Scout’s Analysis: Early red flags to watch around the NHL

This NHL season is just over one week old and some significant team and individual concerns are already starting to appear throughout the league.

This year’s schedule is even more condensed than usual due to the fact the NHL will take a two-week hiatus when players are competing at the Winter Olympics in Italy in February. The flurry of games doesn’t pair well with slumping teams, or goal scorers who lose their puck touch for an extended period of time. The results can turn into teams chasing playoff spots from the back of the pack and uneven efforts from struggling playmakers, defenders, and goaltenders alike.  

The “red flags” I’m about to present range from teams lacking execution and detail, to singular players who flat out have to play better hockey given their elevated role on their team.

I can only imagine the chaos that would have ensued if the Sabres lost Wednesday night’s home game to the Ottawa Senators. As it turns out, Buffalo walked away with a much needed, albeit disjointed, 8-4 victory over the Senators.

The win might lead to some momentum for the Sabres and eliminate some of the noise circulating about needed change in their hockey operations department, but the reality is they are still an unpredictable team that lacks a consistent identity. To be fair, they are missing several players due to injury (including goaltender Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen and centre Josh Norris) but the group lacks consistent detail and overall compete on a nightly basis. In short, I never know what to expect from the Sabres.

Here are a few examples of what I’m describing when scouting Buffalo:

The first clip displays how the Sabres end up chasing the play after a clean face-off win in the offensive zone.

Sabres defenceman Owen Power has two options when the puck arrives on his stick: chip the play deep or direct the play on net. He elects to send a soft wrist shot on net. The puck ends up on the stick of Colorado defenceman Josh Manson instead of one of the Sabres forwards who were hunting a rebound or for a chance to cycle the puck down low in the Avalanche zone.

Watch how easy the Avs break the puck out of their zone after losing the draw, exploit passing lanes heading up ice, and eventually bait the Sabres into over-committing in their defensive zone before Nathan Mackinnon pounces on a loose puck for the tuck.

The next clip again shows how the Sabres, more often than not, lack detail and execution. They win the draw in the offensive zone on the power play, but Rasmus Dahlin’s initial pass is in Tage Thompson’s skates. He corrals the puck and moves it below the goal line to Jack Quinn who, in turn, doesn’t settle the play down and ends up having his return pass chipped over the head of 6-foot-6 Thompson.

Colorado’s skaters end up racing up ice to create an odd-man rush on the penalty-kill. The Sabres break up the play and head north again, but the Avalanche skaters end up out-skating the Buffalo skaters to win the puck back and send it out of harm’s way. The entire sequence isn’t NHL quality from the Sabres and displays part of the reason(s) why this team is frustrating to watch at times.

Flames goaltender Devin Cooley was named first star Wednesday night in Utah, but the Flames fell to the Mammoth by a score of 3-1. Both teams have struggled to score goals so far but Utah found a way to win the predictably low-scoring game against a Flames team that is averaging only two goals per game through five contests.

Calgary nearly made the playoffs last spring on the back of outstanding goaltending led by their starter Dustin Wolf. The Flames were one of the lowest scoring teams in the league last year and, minus injured Jonathan Huberdeau to start this season, continue to find difficulty lighting the lamp to start this season.

The margin for error is very small for the Calgary goaltenders. Wolf was spectacular last year, posting a 29-16-8 record with a 2.64 GAA and .910 save percentage, but he’s been below average by his standards through his first four starts this year (1-3-0, 3.77 GAA, .873 SV%).

The Flames rely on their netminders to provide elite level goaltending to keep them in games. It’s a lot to ask, but Wolf has proven he is capable in the past and will undoubtedly elevate his game moving forward.

Assuming Wolf does that, the question still remains how the Flames are going to find ways to score more goals. Huberdeau’s return will certainly help, but the fact of the matter is Calgary has generally been chasing the game so far this season and aren’t a team built for come-from-behind victories on a consistent basis.

• New York Islanders rookie defenceman Matthew Schaefer is averaging over 23 minutes per game and being deployed in all situations. He leads the Islanders, along with forward Kyle Palmieri, with three points through three games. It’s a nice story and I’m not surprised Schaefer is having an impact out of the gate, but the Islanders are 0-3 and already face an uphill battle in the Metropolitan Division. The Isles were 31st in power-play and penalty-kill in the entire NHL last season and their team stats aren’t exactly glowing to begin this campaign:

• The LA Kings lost defenceman Vladislav Gavrikov to the New York Rangers via free agency and Jordan Spence through trade. They replaced the two defenders with veterans Cody Ceci and Brian Dumoulin. So far this season the swap hasn’t provided positive results.

Gavrikov is averaging over 22 hard match-up minutes for the Rangers and he’s plus-2 through five games.

Spence is still getting acclimated in Ottawa and looking to earn the trust of Senators head coach Travis Green. He’s been a healthy scratch and only dressed for two games so far, but his stat line isn’t atrocious. He’s averaged over 17 minutes of ice time, contributed three assists and is a plus-1.

Meanwhile in LA, Ceci and Dumoulin are both averaging between 17 and 19 minutes per game, haven’t produced any offence, and are both minus-5 through four games.

•Andrei Vasilevskiy is off to an 0-2-1 start in Tampa Bay and has posted an .870 save percentage and 4.07 GAA.

• Linus Ullmark has a 1-2 record and a 4.07 GAA combined with an .842 save percentage. He’s also last among all goalies who’ve played this season in Goals Saved Above Expected.

• Connor Bedard appears stronger to start the season and that added strength has resulted in Bedard playing the game faster than he has in the past. His three-zone detail has also improved. Bedard has contributed 2G-4A and he’s a plus-1 through Chicago’s first five games. He now needs to find a way to win more face-offs. Bedard continues to struggle in the face-off dot and has only won 37 per cent of his draws.

• Elias Pettersson is not off to an inspiring start again, which should be alarming for the Canucks. He’s taken the most faceoffs on the team, but has won just 39.5 per cent of them, and Filip Chytil has come on in place of Pettersson on the first line for a few shifts already. Pettersson needs to get more involved and be more determined. In 2022-23, when he scored a career-high 102 points, Pettersson led the Canucks with 257 shots, but that rate has been in decline ever since. In 2023-24 he had 207 shots (but still led the team) and last seaosn he plummeted to just 109 shots in 64 games. Through three games this season he has three shots on goal.

By a per-game rate, Pettersson has gone from 3.2 shots per game in 2022-23 to just 1.7 last season and one per game early in 2025-26. The team hasn’t even scored a power play marker yet and that’s one area where Pettersson needs to deliver for the team.