Puck Soup - Unraveled (The Oilers Song)

Episode Date: June 10, 2025

Sean and Ryan talk about Game 3, coaching changes, NHL awards, and more.

I'm Ryan Lambert from Elite Prospects. Sean McAnew from The Athletic. And things got a little wacky last night. I think that's safe to say, huh? Got a little silly. The word of the day is unraveled. We apparently have all decided that is the word. It was the great unraveling of the Evanton Oilers.

They came into that game. And I don't know, like after the first two games, I was watching them and I'm like, you know what these guys are? They're ravelled. Ravelled. Yeah. But then became unraveled last night. Yeah.

Does any of this matter? Yeah, sure it does. And we'll get to why in a second. First, I want to say, we got a few mailbag questions like before game three that was like, is this the best start ever to a Stanley Cup final? Two incredible games. Razor-thin margins between the two teams through. the first whatever, like 150 minutes of hockey they played.

I don't know what the exact math is on that, but, you know, 1.60, we're in the area. Awesome hockey. We're all agreeing. This game, less than a minute in, we're like, uh-oh. Yep. This is maybe not going to go so well. You know, it's the thing. Edmonton wrestles them to a draw in, uh,

in Edmonton, they have home ice advantage. I feel like they should feel a little bit like they gave away a game in Edmonton. On the balance, put it that way. Florida lucky to escape with the one win. And to me, it was all like, okay, now they're going to do it in Florida. Didn't go so well. Yeah. Now, is this just a case of, you know,

Florida's a really good team on home ice and they had a good game, or is there something more? Like, I feel like we're all trying very hard to assign moral slash ethical storylines here. And the one right now is Edmonton just

played into the Panthers' hands with all of the silly stuff. Do you buy that or is this all? Is this just like, yeah, man, it's the playoffs. They're going to. No, I think that's, I think being able to get teams to do that is what makes the Panthers so effective. Right. Like, there are obviously a great hockey team.

But it's drawing penalties. It's pissing off people. It's, um, oops, I fell into the goalie for the 30th time tonight. That's crazy. That keeps happening. All that shit. think that adds up and it it causes frustration and I think you know I saw a quote from McDavid where it's like yeah man all that stuff that happened at the end of the game is crazy

that's but that's garbage time stuff and and you know we're going to tighten it up and blah blah blah and to me I'm like dog Corey Perry was like doing like pantomime oh you're ducking and and Jake Wallman squirting water on the bench and that's the second piece. Period. Like, as soon as, I'll tell you this, as soon as the Ryan, it was the Ryan Hart goal made it three to one, right? I think so, yeah. Yeah. That Ryan Hart goal, I was like, this game is fucking over.

That's it. And that, and I think Edmonton kind of agreed with that assessment. They were like, okay, we're not coming back in this one time to play like assholes. And, you know, can that work? I don't, I don't know. it doesn't necessarily work, but it also doesn't necessarily have to not work. Sure.

If you know what I mean. And I feel like we're getting a little too cute on this, because it's sort of like, this is the Florida Panthers playoff experience. Of course it is. They are a bunch of scumbags, dirtbags, some would say. And as always, I mean, that is a compliment in the playoffs. but they play this way

and if you don't respond to it then you're letting them dictate everything they're coming in, they're running over you I mean you gotta right you got to fight back you got to push back you got to tell them like hey guys we're not going to just let you run wild on this series playing Florida

Panthers hockey we're gonna push back we can play that style too and then as soon as you do we all go got them fell into the trap Well, I think there's a difference between falling into the trap to the extent the Oilers did last night and like meeting them where they're again, I talked about this coming into the series where it's like if the Oilers are playing up and down hockey and they're not getting belted on the forecheck, which was the problem in the first period last night. Like they just couldn't break the puck out of their zone effectively. You know, like if the Panthers are dictating the terms.

that's bad because then you're getting frustrated and that frustration leads you to let's just you know high stick guys after every whistle and and punching squirt water and all this shit that that to me is when you're when you're doing the water squirting it's like okay you're going to take penalties i didn't think like the van der kane high stick in the first period like i wasn't like that's an outrage of the high stick them what do you You know, what can you say? Yeah. But when you're squirting water on the bench,

you're officially, like, gotten to in a way that, like, makes me say, you got to, you get to straighten this shit out between games, like the two days off between games. You have to straighten this shit out in that time, or you're fucked. That's kind of my view of it. I don't, man, I don't know if I, I guess part of this is so easy for me, in my own mind to just turn this around, and it's like Sam Bennett squirting water.

and we're all going, oh, look at that. Calm and cool. He's not screaming or yelling or anything. He's just squirting the water. What a character. I think this is just one of those things where the team that's losing 5-1 when the thing happens is going to look like the team that's unraveled. And the other team looks cool and collected, even though they're out there doing.

But again, you don't, you expect that from the Panthers. You expect them to, oh, I fell into the goalie again. That's crazy. or, you know, like, Matthew could Chuck John with guys. That's a penalty again now based on last night. The referees remembered that you're not allowed to do that. Now they called it on the boiler. Yeah, I mean, well, they called it in game two as well.

And I said to myself, you know, I don't know what happened between game one and two, where one becomes a penalty and it becomes a penalty. But the first one, when it led directly to a goal, that was more than fine. You actually get a goal for doing it, you know? I feel like a call got made between the games, you know, like a phone call. And, okay, you're not allowed to fall on the goal anymore. I think, to me, that's a fair rule. But anyhow, but again, my point is, though, that's the Florida Panthers game, right?

It's to play like assholes, like you said. Mm-hmm. And that's not the Oilers game. And again, if you're the Oilers trying to do what the Florida Panthers do, to them, they're just going to be like, that's really funny. Appreciate that, man. You know what I mean? That's like, oh, if you're like an MMA guy and you're going in there against a sumo

wrestler and you're like, oh, here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to, instead of doing like Brazilian jiu-jitsu to this guy, I'm going to try to knock him over like a sumo wrestler. Yeah. Doesn't work. The other guy, he's big and fat and he's been training this this whole life, you know? But there is another thing I wanted to say about the Panthers. Oh, they're so hard to play against blah, blah, blah.

