Fantasy Hockey Schedule Week 2: First Full Scoring Week

The fantasy hockey season is in full swing now.  Week 2 of the NHL season is the first full scoring period for most fantasy hockey pools.  Don’t dress players from the New York Rangers or Toronto Maple Leafs as they both only have one game this week. 

Remember teams (Anaheim, Buffalo, Los Angeles and NY Rangers) who start the season overseas tend to have slow starts once they get back to North America.

Games To Be Played in Week 2

FOUR GAMES: Colorado, Minnesota, St. Louis and Vancouver

THREE GAMES: Boston, Calgary, Carolina, Columbus, Dallas, New Jersey, NY Islanders, Ottawa, Phoenix, Pittsburgh, Tampa Bay and Washington

TWO GAMES: Anaheim, Buffalo, Chicago, Detroit, Edmonton, Florida, Los Angeles, Montreal, Nashville, Philadelphia, San Jose and Winnipeg

ONE GAME: NY Rangers and Toronto

Home/Away Games This Week

When it comes to dressing your players for the upcoming week—especially your goaliesit is important to know which team is on a long road trip and which team is enjoying an extended period at home.

Listed below are the teams that play at least three home/away games this week or play all their games at home or on the road (home/road records up to October 8, 2011):

HOME: Anaheim (1-0-0), Chicago (0-0-0), Dallas (1-0-0), Montreal (0-0-0), Nashville (0-0-0), NY Islanders (0-0-0), Philadelphia (0-0-0), Pittsburgh (0-0-0) and Toronto (1-0-0)

AWAY: Calgary (0-0-0), Colorado (0-0-0), Los Angeles (0-1-0), NY Rangers (0-0-2), St. Louis (0-0-0), Tampa Bay (1-0-0), Vancouver (0-0-0) and Winnipeg (0-0-0)

Teams That Play on Sunday

If you participate in any type of head-to-head hockey pool, you are likely dressing a lineup for each scoring period, which usually ends on Sunday.

As the week comes to an end, and you find yourself in a close battle for those wins, you want as many players as possible playing for you.

Here are the teams that play on Sunday:

Anaheim and St. Louis

Teams That Play in Back-to-Back Games This Week

When you are deciding which goalie to dress you need to look at the NHL schedule to see if your goalie's team will play in a back-to-back game that week.

Most coaches will not dress the same goalie in back-to-back games, so that is something to consider when you are thinking about which goalie to dress. 

Here are the teams that play in back-to-back games this week:

Buffalo. Colorado, Minnesota, San Jose, St. Louis and Vancouver

Top 5 and Bottom 5 Teams

Knowing which team is on a hot streak or cold streak will help in making your lineup decisions. 

For example you definitely want to dress a goalie from teams that are on a hot streak. Here are the top five and bottom five teams up to October 8, 2011:

TOP FIVE: Buffalo (2-0-0), Tampa Bay (1-0-0), Detroit (1-0-0), Pittsburgh (1-0-0) and Philadelphia (1-0-0)

BOTTOM FIVE: Los Angeles (0-2-0), Columbus (0-1-0), Montreal (0-1-0), Ottawa (0-1-0) and Carolina (0-1-0)

Top 5 Power Plays

Fantasy hockey is all about offense and what better place to generate offense then the power play.  Here are the top five power plays:

          Pittsburgh: 66.7 percent
          Ottawa: 66.7  percent
          Buffalo: 37.5 percent
          Tampa Bay: 33.3 percent
          Nashville: 33.3 percent

Latest Significant Injuries

Staying on top of injuries is extremely important to the success and failure of your fantasy hockey team.  Not knowing who is injured could lead to dressing a player who won’t get you any fantasy points.  Here are the latest significant injuries taken from TSN.ca:

