With most NHL teams having played 41 games this season, it's time for another round of report cards.

Some teams have far outpaced their preseason expectations -- the Minnesota Wild and Washington Capitals among them -- while others have fallen well short -- looking at you, New York Rangers and Nashville Predators.

In addition to an overall grade for each club at the midway point, we've also identified each team's class president and a player in danger of failing.

Note: Teams are arrayed alphabetically by letter grade. Ryan S. Clark graded the Pacific and Central Division teams, and Kristen Shilton graded the Metropolitan and Atlantic Division teams. Stats are through the games of Jan. 11. Preseason over/unders are courtesy of ESPN BET sportsbook.

Jump to:
ANA | ARI | BOS | BUF
CGY | CAR | CHI | COL
CBJ | DAL | DET | EDM
FLA | LA | MIN | MTL
NSH | NJ | NYI | NYR
OTT | PHI | PIT | SJ
SEA | STL | TB | TOR
VAN | VGS | WSH | WPG

A grades

Minnesota Wild

Record: 27-13-4
Preseason over/under: 93.5
Current points pace: 108.1

Class president: Kirill Kaprizov. Being on pace for a 50-goal and 100-point season only adds to the reality Kaprizov is one of the game's most dangerous players. There's also an argument to be had about him being one of the most valuable. The Wild aren't like other teams that have balanced scoring throughout their lineup. They have four players who have scored more than 50% of their goals and Kaprizov is among that quartet. His 23 goals and 27 assists -- with 15 of them being primary -- means he has played a role in being responsible for more than 40% of the Wild's goals.

In danger of failing: Yakov Trenin. Pointing the proverbial finger at Trenin is a bit repetitive, but it's that way because of the Wild's salary cap implications. The combined Zach Parise and Ryan Suter buyouts mean the club must spend judiciously. Signing Trenin to a four-year deal worth $3.5 million annually meant the Wild were getting a player who could provide them with another double-digit goal scorer. Trenin had three goals through 37 games and is projected to score six goals after three straight seasons of more than 12 goals.

Grade: A+ (first-quarter grade: A+). Kaprizov is having the type of season that has him in the Hart Trophy discussion. Filip Gustavsson could end up being a Vezina Trophy finalist and Matt Boldy, Brock Faber and Marco Rossi continue to show why they're an important part of the Wild's present and future plans. It's enough to keep them in the race for the Central entering January. But will it be enough in the postseason?

Lazio have parted ways with their falconer, the Serie A club said on Monday, after local media reported that he had shared images of his penile implant on social media.

Juan Bernabe, the man in charge of flying the club's eagle mascot before kickoff, was let go after Lazio became aware of the photographs and videos on his social media accounts.

Reuters has attempted to contact Bernabe for comment.

Bernabe is the instructor of Olympia, a white-headed eagle Lazio adopted in 2010. Olympia's flight over Rome's Olympic Stadium before matches has become a symbolic moment for fans.

The club said in a statement that they recognised supporters would be disappointed at the eagle's absence from home games.

"The club is aware of the pain the absence of the eagle will cause the fans but it has become impossible to associate our historical symbol with such [an] individual," Lazio said.

Bernabe was suspended by Lazio in 2021 after he was filmed at the stadium cheering for Italian dictator Benito Mussolini.

The Premier League have not charged any club with breaches of Profitability and Sustainability Rules (PSR) for last season, although Leicester City remain the most at risk of further penalties.

Newly promoted Leicester were referred by the Premier League to the independent commission over PSR infringements last March and were later charged, although the club lodged a successful appeal meaning they avoided any points deduction.

However, the Premier League had appealed the decision to acquit Leicester, with British media reporting that the case must to be brought to a conclusion before being charged for further breaches.

The Premier League said in a statement: "Issues as to the jurisdiction of the Premier League over Leicester City Football Club in relation to PSR compliance are currently the subject of confidential arbitration proceedings.

"Accordingly, neither the League nor the club will make any further comment at this stage about any aspect of the club's compliance or otherwise with any of the PSR or related Rules, save to say that no complaint has been brought against Leicester by the League for any breach of the PSRs for the period ending season 2023/24."

Manchester City's wantaway defender Kyle Walker has been left out of the squad for the clash against Brentford on Tuesday as he explores a move away from the club.

