Still time for some trading before the season starts, especially as teams try out formations in preseason. But already some teams seem to have an excellent first powerplay unit if they load up. There seems to be a clear break between the top-7 and the next tier of teams in terms of completeness of top powerplay unit.

The Top-7 Top Powerplay Units

The Vancouver Canucks:

Four of the five have awesome passing (80+), all forwards can bury the puck and good to great puck control all around. Vlasic is the weak link but he has enough speed and puck control to not be a liability at least.

Joe Sakic  C L  OK    60 80 71 76 90 80 84 86 81 62 79 95 99 82
Steve Sullivan LW R  OK    66 80 64 74 72 85 82 81 78 75 77 78 81 81
Jaromir Jagr RW L  OK    60 78 76 78 90 70 81 87 85 56 76 91 99 81
Marc-Edouard Vlasic  D L  OK    62 71 66 79 83 89 68 64 71 75 57 55 55 73 
Sergei Gonchar D L  OK    67 74 67 88 88 72 75 80 95 73 61 81 86 80

The Philadelphia Flyers:

The centre is a great passer, the right winger a finisher and the left winger does both very well. But it is the blueline that ensures that the puck will be up ice and in the face of the opposition a lot with the man advantage.

Scott Gomez C L OK 60 78 72 73 86 80 77 80 78 58 62 73 76 75
Ray Whitney LW R  OK    60 72 62 73 81 80 71 79 81 60 77 81 85 77
Jonathan Cheechoo RW R  OK    72 76 73 71 88 71 77 69 78 57 82 66 68 78
Tomas Kaberle D L  OK    68 75 72 87 87 87 76 79 87 71 61 74 77 79
Scott Niedermayer  D L  OK    70 90 71 89 89 67 90 81 87 77 63 87 98 83

The San Jose Sharks:

The centre could use more passing and the right winger is merely alright in being the all-around utility man, and one of the defensemen has just enough puck control and speed to keep up, but this supporting cast is fine enough as the main players are Ovechkin and Lidstrom of course.

Eric Staal C L  OK    69 76 72 76 90 73 75 72 83 61 76 64 66 78
Alexander Ovechkin LW R  OK    82 88 76 78 90 78 88 75 85 50 85 60 65 83
Jozef Stumpel RW R  OK    67 73 68 74 83 87 72 71 73 75 72 83 84 77
Andrej Meszaros D L  OK    74 70 72 78 90 63 72 66 75 71 58 60 60 75
Nicklas Lidstrom D L  OK    62 75 74 89 89 80 80 78 85 80 61 91 99 81

The Buffalo Sabres:

This team's top pp unit could be better if they had more passing on the blueline. Its centre and the centre playing right wing in a pinch this season are the only greats at dishing it off. That said, three lightning fast skaters, plenty of scoring and puck control everywhere will be a force.

Sidney Crosby C L  OK    67 87 74 77 89 75 88 95 87 58 80 60 67 84
Brian Rolston LW L  OK    65 86 72 78 89 79 85 69 81 74 77 83 89 81
Olli Jokinen RW L  OK    66 78 76 77 90 70 80 79 76 62 81 75 82 80
Jay Bouwmeester D L  OK    75 80 73 87 90 74 83 67 74 77 61 66 67 79
Rob Blake D R OK 73 68 76 84 86 66 74 64 81 76 63 87 92 78

The Atlanta Thrashers:

A work in progress. the centre has been traded. Not quite sure what's what. But the endresult surely won't be much worse.

Rod Brind'Amour C L  OK    74 74 75 82 87 79 73 83 80 84 73 93 99 83
Dany Heatley LW L  OK    71 80 72 78 90 72 77 81 80 61 88 67 68 82
Marian Gaborik RW L  OK    63 90 66 75 67 73 90 75 75 58 89 69 70 81
Zdeno Chara D L  OK    84 70 90 90 85 63 74 68 81 79 61 75 83 83
Sheldon Souray D L  OK    72 70 78 81 87 52 73 71 80 73 72 72 76 78

The Minnesota Wild:

The elite passer or the otherwise overall better centre? For sure it will be a guy named Henrik. The wingers will pot the puck, a blueliner can score a bit too, everyone has very good puck control, all but one is fast. This team's top unit might be prototypical.

Henrik Sedin C L  OK    60 78 68 72 90 74 81 90 78 60 60 71 72 77
Henrik Zetterberg C L  OK    62 80 67 77 79 80 81 75 77 73 83 65 69 80
Daniel Sedin LW L  OK    58 78 68 72 90 83 81 77 78 59 79 71 72 78
Teemu Selanne RW R  OK    58 80 70 71 90 69 82 75 79 56 87 87 92 80
Dan Boyle D R  OK    72 83 65 89 89 75 83 73 91 58 67 71 73 80
Alexei Zhitnik D L  OK    70 68 72 83 78 65 70 68 77 77 58 86 88 77
 
The Chicago Blackhawks:

Again, passing versus otherwise overall better playing, though how the league's best passer could be left off the top unit is beyond me: go with Joe. The wingers score and pass and there's a good offensive defenseman, though his partner has just enough puck control not to get lost with this bunch.

