NHL teams at 10 (PIT, COL)

October 24, 12:04 PMNHL ExaminerChris Morgan

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Malkin and Crosby are doing just fine. (US Presswire)

First things first, if you are at all interested in tonight's Boston and Ottawa tilt (and that's a pretty good game so why wouldn't you be) then I advise you to head over to the Boston Bruins Examiner's page, where I took the Ottawa half of a game preview. Also, good news for fans of Canadian NHL teams: Examiner now has several Canadian editions. Soon, we should have people covering all the NHL teams. If the hockey team Examiners aren't among the first spots filled up in these Canadian markets, well then we've clearly overestimated Canada's love of hockey, and I don't think that is the case.

Now, on to other business. Two more teams crossed the 10 game threshold yesterday; Pittsburgh and Colorado. As such, here's a quick look at how they've done through their first 10 games.

Pittsburgh Penguins: 9-1-0, good for 18 points. Well, that long run to the Stanley Cup really hurt this team coming out of the gate, didn't it? Or not. (side note: This reminded me of last season when the Red Wings lost their first game of the season to Toronto and ESPN's Pierre LeBrun proclaimed that the Wings were suffering from "Cup Hangover" and that the Maple Leafs were a team to reckon with. Well done, Mr. LeBrun.) The Penguins have the best record in the NHL, and only have that one pesky loss on their record. Obviously, they can't keep this pace up, but this team looks like they could pretty much coast to a playoff spot, and have to be the odds on favorites to win their division, if not the conference.

As you would expect, the Pens are being led by Evgeni Malkin (13 points) and Sidney Crosby (10), and you can probably safely expect to see them among the league leaders in points at season's end. However, in addition to the scoring prowess of their top two players, Pittsburgh has gotten excellent goaltending from Marc-Andre Fleury. He's 8-0 with a 1.96 GAA and a .926 SV%. That's an excellent start, and it has led a couple people to call him the best goalie in the league now and the person who should statr for Team Canada in the Olympics this year. To which I say let's not get ahead of ourselves here. Sure it is a good start, but Roberto Luongo and Marty Brodeur, amongst others, have a lot better track records than Fleury, and if you want to just base who the best goaltender is on the small sample size of an early season, then there are still a few goalies ahead of Fleury.

All is not well in Penguins Land, however. Sergei Gonchar is out 4-6 weeks with a wrist injury, Jordan Staal only has five points so far, and Chris Kunitz has no goals on the year. The Pens may be able to weather the storm of lacking secondary scoring (they did that a bit last season) but losing Gonchar is huge.

Colorado Avalanche: 7-1-2, good for 16 points. The Avs have to be the surprise team in the NHL early on. I had them pegged for last in the Western Conference, as many others did. However, they've ridden good fortune, good health, and good goaltending from Craig Anderson (2.25 GAA, .929 SV%) to a (very) early lead in the Northwest Division. Wojtek Wolski is leading the team with 10 points, with Milan Hejduk, Paul Stastny, and rookie Ryan O'Reilly right behind him with nine points each.

It's a great start and all, and I don't want to rain on their parade, but it's just a start. It's only 10 games, and I fully expect the Avs to regress eventually. Maybe they won't be the worst team in the West, but I still don't see a playoff team here. Craig Anderson has started all 10 games thus far. He can't keep that up all season. Plus, he's never been a starter before. Just how many games can he give them? Every Peter Budaj start doesn't bode well for the Avalanche. This is a team that also really lacks any depth. I doubt Wolski scores more than 60 points on the year, and 50 is more likely. Who knows if O'Reilly and Matt Duchene can keep up their good early play? I like Kyle Quincey a lot, but after that on defense they do not inspire.

Pretty much everybody saw this season as the beginnings of a rebuilding period in Colorado. Maybe that process is further ahead than we expected, but on paper this still isn't a particularly good team. I hope the fans are enjoying this hot start, because it probably won't last. It does give them reason to be optimistic, however, which is something.

With Saturday's full docket of NHL games, I'll probably have quite a few of these to write tomorrow. For now though, I'm done.