NHL power rankings: Is it time to take the Philadelphia Flyers seriously?

It took two months of hockey and a month of Mike Gould trying his absolute darndest to be a hipster and pick other teams, but the San Jose Sharks have finally lost their hold on last place in our power rankings. Part of it is due to their recent stretch of bad but not horrendous play, but a lot of it is due to the Anaheim Ducks just not playing well recently.

Mike and I continue to navigate through the results so far with another week of our co-op power rankings. I have my same old system which I aggregate six stats (points %, 5-on-5 goal differential, 5-on-5 xGF/60, 5-on-5 xGA/60, power play xGF/60, and shorthanded xGA/60, all coming courtesy of Natural Stat Trick) to come up with a list that eliminates my own biases, along with a rule that no team can be above a team that’s more than five points ahead of them in the standings, regardless of where the aggregate places them. On the other hand, Mike goes off his own intellect and pure vibes, and together we find a way to combine it and meet in the middle.

1. Vegas Golden Knights

Record: 19-5-5, +31
Last Week: 4th (+3)
Mike’s Rank: 1st
Scott’s Rank: 2nd

Mike: The Knights retake the top spot in our rankings after picking up seven of a possible eight points last week. Although their bookend games were a bit suspect — you really needed a shootout to beat San Jose? — the Knights defeated the Blues and Stars by a combined 12-4 score in their games on Wednesday and Saturday. Unfortunately, as Scott and I saw in our uniform rankings last week, the Golden Knights’ repurposed alternate jerseys are among the worst in the NHL.

2. Boston Bruins

Record: 18-5-3, +22
Last Week: 1st (-1)
Mike’s Rank: 3rd
Scott’s Rank: 1st

Scott: The Bruins had a quiet week with just two games, and not being able to beat a Rasmus Dahlin-less Sabres team isn’t exactly a great sign, but they rebounded by beating the Coyotes on Saturday, and the Bruins only had Charlie McAvoy for half a game last week. They continue to stick around with the best of the bunch, and while they actually finished third in my aggregate, the Bruins take first due to the Panthers and Kings being out of range of the Golden Knights.

3. New York Rangers

Record: 19-6-1, +15
Last Week: 2nd (-1)
Mike’s Rank: 2nd
Scott’s Rank: 5th

Mike: Speaking of alternate jerseys, the Rangers put their new ones to excellent use in their 4-1 win over the Kings on Sunday. Those navy threads are absolutely fantastic, although I know Scott disagrees with me on that. Jonathan Quick stopped 25 of 26 shots in the victory, in which the Rangers convincingly bounced back after disappointing losses to the Senators and Capitals last week. I’m pretty confident that the iteration of the Rangers we saw on Sunday is the more genuine one.

Scott: Let it be known that Mike said I wrongly disagree on his Rangers’ jersey opinion, but I edited the “wrongly” part out in post because I (a) have that power and (b) consider it my role as a journalist to remove libel from my pieces.

Mike: Hahaha, I put it back in when you weren’t looking! I win.

Scott: Matt, edit it back out please!

4. Los Angeles Kings

Record: 16-5-4, +32
Last Week: 3rd (-1)
Mike’s Rank: 4th
Scott’s Rank: 3rd

Scott: The Kings set an NHL record with 11 straight road wins to start a season, so naturally they proceeded to lose their next two games, including blowing a 2-0 lead to an Islanders team that has blown countless leads this season and 4-1 to another top team in the Rangers.

Mike: L.A.’s horrendous chrome helmets were put in their rightful place by the Rangers’ terrific new alternate jerseys on Sund—alright, fine, I’m done.

5. Florida Panthers

Record: 17-8-2, +16
Last Week: 7th (+2)
Mike’s Rank: 5th
Scott’s Rank: 4th

Mike: Matthew Tkachuk isn’t pulling a Jonathan Huberdeau, is he? Something doesn’t quite look right with the 26-year-old winger, who still has just five goals in 27 games with the Panthers this season. Fortunately, the rest of the team seems to be picking up the slack. Sam Reinhart is having one of the wildest contract years of all time — the Flames are going to offer him a crazy contract next summer, aren’t they — and Aleksander Barkov is going to give Sean Couturier a real battle for the Selke Trophy. These Cats look legit.