Why is Sam Bennett going to get $10 million this summer? Why is Brad Marshan going to get $50 billion and whatever it is, right? What we don't talk about enough, Bennett, Reinhardt, to a lesser extent, Eckblad, who finally showed up in this series. Matthew Kachuk, even though he's hurt. How many guys do they have who play like that? Like, they play like third line agitator style guys, but they were top six picks. Yep. It's a handful.

Mm-hmm. You know, I wouldn't count Barkov in that group. And he was obviously, what, like a second overall guy? Yep. But like, and I guess maybe you would say Sam or Seth Jones as well doesn't really play like that. But all those other guys, it's like, oh, no, we're combining top and skill or, you know, some, whatever you want to call that with playing like that. Like the mindset is we're going to play like assholes, but we're also some of the best players in the world.

There's a reason all these guys were on Team Canada and the Four Nations, right? Mm-hmm. So I think that's being overlooked in all the assholes. Like that's why Sam Bennett scored last night, right? Is because he's the kind of guy that can create a breakaway out of nowhere. Yep. Oh, he's been fantastic. And you're right.

Like, we've talked a lot about how Sam Bennett is getting Sam Bennett paid, but I wonder who else Sam Bennett is getting paid this summer as far as who's the discount brand. Diet Sam Bennett, yeah. That some team is going to talk themselves into giving way too much up for. It'll happen to somebody. Oh, we were talking about this on the Discord yesterday. Like, who's Utah going to spend all that cap space on? Might be Mitch Marner, but it might be like Ryan Donato, right?

where it's like, oh, Donato had like 28 goals this year or whatever the number was. Here's six million bucks, big dog. Come on in, you know. But yeah, you know, I'm watching these games and I'm just going like, it all feels like it's, they've got the train rolling downhill at this point for Florida. You know, this is the stat. They've scored nine of the last 11 goals in this series. That's in two games. That's a problem.

for the Edmonton Oilers. But has anything shifted that makes you think, okay, either a light bulb went off on the Florida side or anything? I'm just trying to, I'm trying to work away from talking myself into the momentum aspect of it because I think that exists. But I also think we sometimes get a little carry away on it. So. Well, I'll tell you, I'll tell you what my thinking here is.

Stu Skinner, polled last night. I don't know if they've said they're going back to him. But just the fact that you're asking that three games into a Stanley Cup final, oh, who's their starting goalie for game four? That's not good. No, sure isn't. And we should say, like, I can't imagine they're not going to go back to Skinner. I agree.

Yeah. But just the fact that it's even. Even a question. Uh-oh. That's kind of my thing with it is like it's not so much that like Florida is necessarily going to carry over momentum, but just like they have planted the seed of doubt. Does worry. You know what it is with Stuart Skinner?

He's in that zone now where when he gives up a goal, we might have to see a camera shot of the backup goalie. And you never want that. Like the Florida Panthers, you have to. to score six goals before they will even remind you who the backup goal he is in Florida. And that's usually the way it is for most teams. But Stuart Skinner, he's the goal number two in game four gets you the Calvin Picker shot on the bench. A million percent.

And that's the thing, right? It's like you're watching the Dallas series and you're like, oh, no problem. We got it all figured out. And what is it? Like four goals, four goals? How many goals against is he having these three games? Isn't it four goals in the first two games each and then... See that bad?

I think so. Let's call him up here. He has given up... He gave up three in the win and then five and five and five. Back to back games, giving up five goals. His save percentage, tell me if this is good and tell me if this suggests anything good for the rest of the series. Game one,

His saver sentence started with a nine. Oh, I like that. Game two, it started with an eight. Game three, it started with a seven. So I'm running it through the pattern analyzer here. And the good news is it won't get to zero before the end of the series. Probably not. Although you never know.

You never know. Yeah, this is what you couldn't have if you were the Oilers and you made. I mean, we talked about it during the season and at the deadline and in the playoffs and a week ago when it was working. And now that it's not, this is when you decided to go into the playoffs and say with the greatest player of his era, quite possibly the second greatest player of his era, all on down the list, Evan Bouchard's cheap deal, et cetera, et cetera. Stuart Skinner is going to be the guy. We're going to, we're going to bet it all on. Yeah. The other thing that you got to say is it's not all his fault.

And like Edmonton has been bad defensively. Again, they can't break the puck out, which is a huge part of playing defense. Their rush defense has been, I thought, pretty bad last night especially. And so it's not all on Stuart Skinner, but again, you invited this by having this be a topic of conversation for the last, says here, 12 months. You know? More than that probably. 14. However long,

however far back you want to go. Like, this is an issue and they're not addressing it. But the other thing is, you know, not just are they giving Florida all these power plays. When they're drawing penalties,

their power play looks like dog shit. Yeah. And that's not, do you want to say like, okay, well, you know, they don't have Zach Hyman. Well, he's not fucking coming back. So you get,

to me, I just get it to the two best players in the world, like you said, and I have those guys shoot the puck a lot. When it works, it looks great. Remember that in the assistant game, too? Wow, incredible. Mm-hmm. But it looked downright bad at times last night,

and that's not, that can't be acceptable. I don't know what to say. It's just kind of all going wrong for them. So where are we at in game four? what's the gut feeling because you're sounding very pessimistic about the Oilers you're sounding like a guy who's expecting this series to maybe be 3-1 and were yeah i i mean if they play even kind of close to what they did the the last two game not i i didn't think they look great in game two i thought they looked fine but again a lot of what you would say the oilers strength is

is punishing you for taking penalties against them. What are they like two for 14, 18 in the series? I don't have it in front of me here, but like I'll tell you this, it's bad. It's a bad number for them. Yeah. And if they're not doing that, that's a huge part of what makes them such a successful team.

