My familiar team of five had been waiting since August for this day, when Online Team Play would finally be patched into the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions of NHL 15.

Yet last night, none of my longtime EASHL teammates came home with a new copy of NHL 15, after learning that we could not join the same lobby or send each other match invitations in this "next-gen" version of Online Team Play.

Wasn't that the whole point of Online Team Play, to begin with -- you and your boys challenging cliques from around the world? I thought so, but apparently, EA Canada thought otherwise.

As the version of Online Team Play that they released Tuesday relies on randomized matchmaking with strangers, which reduces the odds of skating alongside nine competent, sensible hockey players to a ratio below the Edmonton Oilers' playoff chances.

This is how the eight games I completed yesterday played out:

• Ignorant teammates were always going offside, lengthening the game and disrupting the offense.
   
• Impatient players were constantly calling for bad passes from the AI, leading to unnecessary turnovers and dumb goals against.
   
• Undisciplined skaters kept taking idiotic penalties, repeatedly putting my team in shorthanded situations.
   
• Collisions away from the puck weren't being correctly whistled for interference. I could skate into and knock over anyone I wanted to on the ice, and I wouldn't receive a penalty, so long as I didn't press the body check button.
   
• Since there are no fighting restrictions, and combatants don't get replaced by AI skaters after taking a major penalty, scraps were happening after nearly every whistle, significantly increasing the length of games. EA needs to make these goons stay seated for five minutes in the penalty box after they drop their gloves, or institute a "one fight per match" limit. Both moves would be an improvement over the bloodbath that exists on the ice now.
   
• Players who put down their controller are not replaced by the AI, like they are in EA's FIFA series. When my center stopped playing after we fell behind by two goals, I had the displeasure of starting every single draw on defense. Absent players disrupt the game even further by remaining in an offside position after every offensive zone face-off.
   
• Games kept getting paused, because for some reason, EA thought it was a good idea to give each team three 45-second timeouts. Six-on-six bouts of Halo or Call of Duty don't come to a complete halt because one person hits the start button. So why do online sports games still let pauses interrupt live multiplayer matches?
   
• Being forced to shoot against AI goalies is one of the biggest bummers in this five-on-five, "skaters-only" version of OTP. Computer-controlled netminders stupidly fall for the same basic forehand-backhand deke all game long, yet they'll continually make miraculous diving saves on cross-ice one-timers, and are rarely beaten cleanly on wide-open shots from high-percentage scoring areas.
   
• Poke checks and stick lifts were incredibly ineffective at separating the puck from the carrier. You could hit the puck dead-on with your stick, yet somehow, it would warp right back onto the offensive player's blade in a split-second, without him ever needing to break stride.
   
• The lack of customizable camera angles -- which are still available in the Xbox 360/PlayStation 3 versions of NHL 15 -- made it extremely difficult to keep the puck and your defenseman in the camera frame at the same time; one of those objects was usually off-screen while trying to play defense.
   
• The line change and team strategy settings were constantly popping up on screen thanks to online trolls, as anyone on the team can change them at any time. Whenever these menus are active, players cannot use their poke check on the ice, since the right bumper is one of the buttons that switches between settings. Griefers could also ruin games by purposely pulling the goalie and sending him skating over to the bench.
   
• The frustration of trying to cooperate with random hooligans only gets prolonged if you happen to be tied at the end of regulation, since the rules are set to continuous sudden-death overtime instead of the NHL's regular format of four-on-four overtime followed by a three-round shootout.

I could go on, detailing further issues like forced pass assist (which is still happening in online games), poor collision detection during standing body checks, or the fact that people are picking the same overpowered Olympic teams (Russia, Canada, USA) repeatedly, but I think you get the point by now:

Online Team Play, like every other mode in NHL 15, feels rushed, incomplete, and poorly designed.