Saturday storylines: Matthews vs. Boeser

Today’s the day we officially hit the halfway point of the NHL season. We can no longer say “it’s early.” Now, it’s late. For some teams, probably too late. We’ve got nine games on the slate tonight, including one all-Canadian matchup. But we’ll start our roundup out West…

HNIC Game of the Night: Ducks at Flames

Tonight’s top game is a playoff rematch from last year’s opening round. It also may be a battle between two teams fighting for one spot in the tight Western race, as the Calgary Flames host the Anaheim Ducks in a Pacific battle with wild card implications.

The Flames recent struggles may have flown under the radar somewhat outside of Calgary, since they’ve yet to reach the sort of debacle-level depth we’ve seen in places like Edmonton, Montreal and Ottawa. But the Flames aren’t all that far ahead of those teams in the standings, and lately they’ve been spinning their wheels as the Western playoff contenders slowly pull away from them.

Looking back over the team’s last 15 games, it’s not hard to spot the pattern. Beginning in December, the Flames would lose three straight, win two, lose three more, win two again, and then drop another three in a row. Even with a handful of loser points sprinkled in, that’s not good enough to stay in the race, and it’s seen the Flames go from holding down the last wild-card spot to being three points out.

Now we’re back in the win phase of that cycle, with a pair of solid performances this week against the Blackhawks and Kings. That’s encouraging, but now it’s time for the team to break the pattern and keep the win streak going. They haven’t been able to do that in a long while.

So what’s going wrong? Some of the culprits are obvious. Despite two good games this week, the top line of Sean Monahan, Johnny Gaudreau and Micheal Ferland has largely cooled off after a strong start, and the rest of the lineup hasn’t been able to step up and compensate. The special teams have been poor, especially a penalty-kill running south of 80 per cent, and the team doesn’t spend enough time playing with a lead.

The Travis Hamonic trade still hasn’t paid off. As much as we hate to say it, neither has the Jaromir Jagr signing, with rumours swirling that he could be shut down or even released in the near future. And fans have been grumbling about coach Glen Gulutzan, particularly his continued commitment to rolling four lines even when trailing.

That’s a long list, but you could come up with a similar one for most teams. The NHL’s mushy middle is a crowded one these days, and the Flames are firmly stuck in it for the second straight year. There are worse places to be, but this isn’t what Calgary fans were hoping for heading into the season.

All of which brings us back to the Ducks. They’re in that middle, too, although lately they’ve looked like a team headed for better things. Getting healthy has helped, as a brutal stretch of first-half injuries have mostly cleared up. It’s probably too late for Anaheim to make a run at a sixth-straight division title, but escaping the playoff bubble seems like a realistic goal right now. They’d won three straight before dropping Thursday’s shootout in Edmonton, so they’re headed in the right direction.

The Flames are probably going to have to pass them to make the playoffs, so there should be plenty of urgency with a chance to gain some ground on home ice. Calgary hits the season’s midway point with tonight’s game, and they’d love to head into the second half with some momentum. To get it, all they’ll need to do is manage something they couldn’t back in last year’s playoffs: Win a game against the Ducks.

Marquee matchup: Auston Matthews Brock Boeser

There’s no point overthinking it this week. Matthews vs. Boeser is going to make for must-see TV.

The narrative writes itself. You’ve got last year’s Calder winner against this year’s mid-season favourite. Two-thirds of America’s top line in international best-on-best competition for the next decade. The big market golden boy who gets wall-to-wall coverage against the West Coast kid who was only discovered last week.

>> Read the full post at Sportsnet

Grab bag: The votes are in

In the Friday Grab Bag:
- Once again, the NHL has something it doesn't feel like telling you
- Passing judgment on that list of history's greatest uniforms
- An obscure player with a great name and better fists
- The week's three comedy stars
- And a YouTube look back at Mario Lemieux's "five goals five ways" game which is really just an excuse to make fun of Wayne Gretzky's pants.

