The Athletic Hockey Show - NHL No. 1 center tiers

Episode Date: March 21, 2024

Hailey, Max and Sean discuss and debate Sean's latest piece at The Athletic, the No. 1 center tiers. A project Sean took on, to classify the top of every team’s depth chart. From the best of the best: MacKinnon, McDavid and Matthews to the other end, where someone has to take the opening face off and everyone in-between, Hailey and Max take Sean to task on his rankings of the top centers for each of the NHL's 32 teams.Plus the crew recaps the very first PWHL trade deadline, the interest in expansion to markets like Pittsburgh and Detroit and the sell out in minutes on Wednesday for a game in Montreal's Bell Centre which will set yet another attendance record in the PWHL's inaugural season. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the athletic hockey show. What's up, everybody? Welcome back to another Thursday edition of the Athletic Hockey Show. It's Haley, Max, and Sean here with you. And this week, we're going to put Sean Gentilly in the hot seat. He had a center tiers, a 1C center tier story come out this week. And Max and I have some thoughts. Isn't that right?

We sure do. A lot of thoughts. But first of all, it was a really good piece. But I think the point of it is to get everybody to rearrange it for you anyway, right, after you'd do it. To the two of you, to the many people who read this and had issues with the placement of their favorite players or whatever, your quibble's not with me. It's with my many, many front office sources and moles who told me how to think on this one. And in some cases, the alphabet. Just kidding.

It's the alphabet. I actually Funny story about that. I tried to list everybody alphabetically within their little sub-tieres and screwed up because I move enough people around where the alphabetized section got screwed up.

Whoopsies. I think the funniest part for me was opening this story up, I guess, on Tuesday morning, came out, right? Correct. And seeing, please, please note, players within each tier

are listed alphabetically. Please, line break. Then the best, the best here, of course, goes Nathan McKinnon, Austin Matthews, Connor McDavid. And the first comment on the story was

McKinnon over McDavid? What? I hope that person was doing a bit, honestly. I tend to think. But that just goes to show that nobody reads the intro. Like one day,

like when you're doing a list like this or any kind of like notebook or trade tiers, five players the Red Wings should trade for. Max, you should just throw in. Nobody's going to read this. I have nothing to say. Here is my list and just see if anyone notices.

I should confess my deepest, darkest secret in the intro above the listical portion and see how many people see it. Or just be like, hey, my name is Max. I have a peanut allergy. Here's my thoughts on the Red Wings and free agency. see if anyone says, oh my God, I didn't know that about you. I mean, the big joke that Dom and I always have is that people just, with the power rankings, is that people just control F and see where their team shows up and then they get mad about it, which is not far off.

I think that's a good rule of thumb for anything where you're talking about 32 separate fan bases. And let me say, I guess, before we go into this, like really make it plain, this is every team's first line center or a reasonable approximation of their first line center because that's as we're going to get into like that's debatable in some cases. It depends on who you ask. It depends on what you value

and maybe depends on each team's individual situation. So it's like, you know, we'll see. But 32 teams, 32 players on this list split up between 10 tiers. One player per team, which I had to scold an assistant general manager who emailed me back and asked, and asked about a particular guy and said,

why is he on there? I was like, oh, player X is already on the list. It's one per. Oh, gosh. Don't be like that guy. Well, here's my biggest, my biggest question for you to start out.

Maybe not my biggest, but my first. How dare you? How dare you? Is that your question? No. We talked about the alphabeticals on those first three, the M's, the killer Ms. Should there have been someone above all of them because his name, his last name starts with C, that being Sidney Crosby? Man, should there have been the Cid stands alone?

No. No, no, no, no. This is his name starts to the C. So he's alphabetically, he would go first. If he's in the tier, he's listed first. And that was the first guy who I thought, like, are we really, to the point where Sid's been passed by by all three of the other. I think so.

I think, I think Sydney Crosby is somewhere between the fourth and 12th best player in the league at this point. I think, I think that's reasonable to say. It's not a knock on him. I think part of it, too,

is, I mean, the three of us, we always joke about how much I bring up the penguins and it's, it's true. Like, that's just the lens through which I, I,

I, it's where I grew up. It's where I worked for a long time. It's a team I covered for a long time. Like that's, for better or worse, that's the lens, you know, that I look through a lot of the rest of the league on. So I think part, so true, like, point taken, it's funny to joke about it's correct. But I'm also like, especially when I do stuff like this, I'm like hyper aware of the fact that that's like to some, that I'm bringing some degree of bias to the to the process, right? So maybe I'm unfairly docking, Sid, points in this.

I don't think I am. I think that those three guys stand alone. I think the company that Crosby is in, you know, as it stands and as published is pretty unbelievable and pretty impressive. And also, like, for the record, like, nobody pushed back. Like, nobody was like, yeah, well, we love, we love Connor and we love Austin and we love Nate, but you know, you're one short there and it should be 80 sad. And that's not that those conversations didn't happen.

And if somebody would have said so, I would have been more than open to the, to, you know, making the change, but it's not the way it shook out. I think I'm actually with you. It's just one of those things that like, like when I think in the abstract, like, am I ready to, this year maybe the first year, statistically that the case actually becomes really stacked against them, right? But I think even as recently as like last year, if someone wanted to say, how could you take Matthew? Not how could you?