It's that simple. Three power play goals in the series. Three, okay. So here's how it breaks down. Here's how it breaks down. They are three for ten, which is actually a pretty good number. Last night it looked horrible, right? And the Panthers are five for six.

Okay. I think we got to the bottom of this one, Sean. I think we fucking cracked it here, but we may very well have. And again, like they had like a five on three and I think game two and they didn't do anything with it. like it's you got if you if you're expecting the margins to be really thin

anyway you can't you can't go you can't let the other team go 84% or whatever on the power play even if you're even if you're like oh they're going to take more penalties than us that's true but oh boy

I do think I this still feels to me like We've got a few twist and turns left. I'll say Edmonton and then game four. Sure. And then we... Hey, I hope you're right. And...

Because this is the other thing. Carr and McDavid can just have a fucking four-point night on Thursday. And everybody goes, well, yeah, I mean, okay, sure. That's Carr-McDavid. He's going to do that to you. Like, that, it is that simple for them. But, again, how many goals has Edmonton scored with all three of Bouchard? Drysidle and McDavid off the ice in this series.

I'll tell you, it's zero. Yeah. So there's your problem. That is a problem. No depth at all. And once again. The guy that I was really looking at was Evander Kane to sort of step in and be the, the Zach Hyman replacement.

And last night was not good for him. You can't be, like it's that impossible thing we ask guys like that, we just go out and be a total wrecking ball, but you cannot take any penalties. Yep. And not how it worked last night, so that, that is tough. Yeah, I, uh, I wrote the other day, um, about just like how I felt the Con Smythe race was shaping up. And it felt like maybe Bennett was the favorite, but Marshan had really worked his way into that conversation with the last few games.

And now it just, you know, it just does feel like Bennett again, but also McDavid leads the playoffs in scoring, but also he only had, like, there are a bunch of guys where you could, you could make a semi-credible argument or a bunch. There's like five, I guess you could say. McDavid, dry-sidal, Bennett, Marsh, and maybe Brobrovsky if he stands on his head the rest of the series. But now it just feels like Bennett, right? He, I would say, moved ahead. I do think the Brad Marchand narrative-driven bandwagon is still chugging along. And I mean, he's been four goals and three games in the series, right? So, hard to argue.

O.T. winners and all of this stuff, he's been fantastic. I just think that the Bennett and the Marchand voting block feels like there'd be a lot of overlap of like, all right, let's, we're going to pick a guy. guy who epitomizes these scumbag panthers do you pick the guy they added because it's kind of irresistible we've never had a trade deadline cons smith before

right or do you say we go with the guy who has like 50 goals in the playoffs is he up to 14 now 14 6 20 and 20 games more road goals than anyone ever.

Is that true? He's already there? Oh, yeah. Has he not? I thought that. I can't remember if he's now tied or he passed it. Okay. You know.

Either way, that's... Last night was just his second home goal of the entire playoffs. So 12 is a lot, I feel like. That's just my opinion, though. And again, in 20 games. He's shaping up to win the Cy Young. How many times do we get that kind of a guy? though.

Like winning the Con Smyth, you never see a guy with like four assists or whatever. It's pretty cool. I don't know. I think that rock. And he does have the record, by the way. It's just the 12th goal was the road record in the playoffs.

Yeah, it's crazy. Because, man, I was, because when I was writing this the other day, I was like, oh yeah, remember when McDavid, like, had like 45 points last year and, like, won the Kahn Smyth,

even though his team lost? That was fucking crazy. That was wild. and now I'm like I kind of doesn't feel like he has yeah he only has like 32 points or whatever it's like oh what a bum so he's so fucking good man but just a little overwhelmed and like I say I think I think uh you know the the first few minutes of the next game will bear out whether my theory is correct that they are extremely gotten to yeah it does feel like that is the beginning of next game is going to feel more important than typical.

Yeah. Yeah, I would say so. Because, again, it's, Edmonton needs to get back to their style of play. They need to move the puck up and down the ice very quickly to, uh, to feel like they're playing oilers hockey again instead of letting Florida dictate it to them. Uh, did you see the clip of the little girl from the local news in Florida? I did not. From last night?

No. So it's just like, hey, whatever, I'm Steve Stevenson here at the ABC 14 or whatever. And we talked to this little girl before the game. And we said, what did you think of, what did you think is your favorite part of going to a Panthers game? She goes, the fighting. And he's like, so you got what you wanted to see it tonight, right? And she's like, yeah. And he goes, what was the best part of it?

She's like, oh, when they punched each other a lot. Classic. It's like, you know what? A little girl? Hard to argue. It was pretty cool when they punched each other a lot. But yeah, again, if you're a Florida Panthers fan, you love to see how last night went,

not just because of the wind, but because the Oilers were extremely mad and had a lot of quotes about how they weren't actually mad at all. They were laughing. Yes, there was. a lot of that, you know, don't put in the newspaper,

I got mad. So, it was Greg's. When you're actually laughing and you're not mad at all, you got, you got two days to sort that out because otherwise this feels like a

panthers, Panthers run away. And I know. I just know what's going to happen, man, the next game, 30 seconds in, Sam Bennett's going to bump Stuart Skinner. The Oilers aren't going to do anything.

No, they're not going to do anything because they'll be like, we're not, mad. Everyone told us we can't be mad. We have to stay all nice and ravelled. And we're all going to go, there you go. Tricked again. Panthers are in their kitchen. The Oilers don't want to play tough, hard-nosed playoff hockey. Well, I mean, here's the thing. If you can get your, your opponents in a situation where they're damned if they do and they're damned if they don't, sounds like they're damned. Do you know why all of our media narratives always favor,

whichever team is winning because they're that damn good. Our narratives are just so flawless that we have like a 100% winning percentage. Yeah, as long as you get to watch the game first. I've narratively made it so that no matter what you say, I'm going to be, you would have to concede I'm correct about this. That's it.