>> Read the full post at Vice Sports

Podcast: Take it outside

In this week's episode of Biscuits, the Vice Sports hockey podcast:

- The latest edition of the Winter Classic was hard to watch. Literally.
- The Canadiens are going to trade Max Pacioretty, because of course they are
- I compare Marc Bergevin's trading strategy to a scene from The Simpsons
- The NHL releases its list of the best ever uniforms, and it was... good? It was actually pretty good.
- Are angry players really going to no-shhow the all-star game?
- How I'd fix all-star voting
- Reader questions, in which Dave and I resist the urge to fight over chicken wings and instead unite on the subject of breakfast buffet bacon

>> Stream it now

>> Or, subscribe on iTunes.

Ten times an elite defenceman was traded in his prime

If you’re the sort of fan who enjoys a good trade rumour, these days it’s all about the blue line.

That’s not all that unusual – in today’s NHL, it always feels like just about everyone needs help on defence. But for a change, we’re not just talking about depth pieces or short-term rentals. Instead, it’s some of the biggest names in the sport who are rumoured to potentially be available. In Ottawa, there’s been talk that Erik Karlsson could move at some point before he hits free agency in 2019. Arizona is facing a similar dilemma with Oliver Ekman-Larsson. And the slumping Penguins are now reported to at least be considering a move involving Kris Letang.

That’s not to say that any of those trades will happen, of course. But it’s rare to even see names of this magnitude show up in discussions at all. After all, as we’re so often told, nobody trades elite defencemen in their prime in this league.

Or do they? It turns out, trades involving top defencemen have been more common than you might think.

So today, let’s crack open the history books for a look at some of the times in NHL history that an elite defenceman was traded in his prime. We’re looking for guys who were established stars, which we’ll define as already having at least one post-season all-star pick or multiple top-five Norris finishes in their career. We also want players who were still relatively young, which we’ll say means they were 32 or younger. That rules out guys who were traded later in their career, like Brian Leetch and Ray Bourque, as well as some who blossomed into top-tier stars after they were traded, like Ryan McDonagh and Brent Burns. But it still leaves us with a surprisingly long list of candidates.

Here are 10 times in the last 30 years than an elite defenceman was traded in his prime, and what those deals might teach us about what to expect from today’s rumoured moves.

Paul Coffey

The trade: We have plenty of trades to choose from with Coffey, who was traded seven times. We’ll go with his first, the 1987 deal that saw the Oilers send him along with Dave Hunter and Wayne Van Dorp to Pittsburgh for Craig Simpson, Dave Hannan, Moe Mantha and prospect Chris Joseph.

The reason: Coffey was a two-time Norris winner at the age of 26 and had been a key part of three Edmonton championships, but by the start of the 1987-88 season he was holding out in a contract dispute. The Oilers made him wait until November as they worked to get a top asset back; they found one in Simpson, a 21-year-old who’d been the first-overall pick two years earlier.

The result: This trade allowed Simpson to become the first player to ever score 50 goals in a season split between two teams. But over time, Coffey had the greater impact, including three 90-point seasons, and he helped the Penguins win their first Stanley Cup.

The lesson: Sometimes, your hand is forced and you just have to bite the bullet and do the best you can. Under the circumstances, the Oilers did OK on this deal.

Rob Blake

The trade: In February 2001, the Kings sent Blake and Steve Reinprecht to Colorado for Adam Deadmarsh, Aaron Miller, a player to be named later and two first-round picks.

The reason: Blake was a pending UFA and wanted big money, so Kings ownership decided to move him even though the team was contending for a playoff spot.

The result: The deal worked out great for the Avs, who won the Cup that year and then re-signed Blake for five more seasons. The Kings didn’t get much from the deal – Deadmarsh had his career cut short by injuries and the picks turned into Dave Steckel and Brian Boyle – but did get Blake back for a few years at the end of his career.

The lesson: When a Norris-calibre player becomes available, sometimes going all-in pays off. The Avalanche had already traded for Bourque the year before, so they were firmly in all-or-nothing mode. They ended up with “all”, and have a banner to show for it. Remember that when contenders start to hem and haw about the asking price for Karlsson or Ekman-Larsson being too high.

>> Read the full post at Sportsnet

Weekend wrap: Division by zeroes

This is a weird question to ask before the season has even hit the halfway mark, but we’ll ask it anyway: Is the Atlantic Division playoff race already over?

