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NHL Pucks and Stuff – Week 2

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PUCKS and tsuff week 2

NHL Pucks and Stuff is a new feature here at Sport Statricity designed to highlight the week that was for every NHL team. The good, the bad, the ugly or the eccentric, you’ll find it here. Enjoy!

Anaheim Ducks: The Ducks have enjoyed a nice run with four straight wins, but injury concerns might derail them. Matt Belesky and Dustin Penner have been added to the list of wounded which already includes Luca Sbisa and Sheldon Souray. Luckily, newcomers Mathieu Perreault and Jakob Silfverberg (both with five points on the year) have been outstanding.

Boston Bruins: Though they haven’t been scoring much (Loui Eriksson finally got his first for the Bruins on Saturday night), they haven’t really needed to thanks to the outstanding play of goaltender Tuukka Rask. So far this season he’s only allowed four goals on 115 shots against. I’m starting to wonder if backup Chad Johnson might never get a look.

Buffalo Sabres: Last week in this spot I was pretty hard on the Sabres, and I’d like to go easier on them, but three straight games, three straight loses and only four goals scored over that time. The team has 15 (!) players that have yet to register a point this season and is dead last in the NHL with only one point in the standings through six games. If I were Ryan Miller or Thomas Vanek, I wouldn’t be able to abandon ship soon enough.

Calgary Flames: The Flames on the other hand, just don’t know the meaning of the word “die”. The team picked up wins over Montreal and New Jersey, and is still without a regulation loss on the season. Don’t be fooled however, the underlying numbers are bad and this is a team just waiting to tumble off the cliff.

Carolina Hurricanes: Though the team has picked up points in four of it’s first six games, there are some major concerns. Chief among them: goalscoring, as the Canes are averaging just 2.17 per contest. Somebody seriously needs to go wake up the Staal brothers and Alex Semin, because they have just two goals and five points between them. Ouch.

Chicago Blackhawks: The loss to rival St. Louis on Wednesday was tough, but back to back home wins over the Islanders and Sabres eases the pain. This is still an excellent team, but a rematch against the Blues next week will be a real litmus test for the Hawks.

Colorado Avalanche: Last week I said “Wow!” and this week I say, Double Wow!! Yes, the two exclamation points were deliberate, this team is on fire. The Avs picked up three straight wins last week, allowing only two goals in the process, and sits first in the Central with a perfect 5-0 record. Oh, and Nathan MacKinnon picked up his first NHL goals and leads the team in scoring with six points. He’s pretty good, I guess.

Columbus Blue Jackets: The back and forth season continued for the Jackets last week, as they followed up a win against the Sabres with a loss to the Bruins. On the plus side, the trio of Marian Gaborik, Brandon Dubinsky and Cam Atkinson has been outstanding so far, netting 12 points combined (about 33% of the team’s total offense).

Dallas Stars: It was a strange schedule for the Stars last week, with five days off before a back to back on the road against Winnipeg and Minnesota. Though they beat the Jets, they unsurprisingly faded against the Wild, managing just 19 shots in a 5-1 loss. Rookie Alex Chiasson continued the torrid start to his career with a couple more points, bringing his total up to five on the season and 12 in 11 career contests.

Detroit Red Wings: Sitting fourth in the Atlantic with a 3-2 record, the Red Wings aren’t happy with themselves yet. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that Detroit is getting outscored 5 on 5 so far this year. The power play operating at only 17.6% isn’t helping much either. Coach Mike Babcock knows that both those areas need to improve if the Wings want to be real contenders in the East.

Edmonton Oilers: Perhaps the Flames should take some lessons from their provincial brethren if they want to learn how to lose. Despite a shootout victory over New Jersey, the Oilers continue to sit dead last in the West. It’s pretty easy to figure out why too, check out netminder Devan Dubnyk’s statline so far this year: 4 games, 0 wins, 5.43 gaa, .829 save percentage. Ugly to say the least.

Florida Panthers: The Panthers are hard to figure out this season. Well, they’re not really, the team is bad, but how they’re bad is the confusing part. They had a brilliant 6-3 win over the Penguins in their home opener, but followed that up with a 3-0 loss to the Kings. Add in the fact that they’ve already allowed seven goals in a game twice this season. One thing is for sure, win or lose, there’ll be no shortage of excitement at Panthers games this year.

Los Angeles Kings: The goalie that picked up the shutout against Florida wasn’t Jonathan Bernier though, it was Ben Scrivens making his first start in the black and silver. He was great, but the same can’t be said of defenseman Jake Muzzin. The sophomore is slumping badly, and has been a healthy scratch for three straight games after picking up a minus five through the first three.

Minnesota Wild: It was a momentous night for a couple of Wild rookies on Saturday night against Dallas, as both Justin Fontaine and Matt Dumba picked up their first NHL goals in a 5-1 win. The team seems to have turned the corner with two straight wins and one of the best goals against averages in the NHL.

Montreal Canadiens: The Habs started their Western Canadian road trip last week and looked good in back to back 4-1 wins over the Oilers and Canucks, respectively. Goaltender Carey Price was particularly sharp against the Canucks, stopping 39 of 40 shots and may have the early inside track on the starting job for Canada in the Sochi Olympics.

Nashville Predators: The Preds finally picked up a couple wins this week, unfortunately those box-ended an ugly 4-0 home loss to the Leafs. Rookie forward Filip Forsberg picked up his first NHL goal, but all-star defenseman Shea Weber has been just horrible, with a minus five and only one assist through five games. He needs to get going, or the season will get very long, very quickly in Nashville.

