Buffalo’s Surprising Edge: What Early NHL Weekend Rankings Reveal—and What They Conceal
Advertisement
2. Dallas Stars (2-0-0, +1) — Beating the Jets and the Avs on the road is impressive, even if shootout wins are mostly fake. They’ve got the Minnesota Wild in the home opener Tuesday, and 6 points against that trio of teams would certainly send an early message about where the path out of the Central Division runs.
1. Florida Panthers (3-0-0, +6) — Here’s a free prediction: The Panthers are going to be the toughest team to rank this year, at least as far as a long-term outcome.
They’ll be missing Sasha Barkov for probably the entire regular season, and Matthew Tkachuk for most of it. And they’ve shown us in recent years they don’t really care where they finish in the standings. (Last year, they went into the playoffs as the 11 seed.) It won’t surprise anyone to see them stumble through a mediocre season, maybe even hanging closer to a wild-card spot than a division title, at least until they’re healthy. But assuming they make the playoffs, will anyone want to pick against them? Doubtful.
Post Comment