Perfect, man. I mean, the only outcome where that's not the case is if the oil, just go out there and, you know, fucking Charlestown chiefs just absolutely beat the dog shit out of the Panthers at puck drop. Just like 10 guys gloves on the ice. It's a melee. And then, you know, Edmonton scores like three goals on the ensuing three on three. That's the only way that it doesn't work.

And you know what? If they can pull that off my hats off to them. And even then, I'd be like, you know, know what, during that line brawl, they were not unraveled. They were very, they were very calm and confident. Eyes of the Beast. Yeah. While they were chasing Berberowski around with a chainsaw.

I went to the movies yesterday and I saw the trailer for the movie, the movie The Smashing Machine. Do you know about this? I have heard of it, yes. Yeah, it's the new. Please explain to me why the rock does not look like the rock in that movie. Makeup, baby. It's freaking me out, man.

I don't like it. he still sounds so much like the rock though but anyway he he plays like a uh an old-timey ufc guy and what i liked in the trailer that i saw yesterday was that they're showing him like in pride fc and all that kind of thing you know like not just ufc but like again it's the early days of ufc was we're going to get like a capoeira guy against a karate guy and we're going to see which one wins that was that was was the premise of UFC. There are guys fighting in geese, and there are guys fighting in, like,

there was the literal, like, jujitsu versus the sumo guy fight. That is not an exaggeration. I'm sure that was an actual thing that happened. I've seen it, like, a 150-pound dude, like, choke out a sumo guy. It was so sick. It was absolutely wild. Yeah. Oh, man, there was one where a guy gets the, gets one guy in a crucifix and just elbows

him in the head, just like 15 times in the. I'm like, okay, I think that's enough. Anyway, but yeah, like my point in saying all that is, again, if you get, if you get the,

if you get the karate guy to try to do sumo wrestling, it's a big fucking problem for him. And I don't think, I don't think the oilers have it in them to be the sumo guy. Or the karate. You know,

you get to pick which guy's which. But I don't think they have it on them. And I can't wait to see the Smashing Machine movie. It looks fucking sick. Um, Anything else you want to say on this game? I don't think so.

Or the series or anything like that? Who's your con-smyth pick right now if you had to do it? It's Sam Bennett. Yeah, I think that's right. Man, he's going to get so much money. Is he going to get so much money, or is he going to take the same contract Sam Reinhardt signed and stay in Florida? I mean, he could. Why wouldn't you?

You got a good thing going. He's got a real good thing going. even leaving the taxes aside, would I rather make $2 million less a year now to like just, why wouldn't you think this can go on for a while? All those guys that I was mentioning who were like top six picks or whatever, they're all like 28, 29 and under. Mm-hmm. Just fucking keep it going, man.

And the other nice thing is if you're Sam Bennett and you sign, let's just say it's a seven-year deal in Florida. Sure. you signed a seven-year deal in anywhere else and the clock immediately starts taking towards at the later years of those deals being no good and everyone complains. Yeah, of course.

Whereas you signed that deal in Florida, if three years from now, Sam Bennett is like grossly overpaid as a third line center, but he's got two cup rings. Who cares, man? Three cup rings, four. Like that's the point is like,

why would you ever break this band up? Yeah, exactly. So I don't know. We will see. As somebody who will have to be covering free agency, I hope Sam Bennett makes it. As a Lee fan, I hope very sincerely that he does not. Because we all see where this is going. But yeah, if Florida wins, I think Bennett's the guy.

Yeah, I think there's basically nothing that would change that at this point. Like I'm saying like Marshand Hat Trick, Bennett goes like minus four or whatever in the next game. Like I don't think that's changing. And I think he's built the distance between him and the next closest guy. Just with this game and like how much narratively he's taken over the series and just made himself the topic of conversation for two months at this point, basically. Because he was doing the shit in the first round. You know?

So like my again, my hat's off to him. Like if you're going to do it in a given situation, a contract year when you're 29 years old is as good a time to score 14 goals in 20 games as you possibly can get. So my hats off to him. All right. Let's move on to some non-standly Cup stuff, I guess. And Peter DeBorg got fired on Friday. You sure did.

That was kind of out of nowhere. I mean, we'll go ahead. It certainly would have felt out of nowhere a week before it happened. You know, by the time we got to the end of that Edmonton series, you were kind of wondering. But even I did not think they were going to pull the trigger on that. Well, the reason I said I think it's surprising is there was an article in the Dallas Morning News by Tim Kowlishaw where he talks to Tom Galardi, the owner of the Dallas stars. And I'll see if I can quickly pull up the quote here. But he's basically like, yeah, I got all these Canadian media guys asking me if we're going to fire him.

Why would we do that? Here's the quote. He's like, they're all calling me is basically how he sets this up. And he goes, quote, they wanted to know if Pete was out. They said the rumor up there was that he was out. Are you kidding me? He's a top three, top five coach in the league. You think I want to be going into the coaching market right now?

Do you see who's getting hired? Pete's a season coach. I'm just one voice in the discussion, but I don't see Pete being on anyone's agenda. Wow. Okay, that's... Seven days later. Pack your shit, brother. You're out of here. All right. That is a much stronger... You know, we...

There's the cliche thing in the sports world of the dreaded vote of confidence, but that was significantly more than we usually get. Well, and especially because he is right to go, did you see who's getting high? He's like Lane Lambert got hired, man. Like, what, we gotta be, we gotta be in the Lane Lambert business. Dropping the, look who else is getting hired. I mean, he's not wrong, but, oh. No, and he made that comment before Pittsburgh and Boston made their hires that, like, by a day or three or whatever. At least.

Do you buy into this at all that if they were going to fire to bore, they needed to do it sooner? because now all the jobs are gone or is it just like paid? Well, they couldn't have fired him sooner, really. I mean, by a couple of days, might have just got him into the Boston and Pittsburgh discussions, but maybe not. Everybody was so far down the road in Boston and Pittsburgh, right? Like the Boston thing, it was like, we were hearing Marco Sturm and then not Marco Sturm and then Marko Sturt, like back and forth for like three weeks it felt like. And then they hired Marco Sturm. We'll talk about that in a minute.

but yeah, it's just like Tom Galardi is correct, you know, the guy they are hiring to replace Peter DeBoer, whoever it ends up being, is not going to have anywhere near the kind of track record Peter DeBoer does, for good or ill. But this all reads to me as they did the exit interviews, because I think the Kalashaw interview was before, like, exit interviews for the players. and I think a lot of the players were kind of like, I'm not playing for this fucking guy. You see how we talked about our goalie?

