The NHL season is just a week away and I cannot tell you how excited that makes me. his has been a particularily bad preseason for injuries though, as many teams have lost big parts of their team to some rough injuries. Carolina has long Jordan Stall to a broken leg, Datsyk is out for a month with a shoulder problem, and who would have guessed that David Booth would get injured before playing in a single game for the leafs (Although hes not a high profile player like the other 2).

There are many questions to be answered when the season gets started. Some of these questions are will Clarkson prove to be worth his enormous contract after an embarrassingly bad first season with the leafs? Will Johansen swallow his ego and sign a cheaper bridge contract with CBJ? How will Anaheim do with their new additions of Kesler and Heatly and minus Selanne? Will the blues goaltending hold up? Can Colorado repeat their impressive performance of last season? How about those Kings?

All of these answers will become more clear as the days go by, but one thing is for sure, hockey season is right around the corner and this season is going to be a great one.

Chat about everything hockey.

I'm pumped for the season to start.

This blackhawks video to get people pumped for the season is pretty awesome

Also, I'm surprised you didn't mention my Blackhawks which barely lost in the WCF and has won 2 of the last 4 stanley cups ;-)

With their shootout victory over the Sharks today, the Islanders take sole possession of first place in the entire NHL!

Looking at the standings today, it looks like the top dogs in the atlantic division are tampa bay and montreal. It should be noted that hedmen is injured right now for the lightning, so it makes you wonder how much better they can be with him in the lineup. Montreal is a little bit different in the fact that they find ways to win games by holding on to tight leads or having come from behind victories.

Over in the metro division, it is no surprise that pittsburgh is leading, but perhaps somewhat surprising that the next best team is the new jersey devils. The devils snapped their ugly shootout loosing streak the other night, and perhaps those extra points they could not grab last season can make a difference in the teams success this season.

In the west, the always dangerous ducks are tops in the nhl, and are 4 points ahead of revitalized vancouver canucks in the pacific division. Vancouver made 2 major free agent signings this offseason with the acquiring of ryan miller in goal, and radim vrabata to play along side the sedins. The trading of Ryan Keseler is proving not to a dagger in the success of vancouver as trade acquisition nick bonino is filling in comfortably. Another nice story in the pacific division is the performance of the calgary flames. The youth movement of gaudreau and monahan in the past two seasons, combined with an extremely underrated defense lead by mark giordano has calgary sitting as one of the better teams in the nhl currently. The free agent signing of jonas hiller has stabilized the goaltending situation in calgary and has proven to be a point of strength so for for the flames.

Looking at the central standings right now, you may be surprised to see that the top team in that division is the nashville preditors. It appears that the emergence of hutton last season combined with a finally healthy again pekke rinne has nashville back to its defensive style of play that was so effective a few seasons ago. Nashville always seems to be deep on defense, but their offense has been given a boost this season as well. Nashville traded for james neal, and signed a number of veteran players that has their team turning some heads so far this nhl season. The wild and blues are right on the tails of the predators, so they need to continue to play effectively and consistently.


On the flip side, there are teams that are not performing so well early in the season. In the atlantic division, it appears that the rather impressive signings this offseason have not benefited the buffalo saber in the short term. The team has played the most games in the division, but has compiled 9 regulation losses already, which is the worst in the nhl. Boston has a less than impressive 7-6 record on the heels of trading jonny boychuk and losing chara to injury, but remains a scary team to face.

Similar to last season, the metro division seems to be off to a slow start as the islanders have come back to earth, and the capitals and flyers have sub .500 records. The biggest struggles in the division belong to an injury plagued colombus team that has lost 5 straight games, and a very weak carolina hurricanes who were the last team in the nhl to win a game this season. 

The pacific division sees the oilers struggling for consistency again and will have a harder time keeping up now that taylor hall is out with an injury. The team that likely hurts the most by free agency losses is the coyotes, who lost their points leader of the past few seasons in radim vrabata.

The central sees dallas and colorado at the bottom of the division. The statistic that both teams are one and two this season in overtime losses has something to do with that. Those extra points appear to be the difference between being in the mix and being in the basement of the division. Chicago is underperforming so far and are tied with the winnepeg jets with a 6-5 record to sit in the middle of the pack.


The season is early, but it has some interesting story lines and developments so far. It will be interesting to see how the standing look when the all star break comes along.

My friends it's simple who's going to take the cup. It's just that no one can see it

With there new goalie and staff change, my Vancouver Canucks are easily going to take first place in there division and sweep all teams as they win the cup. I hope.

But ya lets be a little more serious. Looking at the standings today (2014-11-18) There are teams that I am not surprised are in the front but some teams (NY Islanders) that I am very surprised about.

Also hate to say it but the Rangers starting goalie hasn't really shown up for many games. I mean ya there are games he has been there but he hasn't had that good of a start

All in all I'm very existed about this years hockey and it should be a good season.