          Toni Lydman: Anaheim (on IR due to right shoulder surgery)
          Kurtis Foster: Anaheim (questionable due to left thigh surgery)
          Mikael Backlund: Calgary (out six weeks due to broken finger)
          Kyle Cumiskey: Colorado (on IR due to groin injury)
          Kristian Huselius: Columbus (out indefinitely due to pectoral surgery)
          Jared Boll: Columbus (out six to eight weeks due to broken thumb)
          Scott Glennie: Dallas (on IR due to concussion)
          Ryan Whitney: Edmonton (on IR due to right ankle surgery)
          Sam Gagner: Edmonton (on IR due to left ankle sprain)
          Andrei Markov: Montreal (on IR due to right knee inflammation)
          Chris Campoli: Montreal (out indefinitely due to left leg injury)
          Mike Fisher: Nashville (on IR due to shoulder surgery)
          Travis Zajac: New Jersey (out indefinitely due to left Achilles surgery)
          Nino Niederreiter: NY Islanders (on IR due to groin injury)
          Marc Staal: NY Rangers (on IR due to concussion)
          Sidney Crosby: Pittsburgh (on IR due to post-concussion syndrome)
          Martin Havlat: San Jose (on IR due to shoulder surgery)
          Antero Niittymaki: San Jose (out three months due to hip surgery)
          David Perron: St. Louis (on IR due to post-concussion syndrome)
          Tim Connolly: Toronto (on IR due to upper body injury)
          Nazem Kadri: Toronto (on IR due to torn ligament in knee)
          Ryan Kesler: Vancouver (out indefinitely due to left hip surgery)
          Mason Raymond: Vancouver (out indefinitely due to fractured vertebrae)
          Eric Fehr: Winnipeg (out indefinitely due to right shoulder surgery)

The Top 10 Scorers

Most elite stars are consistent scorers, but there are several players who are very streaky so keep an eye on their stats so that you can dress them while they are on a hot streak.

Here are the top 10 scorers at forward and defense from the start of the season:

FORWARDS:

Thomas Vanek: Buffalo (2 GP 2 G 3 A)
Anze Kopitar: Los Angeles (2 GP 3 G 1 A)
Luke Adam: Buffalo (2 GP 2 G 2 A)
Jason Pominville: Buffalo (2 GP 1 G 3 A)
Matt Cooke: Pittsburgh (1 GP 2 G 0 A)
Milan Michalek: Ottawa (1 GP 2 G 0 A)
Rick Nash: Columbus (1 GP 1 G 1 A)
Brad Richards: NY Rangers (2 GP 1 G 1 A)
Martin St. Louis: Tampa Bay (1 GP 1 G 1 A)
Cory Emmerton: Detroit (1 GP 1 G 1 A)

The Top 10 Scorers: Defensemen

Jack Johnson: Los Angeles (2 GP 1 G 1 A)
Ryan Suter: Nashville (1 GP 1 G 1 A)
Dion Phaneuf: Toronto (1 GP 1 G 1 A)
Kris Letang: Pittsburgh (1 GP 0 G 2 A)
Nate Guenin: Anaheim (2 GP 1 G 0 A)
Keith Ballard: Vancouver (1 GP 1 G 0 A)
Alex Goligoski: Dallas (1 GP 1 G 0 A)
Filip Kuba: Ottawa (1 GP 1 G 0 A)
Nicklas Lidstrom: Detroit (1 GP 1 G 0 A)
Ian White: Detroit (1 GP 1 G 0 A)

Top 5 Goaltenders and Bottom 5 Goaltenders

Here are the top five goaltenders and bottom five goaltenders from the start of the season:

HOT GOALTENDERS:

Ryan Miller: Buffalo (2 GP 2 W 0 SO)
James Reimer: Toronto (1 GP 1 W 1 SO)
Dwayne Roloson: Tampa Bay (1 GP 1 W 0 SO)
Ilya Bryzgalov: Philadelphia (1 GP 1 W 1 SO)
Kari Lehtonen: Dallas (1GP 1 W 1 SO)

COLD GOALTENDERS

Jonathan Bernier: Los Angeles (1 GP 1 L)
Steve Mason: Columbus (1 GP 1 L)
Carey Price: Montreal (1 GP 1 L)
Craig Anderson: Ottawa (1 GP 1 L)
Henrik Lundqvist: NY Rangers (2 GP 2 OTL)

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Aaron Brouwer is the co-creator of www.fantasyhockeycoach.com.  FHC is a free fantasy hockey service that developed a ranking system combining post-lockout statistics, current factors and our own hockey knowledge.  Brouwer writes about fantasy hockey on Bleacher Report. You can contact Coach Brouwer at [e-mail].