The first week of the 2023-24 NHL season has wrapped up and there is a lot to talk about. Some teams have played three games already, while others have only gotten to play once. There are surprises in regards to how teams started and shocking starts to some players’ seasons. All of the most unexpected things from Week 1 of the 2023-24 NHL season will be looked at below. We’ll look at each and overreact before using logic and predicting how the rest of the season will play out.
The Lightning Will Be Sunk by Goaltending
At the start of training camp, the Tampa Bay Lightning revealed that Andrei Vasilevskiy would undergo back surgery and it would keep him out for the first two months of the season. This created a lot of cause for concern as he is an elite goalie that isn’t replaceable. Backup Jonas Johansson and next-up goalies Matt Tomkins and Hugo Alnefelt will have to hold down the net for now as the Lightning didn’t grab anyone off of waivers and haven’t made a trade.
Tampa Bay has started the season 1-2-0 against three teams that missed the playoffs last season and allowed 14 goals (4.67 goals against per game). Johansson has started two games and allowed eight goals, giving him a 4.09 goals-against average (GAA) and .889 save percentage (SV%) on the season. He had 28 career NHL starts in his career before this season and he’s 28 years old. Some were even questioning if he should be the backup for the Lightning going into the season. The 29-year-old Tomkins just started his first NHL game and also allowed four goals.
Without their elite goalie and despite scoring a lot of goals, the Lightning will be sitting outside of a playoff spot by the time Vasilevskiy is back and it will be tough to recover in a tough division. Two months is a lot of time and it is a lot of pressure on the defense to help keep the goals down. In reality, the Lightning should still be able to sneak into the playoffs and we’ll see what this elite postseason team can do with that.
Jordan Binnington is Going to Bounce Back
Jordan Binnington has been on a downward trajectory since winning the Stanley Cup in 2019. Over the following five seasons, his SV% numbers have gotten worse each season. He started with a .927 SV% in 2018-19 and last season the St. Louis Blues’ starter finished with a .894 SV%. The Blues have gotten progressively worse and the team even missed the playoffs last season, so not all of it is on him.
Binnington looks to be back in his first two starts. The Blues weren’t picked by many to make the playoffs, but with how Binnington is playing, it’s a flashback to the start of his NHL career and how he pulled the team to the postseason. He’s 1-0-1 with a 0.92 GAA and .969 SV%. The Blues have faced two playoff teams from a season ago and he has a 4.1 goals saved above average (GSAA) already. For a goalie paid as much as the Blues’ starter is and how many games he’ll have to play, it looks promising. Now, in reality, it’s only two games and Binnington is a loose cannon when things start to go south. He had a lot of really bad starts last season and those should start to come around sooner rather than later.
The Canucks Are an Elite Team
The Vancouver Canucks shocked the hockey world by rolling over the Edmonton Oilers in the first game of the season and then winning the second game as well against the same opponent. As the Oilers are one of the Stanley Cup favorites this season, it’s definitely a good look for the Canucks. Not only did they contain the Oilers to only four goals in two games, the Canucks scored 12 goals themselves.
Both goalies performed very well and the offense was clicking throughout the lineup. Some have picked them to make the playoffs, but by their start, they appear to be one of the best teams in the league. The reality is they just got the better of the Oilers to start the season whereas the outcome has been reversed in past seasons. It’s tough sometimes facing the same team twice to begin a season. Brock Boeser won’t score four goals a night, the goaltenders won’t play elite every night, and Elias Pettersson won’t average three points a game. They are bound to struggle at times, especially with a lackluster third defensive pairing right now.
Matthews is Going to Average a Goal-Per-Game
Auston Matthews has begun the season with back-to-back hat tricks and it took him much longer to reach six goals last season. 2022-23 was a down season by his standards, but he seems to have put that behind him with a new linemate in Tyler Bertuzzi and higher expectations in 2023-24. He is one of only five players in NHL history to start a season with consecutive hat tricks and could become the first to do so in his team’s first three games.
Matthews was the first since Steven Stamkos in 2011-12 to score 60 goals in a season when Matthews did so in 2021-22. More impressively, he did it in just 73 games. He only scored 40 goals last season, but his shooting percentage was down 3.5 percent from his career average. With six goals in two games and the Toronto Maple Leafs looking like a very good team offensively, he could average a goal per game. It would be shocking if he could pull it off, but not entirely impossible. I think we can all agree he’s back to his scoring ways though.
Bruins Will Cruise to Playoff Spot
In 2022-23, many people counted out the Boston Bruins because of the injuries to key players they were dealing with to begin the season. This included Brad Marchand and Charlie McAvoy. Instead of letting that stop them, the Bruins went on to have the best record in NHL history. They did lose in the first round, but at least they got to the dance despite the adversity they had to face.
