This, of course, is what I keep telling myself as a Boston Bruins fan. That and “the team has had a lot of injuries like the ones to Savard and Lucic,” “we lost Kessel,” “it’s a journey, not a sprint” and all those other infuriating mantras. But the fact remains, that the Bruins season so far has been at best, perplexing, and at worse, dismal.

But…we are only 22 games in. And I firmly believe that what happens in the first portion of the season doesn’t really matter in the long run. (Example A – last year’s Pittsburgh Penguins. And yes, before everyone goes all crazy on me, I know the Bruins don’t have a Crosby or Malkin! Believe me I know!)

No doubt though – this has been a wacky season so far for the whole NHL. With unexpected stars emerging, superstars slumping, and a host of injuries to all-star caliber players, it’s been nothing but unpredictable.

Looking at the Eastern Conference standings, my Bruins are now in 11^th place in the NHL but really not that far behind Philadelphia, Ottawa, the Rangers, the Islanders (!) and Tampa Bay. Washington, no surprise, is in first.

I have to say I get great satisfaction in seeing Carolina way down there on the bottom of the East, with only Toronto below them by a point.  After the Hurricanes rudely dumped the Bruins out of the playoffs last year, I have despised them. I also think it was a huge mistake for them to fire Peter Laviolette (a former Stanley Cup winning coach and former Providence Bruins coach) and bring on Paul Maurice last year. Winning coaches get dumped all the time (John Tortorella and Ken Hitchcock are two that come quickly to mind) but I have never been impressed with Maurice.

In the West, no one is surprised to see San Jose on top again. But will it matter come April? For the Sharks, the true test will of course be the playoffs. But there are some other surprises out there in the West as well.  Colorado is in 2^nd place, no doubt led by the rejuvenated goaltending of Craig Anderson. And excuse me, but who let the Los Angeles Kings into the 4th spot? Oh that’s right, that would be Anze Kopitar, he of the league leading 32 points, assisted by goalie, Jon Quick.

Columbus is in 6^th ahead of Detroit, Dallas and Vancouver? That’s just crazy! But woefully for Ducks fans, their team is in second to last. (The Ducks also have a juicy goaltender controversy with $6 million dollar man, JS Giguere, threatening to quit if he doesn’t get to be the #1 goalie again. He does kind of have a point, doesn’t he?)

As far as scoring goes, Alexander Ovechkin is once again on top, tied with Marion Gaborik. (Don’t worry, Ovie, it probably won’t be long until Gaborik is out again with some injury.)

What is surprising to me, scoring wise, is that Vincent LeCavalier is still having trouble, although Steven Stamkos and Ryan Malone are both having nice years so far for Tampa Bay. (Although ‘Bolts personnel and fans can give Vinny ten million reasons why he better get his act together and soon!)  A player I would dearly love to come to Boston, Ilya Kovalchuk, has scored 13 goals in spite of being out for a bit with a significant foot injury. And speaking of injuries, the ‘Canes Eric Staal has only scored 3 goals in the 13 games he has played before going out with an upper body injury. One has to wonder if he’d been playing hurt for awhile before going on the IR.

Every team except for 5 has a player in the top 50 goal scorers list so far this season. That would be surprisingly Buffalo (where are you Thomas Vanek?), and not so surprisingly Toronto, Nashville, Carolina and of course, sigh, Boston.

But once Phil Kessel gets going, Toronto fans will no doubtedly have much to cheer about. Buffalo has some great players besides Vanek who know how to score (but I’m sure Lindy Ruff could remind Vanek of the 6,400,000 reasons he should be scoring more.) A healthy Staal should be a huge boost for Carolina. Nashville and Boston both have the same problem – no really hot star scorers in the bunch.

What Buffalo does have is a stellar goaltender in Ryan Miller who is surging ahead of the competition so far this year. Antero Niittymaki is trying to prove he is the goaltender that Lightning fans have waited for since Nikolai Khabibulin left a few years ago. But for overall wins so far, it is no shock at all to see Mr. Goalie himself, Martin Brodeur once again looking down from the top, although he is tied with Miller, Quick, Craig Anderson and Evgeni Nabokov. In fact, Brodeur just had his first OT loss this year (in the shootout) on November 19^th to Nashville, of all teams.

So, even though we are only a quarter of a way through the season it has been most interesting. Something tells me the dog days of the season, traditionally in January and February, won’t be so dull this year especially with the Olympics breaking up things.

As a Bruins fan, it’s been disappointing. But as an overall NHL hockey fan, it’s been intriguing, surprising and fun.  And I can’t wait to see what happens next!