Report Card Grades for Every NHL Team's First Month of the 2026-27 Season

The first month of the NHL season can start to tell you a lot about where a team is and where its season might be going.

It is not too soon to start worrying for some teams that are off to disappointing or slow starts, and it is not too soon to start raising expectations for teams off to strong starts.

American Thanksgiving is usually one of the big cut-off lines for which teams make the playoffs and which ones do not, and that is only a few weeks away at this point.

So now that we are starting to get closer to that, it's time to hand out some updated grades and issue our next report card for the 2026-27 season.

Grades are simply based on what we have seen so far in the first month. There is still time for teams to turn things around (or get worse).

ANA | BOS | BUF | CAR | CBJ | CGY | CHI | COL | DAL | DET | EDM | FLA | LAK | MIN | MTL | NJD | NSH | NYI | NYR | OTT | PHI | PIT | SEA | SJS | STL | TBL | TOR | UTA | VAN | VGK | WPG | WSH

The big question for the Ducks this season was whether or not they had enough defense to take another step forward after making the playoffs in 2025-26.

The early returns: Still some work to do.

They are 29th in the NHL in expected goals against per 60 minutes during 5-on-5 play and, unlike last year, are not yet outscoring all of their defensive issues. They are outscoring some of them, but not all of them.

They spent most of their summer dealing with their own restricted free agents, probably spending way more than they intended, and never had a chance to fix their biggest weakness (the defense).

The good news? The young forwards (Leo Carlsson, Beckett Sennecke and Cutter Gauthier) are absolutely rolling.

There should have been some legitimate concerns about this team's ceiling entering the season, given how much of their 2025-26 success was tied to goaltending and how weak their defensive metrics were.

But through the first month, the Bruins have one of the best records in the league, and even though some of their defensive metrics are still lagging a little, they are generating a lot more offensively to at least keep them above water in terms of out-chancing their opponents.

It's not all falling on goaltender Jeremy Swayman.

The infusion of young talent with players like Fraser Minten and James Hagens has been a breath of fresh air and is giving this team some much-needed spark.

For the first time in more than 15 years, the Buffalo Sabres entered a season with major expectations.

There were some questions about what that ceiling could be after an offseason that mostly saw them subtract instead of add. But if there was a team that seemed capable of overcoming that, the Sabres were it, given the young talent on the roster that was coming back (not to mention stars like Tage Thompson and Rasmus Dahlin).

For the most part, things are going well, but you do have to wonder if maybe they missed a big opportunity to take a big swing at upgrading their goalie position by missing out on Connor Hellebuyck.

That would have given everyone—from the fans to the players—a shot in the arm.

Are the goalies going to be good enough over a full season? It's a valid question.

The only expectation for the Flames this season was that they would lose, and lose a lot. This is one of the few rosters in the NHL that looks to be in a full-scale rebuild, and it is short on talent in most areas.

So far, they are at least putting up a fight and hanging in some games ... and winning some.

Goalie Devin Cooley has played a big part in that early success.

It's still a team that is likely to fade as the season goes on, but they are not yet the complete disaster they were supposed to be. The lack of offense will eventually be the killer here.

The defending Stanley Cup champions have looked exactly like you would expect them to look.

Grinding teams down, owning the puck, setting up shop in the offensive zone, and getting just enough goaltending behind all of that to keep winning games. And even that undersells the goaltending, where Pyotr Kochetkov has been outstanding to open the season.

It is, again, a team that has no real weaknesses. The star power that most champions have is not quite there in big-name appeal, but you won't get a shift off against anybody here.

What is truly scary about them is that they have the trade assets and salary cap space to make a big splash and add to that at some point this season. They are still great. They can easily make themselves better. A lot better.

The front office apologists, and probably the front office itself, will tell you that Connor Bedard's absence at the start of the season played a big role in the slow start.

But it should not have resulted in them being completely uncompetitive. Even after his return, they still aren't anywhere close to being a competitive team.

Everybody loves the young talent on paper.

