A brief history of the playoff penalty shot, suddenly the NHL's hottest new trend

Something weird happened in the NHL last week. And for a change, it was something fun.

Specifically, it happened four times: In Game 2 between the Flyers and Penguins last Monday, later that same night in Game 2 between Carolina and Ottawa, the next night in Game 2 between the Kings and Avalanche, and then again two nights later in Game 3 between the Sabres and Bruins.

Each of those games featured a penalty shot. That’s relatively rare in the playoffs. There have been only 94 postseason penalty shots in NHL history, an average of less than one per season. To have four in the same week? Almost unprecedented.

For you kids out there, a penalty shot used to be a big deal. Back in the days before the shootout came long and ruined everything diminished the play's novelty somewhat, a penalty shot would be big news. I still remember Peter Ing stopping Wayne Gretzky at Maple Leaf Gardens, which was the Leaf fan equivalent of Buster Douglas KOing Mike Tyson. If you’d ever held a stick, you knew what your penalty shot move would be. And you only had one, because they were so rare that that’s probably all you’d ever need.

To get the chance in the playoffs, with the eyes of the hockey world focused on you? Almost (but not quite) unheard of. So today, since NHL referees have apparently decided to revive the concept for this year’s postseason, let’s celebrate with a brief history of the playoff penalty shot.

>> Read the full post at The Athletic

Your team is the best! (At this one very specific stat from the 2025-26 season)

Everybody’s good at something. It’s just a case of figuring out what.

Or at least, that’s how it was explained to me growing up. Granted, those explanations often came from coaches who were cutting me from the team, or concerned teachers whispering to my parents, or over the shoulder of horrified potential prom dates as they sprinted away from me. But the lesson stuck.

And it turns out that it applies to the NHL. Even in a league with 32 teams that range from model franchises to, um, not that, everyone is good at something. In fact, every team in the league is the very best at something. You just have to be willing to dig deep enough to find it.

Digging deep is kind of my whole schtick. So today, let’s go through each team and find at least one positive stat in which they led the entire league during the 2025-26 season.

Your team is the best… in this one extremely specific thing.

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Let's find three positive thoughts for each of the NHL’s 16 most hopeless teams

You think your team had a bad year. Are you positive?

You should be, because it’s time for our annual exercise in positivity. While half the league enjoys the playoffs, we’re going to look at the other half. For each team that missed the postseason, we’ll come up with three reasons to think positively.

It goes without saying that this is easier for some teams that for others. So we’ll do this countdown style, starting with the easiest team to feel good about and working our way down to the toughest sell of the bunch.

That means our first team should be easy. And as it turns out, it absolutely is.

>> Read the full post at The Athletic

MLB's new ABS replay system is an apparent success. Could the NHL learn from it?

Here’s a sentence you’ve never seen me write before: Replay review is good.

It works. It’s doing what it’s supposed to do. I’m glad it’s there, because it’s making the game better.

Just not in the NHL.

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Playoff pressure rankings: Everyone wants to win, but who can’t afford to lose?

It’s the postseason, and the pressure is intense. But pressure comes in different forms for different teams in different circumstances. Some teams have regular pressure, while others have capital-P pressure. Some teams go all caps and break out the fancy fonts.

You get the picture. It’s time for our annual Playoff Pressure Rankings, where we count down from the teams that would prefer to win to those that have no other option.

>> Read the full post at The Athletic