President's Trophy vs Stanley Cup

[WordsOfWisdom]

Since Tampa finished with 128 points, they were the clear winners of the President's Trophy for best team during the regular season.

 

Also, since people consider the Stanley Cup playoffs to be the NHL's "second season", does that mean Tampa are already the "defending champs" going into the playoffs? (Food for thought lol.)  

 

With Tampa sitting on the verge of elimination, it begs the question: is it a greater achievement to be good for 16 games or 82 games?  It also raises another question:  If you had to take the Stanley Cup winner from any particular season and put them up against the President's Trophy winner from that same season (assuming it's not the same team) who would be the favourite to win?

 

The Stanley Cup playoffs are a small sample size compared to a full season. It's analogous to beginning the season in October and then stopping it in mid-November to analyze the standings. If we did that, we would get something like this:

 

 

So.... Leafs win the Cup then?  Buffalo perhaps?