There are a lot of changes in the rankings but that shouldn’t surprise anyone early in the season as a couple of wins or losses really change things. Tampa Bay moves to the top of the list while Pittsburgh and Edmonton take big jumps up. Anaheim was the big loser during the week.
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1. Tampa Bay
Record: 7-2-1 (2-1-0)
Last Week 2
The Lightning went on a road trip to the American Southwest to end a five-game road trip and after victories over good teams in Colorado and Vegas, they finally lost it in Glendale in a 7-1 loss to the Arizona Coyotes. While not on top of the Eastern Conference as they have played less games than Toronto, the Lightning are the best team in the NHL. They are doing this well with a slumping Steven Stamkos who has a goal and five points in 10 game. Wait until he gets going.
2. Nashville
Record: 8-3-0 (1-2-0)
Last Week 1
It was a tough week for the Predators who sandwiched losses to San Jose and Edmonton around an overtime win over the Devils. They are missing Pekka Rinne who finally practiced Monday after suffering an undisclosed injury over a week ago. Filip Forsberg had a hat trick Saturday to give him 10 goals and 14 points in 11 games.
3. Pittsburgh
Record: 6-1-2 (3-0-0)
Last Week 8
The Penguins were terrific this week as they won all three games in Western Canada, defeating Edmonton, Calgary and Vancouver to move to the top of the Metropolitan standings. Sidney Crosby was the first star of the week with five goals and eight points in three games. He was goalless in his first six games but was on fire last week. Evgeni Malkin has 18 points in nine games.
4. Toronto
Record: 8-4-0 (2-1-0)
Last Week 4
The Maple Leafs beat Winnipeg twice this week but lost at home to Calgary on Monday. They also lost Auston Matthews for at least four weeks with a shoulder injury that does not require surgery. The Leafs have been weak at home with only a 3-4 record but are perfect on the road in five games (the only other perfect team on the road is Nashville). Nazem Kadri has replaced Matthews as a top-two center and has goals in each of his last three games after not finding the back of the net in his first nine games.
5. Boston
Record: 6-3-2 (2-1-0)
Last Week 6
Boston defeated Ottawa and Philadelphia (not exactly the cream of the crop this season) before being shut out by Montreal. Zdeno Chara has more goals (three) than any other Bruin save for Patrice Bergeron and David Pastrnak. They get Torey Krug back on Tuesday as he has missed the entire season with an ankle injury. That will help the offense.
6. Montreal
Record: 6-2-2 (2-1-0)
Last Week 7
The Canadiens continue to be the surprise team of the NHL as they won two-out-of-three this week. That ain’t bad. Montreal defeated Calgary at the start of the week and Boston at the end, losing to Buffalo in the middle. Max Domi leads the team with five goals and 11 points in 10 games. He only scored nine times for Arizona last season in 82 games. It looks like the change in scenery has really helped him.
7. San Jose
Record: 6-3-2 (2-0-1)
Last Week 10
The Sharks defeated Nashville and Anaheim and lost in a shootout to Carolina during a three-game road trip. The Sharks seem to play loosy-goosy with Aaron Dell in goal in net as his opponents average close to 34 shots per game while the Sharks give up only a shade over 26 shots when Martin Jones is between the pipes. Joe Pavelski has five goals this season in 11 games but has yet to garner an assist.
8. Colorado
Record: 7-3-2 (1-2-0)
Last Week 3
The Avalanche beat Ottawa but lost to Tampa Bay and Minnesota. Colorado has the top scorer in the league in Mikko Rantanen who has 21 points as a member of one of the best lines in hockey with Nathan MacKinnon and Gabriel Landeskog. They are also a plus-40 through 12 games. Tyson Jost continues to struggle with only a goal and an assist in 11 contests.
9. Winnipeg
Record: 7-4-1 (1-2-0)
Last Week 5
It was a tough week for the Jets who are travelling this week to Helsinki, Finland to play a couple of games against Florida. They lost twice to Toronto but defeated the Red Wings. Mark Scheifele was the second star of the week with four goals and seven points to move into first place among Jets players with 12 points. Patrik Laine has only three goals this season, all on the power play.
10. Minnesota
Last Week 12
Record: 6-3-2 (2-1-0)
The Wild saw their five-game winning streak come to an end Monday in a loss to Vancouver. They beat the Kings (no big deal) and Colorado (a very big deal) earlier in the week. Jordan Greenway scored his first NHL goal Monday. Devan Dubnyk continues to provide the aging Wild with outstanding netminding as he is 5-2-2 this season with a 2.19 GAA and a .937 save percentage.
