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Penultimate LHH Power Rankings of the Year: Hold on for one more day

The Isles drop out of the top ten as everyone gets all panicky like.

By ICanSeeForIslesAndIsles

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Still standing.
Still standing.
Eric Hartline-USA TODAY Sports

My son knocks down milk so quickly we hardly have a chance to burp him. He simply won't let go. I told him he's sucking more than the Isles recently. OK I promise for the rest of this article, I won't talk about my son anymore. Or the Isles.

Weekly Roundup of Opinion Polls

Site Updated New Ranking Prior Ranking Comments
CBS 4/7/2015 9 10 The Isles did not look great in March and have just three wins in their last 11 games. They still have a shot at home ice in the first round, though. A strong finish with three games left could go a long way for this team in a lot of ways.
ESPN 4/6/2015 14 13 The final regular-season days at the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum are at hand. The Isles would like to stay ahead of the Caps and Pens for home ice but have just three wins in their past 11 games and aren't inspiring much faith in a long playoff run.
TSN --- --- 8 None this week
Fox 4/9/2015 11 10 You won't see many worse goals than the one Jaroslav Halak allowed with 2.1 seconds left on Tuesday to permit Philadelphia to escape with a win. You also won't see many confident looks on Islanders fans' faces, given Halak's recent struggles.
USA Today 4/6/2015 9 8 John Tavares is in MVP equation with 80 points this season.
RDS 4/7/2015 10 11 1-0-1 for the Islanders.  Victory against the Sabres, but they still weren't capable of preserving their lead against the Blue Jackets, falling in the shootout.  John Tavares has collected six points in his last four games.
Average 11 10 Didn't this happen in Major League 2?

USA Today finds the silver linings, if that's your thing. The others go more with the obvious and more obvious.

LHH Power Rankings

For all games through 4/8/15

GP Reg W OT W SO OT L Reg L LHH Pts LHH Pct LHH Rating
1 New York Rangers 80 42 6 9 2 21 307 0.640 119
2 Tampa Bay Lightning 80 43 3 7 3 24 297 0.619 116
3 Montreal Canadiens 80 37 5 11 5 22 285 0.594 114
4 Chicago Blackhawks 80 36 3 12 3 26 270 0.563 111
5 St. Louis Blues 80 35 5 13 3 24 275 0.573 110
6 Nashville Predators 80 33 8 12 4 23 274 0.571 110
7 Washington Capitals 81 35 5 9 7 25 271 0.558 109
8 Anaheim Ducks 81 34 8 13 2 24 279 0.574 109
9 Vancouver Canucks 80 35 5 8 3 29 260 0.542 108
10 Minnesota Wild 80 37 4 7 5 27 269 0.560 107
11 New York Islanders 80 33 6 12 1 28 260 0.542 107
12 Los Angeles Kings 80 36 1 10 7 26 264 0.550 105
13 Pittsburgh Penguins 80 32 6 10 6 26 258 0.538 105
14 Detroit Red Wings 80 31 7 14 3 25 262 0.546 105
15 Winnipeg Jets 80 31 4 12 7 26 252 0.525 104
16 Dallas Stars 81 32 4 7 7 31 243 0.500 103
17 San Jose Sharks 80 33 2 10 3 32 242 0.504 102
18 Calgary Flames 80 31 9 7 4 29 251 0.523 101
19 Boston Bruins 80 28 9 13 4 26 251 0.523 101
20 Ottawa Senators 80 28 7 13 6 26 247 0.515 100
21 Columbus Blue Jackets 80 27 5 10 3 35 218 0.454 98
22 Philadelphia Flyers 80 25 5 14 7 29 226 0.471 96
23 Colorado Avalanche 80 26 2 13 8 31 219 0.456 95
24 Florida Panthers 80 27 1 18 5 29 230 0.479 93
25 New Jersey Devils 80 26 1 12 6 35 208 0.433 87
26 Toronto Maple Leafs 81 22 3 9 3 44 177 0.364 85
27 Carolina Hurricanes 80 23 1 12 4 40 186 0.388 83
28 Edmonton Oilers 80 17 2 12 6 43 158 0.329 77
29 Arizona Coyotes 80 14 5 10 3 48 140 0.292 71
30 Buffalo Sabres 80 14 1 13 3 49 133 0.277 69

The top three are all Eastern Conference teams, but the West has six of the top ten spots. This might be a result of Western teams beating each other up. Or it could be that the East is more competitive this year. I know, right???

The Kings can make a good argument that their more difficult strength of schedule is robbing them of a chance to defend their title in the playoffs. Meanwhile, Boston and Ottawa are in the lower half of the table, and yet one of them will be going to the playoffs.

Next article will be the last of the year, and will run whenever all publications have filed their final opinion poll (might be sooner than the usual LHHPR publication date since the season ends this weekend).

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