The England international, who has made 319 career appearances for City, has asked to leave for a club abroad in January and sources have told ESPN that AC Milan are leading the chase.

Walker sat out Saturday's FA Cup win against Salford City -- after which manager Pep Guardiola revealed his exit desire -- but the Spanish boss said he was still in contention for the Premier League game at the Gtech Community Stadium.

However, Walker is absent from the 20-man matchday squad for the first time in the league since missing out against Everton in December through illness.

The 34-year-old was close to joining Bayern Munich in 2023. He is under contract at the Etihad Stadium until 2026 but a source has told ESPN that Milan are open to offering Walker a deal until 2027.

"I said to him now it's a question of the market," Guardiola said earlier this week.

"He is an incredible player with his incredible physicality, when he is focused he is unstoppable as a right-back, He's a top class player, if he is fit he can play one, two, three, four more years as a professional.

"I never see a player with these physical conditions in my career, and of course I never, never, never have a desire for one player, but he has to have agreement with the club and I'm sorry, I was never involved with all the players."

While established heavy hitters Liverpool and Arsenal are the big names leading the way in the Premier League this season, there is a third, unexpected contender in the 2024-25 title race -- Nottingham Forest.

Nuno Espirito Santo's side narrowly staved off relegation last term but a miraculous surge in form and results this season has got them hurtling into the new year in fearsome fettle and staking a decent claim as underdogs in the hunt for the championship.

Forest brushed aside Nuno's former side Wolverhampton Wanderers 3-0 on Monday to register their sixth league win on the bounce and go level with second-placed Arsenal on points and six behind leaders Liverpool with more than half of the campaign played. Considering they were only promoted to the Premier League in 2022, and marked their first season back in the top flight with a seemingly chaotic recruitment strategy that saw 30 players signed across two transfer windows, it's a remarkable turnaround.

Of course, there is a recent precedent for a team winning the Premier League against all the odds, with Forest's East Midlands neighbours Leicester City maintaining their irrepressible form throughout the 2015-16 season to clinch one of the most unlikely titles in history.

With Forest not in league action until they host Liverpool at the City Ground next Tuesday, having already beaten Arne Slot's side at Anfield, this feels like as good a juncture as any to assess the plausibility of their title credentials.

Nottingham Forest's flying form

After putting three unanswered goals past Wolves at Molineux, Forest extended their Premier League winning streak to six straight games. Since the start of December they have also beaten Manchester United, Aston Villa, Brentford, Tottenham Hotspur and Everton. This is the first time Forest have won six consecutive top-flight league games since the 1966-67 season, when they also mounted a title challenge in the then First Division only to be pipped to the trophy by Manchester United.

Forest have now won 10 of their last 13 Premier League outings and have been firmly ensconced inside the top four since their 2-1 victory over Villa on Dec. 14. With 40 points earned from their first 20 games, Forest are already eight points better off than their final points tally from last season, when Nuno's side finished 17th with 32 points from 38 games.

Of the 70 teams to have accrued 40 points or more from their opening 20 games of a Premier League season, only four have failed to finish inside the top four come the end of the campaign. That's right, Forest fans: UEFA Champions League qualification is as good as guaranteed! Perhaps that's overstating it but, the way things are going, European football may well be returning to the City Ground for the first time since 1995-96.

Who are Forest's key players?

While perhaps not quite on par with Forest's legendary vintage of the late 1970s, when the club won their only league title as well as back-to-back European Cups, Nuno's crop of players have been performing at an incredibly consistent level this season.

Arguably the star man has been 33-year-old striker Chris Wood, who has rolled back the years and weighed in with crucial goals. Wood is on fire at the moment with 12 Premier League goals in 20 games. He is already only two goals off equalling his best haul for a season in the top flight (14), which he has mustered on two occasions -- first with Burnley in 2019-20 and most recently with Forest in 2023-24.

The New Zealand international has excelled as a physical, penalty box poacher, forming the perfect focal point in front of Anthony Elanga, Morgan Gibbs-White and Callum Hudson-Odoi. That trio have all hit peak form at the same time, contributing nine league goals and nine assists between them.