11. Edmonton
Record: 6-3-1 (3-0-1)
Last Week 18
The Oilers are hot and soaring up the power rankings as they picked up seven of a possible eight points this week. They lost a wild one to Pittsburgh in overtime before defeating Washington, Nashville and Chicago. Connor McDavid has been his usual greatness with eight goals and 17 points in 10 games. The Oilers need to put Jesse Puljujarvi on a top-two line or send him to the minors to gain some confidence. Ryan Strome is still pointless in his first 10 games.
12. Washington
Record: 5-3-2 (1-1-0)
Last Week 11
Washington played twice in the last seven games, defeating the Flames in a shootout after losing to Edmonton as they travelled to Alberta. Jakub Vrana has been seeing first line time with Alex Ovechkin and Evgeny Kuznetsov but could lose that spot when Tom Wilson returns from his suspension. Braden Holtby has a 3.41 GAA thus far this season.
13. New Jersey
Record: 5-2-1 (1-0-1)
Last Week 15
The Devils lost in overtime to Nashville and defeated the lowly Panthers this week but the schedule starts getting a lot tougher as they were the home team in seven of their opening eight games. Kyle Palmieri continues to excel with eight goals and 13 points in eight games. Cory Schneider has finally returned to the team after missing all of training camp and the first three-and-a-half weeks of the season recovering from off-season hip surgery. Eddie Lack was sent to the minors on a conditioning stint.
14. Carolina
Record: 6-4-1 (1-1-0)
Last Week 13
It was a light schedule for Carolina as they defeated the Sharks in a shootout and then lost to the Islanders on Sunday. Sebastian Aho, a budding star, has an 11-game points streak to start the season. He has 16 points in the 11 contests. The Hurricanes finally got Scott Darling back but the netminder has yet to play as he backed up Petr Mrazek Sunday. Look for that to change this week.
15. Calgary
Record: 6-5-1 (1-2-1)
Last Week 9
It was a real bad week for the Flames until Monday when they knocked off Toronto. They were thrashed by Pittsburgh to the tune of 9-1 at home and also lost to Montreal. They lost in a shootout to Washington but at least picked up a point in the process. Elias Lindholm has come into his own this season in Calgary after a trade from Carolina. He leads the Flames with eight goals in 12 games.
16. Chicago
Record: 6-3-3 (2-1-1)
Last Week 21
The Blackhawks have played quite well in October and did nicely this week with wins over Anaheim and the Rangers, an overtime loss to Edmonton and a loss to St. Louis. After a mediocre season last year, Patrick Kane is back and has 18 points in 12 games. Alex DeBrincat is proving that last year was no fluke as the diminutive forward has eight goals and 14 points this season. It’s nice to have Corey Crawford back as he is 3-2-0 with a 2.44 GAA and a .919 save percentage.
17. Vegas
Record: 5-5-1 (1-1-1)
Last Week 14
The Golden Knights head out on the road once again after completing a five-game homestand in which they were 1-1-1 this week, defeating Ottawa in overtime, losing to Vancouver in a shootout and Tampa Bay in regulation time. After a tough start to the season, Marc-Andre Fleury has turned his game around and is 5-4-1 with a 2.50 GAA and a .897 save percentage. Max Pacioretty has been a disappointment with only two goals in 10 games. He missed Sunday’s game with an upper body injury.
18. Columbus
Record: 6-4-0 (2-1-0)
Last Week 17
Columbus started the week by losing to Arizona before defeating St. Louis and Buffalo to finish the week. They are getting poor goaltending as Sergei Bobrovsky is 2-4 with a 3.87 GAA and a .872 save percentage. Joonas Korpisalo is not a lot better although he has won all four of his starts as he has a 3.46 GAA and a .897 save percentage. Artemi Panarin has five goals and 15 points in 10 games.
19. Ottawa
Record: 4-4-2 (0-2-1)
Last Week 19
It was a tough week for the Senators as they lost in overtime to Vegas after losing to Boston and Colorado earlier in the week. Mark Borowiecki picked up his second suspension in a week and he will miss the next three games after an illegal check on Cody Eakin. Defenseman Thomas Chabot leads the Senators with 13 points in 10 games.
20. Buffalo
Record: 6-4-1 (1-0-1)
Last Week 22
The Sabres beat Montreal before losing in overtime to Columbus this week. They were quite busy in the off-season and the pickup of Jeff Skinner has been great thus far as he has six goals and 12 points in 11 games to lead the Sabres. Jason Pominville has five goals and nine points this season. While Carter Hutton has been the first call in most games, Linus Ullmark has been strong as a backup with a 2-0-1 record to go with a 2.00 GAA and a .935 save percentage.
