I'm standing in for the Ramblings for the second week in a row and as there were just two games on Sunday, I thought I'd breakdown both of them.

Anaheim has been playing well in 2023-2024 and hit their peak to this point with a 4-2 win over the Vegas Golden Knights after scoring four goals in the third period. The Ducks ensured that every NHL team now has a regulation loss this season as Vegas gets their first.

Us handing VGK their first L in regulation👍#FlyTogether pic.twitter.com/czhD4HAiEr

— Anaheim Ducks (@AnaheimDucks) November 6, 2023

Mason McTavish had the game winning goal and now has six goals and seven assists in 11 games to lead the Ducks in points.

John Gibson had a quality start and got the win in making 32 saves on 34 shots. He now has three quality starts in six games and has a record of 2-3-0 with a save percentage of 91.0. He hasn't had a season above 91.0 since 2018-2019 when he had a 91.7 save percentage.

The line of Troy Terry, Leo Carlsson and Trevor Zegras outshot Vegas at ES six to one and outchanced them eight to three. Terry had an assist and has seen his production get back on track with 10 points in 11 games now and 11 SOG and three goals and two assists in his past two games.

Carlsson has now played five games in a row and the Ducks might have re-thought their plan to not dress him as they have managed his minutes to between 13-17 in his past four games after being between 19-22 his first three.

Trevor Zegras had just one shot on goal in 16:26 of ice time. He has just one goal and one assist in 11 games now. It's impressive that the Ducks have been doing this well offensively without much contribution from Zegras and are now 7-4-0.

Before the 2021-2022 season, I actually included Sam Carrick in my Western Conference sleeper picks after playing just 13 games the year before. He ended up 64-11-8-19 with 122 hits which would have only helped in very deep leagues. He took a step back in 2022-2023 with just 52-3-4-7 and 98 hits. With two goals on Sunday, he now has had three goals and two assists and 14 hits in 11 games. I'd expect a ceiling of what he put up in 2021-2022.

Frank Vatrano can't be stopped. He had two more points albeit assists and now has 12 points in 11 games. He set up McTavish on the GWG.

Alex Killorn was activated from the IR and played his first game of the season and first as a member of the Ducks. He saw some time on the first unit of the power play but went pointless in over 16 minutes of ice time playing with Adam Henrique and Jakob Silfverberg at even strength.

I didn't really want Cam Fowler on my fantasy teams leading up to the year, but I was able to get him on waivers and I thought he might be a good insurance policy if Olen Zellweger or Pavel Mintyukov weren't ready or Jamie Drysdale wasn't quite up to form. We all know now that Zellweger was sent to the AHL, Drysdale was injured and Mintyukov has been very good, but Fowler is now up to seven points in 11 games with 24 blocks and is still averaging over 24 minutes per game. I don't think there is any doubt that Fowler's production will decline as Mintyukov continues to improve and Drysdale returns to the lineup. Fowler is like old reliable at 31-years of age and is somehow above his point pace from a year ago.

In looking at the Vegas lineup, Logan Thompson had his first non-quality start of the season and is now 5-1-0 with a save percentage of 92.3. His stats took a beating in the third period as he let in three goals on just five shots on goal.

Jack Eichel did have a goal and an assist but had a bad giveaway on the second Ducks goal which made it 2-2.

Ivan Barbashev scored his fourth goal in 13 games and now has three points in his past three games after just two points in his first 10. It doesn't hurt that he gets to play with Eichel.

Paul Cotter is starting to slow down. In his first seven games he had two goals, three assists and 25 hits. In his last six games he has just one goal and 14 hits.

–

News came down on Sunday that Jack Hughes will be week to week after going into the boards on Saturday.

Although Jack Hughes has been officially designated as "week to week" with an upper body injury, multiple people around the @NJDevils have used the word "fortunate" to describe the severity of his injury after that collision against the boards.

— Greg Wyshynski (@wyshynski) November 5, 2023

This news prefaced the Devils game against Chicago on Sunday. New Jersey was able to eke out a 4-2 win over the Blackhawks. The win moves the Devils to 7-3-1 and Chicago with the loss moves to 4-7-0.

Vitek Vanecek was able to bring his record to 6-2-0 and get his save percentage up to 90.0 after making 34 saves on 36 shots on goal.

Dawson Mercer got his first goal and first point in game 11 after playing 17:38 and putting up four shots on goal.

Max Willman was called up in place of Jack Hughes and scored a goal in his first NHL game this season. It was his first goal since 2021-2022 when he had four goals in 41 games with Philadelphia.

From the Chicago standpoint, Arvid Soderblom had a strong night in goal making 39 saves on 42 shots in a losing cause. After two really bad starts in a row for Soderblom, he kept the Blackhawks in this game.