Yep. If I had to guess, that's what happened there. That's not, yeah, that feels pretty reasonable. Now, I mean, we, and part of it also could be the exit interviews with Pete DeBore, because there was some speculation of, like, was this guy not, actively trying to get himself fired, but was he sort of in the John Tortorella?

I'm kind of done with this lane. So who knows how that went, although it was not, you know, they didn't go out of their way to frame it as a parting of the ways or whatever you sometimes get. Of the guys that are out there, there are some big names. And in fact, there's... John Torterella is one of them, right? John Torterale and Peter Lavillette are two of only 16 guys who are out. ahead of Pete DeBore on the

all-time wins list. Yeah, but where are they on the all-time points percentage list? You know what I mean? Yeah. Well, Peter Lavalette is just ahead of Pete DeBore. Is it really? Yeah, he's 589 with 846 wins.

Oh, it's because DeBore had those years with the Panthers when they were fucking horrendous. Yeah, yeah, yeah, sure. That makes sense. but like what is it I think obviously it's like five of the last six or whatever Western Conference Finals have been coached by or have Peter DeBoer's been there

but I think it's like eight of the last 14 or some crazy eight of the last 12 something like that where it's like man this guy goes to the conference finals a lot with teams to lesser and greater degrees that are a little flawed you know and I don't know that like, again, this is all because it's not even that he pulled Jake Ottinger. It's that after the game, he was like, I don't know, the guy's a loser.

What do you want for me? Was kind of the subtext of what he's saying. And that just felt like, as you said, maybe he's trying to get himself bounced. But one year left at four million, hell, I'd sit on the beach too, brother. That's fine. Yeah. There's that too, right? go chill for a little bit and circle back either next summer or in November, yeah.

In November or January. I mean, we know those, there will be jobs open. Let me ask you this. What do you think Dallas is looking for in a new coach? I mean, you would think that they're very much in win now mode, right? I mean, this is not a situation where you would expect them to take a step back. I mean, does it have to be somebody with experience? I don't know. Do they have anyone like A.HL or assistant coaching? Their AHL coaches is apparently going to get a nice long look. They just went to, I think, the Western Conference Finals in the Calder Cup.

Oh, I mean, if you get to the conference finals, that's great success. No problem there, brother. Don't look up how they did. Sounds like he's already learned the Dallas Stars way. But, yeah, to me, I'm just like, if I'm the Stars and I'm like, like, fuck, man, I got to hire Peter Lavie Allette. The guy who had zero answers with a team that won the president's trophy two years ago? I don't know, man.

Mm-hmm. Like, seemingly couldn't repair the room after the, uh, the, who was it? The Barclay Good Drow trade and then the, the Jacob Truba trade and all this kind of stuff. And it's like, that guy's the guy. I'm trying to sell to people who are, like, pissed off about how the postseason went? I don't know what the answer is. I think you do kind of have to just maybe you just hire the AHL coach and say, we're going to stick internal here because we like the guy.

We know the guy. He's going to go somewhere else if he doesn't get a job here, that kind of stuff. And also because, like, you cannot, I can't personally, I can't see trying to sell the stars fans. How do you guys feel about John Tortorella? Yeah, that doesn't feel like a big, a big win, let's just say. No. So it's tough, man, like you say. Neil Graham is the name of the coach who has led the HL Cedar Park teams since 2019.

Yeah. And in my recollection, they have been good that whole time, basically. Would imagine so, yeah. And I mean, obviously the stars are a good draft and developed team and all that kind of stuff. So that helps. But he seems like he's getting a lot out of those guys. I don't have, you know, I don't follow the AHL as closely as I maybe should, given that I live like 10 minutes from an AHL rank. But Elaine Nazardine is on the staff as well.

So he'd be an internal. That's a name that you have definitely heard as well. But again, you're like, look, I know. you like Peter DeBore, he goes at all those conference finals. How do you feel about the guy that the devils were like this guy's not good enough? And then he gets hired by Pete DeBore to join his. So it's not like you're really shaking things up. If the exit interviews were, we hate this guy personally, then that's one thing.

If it was we don't like how we play or how we do this or that, I don't know that bringing in his right hand man fixes that. Yeah. And I mean, look, again, I'm a. I'm a DeBoer fan, obviously, he's a guy with a shelf life. You know, I think wherever he goes, he has success, and I don't think that's by accident. Except to say that he kind of does step into a lot of teams that are already pretty good in a lot of cases. Or have star players that a coach can work with. Let's put it that way.

And hell, Dallas had a lot of star players, you know? Because of the team name. But, yeah, to me, I just. I don't know. I look at this and I go, okay, Tyler Sagan had two goals and an assist in the five games against the Oilers, and he was the second leading scorer on the team in that series. Not great. Is that Pete DeBore's fault?

Is it Pete DeBore's fault that the goalie gave up two goals on two shots to start an elimination game? I don't, you know, maybe it is. The backup goalie came in and wasn't any much better. That part is kind of his fault. But where are we at on the Jason Robertson trade rumors? I saw a very funny tweet about that this morning. God, I got a Dom quote tweeted somebody, so I got to find Dom's Twitter account here real quick.

But it was Elliot Friedman. If Robertson on SN 590, Jason Robertson's name is out there, could be moved to make, you're going to love this one. could be moved to make room for Grandland extension if Dumbo or Lubushkin can't be shipped out. How is that the tradeoff you're going to make? I want, okay, are they, when you see things like that, are they counting Jamie Ben as coming back? I think they must be. Yeah, because I mean, that is, again, like, he was guaranteed, he was told by management that they had a job for life.