But not all of these guys are going to succeed given the attrition rate of prospects, and there is also the question of how well these guys will develop by getting steamrolled every single night in the NHL.

Losing breeds more losing. This team is still losing a lot.

It's not a bad start by any means, and the offense led by Nathan MacKinnon is as dominant as ever. But they have only been a middle-of-the-pack team defensively and in terms of driving possession.

There's still time for those areas to correct themselves.

It's also a veteran team that knows it's going to be a playoff team and probably hasn't flipped the switch just yet. Let's see how they look around February. It will probably look a lot different (and better) than this.

Head coach Rick Bowness is still trying to change the culture here, and it's still an uphill battle. It's also a very subjective thing to work on and address, and the only way to fix it is by winning more hockey games. How do they do that? From a more tangible and objective perspective, the biggest issue so far is the lack of offense. Kent Johnson is having a nice start to the season, but a lot of returning veterans are really struggling to make an impact.

Entering play on Monday, Zach Werenski, Charlie Coyle, Valeri Nichushkin, Sean Monahan, and Matthew Knies had combined for just five goals in the first 12 games.

That is not good enough. They need more from some of those players.

Solid. Really solid. The underlying numbers are painting a strong picture in terms of the Stars' ability to push play. Jason Robertson and Mikko Rantanen are off to great starts offensively, and perhaps the most encouraging sign of them all is the dominant start from No. 1 goalie Jake Oettinger.

When he is on his game, there are few goalies in the NHL better than him.

He entered the week plus 9.8 in goals saved above expected, which is the second-highest mark in the league. If you get goaltending like that, you are always going to have a chance, no matter what the rest of your team looks like. When a good team is getting goaltending like that, you are going to be a serious Stanley Cup contender.

There are two different layers of the Red Wings right now.

The front office and ownership deserve an F for their hockey decisions over the past year—and, frankly, for longer than that.

And then there is the situation with the players actually on the ice and the way they are playing. So far? You have to give them some credit for being as competitive as they have been, given the three-ring circus going on around them. It would have been easy for everybody here to just mentally and emotionally check out.

They are a top-10 team in expected goal share.

There are some good individual performances here.

Am I grading on a curve, given everything else happening with the organization? Maybe. But there is a solid process in place with the way the team is actually playing, and they are shutting out a lot of noise to play some really good hockey. That is worth something.

The record speaks for itself. They are off to one of the best starts in franchise history, and the superstar trio of Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl, and Evan Bouchard is the driving force behind it.

McDavid is playing some of the best individual hockey we have seen from a player in decades, and he looks like he might challenge the league's single-season point record.

Bouchard is doing what he normally does, and finally getting some recognition for it. He is playing at a Norris Trophy level.

The only two things that keep this as an A-minus instead of an A are…

They have not really been tested with the schedule just yet.

And they are still a really bad team when McDavid and Draisaitl are off the ice. Entering play on Monday, Edmonton had been outscored 20–12 at five-on-five with neither player on the ice, with a 37 percent expected goal share.

That depth needs to get better. It simply does. It is working now in October against a lot of pretenders and lottery teams. They need it to work in April, May, and June against real contenders.

They are mostly beating the teams they should beat, and they are doing it without top center Aleksander Barkov. Unlike last year, they at least know he will be back at some point this season. And when he is back, that should again put them back among the league's top contenders.

The Tkachuk brothers are off to great starts, but one of the bigger developments is defenseman Seth Jones playing some of the best hockey of his career. He has been really good since joining the Panthers, but he looks outstanding so far this season.

Once again, there is simply not enough offense and not enough difference-makers here. They are still waiting for Quinton Byfield to take a big step, and outside of Artemi Panarin, nobody has really generated much in the way of scoring to move the needle.

Even worse: A lot of the territorial and defensive dominance they have shown over the past few years is not quite here this season. They are a bottom-10 team in expected goal share and are not really pushing play the way we have seen in the past. That needs to be better. A lot of things need to be better, but it's hard to imagine where it is going to come from.

