former #1 ranked Chel player last year, but .500 in HUT because horrible servers

I completely agree with the experiences the people in this thread are complaining about.  I've been gaming for longer than most people here have been alive, and my friends and I were obsessed with NHL 94.  We played for years, then grew up a bit, but I got back to it with NHL 13 when my son was five.  I've bought most versions since then (missed a couple).  As the OP stated, I know when it's me and when it's not. Even so, I tend to err on the side of "my fault" when it's close.

There is absolutely no chance at all that the game play doesn't tilt for reasons outside of skill difference.  It simply isn't humanly possible to react in real time to something like a poke check.  Sure, it can be anticipated sometimes.  But the chance for that should alternate back and forth.  It doesn't.  I'll even take chances occasionally and try to guess in advance where the puck or a player is going to be, and move to check *before they even go*.  Never works.  It isn't my players.  I have a 95 OVR team with 11 active synergies, spend all my booster points on speed, edges and checking, and literally can't keep up to, or time plays against, teams with 82 OVR. 

As the OP stated, shame on the mods for trying to gaslight people with nearly 30 years experience, playing nearly every version of EA NHL, into thinking that the games are at all balanced.  They aren't.  When my son and I play on the same console, the game play works fine. 

I won't buy any more NHL games, or other PvP games from EA, until EA puts servers in more locations.  Or, at the very least, allow players to select games based on ping time to the actual server being used.  It's too frustrating.  I literally feel rage when the game matches me with someone who is clearly playing a different game than the one I'm trying to play. Games should be fun.  This one isn't anymore.

For a company that claims to care about customer satisfaction, it's astonishing how little it does to fix even the smallest of bugs and glitches, let alone major infrastructural problems that it could afford to fix.