The Bruins lost players like Patrice Bergeron, David Krejci, Tyler Bertuzzi, Taylor Hall, Dmitry Orlov, Nick Foligno, Connor Clifton, and Garnett Hathaway while adding very little to replace them. It is expected that they could even miss the playoffs this season. Well, they’ve started 2-0-0. In reality, their schedule is very favorable to begin the season with seven of the first eight games against non-playoff teams from last season. The division is strong and they will face more struggles without two elite defensive centers this season.
Chychrun is a P/GP Defenseman on Senators When Healthy
Jakob Chychrun has had the offensive tools as a defenseman for a long time, but he really started to show them during the 2019-20 season where he scored 12 goals in 63 games. The following season he improved upon that, scoring 18 goals and 41 points in 56 games on the Arizona Coyotes, one of the worst teams in the league during those years.
The Coyotes finally managed to trade Chychrun to the Ottawa Senators last season and through three games this season, he looks like he fits right in. 0.73 points-per-game was the most Chychrun has produced in his career, but he has four points in three games for the Senators in 2023-24. The Senators are a very underrated team offensively, and when they get Josh Norris back and Shane Pinto signed, they will have a very impressive top-nine. On a team like that and if he stays healthy, Chychrun could dominate and be a point-per-game player. It is very difficult for a defenseman to play at a point-per-game. Only two did so last season, Erik Karlsson and Cale Makar. It will take a lot for Chychrun to do so and he likely won’t. But he’s off to a good start.
Panthers Won’t Overcome Injuries and Be Well Out of Playoffs
The Florida Panthers will be without Aaron Ekblad and Brandon Montour until late November/early December. One of them is a big loss, but both cripple the defense of the Panthers. They can’t address the holes by trading for someone because both of the team’s elite defensemen will be back this season. They have to push through and do the best they can. It won’t be enough.
Even when mostly healthy, the Panthers just snuck into the playoffs by one point last season. Sure, they went on a magical run, but the regular season is different from the playoffs. Both of the key injuries to the back end impact the offense and the defense. The goaltending has a lot less help in front of them and the power play is worse off. It is a tough division and they won’t be able to overcome the hit early in the season. While missing the playoffs by a wide margin is an overreaction, they should be a bubble team and more likely just miss. They did finish very strong last season, but injuries can derail any team.
Hill/Thompson Are Taking Home the William M. Jennings Trophy
The Vegas Golden Knights look like one of the most dominant teams in the NHL this season and that’s no surprise. They won the Stanley Cup last season and even after making some lineup changes, they are as strong as ever. The William M. Jennings Trophy goes to the goalies on the team that allow the fewest goals against in the season.
After three games, the tandem in net for the Golden Knights looks very good. They’ve allowed three goals in three games, the defense is big and dominant, and the team has some strong defensive forwards. 79 games to go, but Vegas is off to a good start. Anything can happen though.
Goals Against Will Kill Oilers’ Season
There’s no denying that the Oilers will be an elite offensive team as long as Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl, and company are around, but defense and goaltending continue to be an issue. They allowed 12 goals in two games and lost both of them to the Canucks. You can chalk it up to a tough start, bad bounces, or something else, but everything needs to be tighter defensively moving forward.
Related: Edmonton Oilers’ Worst-Case Scenarios in 2023-24
This starts in net with the goalies making some saves that should be goals, the defense limiting chances and not allowing clear-cut 2-on-0’s, and the forwards backchecking to eliminate odd-man rushes. Goaltending and team defense killed the Oilers last season in the playoffs when Stuart Skinner was pulled four times in two rounds. A lot is still expected of Jack Campbell due to his contract and how he performed in the preseason. The goalies need to step up and the new system defensively needs to be learned quickly.
Kraken Are a Bottom-7 Team This Season
The Seattle Kraken struggled in their first season, but bounced back in 2022-23 to make the playoffs and knock off the defending Stanley Cup champions, the Colorado Avalanche. This was done through an amazing team effort and depth. They have lost some of that depth that made them successful last season and it is difficult to replace to the same level.
The Kraken have started 0-2-1 and don’t look very good. I believe that they were ahead of schedule last season and they could be regressing to the norm this season. The Golden Knights, Oilers, and Los Angeles Kings should be playoff teams again, while the Canucks and Calgary Flames are better. It won’t be easy for the Kraken within their division and outside of it with the lack of elite talent on their roster.
This is only Week 1 of the season and these overreactions are meant to be fun and spark discussion. Some could very well happen, while others will be way off. Each team has only played 1-3 games and there is a very long way to go. Come back next week for more overreactions in Week 2 of the NHL season.