Scott: They actually ended up first on my list this week, and if not for the five-point rule sticking them behind a few teams, they’d be there. That Stanley Cup Final run seemed to finally unlock this iteration of the Panthers roster, and they’ve finally become what they wanted to be when they brought in Tkachuk, even if he hasn’t been his usual self.

6. Dallas Stars

Record: 15-8-3, +8
Last Week: 6th (0)
Mike’s Rank: 6th
Scott’s Rank: 8th

Scott: It was a bit of an ugly week for the Stars, as they managed to lose by 4+ goal deficits to the Lightning and Golden Knights and they dropped a close one to the Panthers. The only win they were able to get this week was against a struggling Caps team, and they needed overtime to do so. Not the end of the world, but it’s not a great sign either.

Mike: I would like to know for how many consecutive weeks we have ranked the Stars sixth overall. It feels like … a lot.

Scott: This has only been the third week in a row, but that also followed a stretch where they were fourth in five of six weeks to start the season, and the other time was fifth, so we’ve been very consistent on where we rank them I guess.

7. Colorado Avalanche

Record: 16-9-2, +12
Last Week: 5th (-2)
Mike’s Rank: 9th
Scott’s Rank: 6th

Mike: The Avs are coming off back-to-back losses to a couple upstart teams out of Winnipeg and Philadelphia. There’s still way too much talent in Colorado for things to truly go south, but the depth of this Avs team is really being tested this year. Colorado’s fourth-highest-scoring forward is, uh, Ross Colton, who has 12 points in 27 games this year. This is a team that could use a guy like Nazem Kadri back in the worst way.

8. Vancouver Canucks

Record: 18-9-1, +34
Last Week: 8th (0)
Mike’s Rank: 8th
Scott’s Rank: 9th

Scott: The Canucks lost the Hughes Bowl in heartbreaking fashion due to a late game-winner for the Devils, but they bounced back by shutting out the Wild and beating the Hurricanes on Saturday. Hard to really complain about that week outside of wanting all six points to keep up with the Golden Knights.

Mike: It’ll be interesting to see how the Andrei Kuzmenko situation plays out. He really doesn’t look like himself under Rick Tocchet, although regression was always inevitable considering his ridiculous shooting percentage last year. Even so, he’s much better than he’s currently showing.

9. Toronto Maple Leafs

Record: 14-6-4, +7
Last Week: 10th (+1)
Mike’s Rank: 7th
Scott’s Rank: 11th

Mike: Is it just me, or is the Maple Leafs’ website bizarrely out of date? Every time I visit their front page, I think Noah Gregor has signed a contract extension, but it’s showing me an article from October 10. You’d think the NHL’s most valuable franchise would employ a webmaster. Maybe Kyle Dubas was doing that job, too. Anyway, William Nylander continues to be a legitimate Hart Trophy candidate as the Maple Leafs have surged up the standings with just one regulation loss in their last 10 games.

Scott: It’s the Leafiest thing ever for them to go into a week where they could play as badly as they wanted to because everyone was too busy watching someone from Dragon’s Den on a plane and dealing with the heartbreak of being used by Shohei Ohtani to get a pay raise, and they go ahead and get their first two regulation wins since Sweden, including their best game of the season against the Preds. The Joseph Woll injury is a concern, but Ilya Samsonov and Martin Jones are still an NHL-caliber goalie tandem and the Leafs have played in front of worse in the past few years.

10. Philadelphia Flyers

Record: 15-10-2, +10
Last Week: 14th (+4)
Mike’s Rank: 11th
Scott’s Rank: 7th

Scott: Hey, don’t sleep on the Flyers. They’ve won four straight now after back-to-back victories against their state rivals in Pittsburgh, snapping the Coyotes hot streak and besting an always strong Avs team. Everyone keeps expecting the falloff to happen soon, but they keep sticking around.

Mike: I continue to be stunned at how good this Flyers team has been through the first two months of the season. They’re not fake good. They’re good. It can’t all be Sean Couturier, right? The Ivan Provorov trade was a clear-cut case of addition by subtraction, and the Tony DeAngelo buyout also falls into that category. John Tortorella also deserves some credit for getting this team to clamp down on things in their own zone. 