With only 29 goals scored (the lowest in the top half of the table), the key aspect of Forest's form this season has been their rock-solid defensive unit. Centre-back pairing Murillo and Nikola Milenkovic providing the steel while goalkeeper Matz Sels has proven his shot-stopping abilities on numerous occasions.

The 3-0 win over Wolves was Forest's fourth clean sheet in a row and ninth overall in the league this season, which is more than any other team. It is also the first time that the Reds have successfully prevented their opponents from scoring in four consecutive top-flight games since March 1992.

Of all those aforementioned players, Gibbs-White is the only one who arrived in that notorious initial splurge of signings. The others have all arrived since the summer of 2023, with Milenkovic the most recent recruit having joined from Fiorentina last summer.

Can Nuno be Forest's Ranieri?

It's fair to say that Nuno was something of an "unfancied" appointment when he took over at Forest in December 2023, despite the job he had done taking Wolves up to the Premier League and establishing them in the top flight.

Prior to arriving at the City Ground, the Portuguese coach had been fired from his previous Premier League job at Tottenham after just three disastrous months and 17 games in charge. He was then out of the game entirely for eight months before landing a job in Saudi Arabia with Al Ittihad in July 2022. Nuno won the 2022 Saudi Super Cup and then delivered Al Ittihad's first league title in 14 years before being sacked in November 2023.

He was then hired by Forest the following month in the wake of Steve Cooper's dismissal, and made their Premier League survival mathematically certain on the final day of the season despite them being deducted four points for breaching the Premier League's Profit and Sustainability Rules. After finishing 17th in 2023-24 and navigating his new team through off-field turmoil, Nuno has somehow managed to transform a piecemeal squad into a cohesive unit in the space of 18 months.

There is a parallel with Claudio Ranieri's reign at Leicester City, which came after the famously itinerant coach had suffered a truly disastrous stint as manager of the Greece national team. The Italian lasted just four months and four games in charge of Greece, who stumbled to one draw and three defeats under his watch.

A humiliating 1-0 defeat in a Euro 2016 qualifier against the Faroe Islands in November 2014 brought everything to a premature end. Ranieri later openly described his decision to take the Greece job as a "mistake" after being tasked with rebuilding the fortunes of the national team in the space of just 12 days and three coaching sessions.

The following year, Ranieri took over at Leicester, who had been battling relegation the previous season. However, at the end of his first season at the King Power Stadium, he had led them to an improbable Premier League title triumph that shocked the world.

Are Forest on track to "do a Leicester?"

With 20 games of the 2015-16 season played, Leicester were in second place with 40 points on the board; they went on to win the league with 81 points, a vast 10-point gap ahead of runners-up Arsenal in the final standings.

It will no doubt make enticing reading for Forest fans that their side are also 40 points to the good after 20 games played. They are only third in the table instead of second because of Arsenal's superior goal difference.

Leicester's next five games were: Tottenham (A), Aston Villa (A), Stoke City (H), Manchester City (A), Arsenal (A). They took 13 points from 15 available from that run of fixtures.

Forest have a run which, on paper, would seem slightly more favourable over their next five league games: Liverpool (H), Southampton (H), Bournemouth (A), Brighton & Hove Albion, (H), Fulham (A). So it's not beyond the realms of possibility that Nuno's side could stay on track or at least keep pace with Leicester's points total through that run.

Of course, there is still a lot of football to be played, and as Forest have proven countless times in the past, things could go dramatically wrong from here. But still, there is reason to dream at the City Ground -- and that hasn't happened for the longest time.

What are the odds?

Leicester City were famously cited as +500000 (5,000 to 1) outsiders to win the Premier League ahead of the 2015-16 season before going on to do exactly that. While their miraculous title triumph means the bookies may never again offer such long odds, Forest were understandably not given much chances of winning the league having only just staved off the drop to the Championship last term.

According to ESPN BET, the Reds were rank outsiders at +100000 (1,000 to 1) to win the Premier League title at the start of the season. They also commanded +10000 (100 to 1) odds of to finish in the top four and qualify for the Champions League, +8000 (80 to 1) to finish in the top six and secure some kind of European qualification, +800 (8 to 1) to finish in the top half of the table, at +175 (1.75 to 1) they were among the favourites to be relegated. What a difference six months makes.

What is Forest's pedigree when it comes to title races?

Forest do have experience when it comes to mounting title races -- though it must be said that none of it is particularly recent.

