A tough decision can be made easier with these charts showing you the best five and worst five schedules for upcoming seven-day periods. Some of you used them last year but for the benefit of new readers here is a refresher. The number next to the team indicates the 'multiplier' to use on a player's point-per-game pace to give you an idea how many points to expect for that week.

A lot of the talk this week has been about the three coaching replacements in Washington, Carolina and Anaheim. As fantasy owners, we expect that the coaching change will bring a sudden surge to a team (see St. Louis), so if you’re an owner of Ovie, Staal or Getzlaf, you probably couldn’t be happier. So let’s have a look at what their new coaches will have to deal with in the next couple of weeks.

After the showdown of not so big proportions between Sid and Ovie last night, the Caps have what most would consider an easier stretch ahead facing Ottawa twice, Florida, Toronto, Philly, Winnipeg and Colorado. This is a great chance for the stars in Washington to get their mojo back (and hopefully play more than 16 minutes) as Florida is the only team ranked in the top ten in goals against per game, while the Leafs, Sens and Jets are all in the bottom five.

Like the Caps, Carolina is all over the place in the month of December with nothing bigger than a four game Canadian road trip; which by the way, is really weird that they move West to East in facing Calgary, Edmonton, Winnipeg and Toronto, and then come back home to face Vancouver. With three games in the first four days of the trip, and then a four  day layoff before playing the Leafs, it will serve as a good bonding experience for the team and their new coach.

Boudreau and the Ducks have the hardest schedule ahead, even though a lot of it is on their once feared home ice. Their first four games are against Philadelphia, Minnesota, Los Angeles and LA; the Flyers are the only ones who aren’t ranked in the top five in goals against per game in the league. As if this month wasn’t already big enough for the disappointing team, consider that they only face one team from the East in their 13 December games and things could get a whole lot worse if Gabby doesn’t help turn things around.

There are some teams playing some disgustingly good defensive hockey in their own barns so far this season. St. Louis (17 GA in 11 games), New York (18 GA in 9 games), Pittsburgh (22 GA in 11 games), Edmonton (23 GA in 12 games) and Detroit (25 GA in 13 games) are all risky teams to put your players in against if you’re in a tight spot. On the flip side, have no fear in starting your guys if they’re playing in any of the following cities; Toronto (42 GA in 12 games), Anaheim (42 GA in 13 games) or Carolina (41 GA in 14 games).

Monthly Look Ahead

Thanks to Brett Baxter for putting this monthly look together for me in last week’s comments.

Can you believe that after Thursday’s games, only five points separates 1^st in the NHL from 15th? The parity in the NHL is at an all-time high, but a lot of it also has to do with team’s current games played amounts. The Wild are tops in the West, but they’ve also played a Conference high 25 games. Then you have the Sharks, who sit in 7^th in the Conference but has only played 22 games thus far.

16 Games: Calgary, Phoenix
15 Games: Colorado, Detroit, Florida, LA, Minnesota, NYR, Ottawa, Vancouver
14 Games: Buffalo, Carolina, Columbus, Montreal, Nashville, New Jersey,  NYI, St. Louis, Washington, Winnipeg 
13 Games: Anaheim, Chicago, Dallas, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, San Jose, Tampa Bay, Toronto
12 Games: Boston, Edmonton

My trade suggestion of the month (in a yearly league of course), would be to try and swing RNH for Jarome Iginla and hope for another patented Iggy turnaround in December.

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