11. Carolina Hurricanes

Record: 14-12-1, -2
Last Week: 9th (-2)
Mike’s Rank: 12th
Scott’s Rank: 10th

Mike: The alarm bells are starting to sound in Carolina after the Hurricanes reportedly held a players-only meeting following their 4-3 loss in Vancouver on Saturday. The Hurricanes played four games in Western Canada this week and lost all four, three of them by one-goal margins. This is a good team under the hood but, as head coach Rod Brind’Amour put it during Wednesday’s game in Edmonton, we seldom see these Canes “play this brutal.”

12. Winnipeg Jets

Record: 16-8-2, +15
Last Week: 13th (+1)
Mike’s Rank: 10th
Scott’s Rank: 14th

Scott: The good news in Winnipeg? They’ve now won four straight games and have taken the top spot in the Central Division. The bad news? Their defense has looked like the Jets of old these past five games outside of the Ducks game, and they just lost Kyle Connor, although the timeline for return is unknown there.

13. Detroit Red Wings

Record: 14-8-4, +15
Last Week: 15th (+2)
Mike’s Rank: 13th
Scott’s Rank: 15th

Mike: Tempers really boiled over on both sides in Detroit’s 5-1 loss to the Ottawa Senators on Saturday, in which Mathieu Joseph belted Dylan Larkin up high before David Perron responded with an inexplicable attack on Artem Zub. It wouldn’t be at all surprising if the Red Wings ended up losing Perron for more than a couple games going forward, and his absence will be sorely felt — especially as the Wings take on Dallas, St. Louis, Carolina, and Philly in their next four games. We’ll see if Perron gets to play in any of those. More than anything, here’s hoping Larkin is A-OK. 

14. New Jersey Devils

Record: 14-11-1, -3
Last Week: 19th (+5)
Mike’s Rank: 16th
Scott’s Rank: 12th

Scott: Jack and Luke proved superiority over their brother Quinn in the first Hughes Bowl to kick off a strong trip through the Northwest, also beating the Kraken and the Flames before dropping Sunday’s match against the Oilers. Hopefully that’s the start of more consistent play from them and they can finally establish more of a footing in the playoff picture.

15. Nashville Predators

Record: 15-13-0
Last Week: 17th (+2)
Mike’s Rank: 17th
Scott’s Rank: 13th

Mike: I’m still not sold on these Preds, but they’re undeniably much better than I thought they’d be. Even with the Lightning in a weakened state, a win over them still ain’t nothing to scoff at, and Nashville rebounded nicely from being shut out by the Leafs with a gutsy 2-1 win over the Canadiens on Sunday. Filip Forsberg is on pace for 91 points this season.

Scott: I guess Ryan O’Reilly really doesn’t like playing in Toronto considering the Preds didn’t really show up for that game. 

16. Arizona Coyotes

Record: 13-11-2, +9
Last Week: 11th (-5)
Mike’s Rank: 15th
Scott’s Rank: 16th

Scott: The Coyotes continued their win streak against former Cup winners with a 6-0 blowout over the Caps, but then they were thwarted by the team with the fourth-longest Cup drought in the Flyers. Funny how that works. They then lost to the Bruins to end the week, but after weeks of Mike and me being concerned about them literally playing .500 hockey, they finally got that streak that could help their playoff chances.

Mike: All good things come to an end. It’ll be fascinating to see how Karel Vejmelka responds if he gets the start against Buffalo on Monday. It’s been Connor Ingram’s net for a long time now; Vejmelka hasn’t played since Nov. 22, and he hasn’t won a game since Oct. 21.

17. New York Islanders

Record: 12-7-7, -5
Last Week: 20th (+3)
Mike’s Rank: 14th
Scott’s Rank: 19th

Mike: It’s the Islanders, and I care! These guys have gone on a terrific run, picking up points in nine of their last 10 games and moving up into a tie for third place in the Metropolitan Division. They knocked off the Kings (!!) in overtime on Saturday thanks to back-to-back goals from Anders Lee and a clutch game-winner by Jean-Gabriel Pageau, who now has, er, two goals in 26 games this season. Next up: John Tavares, sitting at 998 career points, visits Long Island on Monday.