Harking back to the last time they won six straight top-flight games, Forest staged one of their first major title challenges as they kept the pressure on Manchester United throughout the 1966-67 season in the old First Division. However, a chastening 2-1 defeat to Southampton in their penultimate game ended their hopes of lifting the trophy.

There are a handful of other examples of Forest keeping pace with the league leaders before dropping away, and that is perhaps why the First Division championship won under legendary manager Brian Clough in 1977-78 remains the only top-flight title won during the club's 160-year history.

Clough guided Forest back to the top tier as Second Division champions in 1976-77 and then astonishingly kicked on to win the First Division title the following season, going unbeaten during the second half of the campaign to finish seven points clear of Liverpool at the top. Clough's miracle men then won back-to-back European Cups in 1978-79 and 1979-80 with a pair of 1-0 wins over Malmö and Hamburg SV during a wonderful flourish of domestic and continental success.

Now more than ever, Premier League teams need to be tactically flexible and willing to adapt. Stick with the same strategy for too long and opponents will figure you out ... you'll soon start sliding down the table.

The 2024-25 season has seen a number of ingenious or surprise tactical tweaks, leading to excellent performances or a dramatic change in fortunes. We've listed five that we think have been the most impactful, from Arne Slot's novel solution up front for Liverpool to the simple, yet effective way Nottingham Forest have catapulted themselves into the top four.

Usually when you compile a list like this, Manchester City boss Pep Guardiola is front and centre of it -- yet he's nowhere to be seen. Take that as another reminder of how surreally poor his side have been.

Slot and Díaz revive the 'false No. 9'

Around 10-15 years ago, a spate of false No. 9s appeared at the top level of European football, taking their lead from Lionel Messi's mesmeric performances for Barcelona. Ezequiel Lavezzi, Raheem Sterling and Roberto Firmino, among others, all tried their hand at the curious role, which involves playing up front but spending barely any time testing opposing centre-backs. Instead, the player drops back into midfield to conduct play and try to feed goal-hungry wide players.

You don't see many of these nowadays, as the sport feels so athletic and compressed between the lines, there's barely any room for a player like this to exist. From Erling Haaland to Robert Lewandowski to Alexander Isak, strikers are typically big and strong, able to run the channels and hunt goals like a traditional No. 9 would.

So that makes Liverpool's Luis Díaz somewhat of an anomaly: He genuinely looks like a false No. 9, constantly moving away from central zones while the Reds have the ball and combining in deeper areas, often on the left. Manager Arne Slot opted for this setup when Diogo Jota got injured in October rather than simply fielding Darwin Núñez as the focal point, and it has worked brilliantly for the league leaders.

Luis Díaz (7) often drifts left to combine with teammates, freeing up space for Salah (11)

Liverpool have been imperiously effective with Díaz up front, while he has chipped in with a number of important contributions (12 goals and three assists in all competitions), most notably a hat trick against Bayer Leverkusen in the Champions League. Meanwhile, Cody Gakpo has excelled from the left flank and it's been well over a month since Mohamed Salah played a game without scoring or assisting. Perhaps the most important consideration for any tactical move Slot makes is, "How does this affect Salah?" This one has arguably taken him to another level.

Tonali unlocks the potential of Guimarães

Newcastle are on a five-game winning streak in the Premier League, scoring 15 times and conceding just once during that span. It's a patch of form that coincides directly with Sandro Tonali's first run of games in the starting XI in over a year, due to the 10-month gambling ban that wrecked his 2023-24 season and forced a slow start to this one.

Tonali has slotted into the centre of the Magpies' midfield three, his bustling style rejuvenating the physical and aggressive edge that the best versions of Eddie Howe's Newcastle United have had. That has pushed Bruno Guimarães into a freer role just ahead, usually to the right, and it has transformed the Brazilian's game too.

Guimarães (39)'s new role brings him closer to Alexander Isak (14), which delivers a range of benefits

Now situated higher up the pitch, he's able to link up more with striker Alexander Isak, influence play in the final third and get into the box more. And when Newcastle press and win the ball high up, it's Guimarães who can play that first, incisive pass to create a big chance -- as seen for Anthony Gordon against Tottenham.

