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2025-26 NHL Miscellaneous Thread

I look forward to the day when these kind of statements are treated as routine as getting over the flu and not some act of bravery. Wellness, whole person care and mental health are as important as treating hypertension and should be that normalized.
 
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cmaleski2 said:
I've completely given up trying to understand the current NHL icing rules. I mean, I understand the rules as written (at least I THINK I do), but then almost every game you see a scenario play out where clearly the rule as not correctly applied, likely due to the linesmen just not seeing things correctly.

I've chalked it all up to it being very hard to actually make that judgement call in real time at ice level. It's a lot easier to question icing calls (who won the race?, did he make the line?, was that actually deflected?) when you are sitting up higher and can really see everything.
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At what point in the NHL game overall did the linesmen all get together and decide that everyone comes to pay and watch those guys drop a puck? The lecture they seem to love to give guys, even to seasoned faceoff pros like Jordo is comical...it has gotten to the point where they just feel like they need their own TV time and make a spectacle out of way too many faceoffs every night. Get them set ok, but drop the puck and cut it out with the "Johnny Murray School of Faceoff Madeness"...
 
CanadaCanes said:
At what point in the NHL game overall did the linesmen all get together and decide that everyone comes to pay and watch those guys drop a puck? The lecture they seem to love to give guys, even to seasoned faceoff pros like Jordo is comical...it has gotten to the point where they just feel like they need their own TV time and make a spectacle out of way too many faceoffs every night. Get them set ok, but drop the puck and cut it out with the "Johnny Murray School of Faceoff Madeness"...
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Ryan Daisy #81 last night, has worked 2 finals and the 2026 Olympics. Shandor Alphonso has also been around, last night was his 42nd playoff game. He hasn’t worked a final yet.
 
Alphonso was the one who couldn’t get his icing calls straight last night. Both of them got equally pissy about lecturing everybody in the circle for no real reason, so far as I can tell.
 
It was referenced before, but the other game last night was interesting. Vegas took Game 1 over Anaheim with a 3-1 win, banking a rare standout game from Carter Hart in net. Brett Howden remained hot with his 5th of the playoffs, which is bonkers considering he scored 12 goals all season. It was a pretty tight game with Barabshev breaking a 1-1 tie with like 5 minutes left, followed by an empty netter. That blown icing call led directly to a goal for Vegas, thus Queneville’s meltdown. Otherwise, it looked fairly even to me. Vegas just converted one more than the Ducks. Could be a tight series, if less bonkers than the Anaheim/Edmonton tilt.

Only one game tonight … Colorado/Minnesota Game 2. After the fireworks in Game 1, watch this be a 2-1 kind of deal.
 
jeffbear said:
It was referenced before, but the other game last night was interesting. Vegas took Game 1 over Anaheim with a 3-1 win, banking a rare standout game from Carter Hart in net. Brett Howden remained hot with his 5th of the playoffs, which is bonkers considering he scored 12 goals all season. It was a pretty tight game with Barabshev breaking a 1-1 tie with like 5 minutes left, followed by an empty netter. That blown icing call led directly to a goal for Vegas, thus Queneville’s meltdown. Otherwise, it looked fairly even to me. Vegas just converted one more than the Ducks. Could be a tight series, if less bonkers than the Anaheim/Edmonton tilt.

Only one game tonight … Colorado/Minnesota Game 2. After the fireworks in Game 1, watch this be a 2-1 kind of deal.
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The Wild will turn to Gustavsson in goal per Hynes.
 
I’m more concerned about that D group than their goalie situation. They spent a lot of time resources getting Wallstedt playoff blooded in the Dallas series, and this was really his first bad outing. I guess it’s natural to want to stop the bleeding when you just barfed up 9 goals, but it was chaos defensively in front of the kid. I’d have loved to see them give him a chance to bounce back unless he’s just shattered mentally. Then again, Gustavsson has some playoff experience and has decent numbers even if he’s never won a series. That whole thing is weird to be, from this distance. Gustavsson just signed a big extension that kicks in next season (5 years at $6.8 mil AAV) and they turn to Wallstedt for the huge series with Dallas … and he wins. They’ll have options, to be sure. It’s not like you couldn’t get a ton for a goalie with Gustavsson’s track record if you decided to trade him (or Wallstedt for that matter), and both are signed for next year at a not too insane total of $9 mil. So you could punt a decision off to next year if you wanted. Luxury problems to have in a league where there are a lot of teams with goalie issues.
 
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Matthews still not a guarenteed re-sign. But the Leafs fans will start building out the roster with McDavid joining the Leafs as well in a few years.

Nevermind that they still need about 6 good dmen....
 
cmaleski2 said:
Matthews still not a guarenteed re-sign. But the Leafs fans will start building out the roster with McDavid joining the Leafs as well in a few years.

Nevermind that they still need about 6 good dmen....
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I’d trade Matthew’s while you can for young players, if you now suddenly find yourself with McKenna falling into your lap why not rebuild around that then try to fool yourself into believing that guys like Nylander and Reilly are going to suddenly make you a Cup contender after all these years…
 
hockeylover said:
Can’t see that happening. We don’t have our 1st round picks for the next two years bc Treliving is very stupid.
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The Leafs do have a 2027 first round pick from Colorado in the Nic Roy trade...late first round but at least they have something next year after giving up the next two firsts of their own...
 
Couple of draft thoughts …

It’s kind of a weird draft, so from a “fairness” standpoint I don't think it’s that big a deal that Toronto got lucky and Vancouver slipped to third. The draft pool is really thick at the top end with deep pool of guys that you should be able to count on hitting the NHL pretty soon, but there’s serious questions about the ceiling for the top prospects. As in, there’s a lot of quality NHLers, but maybe no superstars. That’s the kind of draft where you may do better getting a really good player at 3 instead of a really good player at 1 who carries all that baggage of not being an instant legend. McKenna’s season in college left more questions than answers, honestly. There’s a reason the rankings kept hedging on him as clear cut No. 1. It IS however a big deal that Toronto didn’t get unlucky, get slotted at 6 and lose this pick to Boston. If McKenna trends more towards Lafreniere than Celebrini (entirely possible), that market is going to eat the poor kid alive.

This was Toronto’s only shot at a boost in the short term, but it absolutely doesn’t mean their goose came out of the oven. They still have that mess of a roster, Cap problems out the wazoo and movement restrictions on basically every player they would like to move to change any of the first two issues. Also, they just hired a con man to run their front office. If the league threw them a life raft (which I do NOT believe) then they got an old camp canoe when they needed one of those 50 person models the Coast Guard uses.

Meanwhile, Vancouver should get a shot at Malhotra at 3 and I think that might work out really well for all involved. Florida didn’t get rewarded for their unintentional tank, the Rangers didn’t jump the line and the Sharks are the ones who jumped up the most … improving 9 spots to Toronto’s 4. Doesn’t sound like the fix was in to me. Plus, we could be set up for some trade action with Chicago, Calgary, NYR and Florida potentially prioritizing immediate help over prospect help. Also, a lot of the first round pool are D, and teams tend to fall in love with specific guys when that happens. Could be a really liquid draft order by the time they’re handing out jerseys and hugging their parents.
 
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Meanwhile, in snowy Denver, Minnesota’s goalie swap didn’t do them any good as they got smoked 5-2 and return home trailing 0-2 in a series that’s starting to feel very perilous. Their injuries have really left them with too many holes to patch.
 
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