NHL 16: Review of Elite Team and Player Ratings

In today's sports video games, ratings matter as much as they ever have. We're past the era where players were simply differentiated by categories such as speed, agility and power. Specialized stats lean more toward advanced statistics than they do the standard skill observations that were once commonplace.

NHL 16 adheres to the new way of evaluating players. Thanks to an early edition of the game, we've been able to scope out the player and team ratings. Here's a look at each team's ratings in offense, defense and goaltending.

Team	Offense	Defense	Goaltending
Anaheim Ducks	90	91	90
Arizona Coyotes	86	88	86
Boston Bruins	88	89	93
Buffalo Sabres	88	88	85
Calgary Flames	89	93	87
Carolina Hurricanes	87	86	88
Chicago Blackhawks	90	91	90
Colorado Avalanche	88	89	90
Columbus Blue Jackets	88	90	90
Dallas Stars	91	88	88
Detroit Red Wings	92	92	89
Edmonton Oilers	87	89	86
Florida Panthers	87	89	89
Los Angeles Kings	90	91	94
Minnesota Wild	91	91	88
Montreal Canadiens	89	91	94
Nashville Predators	89	93	94
New Jersey Devils	86	90	91
New York Islanders	92	90	88
New York Rangers	90	93	95
Philadelphia Flyers	91	89	88
Pittsburgh Penguins	92	89	89
San Jose Sharks	90	93	83
St. Louis Blues	92	91	87
Tampa Bay Lightning	93	92	90
Toronto Maple Leafs	89	90	87
Vancouver Canucks	88	89	89
Washington Capitals	91	91	92
Winnipeg Jets	87	92	87

Team Ratings

Chicago Blackhawks

Appropriately, the defending Stanley Cup champions are one of the highest-rated teams in the game. With just about every key player returning—minus Brandon Saad and Patrick Sharp—Chicago is in business again this season. Thankfully, EA Sports has finally secured the license to the champions home building, per Pasta Padre's Bryan Wiedey:

Captain Jonathan Toews is the second-highest rated player in the game. With him and Duncan Keith on the roster, Chicago is the only team with two players in the top 10.

New York Rangers

When it comes to offense, defense and goaltending, no team looks better than the New York Rangers on paper. Offensively, the team is rated a 90, which is the lowest rating it has in the three major categories. 

Thanks to goalie Henrik Lundqvist, the Rangers check in with the top goalie rating at 95. If you're looking for the best team in the initial ratings, you'll want to play with the Rangers.

Los Angeles Kings

Jonathan Quick puts the Kings just behind the Rangers when it comes to goaltending. But the Kings' qualities go beyond Quick. Drew Doughty, Anze Kopitar and Jeff Carter all have ratings of 90 or above.

What's even more impressive for the Kings is that none of the three are over the age of 30. That may make them the best team to control in Be a GM mode.

Player Ratings

Sidney Crosby

With a 96 overall, the 28-year-old future Hall of Famer is considered a five-star performer in every category in NHL 16, except for physicality. He rates as a four-star performer in that regard.

If you want to pull off some of the slickest moves NHL 16 has to offer, take Crosby for a spin with the Pittsburgh Penguins or Team Canada.

Duncan Keith

image provided by EA Sports

The Blackhawks' all-world defenseman is obviously great at supporting his goalie, but he's also one of the best two-way players in the game. Keith is a four-star shooter with an 88 rating in slap shot power and wrist shot power.

There are few game-changing defenseman in NHL 16 on both ends of the ice, but Keith is one of them.

Carey Price

The Rangers have the highest goaltending rating with Lundqvist and his backup Antti Raanta, who is rated an 82. However, Carey Price of the Montreal Canadiens is the highest-rated netminder in the game at 94, and his backup, Dustin Tokarski, is also rated an 82.

Go figure.

In any case, Price, who is the reigning Vezina Trophy winner, checks out as a five-star player in all three goalie categories. The 28-year-old is a player you might even want to consider building around if you do a fantasy draft in Be a GM mode.

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