Here we are about 1/3 of the way through the regular season and the pattern in the standings has completely reversed from last season.

For much of last season, the West definitely had the have's & have-nots, with a lot of seperation between the teams at the top and the teams at the bottom. The East had quite a bit of parity, as evidenced not only by the very tight rankings in the standings throughout the regualr season, but also by the results in the playoffs. It isn't often that the top 3 seeds (all division leaders) were ousted in the first round, while the 6th, 7th & 8th seeds went much further.

This year, the West is logjammed like a mutha. Only 7 points seperate #2 from #15, with no two teams in that range seperated by more than TWO points. FIVE are tied at 29.

In the East, there are 21 points between #2 & #15, with the largest gap between two teams being six points---and that's between #8 & #9.

Still, the 8th place team in both conferences has 28(West) & 29(East) points.

In the West, it's wide open, as if it's still week 2 of the season. And it'll be interesting to see what happens in the East, whether that donut hole between the fianl playoff position and the lower 7 teams narrows or grows.

Fortunately for the Sabres, during their down time this whole week, all of the teams around them in the standings did horribly. They ALL lost all of their games: Canes, Sens, Panthers & Leafs. If it were not for that, the standings could've looked really ugly for the Sabres with all those games-in-hand being made up. Remarkable luck, actually. Maybe Darcy has an arsenal of voodoo dolls at his disposal.

I totally disagree, the West has always been that close by this time and by season's end they always seem to have more teams still fighting for a playoff spot.

The West is always the closer conference. Last year 7 teams in the west had over 100 points at year's end, the East only had 4. The separation from 1st to 8th in the East was 33 points, the West was only 18 points.

Even at this time the West is always much closer, they may have more teams clinch a playoff spot earlier since they pull away more it seems, but the West is always close.

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lets start the climb tonight.

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Wrong. Through much of last season, the West had a MUCH greater divide than the East. There literally is a reversal this season.



You're saying "always". I am not speaking of anything BUT last season vs. this, and THIS season, the East has a great divide while the West is the opposite. You're also talking about end-of-season point totals, while I am talking about the course of the season.

I don't know why you cannot recall how tight the standings were in the East last year, but it was the case. I remember listening to many conversations about it on the radio too.

Last season all you heard was how "better" the Western Conference was and how much tighter it was...all year. I live in the west and follow the conference out here. Last year it was very close for the whole year and everyone of my "West Coast" buddies bragged about how much better their teams were because the level of competition was higher in the West. Of course I don't agree that they are better (WNY ROCKS!) but the teams were neck and neck out here for most of the 2009-10 season.

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There was soooo much conversation throguh a good part of last season about how wide open the East was, about how much parity there was, about how narrow the point difference was for example, between #4 and #12. This was an ongoing thing for a lot of last season.

I remember even on fan boards, posters were speculating in mid-season about how "the Sabres may be in 10th, but they're only 5 points out of 4th!" I think people are falling back on what typically IS the case and not reflecting on the way last season actually unfolded. Just like in the playoffs, people always say it's much more defensive, while last season's playoffs had more scoring than is usually expected.

I know what the general concensus is on this and it does not apply to last season vs. this season, at least not as much as it normally would.

Points as of Jan 7th 2010:
The middle of the pack in the West was clogged and the lower end of the pack in the East was clogged.


Western Conference

CHIC - 120
SNJS - 117
PHNX - 104
NASH - 101
CALG - 101
COLO - 101
VANC - 101
LA - 101
DETR - 94
DALL - 90
MINN - 84
STL - 80
ANAH - 78
COLU - 73
EDMN - 71

Eastern Conference:

NJ - 122
BUFF - 113
WASH - 109
PITT - 103
BOST - 99
OTT - 92
NYR - 89
PHIL - 84
MONT - 82
NYI - 82
ATL - 82
TAMP - 82
FLR - 78
TOR - 73
CAR - 58

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These are some crazy numbers! What points are these?

By January 7th, average teams should be floating around 45-50 points.

The standing point totals for all NHL teams in the 2009-2010 season as of January 7th 2010.

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shit I wrote down projected totals...one sec....have kids running around asking questions...lol

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That's ridiculous. What are you talking about?

read above post

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I closed the damn page I was on and while distracted copied the wrong column....now I can't find it again and I have to head to school....damn you interwebs!

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Puck over glass, too many men, closed your stat page...it's all the same.

Ooops, the clock says 0:00

I'll just chalk it up as a victory.

Thank you.

I guess I shouldn't of said always, but I've seen lately how much closer the West was then the East throughout the season.

The East may be close too, but the divide between the top 4 or 5 teams is usually a good amount of points, 5 points or more from 4th to 5th last season. In the West it was 5 points from 7th to the 8th only, everyone else was over 100 points very close to each other.

To me the West was like this last year, and it wasn't until the end of the season it separated like it did. Same with the East. Te east may have more teams fighting for 7th and 8th in a given year, but this year just shows you how much worse the Eastern conferences bottom 5 teams are then the West's. As the East houses the 5 worst teams this year in point totals.

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Wow you're a swell guy. At least I tried to find evidence for my claim instead of talking out my ass. Here are the mid-season standings from last year.

As of Jan 2010
http://www.abuildingroam.com/2010/01/nh ... art-2.html

West:

CHI -66
SJ - 63
CAL - 57
PHX - 57
VAN - 56
COLO - 56
NASH - 55
LA - 53
DET - 52
DAL - 49
MINN - 47
ANH - 47
COLU - 45
STL - 43
EDM - 37

East

NJ - 59
BUF - 56
WSH - 54
PIT - 53
BOS - 49
OTT - 48
MONT - 45
NYR - 43
ATL - 42
TAM - 42
NYI - 42
PHY - 41
FLR - 41
TOR - 37
CAR - 29

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Case in point:

In the West
#7-#13 seperated by TEN points.

In the East
#7-#13 seperated by FOUR points.

The top 6 in each conference were pretty similar, seperated by 11 points in both conferences. Overall though, the East was tighter.

This season, so far; In the East, the top 6 are sepearted by 7, while in the West, by 5. And #7-#13 are seperated by TEN in the East and FIVE in the West. Pretty close to the complete OPPOSITE of last season.

Gee, kinda like what I was saying.

Thanks.

So your argument is that the bottom teams in the East were closer than the ones in the West? How is that ore competitive? There were only 10 points seperating 3-12th in the West which was a fun battle to watch.

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First of all, I'm talking about the course of the season, particularly the latter half. Disecting the standings at the halfway point does not exactly address my assertion, but I'll continue with that anyway:

The FIERCEST battles, especially in the last 2 months, are often between the lower end of the playoff picture (#7,8)and the upper end of the out-of-playoff-position teams (#9,10,11, etc.).

The logjam in that range in the latter part of last season was, as reflected in the numbers you provided, pretty tight. The top 6 in both conferences didn't vary much from each other.

You've got decent seperation in the East between the playoff positioned teams and the out-of-position teams. That was NOT the case last season at any point.

Last season it got tighter in the West as the season went on. Do research. It was tight and tough out here. You may have thought it seemed that way but it wasn't.

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