18. Tampa Bay Lightning

Record: 13-11-5, -7
Last Week: 16th (-2)
Mike’s Rank: 18th
Scott’s Rank: 17th

Scott: Vasilevskiy has been a bit all over the place as he continues to get back into form, but that hasn’t stopped the Lightning from winning three of their last four games, and Vasilevskiy didn’t even play in the loss. Nikita Kucherov also had another great week with four goals and seven points in the four games, and now has a seven-point lead in the scoring race. Connor McDavid who?

19. Washington Capitals

Record: 14-8-3, -8
Last Week: 18th (-1)
Mike’s Rank: 19th
Scott’s Rank: 18th

Mike: Washington continues to hang around in an admittedly weak Metropolitan Division. They rattled off back-to-back wins over the Rangers and Blackhawks to close out last week after being edged by the Stars and blown out by the Coyotes. Alex Ovechkin is bound to pick things up eventually, right? He leads the Capitals in points, but what everyone is talking about is Ovi’s meager total of five goals in 25 games this season. Nobody’s catching Gretzky at this rate.

Scott: Someone likened watching Ovi right now to when your dog is on his last legs, and I don’t think I’ve seen a better way of summing up how it feels to watch the Caps right now.

20. Edmonton Oilers

Record: 12-12-1, +4
Last Week: 27th (+7)
Mike’s Rank: 20th
Scott’s Rank: 20th

Scott: As we approach the one-month anniversary of the firing of Jay Woodcroft, the Oilers are now 8-3-0 under Kris Knoblauch thanks to a seven-game winning streak. Funny enough, their 5v5 expected goal share has gone from a league-leading 57.86% under Woodcroft to only third place with 56.82% during Knoblauch’s tenure. Their save percentage has improved from 88.93% to 90.73%, which alone has made the Oilers competent again. Who could’ve seen that coming?

Mike: I’m curious to see how Knoblauch handles things once this winning streak comes to an end, but pretty much everything is looking good in Edmonton right now. That said, it still feels like Ken Holland was far too hasty about using the coaching change card.

21. Pittsburgh Penguins

Record: 11-12-3, +6
Last Week: 12th (-9)
Mike’s Rank: 22nd
Scott’s Rank: 21st

Mike: These Penguins are running out of leeway. Much like the Avs, their depth is a Problem with a capital ‘P’, but their stars are all 10 years older and just not quite as good anymore. That’s truly not intended as a slight against Sidney Crosby, who could kick pretty much anyone’s butt, but these guys just keep finding ways to lose games. Make it four in a row and seven of nine after their setbacks against Philly, Tampa, and Florida last week.

22. Minnesota Wild

Record: 10-12-4, -7
Last Week: 21st (-1)
Mike’s Rank: 21st
Scott’s Rank: 22nd

Scott: The other team riding the coaching change hot streak hit a brief bump with back-to-back losses to the Canucks and Oilers, but 4-2-0 under John Hynes isn’t a bad thing either. Matt Boldy now has six goals in his last seven games too, so it’s definitely a good thing for the Wild that he’s started to wake up.

23. Ottawa Senators

Record: 11-11-0, +8
Last Week: 23rd (0)
Mike’s Rank: 23rd
Scott’s Rank: 23rd

Mike: We’re in year seven of the Sens’ rebuild, which is a little odd because we’re also in year four of it purportedly being over. They’ll certainly be dealing with unprecedented levels of schedule density from here on out as they look to catch up to teams like Montreal and Buffalo, both of which have played six more games than Ottawa thus far. The Sens have been better in their smaller sample size than a lot of their Eastern Conference counterparts, but they also haven’t been without their own warts. This is a team that has parted with first-round picks like a contender while performing like a pretender. Being .500 isn’t an achievement.

24. Calgary Flames

Record: 11-13-3, -15
Last Week: 22nd (-2)
Mike’s Rank: 25th
Scott’s Rank: 24th

Scott: The Flames have lost three of their last four, right after they put three wins in four games together, so they continue to stick around in the murky middle where they probably don’t need to be. At least they’re leaning on Dustin Wolf a bit while Jakob Markstrom is out with his finger injury.

Mike: I would much rather see Wolf (and Matt Coronato, for that matter) return to the AHL so they can be kept far, far away from the mess that is this Flames team. At least they’re starting to get closer to the basement, where they sorely need to be if they want to pick up some of the top talent in this year’s draft.