Yeah. Like, this is one of those things where it's like, we know what Vegas would do in this situation. but hmm i i personally wouldn't think that would be the guy i'd be moving but yeah at the same time jim nil seems to know what he's doing yeah you know what if you want to uh if you want to if you want to sit there and say like they they have the up close look this this guy doesn't have it to to be taking that next step and all that kind of thing that i can all i can always buy that You know, we were talking yesterday about like Nick Eilers in Winnipeg. And it's like everything you look at with Nick with Nick Eilers is like, shouldn't this guy be playing more than like 14 minutes a night or whatever?

But there's like four coaches that have been like, we looked at it and the answer is no to your question. You know what I mean? And shouldn't he be getting more power play time? And it's like when you look at the underlying numbers of how power plays perform when he's on them, the answer once again is no. And I'm not saying coaches can't be wrong about this. I'm not saying I'm wrong about this. But I am always curious.

Like if you could do the like inject a guy with truth serum. Like what's up with Nick Euler's on the power play? Why can't you give this guy more ice time than Adam fucking Lowry? I'd love to know what the answer is like 100% honesty. You know what the one I want is? the thing that happens in Toronto where once a year they're like we're going to make William Nealander a center

and he gets literally 15 seconds of ice time and they're like nope never again and that's it for the year like what is happening how bad is this guy doing like what is the same thing with Robertson does the center need to do that this guy is so bad at

that it takes one shift for them to completely abandon their idea every year it's the same thing with Robertson. It's like, I watch these games. I think he looks pretty fucking good. Apart from that, like, you know, he wasn't scoring stretch in the playoffs this year. And then he scored a bunch against the Oilers when it didn't matter. I feel like when I watch this guy, I'm like pretty impressed by him most of the time. And yet his team is like, look, if it's him or who's the guy I just said? A Granlan. If it's him or Granland, I'm taking Granland every time.

I'm like, what am I missing? Mm-hmm. Because does that not feel fucking crazy? If you're like, I'd rather have Grandland and Ben than like 23-year-old Jason Robertson. Now, look, I understand Robertson's going into the last year of a deal. That is an important thing. That has to be. One year left at a quote-unquote cheap deal.

RFA at the end of it, so it's not a situation where he's going to walk, but could get very contentious. But so basically. what I feel like they're saying is we'd rather not pay this guy $12 million for the rest of his 20s and into his early 30s. We'd rather have

Granland and Ben for like three or four more years. I don't get it. I'd love to have it explained to me. Yeah. And legitimately. Like not... Once we're not saying this

in the, you know, everyone else's dumb kind of way. Like it's, no, no, legitimately, what is the deal here? Well, again, it's the, it's the Nick Eilers thing where it's like a bunch of people I go, okay, that's a smart hockey person or whatever, have looked at it. Again, if it's one coach, that's one thing, you know? Coaches don't like guys for a million different reasons. They don't want to play guys.

They get reputations for I don't want to play the, whatever it is, you know. But with like Nick Eilers, how many coaches have they gone through since he's been there? And every single one of them is like, if I play this guy 17 minutes a night, we are fucked. I don't get it, you know? So anyway. Other coaching decisions have been made. Dan Mews hired in Pittsburgh. Now, of course, you know who Dan Mews is.

I mean, I've been saying for how many years, whenever there's a coaching vacancy, I'm like, you know what? Dan Mews is a real person who exists. That's right. and whose work I'm familiar with. And I did not immediately Google when they announced that. Yeah, he was just the USU18 guy. And he is a Boston fellow who had been an assistant with the Rangers the last couple of years. But the reason I know him is the USU 18s and, you know, how all those guys go to college hockey and that kind of thing.

Um, but assistant in, uh, Nashville before that and, and, and, yeah, he, he's just been around college and NHL coaching for a million years, basically. A million is an overstatement, but, um, I don't know. He, he started as a, uh, as an NCAA assistant coach in 0708. So that's a long time, you know, um, he's like my age, I think. Yeah. Eighty two. So he'll be, uh, he'll be, uh, he'll be 43 in July.

but what this says to me, penguins are absolutely not trying to compete. Not even thinking about it. We said with Dallas being in win now mode that this doesn't feel like a win now higher. No. This is a, again, draft and develop kind of a higher, which, to be clear, I think is the right call for that franchise. It sure is.

But then like now, what do you do with Malkin and Lattang? like Crosby's a penguin for life unless he says otherwise. Yeah. But like how... Wasn't there a big article in the athletic today about Latang? I didn't read it. Was it just today? Okay.

I'll look at it. But yeah, like I mean, how much of a nudge out the door are you going to, are you going to deliver? Um, uh, I'm scrolling. I'm scrolling. Letang Several team sources Several team sources who were granted anonymity to protect personal relationships Said Latang and his play were the source of incredible frustration

For head coach Mike Sullivan and assistant David Quinn this past season The mental errors have always been part of the Latang package Still, the former Penguins coaching staff became so confound Somewhat confounded When the mental errors began to multiply as his physical ability dipped Trading him would be the easy solution, right? think again. Team sources said Latang is quote, unmovable.

And unmovable is not the same as untouchable. Let's just say. Yeah. Siddy Crosby is untouchable. Chris Latang is unmovable. Dubus has made it clear he's against

buying players out. I don't think it'll be Latang who gets bought out. Yeah. It just seems like they're The article is saying rocking a hard, please. Yeah, and it's Josh's piece. He says the truth is they're stuck with him. So that's tough.

So there you go. He also says the team sources say Latang doesn't believe he's playing on his final NHL contract. Got bad news for you, Chris. You know what? 2028 is when that deal expires. I love his optimism. I'll say that.

That's the polite way to say, oh, we love that for you, Chris. So, yeah. I don't know much about what Dan Muses brings to the table as a head coach, really, at the NHL level. But this is one of those things where it's like, is he going to be able to tell Sidney Crosby how to do anything? Like the reports where the Crosby was not super involved in this and didn't want to be. No, sure. But I'm saying like if he's like, hey, Sid, when X, Y, and C had Cid's just like, yeah, man. Okay, I got it. Thanks.