New Jersey Devils: The wheels are starting to fall off the bus in Jersey. At 0-3-3, the team is off to the worst start in franchise history. The main problem seems to be consistency, as the team hasn’t been able to put in a full 60 minute effort. Yet miraculously, they’re still ahead of three other teams in the Metropolitan division. I’ll get to them soon.

New York Islanders: Sometimes hockey is a strange thing. The offense led by Michael Grabner (7points), John Tavares (6 points) and Frans Neilsen (6 points) has been very good, as has starting goaltender Evgeni Nabokov. Yet back to back 3-2 loss over the weekend (in which they managed just 35 total shots) has the team sitting with a 2-2-1 record. Clearly offense from their depth players are going to be a problem for the Isles this year.

New York Rangers: Ugh. There’s bad, and there’s whatever the heck the Rangers were doing last week. Things looked good with a 3-1 win over the Kings, then they promptly allowed 20 goals over three straight losses. You’re not reading that wrong, I’ll spell if for you. Twenty. I honestly don’t even know where they go from here (up, one would hope).

Ottawa Senators: The Senators were free-falling down the standings last week with three straight losses. With averaging a league-high 43 shots against per game, it’s not hard to see why. Also, taking four penalties in the third period while you’re done a goal (against San Jose), is not generally considered good come-back strategy.

Philadelphia Flyers: While it appears that the Flyers have come to a consensus with Steve Mason as their starting goaltender, it doesn’t really seem to make a difference. Start Mason, they lose. Start back-up Ray Emery and they lose even worse. The Flyers power play is operating at an anemic 7.4%, Scott Harntell and Vinny Lecavalier are both injured and star forward Claude Giroux is still goalless. Yeah, they’ve got a few things to work on I suppose.

Phoenix Coyotes: If the Yotes think signing journeyman forward Jeff Halpern is going to help shore up their offense, they’re in big trouble. The 37-year-old managed only three points in 46 games last season. I guess when a defenseman (Derek Morris) is leading your team in scoring, you have to try something. The funny part is, Halpern still has to clear waivers since he was playing Europe, so there’s no guarantee at this point he’ll even suit up for Phoenix.

Pittsburgh Penguins: With points in three straight games, it looks as though Evgeni Malkin may be starting to roll. Good news for the Pens, who sit first in the Metropolitan with a 4-1-0 record. It’s probably bad news for the rest of the NHL, because Sidney Crosby is going nuts already with nine points to lead the league in scoring. Ahh, how I love when these two superstars are on top of their game. For the Pittsburgh fan’s sakes, let’s hope it lasts this time.

San Jose Sharks: If this were a power ranking list, the Sharks would be number one with a bullet. There’s so many amazing stats for this team already, but the one that really jumps out is the shot differential. San Jose is averaging 42.4 shots per game versus just 22.8 shots against. Their 3-2 win over the Senators was the closest a team has come to beating them yet, and the Sharks still outshot them by 27. This team is scary good.

St. Louis Blues: In fact, the Sharks have been so outstanding that they’re really overshadowing a great start by the Blues; St. Louis is 4-0-0, the best start in franchise history. They’ve got the hottest power play in the league at 37.5% and sit second behind the Sharks in 5 on 5 goal scoring ratio. Also, Alex Steen is making a (very) early case for the Hart, with four goals and four assists already. The Blues have arrived.

Tampa Bay Lightning: After going goalless in the Bolt’s first three games, everyone knew that Steven Stamkos was just itching to break out. And breakout he finally did against the Panthers, picking up a hattrick and an assist in a four point night. He and linemate Martin St. Louis are both up to seven points on the season. In other words, it’s steady as she goes for the dynamic duo in Tampa.

Toronto Maple Leafs: Perhaps my claim to start planning the parade for the Leafs last week wasn’t so far-fetched after all. With wins over Nashville and Edmonton last week, Toronto remains first overall in the NHL, tied with Colorado and San Jose (though the Leafs have played one more game). However they’ve been making most of their hay thanks to a unsustainable 29.2% power play and need to be better five on five.

Vancouver Canucks: It appears that this season won’t be as easy for the Canucks as it first appeared. After a couple of overtime wins to start the week, they finished with double 4-1 losses (to the Sharks and Canadiens) and now must head out East on a seven game road trip, their longest of the season. How those seven games go may have much to say about the ultimate fate of this year’s edition of the Canucks. Their second line scoring more than two goals combined this season might help too.

Washington Capitals: The Caps are 1-4-0 to start the season. I’ll let winger Troy Brouwer (who has yet to record a point) explain why: “It’s concentration, it’s work ethic, it’s focus, it’s a lot of things. It starts in practice and it continues over into warmups, we shoot high on our goalie sometimes when we shouldn’t be and then we’re sloppy during the game and then we wonder why we are sloppy and can’t make the breakout passes. We’ve got to be better, all around.”

Winnipeg Jets: There haven’t been many positives for the Jets so far this season. Yes, they have three wins, but the effort has been too inconsistent, too often. They’re being led in scoring by two defensemen (Tobias Enstrom and Dustin Byfuglien), neither of whom has scored a goal. Coach Claude Noel needs to whip his team into shape, quickly.

 

Thanks for reading everybody! As always, feel free to send me your comments, and don’t forget to share on the social media platform of your choice. Also, make sure to follow me @CanuckPuckHead and the site @SportStatricity on Twitter for more updates!

 

 

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