Dreams of raising Lord Stanley's Mug may seem a ways off just now, what with the playoffs far over the horizon of the Spring of 2018, but as we head towards the end of the first week for the 2017-18 campaign, everyone is a contender for the glory and has a shot to see their name engraved on the fabled trophy.
Well perhaps almost everyone, some cracks have already appeared in the pre-season planning, with the Winnipeg Jets finding Goals Against once again providing more than a few issues, though they have at least cracked the win column after three outings.
Not so a number of squads, including the Buffalo Sabres who have had a rough go of it three games into a brand new year. Joining the Sabres in the quest for a first win are the Ottawa Senators, Minnesota Wild, Dallas Stars, Nashville Predators, Arizona Coyotes and the San Jose Sharks.
Now obviously, the first week of the season is hardly the time to be sending out the SOS calls, and head coaches probably don't have to start thinking about who has the best rates when it comes to moving companies.
After all, for most all it will take is a quick run of a few games to reverse the bad karma and keep the home town fans (and one or two owners) on the bandwagon.
That task seems to be a lot easier in a few places as the first seven days of the 2017-18 season get close to completion on Wednesday.
The Leafs fans already have the plans in hand for the parade for Stanley, Washington is out of the gate fast, as are the Blues.
Chicago is not far off the pace and scoring goals at will, something they have in common with a few of the teams of the Central division who have been active around the net early in the season.
The defensive division to this point is the Pacific, where no team has yet to hit double digits in the Goals For stats, and the Goals Against markers for the most part tell a story of tight contests over the first few games of the year.
The young guns as expected are showcasing their stuff, with Connor McDavid, Austin Matthews and Evgeny Kuznetsov all finding their form quickly into the season.
The veterans are also serving notice that they still have something to say, Alex Ovechkin is off to a torrid pace early on with 7 goals, thanks to back to back hat tricks to open the season.
Also making some noise in the first week of play, the Vegas Golden Knights a team playing with little of those expansion team struggles, set to host their home opener on Tuesday night as an undefeated squad with a 2-0 record.
As the teams move towards Halloween, the distances will begin to grow between the contenders and those that will quickly learn that there is still much work ahead should they hope to be part of the long haul story of the 2017-18 season.
That's our goal as well as we return to the blog for a new season, holding through for the long haul, chronicling the high profile stories, the side interest items and previewing the upcoming tournament season, including an Olympic Games without NHLers.
We hope you'll come along for the ride.
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