Joe Thornton  C L  OK    67 79 80 76 90 81 81 96 80 57 69 76 82 81
Vincent Lecavalier C L  OK    73 85 74 80 90 81 86 81 79 61 89 75 82 84
Patrick Marleau LW L  OK    66 83 75 73 89 83 84 77 77 59 78 78 86 80
Martin Havlat RW L  OK    58 82 65 78 51 82 81 76 79 66 80 67 67 79
Andrei Markov D L  OK    63 73 71 84 81 76 75 75 78 75 58 69 70 77
Paul Mara D L OK 69 68 69 79 87 58 70 62 73 76 58 72 72 74


The Next-5

The Edmonton Oilers:

The centre is the only great passer of the entire bunch. That's the achilles heel. At least the blueliners have puck control and aren't too slow. And the strength of this unit would be the speed and puck wizardry of the deadly finishing wingers. 

Marc Savard C L  OK    63 77 65 76 90 65 78 91 83 58 69 74 75 79
Ilya Kovalchuk LW R  OK    68 80 66 78 89 74 81 68 91 50 83 68 68 79
Jason Blake RW L  OK    67 81 68 72 88 84 81 66 76 59 82 72 73 78
Francois Beauchemin D L  OK    74 70 70 86 81 77 71 65 73 79 59 59 62 76
Brett Clark D L  OK    70 70 72 82 90 79 70 66 74 78 60 66 66 76

The Calgary Flames:

All forwards can bury the puck but the wingers won't move the puck around alot, and the centre is merely good compared to other top units at passing. There's a great offensive defenseman but the next best blueliner doesn't have the puck control required of all skaters to make for an upper echelon pp unit.

Daymond Langkow C L  OK    67 72 66 76 90 81 70 74 78 64 78 80 80 77
Darcy Tucker LW L  OK    74 75 76 71 74 58 74 66 80 61 79 78 79 78
Glen Murray RW R  OK    63 67 73 73 71 75 70 64 79 60 81 84 88 76
Dan Hamhuis D L  OK    73 68 76 78 90 74 70 60 60 80 58 64 64 75
Brian Rafalski D R  OK    67 73 67 86 90 84 76 76 79 63 59 73 76 76

The New York Islanders:

A great offensive defenseman and one of the best finishers on wing highlight an otherwise average unit. The centre and other defenseman have excellent puck control but the left winger is inferior whereas that position would need to be top notch to elevate this unit significantly.

Sergei Fedorov C L  OK    66 77 70 75 79 75 80 66 78 69 68 89 94 77
Bryan Smolinski LW R  OK    67 67 68 71 90 83 67 65 69 75 65 86 86 73
Bill Guerin RW R  OK    69 77 79 69 83 73 78 63 76 59 81 86 89 78
Michal Rozsival D R  OK    74 66 76 82 90 78 69 67 79 74 60 69 69 77
Lubomir Visnovsky D L  OK    66 77 67 84 84 85 80 76 87 60 68 69 69 79

The Montreal Canadiens:

The left winger isn't expected to have a career year scoringwise but he can pass and skate with the best of them. The centre isn't geared to light the lamp either putting a lot of pressure on the right winger as the sole goal producer of the lot. Two decent but not great offensive defensemen hold their own.

Derek Roy C L  OK    66 79 63 72 86 74 76 75 73 70 69 62 63 76
Patrik Elias LW L  OK    66 86 70 73 67 81 86 79 78 61 69 76 86 79
Jarome Iginla RW R  OK    71 78 83 79 85 80 80 87 81 61 85 79 89 84
Wade Redden D L  OK    70 73 74 81 74 75 75 70 79 70 59 79 85 77
Brian Campbell D L  OK    71 74 67 79 89 83 75 73 74 62 58 67 68 75

The New Jersey Devils:

One great passer, one great finisher, one decent puck controller on the blueline, this unit is a couple of upgrades away from greatness: more speed and passing by the defense, more scoring up front.

Peter Forsberg C L  OK    71 75 73 72 68 56 79 84 77 60 66 77 81 77
Steven Reinprecht LW L  OK    60 70 68 67 74 80 72 72 73 57 62 69 71 72
Shane Doan RW R  OK    79 77 77 76 87 69 78 67 78 63 76 82 91 79
Barret Jackman D L  OK    73 66 79 78 76 65 68 66 65 74 57 64 67 75
Mattias Ohlund D L  OK    73 71 77 85 87 68 75 63 77 78 61 75 77 78