Week 8: Fantasy top 100 forward rankings for 2017-18

Each week during the regular season, NHL.com has you covered with an overview of the fantasy forward landscape. With production trends, injury news and top 100 rankings based on performance and upside in standard Yahoo leagues, fantasy owners should use this information as a basis for roster decision-making.

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TRENDING UP

Phil Kessel, RW, and Jake Guentzel, C/LW, PIT:The Pittsburgh Penguins are dealing with injuries to center Evgeni Malkin and goaltender Matt Murray, but Kessel and Guentzel (C/LW, 75 percent owned) are thriving together on the second line. In the four games Malkin has missed because of an upper-body injury, Kessel has combined for eight points (three goals, five assists), five power-play points and 13 shots on goal, and Guentzel has six points (five goals, one assist), four PPP and 15 SOG. All of a sudden, Kessel is first in Yahoo's performance-based rankings, and Guentzel has entered the top 100 (89th) with even greater value in hits leagues (41 in 26 games).
Vegas Golden Knights:Forward Reilly Smith (LW/RW, 27 percent owned) led NHL.com's
top 10 waiver wire pickups for Week 8
, and his entire line has catapulted in this week's forward rankings. Since Nov. 16, Jonathan Marchessault (C/LW, 60 percent owned) is tied for the NHL lead with 11 points (four goals, seven assists) and William Karlsson (C/LW, 60 percent) is tied for third with 10 points (seven goals, three assists) over the past five games. The Golden Knights continue to prove they have staying power in the fantasy world, so each member of this productive trio is worth owning in most formats.
Kyle Connor, LW, WPG: The Winnipeg Jets rookie has remained on the top line and first power-play unit and finally rewarded fantasy owners with three points (one goal, two assists), three SOG and his first two PPP of the season against the Minnesota Wild on Monday. Connor (10 percent owned) now has 15 points (seven goals, eight assists) and 43 SOG in 19 games mostly alongside Mark Scheifele and Blake Wheeler. Connor has been among NHL.com's top 100 forwards for a few weeks now and could be primed for a big spike in ownership with three more games this week.

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TRENDING DOWN

Clayton Keller, C/LW/RW, ARI: The Arizona Coyotes forward has fallen behind Mathew Barzal (23 points in 23 games) of the New York Islanders and Brock Boeser (22 points in 21 games) of the Vancouver Canucks in the NHL rookie scoring race and has become a plus/minus liability with a minus-2 in each of his past three games (minus-15 on season). The Coyotes have recalled rookie forward Dylan Strome (C, 6 percent owned), who was better than a point per game with Tucson of the American Hockey League, and will start him at wing on Keller's line. Keller (67 percent owned) still has tri-eligibility on his side in Yahoo, but is no longer a lineup lock during this rough patch.
Corey Perry, RW, ANA: The slew of injuries to Anaheim Ducks centers Rickard Rakell, Ryan Getzlaf and Ryan Kesler have understandably led to a decline in production for Perry, who is currently being centered by Derek Grant. Perry still has plenty of value in leagues that count penalty minutes (23) and SOG (52), but should be benched in fantasy this week after a four-game stretch totaling no goals, one assist and a minus-7. After losing 7-3 at the Chicago Blackhawks on Monday, the Ducks have three more road games this week against the St. Louis Blues, Columbus Blue Jackets and Nashville Predators.
Matt Duchene, C/RW, OTT: Since we touched on Duchene's struggles in our
fantasy mailbag
, he scored his first goal with the Ottawa Senators against the Islanders on Saturday. But his body of work since the trade is still not pretty; he has no assists and is minus-10 in eight games. His shot volume (27) has been strong, and he's clinging to a spot in the below rankings because he's finally playing on a line with Mark Stone and Mike Hoffman. Patience can pay off for standard and deep league owners of Duchene, but one more poor week could be grounds for dropping Duchene in shallow leagues.

