There's really only two things we know for sure about the Central Division right now: Chicago and Arizona are deadlocked in a race to the bottom, and Colorado is still the best team on paper.

Other than that? You could probably convince people of anything.

But the thing about even the latter of these facts isn't necessarily nailed down. Yes, the Avalanche have a ton of star power, but they also lost a great No. 2 centre in the offseason and couldn't really replace him, and have also seemingly turned the goaltending position over to a goalie coming off two straight sub-mediocre seasons. The counterpoint to these issues is that the Avs potentially taking a step back from scoring the fourth-most goals in the league last season probably won't matter all that much, and that their D corps and syst