PHILAELPHIA -- The new NHL has reached the quarter pole and there have been plenty of surprises in the league, both positive and negative.Like where did the first-place New York Rangers come from? And the first-place Carolina Hurricanes? And how about the nearly unbeatable Nashville Predators?

On the flip side, why are the Boston Bruins so bad? Why have the Atlanta Thrashers disappointed when they were the sexy pick to be an up-and-coming playoff team? And how about San Jose and Anaheim? Weren’t they supposed to battle for the Pacific Division crown instead of the cellar?

Well, 20 games or so does not a season make. But it does provide many stories of success and failure, and also some interesting side shows to an otherwise head-spinning beginning to the season.

The Habs have exploded out of the gate, using their speed, skill, and relentless forecheck to frustrate opponents and take over games in a blink of an eye.

Their run-and-gun style is quite similar to that employed last season when the Tampa Bay Lightning stunned the hockey world and won the Stanley Cup.

Darren McCarty scored an insurance goal in the third period of Wednesday’s 3-1 win for the Calgary Flames against his former team, the Detroit Red Wings.

It helped Calgary to its eighth straight win, which matches a team record since the Flames moved to Calgary. The franchise record is 10 straight wins, set by the Atlanta Flames in 1978.

The top four, in order: 1. 1997 Stanley Cup clinching goal against the Flyers. 2. Overtime game-winner in the infamous March, 1997 game against Colorado when Claude Lemieux rearranged Kris Draper’s face, touching off a brawl, and a long-time rivalry. 3-through-5. The natural hat trick he registered against Patrick Roy in the 2002 playoffs.

Does anyone at all understand the Bryan McCabe love-in in Toronto? Sure the guy is piling up the points, and leads all defensemen in the NHL with eight goals, 19 assists and 27 points.

But he is a defenseman, right? And a defenseman’s primary job is to help prevent the other team from generating good scoring chances, right?

In a game earlier this week against the Penguins, the Islanders finally won on a goal by Jason Blake, the team’s ninth shooter during the shootout.

Each team gets three shooters. If the game is still tied, each team gets one additional shooter until a winner is determined. No player can shoot a second time until all available players have gone.

The Sabres get off to a surprising plus-.500 start in the NHL’s best division, so they think they can be cool and change the pronunciations of some of their names.

While everyone is quick to laud the Flyers for their strategy and gameplan heading into the lockout that has resulted in a championship-caliber lineup, there are other teams who were not so savvy.

They decided to not sign anyone, walk into the lockout with only a handful of players under contract, and then completely remake the face of the team.

The best example of their mistakes was in making no effort to re-sign Flyers winger Mike Knuble, Michael Nylander and Brian Rolston. Former Flyer Alex Zhamnov, Brad Isbister and Dave Scatchard are the replacements for those three lost free agents.

The Zhamnov, Isbister and Scatchard combo has produced a combined 15 points (six goals, nine assists). They earn this year a combined $7.3 million. The three guys who left have 57 points (22 goals, 35 assists) and were being paid a total of $6.1 million.

Immersed in a lengthy road trip that will keep them away from the Windy City for 10 of the next 12 games, the Chicago Black Hawks will get some time off next week.

The Hawks will get three days between games in Vancouver and Los Angeles and they’ll spend the off-day next Wednesday in L.A. playing golf at Riviera Country Club in the morning, then relaxing with paintball in the afternoon.

Minnesota Wild coach Jacques Lemaire was steaming following a 3-2 loss in Calgary Monday and accused six players of "not showing up" for the game, which was the Wild’s eighth loss in 11 outings.

While Lemaire refused to name names, there were six players who took undisciplined penalties for the Wild in the third period leading to two Flames goals, which were the difference.

The next day, Lemaire put his entire team through a 90-minute on-ice practice and constantly scolded his players for freelancing instead of playing the system in place.

"There’s one way this team is going to win -- only one way," said Lemaire. "It’s to play the way the coaching staff feels they should play. We do for certain periods. But it cracks down at different times. That’s what we’ve been working on. And I’m going to work on this until I get it to the way I want it."

In Philadelphia, the fast-food chain Chic-Fil-A gives away a free chicken sandwich every time the Flyers score four or more goals during a home game.

The same can’t be said in Ottawa, where Pizza Pizza has begged the team to change the number of goals needed for a free slice from five to six goals at home.

To honor the cheapskates, the Senators have scored six goals in both games since the change, and even forward Jason Spezza had something to say about it.

After the Sens scored their final goal in a 6-1 win over Buffalo last Saturday, a goal which was credited to three different Senators as the night progressed, Spezza described it thusly: "I don’t know what happened. It bounced around about 10 times and we got pizza."

While the players and coaches were finally relieved to get a victory, there may have been no one more surprised than Jeremy Rutherford, the Blues beat writer for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. In an e-mail to several writers from around the league, Rutherford wrote "I almost called a couple of you..to ask, ‘how do you write a story about a victory?’"

Shawn Horcoff, who’ll never be confused with Wayne Gretzky, nevertheless had four assists in the third period of Thursday’s 6-5 OT win against Detroit to tie 99’s Oiler record.

"I feel kind of strange. Me and Wayne Gretzky with the same record. Me, in legendary company," said Horcoff, who had been one of the worst Oiler forwards through the first 40 minutes of the game. "How many times did Wayne do it, though?"

"I find it hard to believe that Wayne did it seven times. You’d think with all his records, that four would have been an average night for him," he said.

It’s only been done 64 times in NHL history, though. The record is five in a period by Dale Hawerchuk for the Winnipeg Jets in March, 1984.

They sit atop the Western Conference standings with a 15-4-2 record, but they are 7-0-0 against doormats Columbus, Chicago and St. Louis and only 7-6 (yes an OT loss is still a loss, no matter how you slice it) against everyone else.

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