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NHL Power Rankings 10/16/13: Middling Ranking for Middling Performance

The opinion polls and our own power rankings are back in full force this week.

You cannot stop JT's rally hair. You can only hope to contain it.
You cannot stop JT's rally hair. You can only hope to contain it.
Bruce Bennett

Well, six games in, and the Islanders are at NHL-.500. Which in all other sports means they're average, but in Bettman's Bizarro World, that makes them below average. That being said, our round-up of opinion polls have them all over the map...

Date
Site Published Ranking Comments
1 CBS 10/14/2013 15 The best team in the Metro area right now -- how strange is that to say? They're averaging 23.8 shots per game, last in the league. Hard to keep scoring at that pace.
2 ESPN 10/14/2013 14 Back-to-back losses bring the Islanders back down to Earth a little. Luckily for them, the Sabres come to town Tuesday night.
3 TSN 10/15/2013 11 For the Islanders to have sustainable success, they need offence from the supporting cast (ie. beyond C John Tavares) and getting a combined 18 points from Michael Grabner, Frans Nielsen and Josh Bailey is just what the doctor ordered.
4 Fox Sports 10/10/2013 18 GOOD NEWS: Michael Grabner has been the team’s best offensive player.
BAD NEWS: Michael Grabner has been the team’s best offensive player.
BOTTOM LINE: This unproven defense minus Mark Streit will make earning a playoff bid difficult.
5 Copper & Blue 10/13/2013 24 No comments
Average 16.4

I should note that fewer publications are doing these power rankings nowadays, so I've added Copper & Blue's, but theirs is a mathematical approach. That makes their rankings less opinion-y (and mock-worthy) than the others. But for now it will have to do, since I can't find any others that do this weekly (I'm all ears for recommendations).

Metro Stink

And here comes our first LHH power rankings of the season, based on all games through 10/15/13 except for the two late games (Stars-Avalance and Sens-Coyotes)

Pct Pts
Games Winning Earned/
W L OTL Pts Played Pct Game PWR
1 Colorado 5 0 0 10 5 1.000 0.6181 2856
2 San Jose 6 0 0 12 6 1.000 0.5349 2172
3 St. Louis 4 1 0 8 5 0.800 0.3471 1680
4 Toronto 6 1 0 12 7 0.857 0.3565 1468
5 Tampa Bay 4 2 0 8 6 0.667 0.2991 1424
6 Anaheim 4 1 0 8 5 0.800 0.3200 1400
7 Chicago 4 1 1 9 6 0.750 0.3090 1397
8 Boston 3 2 0 6 5 0.600 0.3562 1396
9 Pittsburgh 5 1 0 10 6 0.833 0.3031 1368
10 Calgary 3 0 2 8 5 0.800 0.3538 1312
11 Detroit 5 2 0 10 7 0.714 0.2615 1217
12 Los Angeles 4 3 0 8 7 0.571 0.2510 1202
13 Nashville 3 3 0 6 6 0.500 0.2262 1083
14 Phoenix 4 2 0 8 6 0.667 0.2595 1050
15 Minnesota 3 2 2 8 7 0.571 0.2574 1040
16 Carolina 2 2 3 7 7 0.500 0.2134 887
17 Vancouver 4 3 0 8 7 0.571 0.2010 855
18 Ottawa 1 2 2 4 5 0.400 0.1804 816
19 NY Islanders 2 2 2 6 6 0.500 0.2017 813
20 Montreal 4 2 0 8 6 0.667 0.2262 811
21 Dallas 2 2 0 4 4 0.500 0.1905 793
22 Washington 2 4 0 4 6 0.333 0.1690 751
23 Florida 2 5 0 4 7 0.286 0.1905 705
24 Winnipeg 3 4 0 6 7 0.429 0.1480 650
25 Columbus 2 3 0 4 5 0.400 0.1375 612
26 NY Rangers 1 4 0 2 5 0.200 0.1143 502
27 Buffalo 1 6 1 3 8 0.188 0.1042 439
28 New Jersey 0 3 3 3 6 0.250 0.1071 416
29 Edmonton 1 5 1 3 7 0.214 0.0969 408
30 Philadelphia 1 6 0 2 7 0.143 0.0408 272

I don't have much to add regarding our own currently middling team, so instead I'll just note that the Rangers, Devils, and Flyers own three of the bottom five positions. That might be like going into the International House of Pancakes and sitting near the fattest people there so that you can feel skinnier (stick tap to Lewis Black's stand-up routine for that one), but I'll take it for now.

Alternate Universe Where All Games Are Created Equal

With so little data, it's not worth getting that worked up over this stuff (when is it ever?), so let's move on to our final part of the stat tracking stuff... Bashing Bettman again!

As mentioned at the beginning of this article, it's ridiculous that a team who has garnered half of all the potential points it could possibly earn, can be legitimately called below-average. That's because of the Bettman Bonus Point, which makes all overtime games worth three points instead of two.

Last year, I tried tracking a system that separated all types of wins and losses (regulation, OT, shootout) and awarding a different number of points for each. Well, many rightly pointed out that this would never EVER happen, given the number of columns that would have to be in the standings. So this year, I will go with the more reasonable argument, which is that all regulation wins should be three points, thus making every game equally valuable.

So without further ado, here are the Standings from an Alternate Universe:

Atlantic W OTW OTL L PTS
Toronto 4 2 0 1 16
Detroit 4 1 0 2 14
Montreal 4 0 0 2 12
Tampa Bay 2 2 0 2 10
Boston 3 0 0 2 9
Florida 2 0 0 5 6
Ottawa 1 0 2 2 5
Buffalo 0 1 1 6 3
Metropolitan W OTW OTL L PTS
Pittsburgh 5 0 0 1 15
Carolina 2 0 3 2 9
NY Islanders 1 1 2 2 7
Columbus 1 1 0 3 5
Washington 1 1 0 4 5
NY Rangers 1 0 0 4 3
Philadelphia 1 0 0 6 3
New Jersey 0 0 3 3 3
Central W OTW OTL L PTS
Colorado 5 0 0 0 15
St. Louis 4 0 0 1 12
Chicago 3 1 1 1 12
Minnesota 3 0 2 2 11
Nashville 3 0 0 3 9
Winnipeg 3 0 0 4 9
Dallas 2 0 0 2 6
Western W OTW OTL L PTS
San Jose 6 0 0 0 18
Phoenix 4 0 0 2 12
Anaheim 3 1 0 1 11
Calgary 3 0 2 0 11
Vancouver 2 2 0 3 10
Los Angeles 1 3 0 3 9
Edmonton 0 1 1 5 3

The Isles would still be in a playoff position, but their two wins don't look as impressive this way.

I leave you with a non-hockey note... Mexico's sports headlines tomorrow better have some form of "Gracias, Estados Unidos!" in them.