This roster has shown us what it is -- a middle-of-the-road team that will compete for a playoff spot, probably get there, and not do much else when it does.

The stars are shining brightly in Minnesota.

Kirill Kaprizov is averaging a goal per game, Quinn Hughes is playing sensational hockey, and Jesper Wallstedt has been the best goalie in the league so far.

But there are some big questions lurking under the surface.

What is general manager Bill Guerin going to do with Hughes if he can not get him signed beyond this season?

Will they find a way to get another center to help fill one of the biggest holes on the roster?

Related to the second question, do they have enough assets to entice the Red Wings to trade them, Dylan Larkin?

If they keep Hughes all season and add a center, there is reason to believe here.

But neither of those things is a given right now.

After losing three of their first four games, the Canadiens have gone on a roll, and the most impressive part of that is the fact that they have done it without No. 1 center Nick Suzuki.

That is especially impressive because center depth was the one big question on this team, even with Suzuki in the lineup. Seeing the team still win games without him has to be an encouraging development for the front office and coaching staff.

Goalie Jacob Fowler deserves a lot of the credit for that, as he has been one of the best goalies in the league through the first month of the season. That is another encouraging development.

You could say the Predators are playing up to expectations, and that is kind of the problem from a big-picture perspective.

They're just kind of stuck in the middle of the league.

In a vacuum, a lot of their offseason moves were solid additions, but there wasn't anybody who was going to change the outlook. The core players are older and past their prime, and while the farm system is strong and has a lot of players that could be very solid NHL regulars, there probably is not a franchise-changing superstar in it.

It's an average team that will have a chance to make the playoffs, but probably won't do much more than that.

That is pretty much how the first month has played out.

It might be time to start paying attention to the Devils as a potential contender. Perhaps as soon as this season.

They have an outstanding 1-2 center duo in Jack Hughes and Nico Hischier; they addressed a lot of their depth issues over the summer. They have some of the best possession and scoring-chance metrics in the league (second in the entire NHL in expected goal share during 5-on-5 play), and now they have one of the best goalies in the NHL in Connor Hellebuyck.

More importantly, why isn't that a contender?

Just imagine them next season with Quinn Hughes in that lineup. It could happen.

It's not a great roster from top to bottom, but any roster that has an emerging superstar defenseman (Matthew Schaefer) and one of the best goalies in the NHL (Ilya Sorokin) is going to have a shot in the playoff race.

It's going to take a lot of heavy lifting from those two guys, but if you are going to lean heavily on one or two players to carry you, a franchise goalie and No. 1 defenseman that can take over any game, on any night, is a good place to start.

The lack of goal-scoring is (and is going to be) the concern, but they will win their share of games.

Absolutely brutal luck for the Rangers when it comes to the season-ending Igor Shesterkin injury. If he were healthy, this could have easily been a playoff team, given a lot of the improvements they made over the summer.

They are a middle-of-the-pack team in expected goals (which is actually a big jump from the past five or six years), have a healthy Adam Fox, are getting a breakout season from Alexis Lafreniere, and have improved some of the depth pieces on their defense.

It should be, at the very least, a respectable complementary cast for a franchise goalie.

And then Shesterkin was lost for the season in his fifth start.

Dylan Garand is doing everything he can and is at least giving them some league-average goaltending, but he's not going to steal many games or be a difference-maker the way Shesterkin is.

Brady Tkachuk is an outstanding player, but losing him was never going to completely take them out of the playoff picture.

They are showing there is still a really good team in place here, and that is especially true with starting goalie Linus Ullmark playing well. They could certainly use an upgrade behind him at the backup spot, but he is back to playing at an elite level when healthy.

What makes their start even more impressive is the injuries they have had to play through. Not only has Ullmark missed time, but Jake Sanderson, Thomas Chabot and Artem Zub (three of their top defensemen) have combined to miss 19 man-games due to injury, while forward William Eklund, acquired in the offseason using one of the draft picks received in the Tkachuk trade, has been limited to just four games.