25. Buffalo Sabres

Record: 11-14-3, -15
Last Week: 25th (0)
Mike’s Rank: 26th
Scott’s Rank: 25th

Mike: The Sabres seem to have broken a few of the Buffalo sports fans I follow on social media. A select few have adopted a very laidback and carefree persona (peace and love!), likely in an attempt to fend off the heartbreak of the team’s dismal start; others have simply been reduced to nihilism. Actually, maybe both approaches are just nihilism in different forms. Anyway, the Sabres will go up against three teams in the Western Conference playoff picture this week (Arizona, Colorado, and Vegas) after losing to Detroit and Montreal and beating … wait, they beat Boston!? 

26. Montreal Canadiens

Record: 12-13-3, -21
Last Week: 28th (+2)
Mike’s Rank: 24th
Scott’s Rank: 28th

Scott: Um, yeah, it’s the Habs. They continue to not be good enough to make any playoff noise but not bad enough to help out their future with a good draft pick. They’d probably be last in the Atlantic Division if the Sabres could figure things out and if the Senators could be allowed to play more games.

27. St. Louis Blues

Record: 13-13-1, -12
Last Week: 24th (-3)
Mike’s Rank: 27th
Scott’s Rank: 27th

Mike: “Hey, cool, we beat the Golden Knights in overti–” Loss. Loss. Loss. The Blues did, in fact, beat Vegas on Monday before losing in a rematch on Wednesday. Then, they suffered back-to-back defeats at the hands of Columbus (yikes) and Chicago (yikes) on Friday and Saturday. Naturally, the Blues remain just one point out of a playoff spot, because the Western Conference is a figment of our collective imagination.

28. Seattle Kraken

Record: 8-14-7, -27
Last Week: 26th (-2)
Mike’s Rank: 29th
Scott’s Rank: 26th

Scott: I’m sorry, the Kraken have lost eight games in a row (*nervously glances at Gary Bettman pointing a gun at my head*)… erm, eight-game winless streak, they’ve only lost one game in a row according to the NHL’s website. But how is nobody talking about this? Heck, they’ve lost nine of their last 10 and that one win was to the Sharks, which doesn’t even really count. Things are getting ugly in Seattle. 

29. Columbus Blue Jackets

Record: 9-16-5, -19
Last Week: 30th (+1)
Mike’s Rank: 28th
Scott’s Rank: 29th

Mike: I just mentioned that Columbus beat St. Louis this week, but don’t confuse that for an indication that the Blue Jackets are on the upswing. No, no. CBJ sandwiched that win over the Blues between blowout losses to the Islanders and Panthers on Thursday and Sunday, respectively. They also lost to the Kings in overtime on Tuesday. Johnny Gaudreau and Cole Sillinger have combined for five goals this season. It’s all just a mess.

30. Chicago Blackhawks

Record: 9-17-1, -29
Last Week: 31st (+1)
Mike’s Rank: 31st
Scott’s Rank: 30th

Scott: The Blackhawks won back-to-back games for the first time since, well, never, they’ve never actually done that this season. Those wins were to the Ducks and Blues, so while the Hawks will take anything these days, that’s not a huge accomplishment either. It really speaks to how good Connor Bedard’s been that I keep forgetting how bad this team’s been this year.

31. San Jose Sharks

Record: 8-17-3, -54
Last Week: 32nd (-1)
Mike’s Rank: 30th
Scott’s Rank: 32nd

Mike: The Sharks still aren’t good, but man are they ever watchable. They took Vegas into a shootout on Sunday night after Mike Hoffman scored to tie the game with just 39 seconds remaining in regulation. I’m beginning to suspect their decision to wear their teal helmets on the road has fuelled the Sharks’ recent surge. They have points in seven of their last nine games!

32. Anaheim Ducks

Record: 10-17-0, -21
Last Week: 29th (-3)
Mike’s Rank: 32nd
Scott’s Rank: 31st

Scott: While I still think the Sharks are the worst team in the league, I can’t get mad that they’re finally being dethroned. The Ducks may need to get Disney to take ownership again, because any magic they had to start the year is gone. Pavel Mintykov’s still been solid during his cold streak, and at least Leo Carlsson’s been lights out when he’s played.

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