You know what I mean? Thanks for the tip guy who's like three years older than me. That's exactly what I'm getting at. Yeah. So it's an interesting time in Pittsburgh. What about Marco Sturm to Boston? He had his introductory presser this morning as we're recording this. I didn't really see a ton about what he thinks,

although, or what he had to say, but from what I gather, the general vibe was where we're a going for it style team. Oh, here's a quote. Yeah, okay. I'm going to push those guys forward. I hate losing. I'm very competitive. So, there you go. Well, I think most guys say that at the press conference and then we'll see where the reality goes.

But that did seem to be the name they were zoned in on almost from. Yeah, for months. Yeah. Yeah, good to, I mean, we can't. They're keeping most of their assistance from last year from what I saw. Yeah. Okay. Well, I mean, you can't say, you can't make fun of the Peter Lavillettes of the world being cycled in and out of jobs constantly and then also scratch your head over somebody new being given a shot.

So I do like how the, I saw like something from the Bruins where it was like three pictures of Marco Sturm's celebration. as a Boston Bruin. And it was like, oh, yeah, this is the, he used to play for the borough. But then I realized it was, all three were from the same goal. Like, they just used three different shots of the same celebration. And I was like, okay. It's really zero in on that, I guess, sure. Yeah, I, you know, he's got the resume, right?

Success in international hockey, success in the HAL, former Bruin, which apparently is always so important. Well, because he knows the Bruins way. Yeah. Do you know when they traded him to L.A.? No. Like 2011, like right before they won the Stanley Cup. There you go.

So, yeah. That's fun. Other than that, I guess I don't have a lot of thoughts. Again, I thought the Bruins were like unsustainably bad. bad this year, you know? I don't think they were nearly as bad as the record indicates. If you want to say that makes them a bubble playoff team next year, I, sure, you know. I mean, the record was extraordinarily bad.

Yeah, and it's because Swainman couldn't make a save. Yeah, for a team that was in that spot. But you're right. If bounce back from Swamen with the full camp and all of that, and suddenly Marco Stern getting some Jack Adams votes. Yep. Um, hey, speaking of that, Spencer Carverer won the Jack Adams. Yep.

Not hard to, but, they tricked them again. They tricked. They keep tricking all these guys. The best one was, uh, Sean Monaghan winning the Masterton, where they're like, we tricked you. Uh, your, your, your best friend's widow came to your house instead. Yeah. And she was like, we love you and we, and we miss, and, you know, we miss having you around or whatever. And he's like crying and it's like, oh, that's, that's a good.

trick, I guess. Yeah. And also, as much as I don't want to be this guy, the dude had a camera crew in his house when she showed up. I believe his wife had told him he, they were getting family photos taken or something like that was the gimmick. And that's why NHL.com. Yeah, it had like nine GoPro's on him at all the time.

Yep, that's great. Cool. But yeah, that's, so that's the nice one. The Carberry one was funny because it was just like, hey, why don't you come in and you talk to, what's his name about, what a crazy season it was? And then they're like, we tricked you, all your family, all your loved ones are here with a big trophy for you. Yeah. You caught me. I want to see a guy get legitimately tricked.

Like, I want to see him get, like, called into the office and, like, Leonces and the GM are there. and they're like Alexander Ovechkin just failed a drug test. He said he won't play for you next year, so you obviously have to go. He's Alex Ovechkin. No, again. Every one of these guys, they should be like, here's a bunch of fucking Nickelodeon slime on you. Here's your fucking trophy. Get the fuck out of here.

They go to shake the guy's hand and then yank it back. Oh, too slow. Or they got the joy buzzer. Oh, that'd be a good one. The old whoopee cushion. Okay, man. Okay, why don't you have a seat? Spencer, come on.

Spencer's got to go home and figure out what's going on. So, yeah, not really a surprise there, although I did see a graph that was just like, here's like every coach that got a vote for the Jack Adams and where their teams ranked in PDO, and nobody was out of the top 12 or something. something like that. Very funny. Did we talk about Kutrov winning the Ted Lindsay last week? I don't remember if we did or not. Okay. Well, he did it. Yep, great. Good player. Right before we hit record on this, we got the Calder results, and Lane Hudson won that.

Not a surprise that he won. I was somewhat surprised by the market. It was a blowout. Like, as far as the first place votes, he was basically on. and then the other two guys combined got 26. And shout up to Justin Wolf were finishing second. Talking about how much disrespect. I guess either you were wrong or it worked because, yeah, it's a landslide. And it's the right call. It's the right pick.

I think any one of the three finalists was a perfectly defensible call. I was surprised by celebrating finishing third, but. It doesn't matter if you finish second or third and something like this. Yeah, no, that's right. But, you know, hey, shout out to Lane Hudson, the king of the secondary assist. He had a lot of them this year. That's the joke. Yes.

It was like half his point total. It was like second assists. Well, when you're four foot three, you got to. Hey, man, I saw this kid play in college, and I was like, that's, that is an unbelievably fun, talented play. Like, if we're just basing it on how fun a player is to watch, there are many guys, period, the NHL, let alone rookies who are above Lane Hudson for me. That kid's fucking awesome to watch. He is. But yeah, shout out to Dustin Wolf.

And speaking of goalies never win awards, did you see the big news over the weekend? No. So you're not going to be surprised by this. Looks like Connor Halibuck has the Vezna's sewn up. Okay. And it seems like they were doing another classic goof him up to him in a park is where it seemed like it took place. Okay. And there was a photo of him with the Vesner Trophy and also the Hart Trophy.

Really? Yeah. Okay. That's interesting. Mm-hmm. Had not seen that. Yeah. I'll say this.

The photo is blurry. Like you could tell me that's Connor Hallibuck. Or you, like, I'm picking up from context clues mostly that it's Connor Hella Buck. But trophy that looks a hell of a lot like the Vesna, Trovee looks exactly like the heart. And he's, he's hugging both of them. Okay. Yeah, there it is. Very distinctive looking.

