | 87% | Florida Panthers |
| 5 | 1990-91 Patrick | New York Rangers | 135 | 156 | 87% | Pittsburgh Penguins |
| 6 | 1928-29 American | New York Rangers | 58 | 71 | 82% | Boston Bruins |
| 7 | 2015-16 Pacific | Los Angeles Kings | 139 | 171 | 81% | Anaheim Ducks |
| 8 | 2007-08 Northeast | Ottawa Senators | 120 | 150 | 80% | Montréal Canadiens |
| 9 | 1999-00 Southeast | Florida Panthers | 128 | 162 | 79% | Washington Capitals |
| 10 | 1992-93 Adams | Montréal Canadiens | 128 | 163 | 79% | Boston Bruins |
| Rank | Race | Winner | Days in first | Playing days | Share | First place for good |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2002-03 Northwest | Colorado Avalanche | 2 | 154 | 1% | April 6, 2003 |
| 2 | 2022-23 Central | Colorado Avalanche | 11 | 168 | 7% | April 14, 2023 |
| 3 | 2015-16 Pacific | Anaheim Ducks | 13 | 171 | 8% | April 10, 2016 |
| 4 | 2007-08 Southeast | Washington Capitals | 12 | 150 | 8% | April 4, 2008 |
| 5 | 1990-91 Patrick | Pittsburgh Penguins | 14 | 156 | 9% | March 17, 1991 |
| 6 | 1996-97 Atlantic | New Jersey Devils | 16 | 176 | 9% | April 4, 1997 |
| 7 | 1986-87 Norris | St. Louis Blues | 14 | 145 | 10% | April 5, 1987 |
| 8 | 1992-93 Adams | Boston Bruins | 18 | 163 | 11% | April 6, 1993 |
| 9 | 2023-24 Atlantic | Florida Panthers | 20 | 157 | 13% | April 16, 2024 |
| 10 | 2011-12 Pacific | Phoenix Coyotes | 20 | 154 | 13% | April 6, 2012 |
Everything on this page comes from the same day-by-day season files the charts draw, with standings read as each day ended. All 308 charted NHL races from 108 finished seasons enter: every division and league race from 1917-18 to 2025-26. Wild card races are not ranked; their story is the playoff cutoff, not first place. A team's time in first place is counted once per season, at its longest, whichever of its charted races it came in.
Longest leads lost is the club that ended the most of a race's playing days in first place and did not finish first. Any club in the race qualifies, not the runner-up alone, because a club can lead for four months and finish fifth.
Winners who led least is the same count for the club that did win, ranked from the fewest days up. Its last column is the day the winner took first place for good, which the comebacks page ranks on.
Only days this race's teams played are counted, the same rule the closest races page counts closeness over. A strike or a pause freezes the standings, and a leader sitting out an idle stretch would collect time on top for nothing.
The ranking is by share rather than by the raw count, because a league's seasons are not all the same length and a short one would otherwise win by being short. Seasons cut short by a strike or a stoppage are ranked on what was played, which is the same rule and the reason for it. The count and the total are printed beside the share, so the order can be checked; where two rows print the same whole percent, the unrounded share put them in that order.
A day two clubs end level at the top is a day in first place for both of them, which is what holding first place means in English. So the two counts of one race can add up to more than the race's playing days. Races whose top two the standings cannot separate appear on neither list: with no winner, the data can name neither the club that lost a lead nor the club that kept one.
A lead measured in days and a lead measured in points are different questions, and the two lists often disagree about which season was the bigger collapse; the comebacks page ranks the same blown leads by size. Only finished seasons are ranked; every irregularity in the record is listed in the data notes.