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TOP 100 FORWARD RANKINGS

Standard Yahoo categories include goals, assists, plus/minus, PIMs, PPP and SOG for skaters. ... Value has been quantified based on factors including but not limited to past production, line combinations, power-play usage, injury history, age, sleeper, bounce-back or breakout potential, anticipated regression, contract status, Yahoo ADP and overall upside for the rest of the season. ... Any players with day-to-day injury concerns (DTD) are noted. NEW - INJ. indicates a player who has returned from injury and rejoined the rankings.
1. Nikita Kucherov, RW, TBL (SAME)
2. Steven Stamkos, C, TBL (SAME)
3. Connor McDavid, C, EDM (SAME)
4. Vladimir Tarasenko, RW, STL (+1)
5. Auston Matthews, C, TOR (-1)
6. Alex Ovechkin, LW, WSH (+4)
7. Tyler Seguin, C/RW, DAL (SAME)
8. Sidney Crosby, C, PIT (+3)
9. Phil Kessel, RW, PIT (+4)
10. Johnny Gaudreau, LW, CGY (-2)
11. Mark Scheifele, C, WPG (-2)
12. Patrick Kane, RW, CHI (SAME)
13. Jamie Benn, C/LW, DAL (-7)
14. Blake Wheeler, RW, WPG (SAME)
15. John Tavares, C, NYI (SAME)
16. Brayden Schenn, C/LW, STL (SAME)
17. Filip Forsberg, LW, NSH (+1)
18. Jaden Schwartz, LW, STL (+2)
19. Sean Monahan, C, CGY (+2)
20. Claude Giroux, C/LW, PHI (+2)
21. Patrik Laine, RW, WPG (-4)
22. Brad Marchand, LW, BOS (DTD)
23. William Nylander, C/RW, TOR (-1)
24. Anze Kopitar, C, LAK (+1)
25. Leon Draisaitl, C/RW, EDM (+2)
26. David Pastrnak, RW, BOS (+2)
27. Jakub Voracek, RW, PHI (+2)
28. Taylor Hall, LW, NJD (+3)
29. Alexander Radulov, RW, DAL (+1)
30. Nicklas Backstrom, C, WSH (+4)
31. Evgeny Kuznetsov, C, WSH (-5)
32. Patrice Bergeron, C, BOS (SAME)
33. Nathan MacKinnon, C, COL (+11)
34. Jack Eichel, C, BUF (+1)
35. Anthony Mantha, LW/RW, DET (-2)
36. Vladislav Namestnikov, C/LW, TBL (SAME)
37. Evander Kane, LW, BUF (SAME)
38. Brock Boeser, RW, VAN (+18)
39. Sean Couturier, C, PHI (+6)
40. Anders Lee, LW, NYI (+2)
41. Mark Stone, RW, OTT (-2)
42. Aleksander Barkov, C, FLA (-2)
43. Jonathan Huberdeau, LW, FLA (-2)
44. Mika Zibanejad, C, NYR (-1)
45. Mike Hoffman, LW/RW, OTT (-7)
46. Ryan Johansen, C, NSH (+7)
47. Mathew Barzal, C, NYI (+24)
48. Artemi Panarin, C/LW, CBJ (-2)
49. James Neal, LW/RW, VGK (+2)
50. Tyler Toffoli, C/RW, LAK (-3)
51. Brayden Point, C/RW, TBL (-3)
52. Nazem Kadri, C, TOR (SAME)
53. Kyle Turris, C, NSH (+1)
54. James van Riemsdyk, LW, TOR (+1)
55. Joe Pavelski, C/RW, SJS (+4)
56. Wayne Simmonds, RW, PHI (+4)
57. Josh Bailey, LW/RW, NYI (+19)
58. Viktor Arvidsson, LW/RW, NSH (+4)
59. Dustin Brown, LW/RW, LAK (+2)
60. Vincent Trocheck, C, FLA (+8)
61. Logan Couture, C/LW, SJS (+12)
62. Teuvo Teravainen, C/LW/RW, CAR (+4)
63. T.J. Oshie, RW, WSH (+11)
64. Nikolaj Ehlers, LW, WPG (+11)
65. Mikko Rantanen, LW/RW, COL (+12)
66. Jake Guentzel, C/LW, PIT (+13)
67. Clayton Keller, C/LW/RW, ARI (-18)
68. Dylan Larkin, C/RW, DET (-10)
69. Jonathan Toews, C, CHI (-6)
70. Sebastian Aho, LW/RW, CAR (+2)
71. Mikael Granlund, C/RW, MIN (-6)
72. Nino Niederreiter, LW/RW, MIN (-2)
73. Jonathan Marchessault, C/LW, VGK (+24)
74. Mitch Marner, C/RW, TOR (-17)
75. Eric Staal, C, MIN (+3)
76. Max Pacioretty, LW, MTL (-12)
77. Jeff Skinner, LW, CAR (-8)
78. Cam Atkinson, RW, CBJ (+2)
79. Corey Perry, RW, ANA (-12)
80. William Karlsson, C/LW, VGK (NEW)
81. Matthew Tkachuk, LW, CGY (SAME)
82. Jonathan Drouin, C/LW/RW, MTL (+1)
83. Brandon Saad, LW, CHI (+1)
84. Brendan Gallagher, RW, MTL (+5)
85. Patric Hornqvist, RW, PIT (+9)
86. Kyle Connor, LW, WPG (+7)
87. Jason Zucker, LW/RW, MIN (+8)
88. Reilly Smith, LW/RW, VGK (NEW)
89. Patrick Marleau, C/LW, TOR (+2)
90. Matt Duchene, C/RW, OTT (-8)
91. Derick Brassard, C, OTT (-6)
92. Patrick Maroon, LW, EDM (-5)
93. Bo Horvat, C, VAN (+3)
94. Kevin Fiala, LW/RW, NSH (+6)
95. Nico Hischier, C, NJD (NEW)
96. Milan Lucic, LW, EDM (NEW)
97. Ondrej Palat, LW, TBL (+1)
98. Sven Baertschi, LW, VAN (+1)
99. Gabriel Landeskog, LW, COL (SUSP.)
100. Alex DeBrincat, LW/RW, CHI (NEW)
Dropped out: Pavel Buchnevich, LW/RW, NYR; Ryan O'Reilly, C, BUF
Just missed: Nick Schmaltz, C/LW, CHI; Micheal Ferland, LW/RW, CGY; Artem Anisimov, C, CHI; Bryan Little, C, WPG; Paul Stastny, C, STL; Jordan Eberle, C/RW, NYI; Mats Zuccarello, RW, NYR; Charlie Coyle, C/RW, MIN; Tomas Hertl, C/LW, SJS; Jakob Silfverberg, LW/RW, ANA; Yanni Gourde, C/RW, TBL; Jakub Vrana, LW/RW, WSH; Alexander Steen, C/LW/RW, STL; Alexander Wennberg, C, CBJ (NEW - INJ.), Jordan Staal, C, CAR
Key injuries: Evgeni Malkin, C, PIT (dropped out); Ryan Getzlaf, C, ANA; Rickard Rakell, C/LW, ANA (dropped out); Jeff Carter, C, LAK; Evgenii Dadonov, RW, FLA (dropped out); Ryan Kesler, C, ANA; Kyle Palmieri, RW, NJD; Andre Burakovsky, LW/RW, WSH; Zach Parise, LW, MIN; Patrick Eaves, RW, ANA
READ: Last week's Top 100 forward rankings