The person who previewed the game for IGN this week seemed to be underwhelmed to me, but did say they didn't get to see much. Which in itself is odd as the game is supposed to be released in 6 weeks.
http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/891/891414p1.html
On the other hand, the previews of NHL 09 all point to an improved version of NHL 08 which IGN deemed the best sports game of the year.
I played the EA series for years and then switched to the 2k series for a number of years. After getting sick of no real advancement in the game (or fixing of recurring bugs!) I went back to EA for NHL 07. That was a decent game but not great. I think they nailed NHL 08 and in particular the control scheme which seemed so intuitive after a few games.