21. Arizona
Record: 5-5-0 (3-0-0)
Last Week 30
The Coyotes won all three games this week and in convincing fashion as they only gave up one goal in each game in defeating Columbus, Vancouver and Tampa Bay. They are back at the .500 mark after starting the season 0-4 and have won four in a row. The Coyotes have already scored five shorthanded goals which is two more than they have scored with the man-advantage. Oliver Ekman-Larsson has yet to score in 10 games after getting double-digits in goals in each of the last five seasons, including scoring 20-plus goals on two occasions.
22. New York Islanders
Record: 5-4-1 (2-0-1)
Last Week 28
The Islanders had a good week as they went above the .500 mark, winning over Philadelphia and the Hurricanes while losing in overtime to Florida. New York is getting terrific production from their top line of Mathew Barzal, Anders Lee and Josh Bailey as the trio have combined for 32 points in 10 games but not a lot of production from their blueline as Scott Mayfield has five points and no one else has more than two.
23. Dallas
Record: 5-5-0 (2-1-0)
Last Week 23
It was a good week for the Stars for the most part as they defeated the Kings and Ducks before handing Detroit its first win in regulation. Dallas is trying to get some offense going from their bottom three lines so they could split up Jamie Benn and Tyler Seguin. Alexander Radulov is hoping to return this week after missing the last four games. He has 10 points in only six games.
24. Vancouver
Record:7-6-0 (2-2-0)
Last Week 24
The Canucks saw the return of Elias Pettersson and Brock Boeser this week and that is great news for the franchise. They split the week, defeating Vegas and Minnesota while dropping decisions to Arizona and Pittsburgh. Pettersson has seven goals and 10 points in only seven games and it looks like Vancouver has another Swedish superstar on its hands. Anders Nilsson is out with a fractured finger and Richard Bachman will back up Jacob Markstrom for the next few weeks.
25. Anaheim
Record: 5-5-2 (0-2-1)
Last Week 16
The Ducks are 0-4-1 in their last five as they did not have a good week with losses to Chicago and Dallas before losing to San Jose in overtime Sunday. John Gibson has been stellar this season despite going only 4-4-2 as he has a 2.44 GAA with a sparkling .938 save percentage. A lack of scoring has really hurt as no Duck has more than seven points, even though Anaheim has played 12 times.
26. St. Louis
Record: 3-4-3 (1-1-0)
Last Week 25
The Blues lost to Columbus and then beat Chicago this week. Their top scorer this season has been Ryan O’Reilly who has 14 points in 10 games. He was picked up in an off-season trade from Buffalo while another off-season pickup, UFA David Perron is second in scoring with 10 points. The Blues continue to struggle in the crease as Jake Allen is 3-2-3 with a 3.99 GAA and a .874 save percentage while Chad Johnson is 0-2-0 with a 3.27 GAA and a .872 save percentage.
27. Florida
Record: 2-4-3 (1-2-0)
Last Week 26
The Panthers continue to slide down the power rankings as they went into the New York-New Jersey area this week and lost to the Rangers and Devils while defeating the Islanders in extra time. This week they travel again, this time to Finland where they play the Winnipeg Jets in a pair of games. Their top players are scoring in Aleksander Barkov, Vincent Trocheck, Evgenii Dadonov, Mike Hoffman, Jonathan Huberdeau and Keith Yandle. The rest are not.
28. Philadelphia
Record: 4-7-0 (0-2-0)
Last Week 20
The Flyers are in big trouble as they lost to Boston and the Islanders this week. They are off to the West Coast this week with three games in California and one in Arizona, so they need to turn things around quickly because if they do poorly this week, they may never be able to recover. Sean Couturier has three goals and no assists this season after a 76-point campaign last year.
29. Los Angeles
Record: 3-7-1 (1-2-0)
Last Week 27
The rough times continued for the Kings as they lost to Dallas and Minnesota before finally beating the lowly New York Rangers. They got Dustin Brown back for the first time this season and he gave the team a big boost in the Rangers win. Anze Kopitar had 57 assists last season but picked up his first of the season Sunday in the Kings 11th game.
30. New York Rangers
Record: 3-7-1 (1-2-0)
Last Week 29
The Rangers lost two-of-three this past week. They beat Florida and lost to Chicago and Los Angeles. Kevin Shattenkirk has only two assists in 10 games with a minus-five rating. Neal Pionk has six assists with five coming on the power play. The Rangers have not had a lot of offense as they have scored 27 goals in 11 games.
31. Detroit
Record: 2-7-2 (1-1-0)
Last Week 31
The Red Wings finally won a game in regulation time on Sunday as they knocked off Dallas. They lost to Winnipeg but played them tough on Friday. Michael Rasmussen will play in his 10th game on Tuesday and that will burn the first year of his entry-level deal. Mike Green returned to the lineup and had an assist in the two contests. Dennis Cholowski leads the Detroit blueline with six points in nine games.