Yeah, the heart's hard to mistake. Yeah. Is a cool looking trophy, but. Yep. Absolutely. So, do you have a reaction to that one? Him winning the heart? Yeah, throw a spoiler alert on that next time.

That's good. That would have been my vote. I'm pleasantly surprised that we would go that direction. Obviously, it's going to lead to all sorts of eye-rolling, given his playoff performance, but based on the regular season, that's who I would have voted for. Man, it is so crazy that this photo just leaked over the weekend.

Dude, if he doesn't win the heart now, like if this turns out to have... Now, that's a trick. Okay, I'm back in. You did win the heart. And then they go actually, Connor McDavid did. It's like, fuck! That's right.

Wait, why is this heart trophy only engraved with my first name? Don't worry about it. Is that a, what's the, what's the outline of that? That looks an awful lot like a trap door under the heart trophy. Sean, I said,

I said something earlier before we hit record to you about, I have some news that I know you don't know what this is. Yeah. And I would love to hear your reaction to this. this. Yes. Because this is really, this is really interesting to me for reasons that will become obvious in two seconds.

Because of rule changes at the NCAA level this year, the Spangler Cup will feature a college hockey all-star team for the first time ever. Wow. Isn't that crazy? Does that not feel weird to you? Explain me, you mean that like the Spangler is like Team USA says? a college or ulcer team or is there going to be in addition to Tican and GMSA there's going to be a college.

Yeah. Spengler is so weird. It is the strangest. Yeah. That's right. So it says here, a new type of team will be participated. This is from Daily Face Off. So, okay, this news came out this morning.

And this is one of those things where it's like, this crossed my desk like two weeks ago. And I thought like, oh, everybody knows about this. But apparently I just like. Like, nobody, it was not framed to me as this is a big scoop for you. You know what I mean? This is, I was just like, oh, okay. You know what I mean? But a squad of select NCAA Division I standouts will compete for the, in the prestigious tournament.

College hockey commissioners association said this. First time in 102 years, joint announcement, blah, blah, blah. Select team representing college hockey officially named the U.S. Collegiate Selects, the team will be comprised of active Division I players of any nationality representing all six conferences in Division I independent programs. The roster as well as the coaching staff

will be named at a later date. Isn't that crazy? It's interesting, but the Spengler does this, right? The Spengler has, like, Team Canada is playing like some club from Switzerland. and you're like, okay, Spengler, whatever. Yeah. So it says here, it's going to be kind of neat if they get full-on teams.

So this is what I'm thinking. Let me read this real quickly first. The University of North Dakota defeated in the 1982 Spengler Cup and in 1981, the University of Minnesota played. So not completely unique, but it's first time it's an all-star team. And so what I think is this. The Spengler Cup takes place right around the same time as like the opening round of world juniors. So all these, most college teams aren't playing at this point anyway.

Okay. So I think what I expect is that it will mostly be, I don't have any like inside information on this. I'm just, this is my prediction, is that it will be mostly like higher end like, like, for guys who aren't drafted basically, undrafted free agents. And then maybe a handful of drafted players who are too old to play World Juniors. Okay. That's kind of my read on it from like, again, just kind of understanding how this works. I'm really curious, though, because like, for example, a lot of the time, like the best goalies in college hockey are,

not drafted players. So I wonder if, like, all these, all the, like, three of the best goalies in the NCAA will be on this team or whatever, you know? I'm, I'm really excited to see how they kind of, I'll tell you this. Yeah. They might get me to watch the Spangler Cup if I could figure out how to do that on like, not streams dot fart, you know.

So that was the news that I wanted to. I like that. Yeah. Yeah. It's fun. Um, anyhow, uh, that's it for the show this week. So why don't you. hit them with the plugs and let's go do the mailbag.

You can catch me on the athletic hockey show with other Sean and Frankie, which we have already recorded and tweeted out. So it's a double Tuesday podcast. I know. I don't like that. Yeah. So there's that. Find me at the athletic.

Subscribe to the red light newsletter. We're going to do Who Says No for trades involving things that aren't actually tradable tomorrow. I really like this. This is a good idea from you. Damn. Well, we'll see how it goes. Yeah, I guess, you know what?

Well, okay. The idea is good. Undeniably, the idea is good. The execution remains to be seen. If the execution isn't there, that's completely on the readers and what they send in. I couldn't agree more. I go through the mailbag questions every week. I know how it is.

And then for me, Elite prospects. The draft guide is out, has been out for a week now. I mean, if you're signing up for elite prospects, this is the time to do it. draft guides and all that kind of stuff. We got all kinds of coverage coming out of the combine, which because of the way the draft is working this year,

you know, not so normal of a combine, a lot more wheeling and dealing style stuff seem to have gone on. A lot of rumors and that kind of thing. So, Cam Robinson had a ton of good coverage from that. And, you know, my coverage of the NHL playoffs continues, et cetera, et cetera. You know, it's all over there. I don't know if there's a deal going on, but again, even if you're getting in it full freight, the draft guide is awesome.

I don't have it in front of me. A thousand plus pages, though, as usual. And then also Patreon.com slash puck suit, where we can do all kinds of bonus episodes. Me and Sean are going to do one tomorrow, and we're going to do the mailbag right now. It's that simple. All kinds of bonus episodes over there.

Not just me and Sean, me and the other Sean, me and the other Sean and Greg, Greg Solo. You know, we got a lot of stuff moving and shaking, and we have a very exciting end-of-month bonus episode planned for people that we may have teased it on here before. We may have teased it on a bonus episode. But basically, I'm going to rig it so that the listener vote for this month is an expansion draft in the style of the PWHL expansion draft that just happened last night. And it's going to be really fun because you're going to be able to build a really good team if NHL teams can only protect three players at once.

So anyway, that's the whole thing. Thanks so much for listening, folks. And have a good one. Bye-bye. Bye-bye.