Rookie Kevin Korchinski turned the puck over at the blue line on the Willman breakaway goal but Luke Richardson has stated before that he doesn't want his young players to be afraid to make mistakes. A coach can say that, but they will have limits to the number of mistakes a player makes, scared or not.

Connor Bedard went pointless and was unlucky to be a minus three. He did end up with four SOG and now has 34 shots on goal in 11 games. Bedard has been getting better in the faceoff circle and had his best night of the year at 57.1 percent. He is now at 40.2 percent after being under 30 early on. He did turn the puck over a few times, with one just inside the opposition blueline and one in his own end. Bedard has been excellent as a rookie with just four giveaways and six takeaways in 11 games.

Alex Vlasic had a career-high six shots on goal for Chicago while playing 17:47.

Taylor Hall now has goals in back-to-back games since coming off the injured reserve.

Other Sunday happenings:

Andrew Mangiapane was suspended for one game for his cross check on Jared McCann from Saturday night.

Calgary's Andrew Mangiapane has been suspended for one game for Cross-checking Seattle's Jared McCann. https://t.co/4DU7Wkq2Oq

— NHL Player Safety (@NHLPlayerSafety) November 5, 2023

The Edmonton Oilers recalled veteran AHLer James Hamblin Sunday on an emergency basis. The Oilers played their last game with less than 20 healthy players and will need Hamblin in their game against the Vancouver Canucks on Monday. Hamblin should fill a role on the fourth line

Waltteri Merela was sent back to the AHL by Tampa Bay. He had gone pointless in 10 games after coming over to North America as a 25-year-old for the first time after playing in Finland.

Alex Laferriere was sent back to the AHL by Los Angeles. This might be short-term as he had two goals and one assist in 11 games, but impressively had 25 shots on goal.

AHL Prospect Check-in

I thought I would check in with NHL prospects who are playing in the AHL this year.

For my purposes, I'm going to focus on AHL players who are 23 or younger as I believe that even if there is a handful of very good players over that age who could still play in the NHL, the majority who will move up in the next year or two will be under.

The list below includes some of the better producing players along with some prospects of interest.

I discovered that there is a 22-year-old unsigned forward leading the Utica Comets of the AHL in scoring. His name is Xavier Parent and he has nine points after eight games. Utica has him signed to an AHL-only contract, so New Jersey would have to sign him to an NHL contract to bring him up.

Name	POS	Age	Team	GP	G	A	PTS	SOG
Danil Gushchin	F	21	SJ	9	4	9	13	39
Arshdeep Bains	F	22	VAN	11	3	13	16	13
Grigori Denisenko	F	23	FLA	10	4	7	11	16
Brad Lambert	F	19	WPG	8	5	5	10	22
Nikita Chibrikov	F	20	WPG	8	2	8	10	29
Jiri Kulich	F	19	BUF	11	9	4	13	30
Fabian Lysell	F	20	BOS	10	3	7	10	21
Rafael Lavoie	F	23	EDM	5	4	4	8	27
Alex Turcotte	F	22	LA	9	2	6	8	22
Xavier Parent	F	22	UFA	8	5	4	9	18
Connor Zary	F	22	CGY	6	1	9	10	15
Isak Rosen	F	20	BUF	10	5	7	12	27
Joshua Roy	F	20	MTL	10	5	7	12	40
Vasily Podkolzin	F	22	VAN	6	5	2	7	23
Logan Stankoven	F	20	DAL	9	6	7	13	19
Nick Robertson	F	22	TOR	9	5	6	11	37
Dylan Guenther	F	20	ARZ	8	2	5	7	22
Mavrik Bourque	F	21	DAL	9	5	8	13	27
Shane Wright	F	19	SEA	7	4	2	6	21
Brandt Clarke	D	20	LA	9	2	5	7	37
Brennan Othmann	F	20	NYR	9	2	5	7	28
Matthew Savoie	F	19	BUF	6	2	3	5	10
Olen Zellweger	D	20	ANA	8	1	3	4	24
Topi Niemela	D	21	TOR	8	2	3	5	11
Simon Edvinsson	D	20	DET	8	3	1	4	25
Aatu Raty	F	20	VAN	11	2	5	7	12

I don't think it is usual that there are 15-20 players in the AHL who are under the age of 23 and are putting up a point per game. Usually, it takes an AHL rookie a year or two to adapt to pro hockey and then get the opportunity to succeed. It seems that a lot of these younger players are either better prepared or are getting better opportunities to succeed and running with it.

It is still early and some of these players are bound to fade a little, but some of these prospects might get called up to the NHL and never see the AHL again.