It's a good defensive team; it still has a star forward in Tim Stützle, and if Ullmark stays healthy and plays well, it also has a top-level starting goalie.

They can absolutely make the playoffs again. If they do, they will not be an easy out.

The best development here so far is the fact that Matvei Michkov has 10 goals in 16 games.

The concern with that is the fact that he is carrying a 43.5 percent shooting percentage, and that number is going to regress significantly in the coming weeks and months.

Beyond that? There is not much to be overly positive about here.

The Flyers were always a strong candidate to regress this season, but it's kind of shocking just how much they have regressed over the first month.

There is almost no offense; they have taken a step backward defensively, and they have just four wins in 16 games despite still getting solid goaltending (Joseph Woll and Dan Vladar are a combined 3.5 goals saved above expected).

Their entire offseason plan seemed to revolve around getting that Leo Carlsson offer sheet to work in their favor, and when it did not, they did not seem to have any sort of a Plan B.

They can score goals, but they are an absolute mess defensively at times, and the goaltending duo of Artūrs Šilovs and Sergei Murashov has been wildly inconsistent. Murashov is the future and an exciting prospect, but he is definitely playing through some growing pains early on.

Beyond that, one of the biggest issues here has been the play of the top line that is centered by Sidney Crosby. They played their best game of the season on Saturday night, but prior to that, it was, by every objective measure, their worst-performing line of the season.

The Penguins are rebuilding, even if it is not a complete teardown, but they still have a chance to contend for a playoff spot again. But if that is going to happen, they are going to need more consistency from their defense and goaltending, and they are going to need a lot more from Crosby and the top line.

The two things keeping the Sharks afloat right now are Macklin Celebrini and some shockingly strong goaltending.

Celebrini has 16 points in 14 games, while Yaroslav Askarov and Alex Nedeljkovic have a combined 10.9 goals saved above expected in net.

The problem is they are getting outscored 12-24 during 5-on-5 play when Celebrini is off the ice, while they are only 29th in the NHL in expected goal share.

There is a really encouraging core of young talent at forward, but the rest of the roster is still mostly terrible, especially on defense. It is a team that is still a long, long way from contention, even with one of the game's best players and some exciting young players starting to make their way into the league.

The Kraken are exceeding expectations so far, but there is good reason to be skeptical of how sustainable it is over the course of the season.

Their goaltending has been below average; they are near the bottom of the league in expected goal share, and most of their success is coming from an offense that is being carried by a 14.2 percent shooting percentage. It's helped them stack some points early on and build a little bit of a cushion for when the regression to the mean offensively eventually hits, but they are going to need an even bigger cushion to help make up for the inevitable slide offensively.

Turning the net over to Joel Hofer instead of Jordan Binnington is the smart decision, and it's giving the Blues a chance to compete this season.

Even after trading Jordan Kyrou this offseason, there is a solid forward group here that is just starting to reach its prime years, and a few of them are off to slow starts that should turn around at some point. When they do, and assuming they keep giving Hofer the net, this could be an interesting team in the Western Conference.

They still need some help on the back end, but the group of forwards featuring Robert Thomas, Jake Neighbours, Jimmy Snuggerud, Dylan Holloway, Mason McTavish and Connor McMichael is intriguing. There isn't really a star in that group, but when Thomas is at his best, he is one of the most underrated players in the league.

Mediocre start for the team, but there is a decent ceiling here.

Their season has been thrown into some unexpected chaos with the Nikita Kucherov trade request, and that's a shame for them because this is still a team that should have a window for contention that is cracked open this season.

Their core is getting older, and they have not had much playoff success in recent years, but they still play a winning brand of hockey and still have a championship-worthy core.

They are fourth in the league in expected goal share and their top stars (Kucherov, Brandon Hagel and Jake Guentzel) are all playing great.

