Quoting: SpaghettiPasta
Have to pay
MacKinnon
Kadri
Comper
Byram
Zadorov
Thats easily doable, why are you worrying about 2 years from now when you dont even know how much of a raise everyone will get? This team already has $1M cap space, plus in 2 years the cap will probably rise another $5M. EJ will leave in UFA (or via trade before then) to free up $6M. Donskoi can walk in UFA to free up $4M. Compher can also be moved if needed. Thats about $19.5M right there
Mack will get a $6M raise, Byram is hard to project rn but lets say $5M raise, Kadri $2M raise, Zadorov maybe $1M raise, then fill the gaps with cheap ELCs.
Roster would look like: (cap hit in brackets in millions, rounded for convenience)
Mack (12)
Rants (9.5)
Landy (7.5)
Granlund (7)
Kadri (6.5)
Jost (3)
Kam (2)
Newhook (1)
Kaut (2)
Bowers (1)
then 4 of: Greer/Ranta/Kovalenko/Saigeon/Morrison/O'Connor/Lewis/ELCs/cheap vets/etc. (4)
Makar (7)
Girard (5)
Byram (6)
Zadorov (4)
Timmins (3)
Graves (1.5)
then another cheap depth guy (1)
Grubauer (5)
Francouz (2)
total cap hit would be about 90M, and by 23-24 the upper limit will probably exceed 90M by then. Keep in mind this is all rough estimates, and small adjustments would obviously be made depending on each player's success
EDIT: forgot to mention before, but Compher, Burakovsky, etc. could either be traded or left for Seattle to take in the expansion draft