The Maple Leafs have just fired their coach, Randy Carlyle. They seem to have been on a cold streak the last few games, but without watching them much, it seems like a strange move for them to make at this point in the season, but maybe they're doing worse than I'm thinking. But at this point, they are in the 8th spot in the conference.

patar4097 : A lot of Leafs fans seemed to be very happy with the decision.

With their victory over the Devils tonight, the Islanders have regained the lead of the Metropolitan division. They have been battling with Pittsburgh all year for that spot, but now the Rangers are coming into the mix, and that scares me.

Nashville has surprised me this year. It's amazing how much of a difference getting your number one goalie back can make.

Oh, and RIP JP Parise.

tgags123 : All over the place, I have been hearing how this is the perfect year for an Islanders, Rangers Eastern Conference Showdown. The Islanders have been doing surprisingly well this year and I'm going to hope that they can get as close to the championship as they can.

   The Red Wings had to place Howard on IR because of an injury he had, which really stinks. He's played so well this year, as is evident by him going to the all-star game later on (hopefully he's back for it, at least). He's done so much better this year, and was healthy as well. However, we are now down to our third goalie, with Gustavsson still out. And really, I think Mrazek will be able to do decent in net. He's done a good job when he's been called upon, but hopefully Howard can get back in net soon.

In a matter of just a couple of days, the Islanders have gone on to take 1st in the division, 1st in the conference, and the 3rd best record in the NHL. The rest of the season is going to be a lot of fun to watch.

so, deals so far this February have been fairly interesting. I won't list them in full detail but I'll link to NHL.com so anyone can reference: http://www.nhl.com/ice/news.htm?id=738676&navid=nhl:topheads

I thought the BUF-WPG deal was pretty good for both sides. Buffalo is almost guaranteed either McDavid or Eichel in the draft so they will have one of them and Reinhart to play with Kane. They also get a fairly even replacement for Myers. I think WPG will win the trade in the end but Buffalo is setting themselves up fairly well too.

NSH TOR trade today seemed strange. Toronto got a 1st round pick basically... and possibly a good prospect depending on how he transitions from juniors into the AHL/NHL level. Put up good numbers in the WHL but that doesn't always translate across. Still I think NSH got what they needed to make an even better push in the playoffs this year. They are a team I could cheer for making a push into the playoffs. They could really use the boost. I know lots of people would whine if they went far because they aren't fans of the team but I'm tired of seeing the same teams we've been seeing the last few years so I think it would be a welcome change.

Enorth for Lindback didn't really make sense as a trade for me.

Anyway, thoughts from anyone else?

   The trade deadline is here, and some big deals have gone down, with the New York Rangers being involved with three of them. The Rangers acquired Keith Yandle, a draft pick, and Chris Summers for John Moore, two high draft picks over the next two years, and prospect Mattias Janmark. One of the other deals they made was trading away Lee Stempniak to the Jets for Carl Klingberg. The last deal they made was getting James Sheppard from the Sharks for a 4th round pick, so it seems that the Rangers are going all in right now.
   Chicago also made some splashes, as they would have to with Patrick Kane going down. The latest one was acquiring Andrew Desjardins
while Ben Smith and a pick are being sent back to the Sharks.  They also got Kimmo Timonen from Philadelphia and sent over a second round draft pick, and a conditional one for 2016. 
   Some other deals include Edmonton trading away Dan Petry for two Canadiens 2015 draft picks, the Avalanche acquiring Freddie Hamilton from the Sharks for Karl Stollery, and Chicago getting Antoine Vermette and sending Klas Dahlbeck and a draft pick to Arizona. 
   Finally, the Red Wings made some deals that I'm very happy with. We traded with Dallas for Erik Cole, and exchanging our second round pick for their third, as well as sending over two prospects in Mattias Backman Mattias Janmark. Then we also got a much needed right handed defenseman not named Phaneauf in Zidlicky, which we acquired for a conditional 3rd round pick. He's a rental, but a right handed experienced defenseman is just what we need on this team. Neither were blockbuster trades, but keeping the young guys we have now like Nyquist Anderson and Tatar, as well as top prospects like Anthony Mantha Teemu Pulkkinen were top priority, as with the youth this team has, selling the farm system is not required, especially with how well we have been playing anyways.
   The deadline ends is less than a half an hour from now, so there is definitely still time for another deal to come down the pipe. Looking forward to see if another team will make a splash.

   Well, this was quite the calm year for discussion here on Vizzed. So, now that the regular season is over, it's time to get the playoffs thread going. Some teams that I was surprised with on what side of the fence they fell on include the Boston Bruins, who after a slow start, struggled down the stretch as well, and the Flames especially. I really did think they would be better than they have been, but I did not think they'd end third in their division, even though they had the least amount of points while still making it in for the west. Of course, I'm glad that the Red Wings made it in again, but the way they did it was far from impressive down the final stretch. And unless whoever ends up getting the starting gig in net steps up, they probably won't make that much of a splash.

~Closed~