There’s a case to be made. The Tampa Bay Lightning are the league’s best team, and are holding a 10-point lead for first place in the division. That’s not insurmountable, but it’s pretty darn comfortable, especially when every other division is within three points. We can already pencil the Lightning in for the division’s top seed.

While we’ve got that pencil out, we might as well go ahead and add the Bruins and Leafs in second and third. We don’t know the order there yet, with the two teams tied (although Boston has three games in hand), but the two teams seem locked into those two spots. If so, that gives us our first playoff matchup, although we may not know for a while who’d have home-ice advantage.

That leaves five Atlantic teams to work with, and man, what a mess the rest of the division is.

The Senators just spent the week dropping a pair of crucial games to the Bruins by a combined score of 10-1, leaving them 16 points back of the third spot. We said that the Senators’ performance against Boston would tell us a lot about the team, and it’s fair to say we didn’t learn anything good. And if you’re keeping track, we’re now into the “disgusted fans throw their jerseys on the ice” portion of the meltdown in Ottawa. (See video at the top of this page).

The Canadiens are in slightly better shape in terms of the standings, sitting 12 back of Boston and Toronto, but they might be even more of a mess off the ice. Word emerged over the weekend that the Habs are actively shopping captain Max Pacioretty, whose goal-scoring streak continued in a 2-0 loss on Saturday. Sportsnet’s Nick Kypreos reported that Marc Bergevin’s “top priority is moving (Pacioretty) for a top goal-scorer back — preferably a younger one.” Makes sense. Teams are probably lining up to move a young guy who scores goals for an older one who, for now at least, doesn’t.

Bergevin aggressively shopping Pacioretty during Max’s worst goal slump in his career is the most Bergevin thing ever. Asset management is just abysmal.

— Andrew Berkshire (@AndrewBerkshire) December 31, 2017

The Red Wings aren’t good, although they’ve been marginally better than expected. The Sabres remain a mess. And that leaves perhaps the only team with a shot at making things interesting: The Panthers, who’ve won five straight to climb back to within nine points of third in the division. That’s still a long way to go, but compared to the other teams in this turtle derby, at least it’s a shot.

Of course, the top three isn’t necessarily the only route to the playoffs for the Atlantic’s bottom five, who could also get in through a wild-card spot. In theory, that’s a more realistic target, with the last spot currently held by the Islanders with 44 points. But that means passing more teams, including the surging Hurricanes and oh yeah, the two-time defending champion Penguins. If you believe that Pittsburgh will sort things out and get back into the race one way or another, that eats up another spot.

Add it all up, and the odds don’t look good. Three sites that try to project playoff chances – Money Puck, Hockey-reference.com and Sports Club Stats – all think the Panthers are still in the hunt, with odds ranging from 17 to 24 per cent. Montreal and Detroit are in worse shape, the Senators range from 0.7 to 3.5 per cent, and the Sabres are basically off the board. Meanwhile, all three sites see the Lightning and Bruins as virtual locks, and only Money Puck has the Leafs at less than 90%.

And if anything, those projections may be underselling the disparity, since they’re based on the assumption that teams stay the course with the current rosters. With two months until the deadline, at some point the Atlantic’s also-rans will have to throw in the towel and start shipping out veterans for future assets, which will lower their odds even more. And if the Metro’s wild-card teams start loading up – remember, we’re told the Penguins are about to make big changes – then the wild-card door may slam shut too.

All in all, the outlook is bleak for the majority of an entire division. That’s not supposed to happen in a league that pushes hyper-parity above all else, but here we are. Nothing is locked in, and we won’t see any mathematical clinching scenarios for a long time, so for now we can put that pencil away. But the way things are going, it won’t be long before we need some ink.

Road to the Cup

The five teams that look like they’re headed towards Stanley Cup favorite status.

5. St. Louis Blues (24-15-2, +15 true goals differential*) – After eight straight weeks in the top three, they’re wobbling. They’ve lost seven of 10, although they did manage a solid win over the Hurricanes on Saturday.

4. Vegas Golden Knights (26-9-2, +26) – I held out as long as I could. More below.

>> Read the full post at Sportsnet