The one thing that is holding them back? Goaltending. Andrei Vasilevskiy has not really played his best hockey to date. Given his age and the number of games and minutes he has played over the years, there is going to come a point where he does start to slow down, but he probably isn't there quite yet. If he gets back on track, this team can cause some problems. Especially if they keep Kucherov.

Auston Matthews looks like he is back to being elite.

William Nylander is still playing like a star.

Gavin McKenna's rookie season is off to a strong start.

Those are all huge developments for the Maple Leafs, but they still have some big flaws in their defensive play and a big question in goal with Sergei Bobrovsky. Bobrovsky was one of the Maple Leafs' biggest offseason additions, and the hope was that he could rediscover some of his past glory and show that he still has something left in the tank.

So far, he has not done anything to justify the Maple Leafs' confidence in him.

It probably should have been a potential red flag when one of the best-run teams in the league (Florida) decided to part ways with a late-30s goalie coming off one of the worst seasons of his career.

Utah is one of the teams in the league where the record (9-6-0 entering play on Tuesday) does not really match the level of play.

It should be better, and they have played well enough for it to be better.

This team is good. Really good. They are fast, aggressive, and relentless on the forecheck, have one of the league's most dominant power play units through the first month, and have pieced together a really good young core of talent, complemented wonderfully by an aggressive front office that has kept adding around it.

Everything about this team's process just screams "contender."

They just might need one more thing to bring it all together.

Connor Hellebuyck could have been that one thing, and it might prove to be a missed opportunity for them.

It is tempting to give them an F for how bad they have been, but their being bad is pretty much what we all expected.

This is the worst roster in the league on paper, and it is very clear this rebuild is just getting underway and is going to take a very long time to complete.

The F's feel like they should be reserved for the bad teams that are somehow worse than expected.

As bad as this start has been for the Canucks, there is at least one positive this season: The play of center Elias Pettersson. After back-to-back down years that made it look like his days as a top-line scorer were over, Pettersson is off to a point-per-game start and is showing some of the skill and creativity that made him a 100-point scorer at one point in his career.

Whether it is to use him as a trade chip or to make sure they still have a top-line player for themselves, Pettersson's resurgence this season is a huge positive development.

The trio of Jack Eichel, Mark Stone, and Mitch Marner is setting the tone offensively, and the team as a whole is mostly carrying the play on any given night.

Imagine how good they could be if they had even above-average goaltending.

Finding a goalie upgrade is going to be tough, but you should still expect them to be active on the trade market. They always are. If Kucherov really does become available, do not rule them out because they always find a way to get a shiny new toy and a superstar player when they become available.

Where there is a will, there is a way. They will find it if the opportunity presents itself.

After a big offseason that saw them land Alex Tuch, Jordan Kyrou, and Boone Jenner, the expectations for the Capitals went through the roof.

In most normal years, they would have had enough points to make the playoffs a year ago, and they are not only bringing back most of that roster, but they have also improved on a lot of it.

Some of those improvements are paying off, specifically as it relates to Tuch with his 10 goals already.

But so far, something is missing here, and it might be some additional help on the blue line. They are going to score more goals, and Logan Thompson has not played his best hockey yet. But it is worth wondering if they have enough depth on their defense to hang with the biggest contenders in the NHL.

It is easy to really like their young players, specifically Ryan Leonard, Cole Hutson, and the Protas brothers (Aliaksei and Ilya), and it is easy to love a lot of the veterans they have coming back and have brought in. But another top-four defender would go a long way for them.

They are starting to see what the roster general manager, Kevin Cheveldayoff, has built is capable of when it does not have one of the best goalies in the world (Connor Hellebuyck) bailing it out every night. It is not good. Winnipeg has won just four of its first 15 games, enters Tuesday on a nine-game losing streak, and outside of Kyle Connor, Cole Perfetti and Mark Scheifele, there is not much to like about any aspect of this team's play this season.

Not having their top defenseman, Josh Morrissey, has certainly hurt, but for as good as he is, he is not going to fix all of this team's struggles. It is simply a poorly constructed team that does not seem to have any sort of plan or direction at the moment. This could be a very long season.