So, not only has Tonali's presence shored up the team defensively -- their expected goals against (xGA) figure is below 1.0 in each of the last five league games -- but it has also extracted Guimarães' best run of form of the season (seven of his eight goals and assists this season have come in the past nine games). As a result, that has had an impact on Isak, who has scored 10 goals in his past nine appearances in all competitions.

Arsenal's set piece havoc

A lot of good came out of Arsenal's midseason trip to Dubai in January 2024, most notable of which was a vast improvement in set piece performance.

Fast-forward a year and Arsenal have earned the moniker "Set Piece FC" from some -- a nickname that's intended to be a criticism, but also naturally hammers home the fact that they're lethal from dead-ball situations.

Their corners were good last season; but now, each one is so potent that they represent major events within games ... almost like a free kick close to the area. Arsenal take a long time to put the ball into the box and that's seemingly by design: The wait builds fear, anxiety and anticipation ... it builds a sense of drama.

The deliveries have also levelled up: Declan Rice's offerings from the left are now as good as Bukayo Saka's from the right, and there's more variety to the placement of the ball. Their classic routine is a group rush from the back post to the near post, where centre-back Gabriel Magalhães (who has four goals this season) is the target and everyone else causes a ruckus. But they've added layers to this routine now, sometimes using Gabriel as a decoy, sometimes scoring via flick-ons and back post deliveries.

Gabriel has taken 17 shots in the Premier League this season, 13 of which have been from inside the six-yard box.

Their free kicks are just as dangerous, with almost every player standing offside then curving their runs back to an onside position as Rice swings the ball in. Arsenal are not the only team to do this kind of thing, but they probably do it best.

The monotonous work preparing and practicing these routines on the training ground with specialist coach Nicolas Jover is certainly paying off: Arsenal have scored the most set piece goals (10) in the Premier League this season -- just over a quarter of their overall tally (39).

Morgan Rogers moves wide for Villa

Morgan Rogers has had the kind of season that has made people sit up and take notice. His powerful dribbles take Villa from one end of the pitch to the other in a flash and it has been exhilarating to watch him swat tacklers aside, charging forward to break open defences.

Indeed, he tops all Aston Villa players for a series of dribbling metrics, most notable of which is his 40 carries into the final third, and has left some of the best players at the top clubs in the world -- from Manchester City to Bayern Munich -- trailing in his wake.

The issue for Villa is that Rogers' style of dribbling is high-risk/high reward. As effective as his runs are when they come off, he's been dispossessed 38 times and has miscontrolled 56 passes this season, both by far the highest numbers in the squad. Worse yet are the areas of the pitch where he loses the ball: playing as a support striker it's in centre of the pitch, which leaves Villa vulnerable and open to counterattacks.

So Unai Emery moved him to the left flank, asking John McGinn to play as the support striker instead. Rogers has continued to motor forward with the ball -- and in fact, thanks to playing close to the touchline in smaller areas, his footwork and close control have improved -- but when he does lose possession, it's in the wide areas, which is less dangerous.

Since the move, Rogers has delivered four great performances (vs. Brentford, Southampton, Manchester City and Brighton & Hove Albion) to help cement Emery's strategy.

Nottingham Forest: Gamestate kings

It's much easier to win games if you take the lead. That's hardly a revelation, but it's worth keeping in mind at times when football can feel incredibly complex.

Forest are certainly doing so as they continually take the lead in matches, then successfully turn those leads into victories. They've scored the first goal in 15 of their 20 Premier League matches and have won 12 of them, which has vaulted them into an unexpected chase for a Champions League spot.

It's a tried-and-trusted strategy for punching above your weight. Forest are effectively matching what Leicester City did during their miraculous 2015-16 title win (40 points from 20 games), the only difference being that at least one of the traditional big guns have avoided a complete disaster of a campaign this time.

Leicester take the lead and kept clean sheets a lot; Forest are doing the same. A more recent comparison could be Villa, who continually took the lead and then won games during Emery's first 12 months, quickly leading them into ... you guessed it ... a Champions League place in 2024.

It will be interesting to see how opposing teams react to Forest now that their secret is out and people start to set expectations based on what they have accomplished so far. In 2016, it took Premier League managers an astonishingly long time -- more than half the season -- to adjust to Leicester's devastating counterattacking tactics. Will the response to Forest be faster?