One would think that with San Jose struggling to score some goals that Danil Gushchin and Henry Thrun might get the call up to the Sharks sooner than later. Neither player will help alleviate the 10 goals against that teams have put up in back-to-back games though.

				GP	W	GAA	SV%
Sebastian Cossa	G	20	DET	4	1	2.50	92.3
Dylan Garland	G	21	NYR	5	3	2.63	91.4
Dustin Wolf	G	22	CGY	5	5	2.18	93.4
Jesper Wallstedt	G	20	MIN	5	3	2.42	91.7
Yaroslav Askarov	G	21	NSH	5	3	1.60	93.5
Drew Commesso	G	21	CHI	3	2	2.02	92.8
Mads Sogaard	G	22	OTT	6	3	2.09	93.5
Spencer Knight	G	22	FLA	5	3	1.74	92.7
Isaac Poulter	G	22	UFA	5	3	1.87	94.2

The future of goaltending is definitely bright with the start to the AHL season that Spencer Knight, Mads Sogaard, Drew Commesso, Yaroslav Askarov, Jesper Wallstedt, Dustin Wolf, Dylan Garand and Sebastian Cossa have had. All of these young goalies should be future starters in the NHL.

Isaac Poulter is a 22-year-old goalie playing for Utica in the AHL and he is not signed to an NHL contract.

NHL Power Rankings

I've done this for a few years now on my own, but I take my player ratings and plug them into each team's roster and then give the team an overall rating, and then break it down for wingers, center, defense and in goal. I usually like to use a period of the past two seasons, so that there is less volatility on a daily basis.

I thought it would be interesting to punch in the numbers solely based on the player's performances in the 10-12 games they have played so far in 2023-2024. The problem with a small data set is that the Vancouver Canucks being this high for much longer is very unlikely, so Canuck fans should enjoy it while it lasts. They have convinced me that they might be a playoff team, but there are still 70-plus games still.

Team	11/02/23	PGR	Goalies	Forwards	Center	Defence
Vancouver	1	6.594	7.10	6.56	6.72	6.58
Vegas	2	6.541	7.06	6.49	6.66	6.56
Boston	3	6.539	7.65	6.50	6.52	6.42
Dallas	4	6.508	7.18	6.50	6.54	6.41
New Jersey	5	6.503	6.50	6.54	6.67	6.43
NY Islanders	6	6.501	7.21	6.46	6.61	6.47
Colorado	7	6.492	6.91	6.49	6.58	6.43
Anaheim	8	6.490	6.74	6.50	6.62	6.43
Los Angeles	9	6.488	5.94	6.56	6.57	6.44
Minnesota	10	6.485	5.87	6.55	6.60	6.47
Tampa Bay	11	6.485	6.99	6.49	6.48	6.39
Detroit	12	6.483	6.61	6.47	6.57	6.49
Arizona	13	6.475	6.79	6.50	6.48	6.37
Ottawa	14	6.474	6.13	6.53	6.58	6.42
Montreal	15	6.471	6.85	6.44	6.49	6.46
NY Rangers	16	6.466	6.86	6.43	6.52	6.47
Buffalo	17	6.455	6.60	6.44	6.43	6.47
Toronto	18	6.454	6.31	6.49	6.61	6.40
Florida	19	6.452	6.60	6.47	6.51	6.40
Columbus	20	6.449	6.55	6.43	6.54	6.44
Pittsburgh	21	6.439	6.23	6.50	6.61	6.36
Nashville	22	6.433	6.47	6.43	6.45	6.44
Carolina	23	6.420	5.47	6.47	6.48	6.49
Philadelphia	24	6.418	5.73	6.47	6.36	6.43
Seattle	25	6.415	6.54	6.41	6.34	6.40
Winnipeg	26	6.413	6.06	6.47	6.42	6.37
Edmonton	27	6.372	5.40	6.44	6.52	6.41
St. Louis	28	6.363	6.80	6.35	6.39	6.32
Chicago	29	6.350	6.29	6.36	6.41	6.34
Calgary	30	6.347	5.89	6.35	6.45	6.43
Washington	31	6.342	6.09	6.37	6.38	6.32
San Jose	32	6.272	6.61	6.24	6.25	6.28
Average		6.450	6.501	6.459	6.511	6.42

Poor San Jose, as the only category they had above the league average was goaltending but this is only until November 2nd, so doesn't include the back-to-back 10 goals given up. Believe it or not, The Sharks have sunk lower than the above.

If people are curious how each team breaks down, they can check out the sheet here.

Thanks for reading and if you have any questions or players you'd like me to look at please message or follow me on Twitter @gampbler15.