But are you sure that Matthews is in a different level than Sid? Right. But this year, the numbers make it tough. The thing about Crosby, and this was maybe a little bit more true a couple years ago for whatever reason. I can't quite, I can't quite suss out why we've shifted back off of this. Everybody wants to make it sound like he's in like the CV-Y. phase of his career where he's turned into like a selky caliber defensive. Yeah, he's not. He's like he's, he's not a problem out of that. He's not a problem. Like he's not a problem defensive player,

but he's also not out there putting up, you know, Austin Matthews impacts defensively, right? And his production isn't such. It's not McDavid level, you know, this guy's this guy could score 150 points in a season. And it's not. But he's still, he's still a point per game player. he's on pace for 40 at 36 years old. So he's impressive in a different way than those top tier guys are, which is fair to put him to the degree tier, right? Nobody will ever have to sell me on any part of the Sydney Grasby experience ever. Like that dude is the fact that he's delivered on the expectations that we're playing.

And this is like what you hear this said about LeBron too, right? Like those two guys are of a type to me. the amount of hype that they came into into their respective leagues with was out of control and the fact that they are actually as good as everyone thought they were going to be and that they've done what they were supposed to basically is remarkable right so i'm never going to say a bad word about about sidney crosbie's career like ever also not for nothing this is according to Corey Snyder's data, which is certainly as good as we have in the public sphere,

he's leading the league in scoring chance contributions at five on five. Like, he's close. He's just not quite. So you already mentioned that you spoke with some league sources, Sean. Obviously anonymously, like nobody's named, but you do have some league source quotes in this story. Was there anybody who got, moved like higher or lower based on the feedback you got from some of these guys or people that

maybe even people that they thought should have but you didn't move like i'd just be curious who who the league kind of disagreed with your gut on the big thing that changed was there was like kind of a combination of of two previous groups into the the spotlight awaits tier which is bark of aho peterson hints um basically split those guys up from the guys who have already won. That just seems like the right way to do things, right? Because it is, the, the division was you have Crosby and Eichol and points kind of in their own tier because they, A, they've done it already and B, they're capable of, you know, being, we'll say the best forward on a, on a, on a cup team still. but before they were mixed in there.

I had them mixing there with Bart, I had Blake Barkov was in there, and I think Hints might have been. And it just seemed like, based on the stuff that I've heard back, that there needed to be an extra amount of differentiation between the guys who have already done it and the guys who were still extremely good,

but maybe the main difference is that they haven't had that, you know, four round 16 win run that some of those other guys, A, have already had, and B still seem capable of having. So that was the big change, I think, that I made based on a, based on, based on feedback, at least, at least towards the top. I like the quote that the one scout had about Eichel, because I feel like that was the knock on him forever. It's like, can you really win with him?

And he finally just puts it in black and white. Of course you can. He, you did. Like Vegas did win with him as the one C. Yeah. It happened. And like has, now has his play this season, you know, been of a type with what we saw from him? during the 20, 23 playoffs, no.

Like, he hasn't been as good as he was when they won the cup, but he's also been kind of injured again. And, you know, his missed time within it with an injury is probably the better way to put it. And, you know, keeping that level up. Yeah, because like, look, man, that guy, should he won the cons might? Like, a lot of people think so. A lot of, a lot of important people think so.

And a lot of unimportant people think so and of which, which I am, of which I I'm part of. It would have been tough for him to be as good now as he was as he was last year, but that's okay. He's still, he's still shown that he can do it. And he's still, he's still is like,

I know, and I know you guys have had these conversations too. A lot of people are like Jack Eichol top five talent, top 10 talent. Like he can, there's not a lot that he can't do. And I think he's still kind of riding that wave. Okay. So to put you on the hot seat more specifically with one.

of my audits, Sean. Why it was Anzee Kopitar not in that tier? Yes. Because I do believe the LA Kings have won a Stanley Cup with that man as their number one center. Maybe one, maybe two. Had a little bit of success.

Bunch that I saw in person, yeah. I don't know. That's the one that's the one that after the fact, I feel good about where we landed here generally. Like I don't stand by every placement and every choice that was made, but Copatar was when I struggled with. and, you know, for better or worse, I feel like his plays declined just enough from where he was in, say, 2014 or whatever, when he was at his absolute peak where it's like now maybe he needs a little bit more help.

And is that, that might be unfair because if, because if you crunch the numbers a little bit and you look at his defensive impacts and you look at his point production, it's, he's basically where he was. Like, like he's having at 36. He's having what we can call like. a standard on J. Copatar season which is, you know, he's going to be in the 60, 70 point range.

He's going to be one of the 10 best defensive centers in the league. And, you know, even at his best, that's kind of, that's kind of where he lived,

right? So I think that that was, you know, a tough differentiation to make. I still, I'll stick by it, but at the same time,

there's no, to me, there's no choice that I made. There's no placement on the list. It is probably more questionable than that one. Can I be a bad guy on a couple of guys here?

I don't want to develop a... I don't know if you can, but... Okay. An anti-manage... Max has a tape. I don't know if you got that club in your bag there, buddy, boy. I think you got Hints and Aho both a tier too high here. That's nice here.

I think... Love both players, obviously. But I think if you swapped in, pretty much any of the guys in the bubble tier, maybe with the exception of Mark Schifley into their teams, I think those teams vary by less than a win in the standings. Larkin, Horvatt, Zabanajad on Dallas or Carolina, I think do the exact same thing that Hintz.

I disagree with you. Okay. I think Hinson Aho both bring like a, and I know it sounds so corny, but the 200-foot game, like I think they bring more than just the point production. And I'm not saying that Dylan Larkin and Bo Horvatt and Mika Zabanajad aren't 200 foot players.

I mean, I think if you put, I think if you put Mika Zabanajad on the canes instead of Sebastian Aho, that top line is not as good. And I, but I do, you know what I think, though? And this is what makes Ajo a tier higher. You put Sebastian Aho on the Rangers and Aho's points go up. Like that's the thing. Like Sebastian Ajo has like given up some of the production that he could have to be

this like Rod Brindamore Carolina Hurricane system style number one center. So I think if you put Aho in a more like offensively driven team like the Rangers, I think Ajo is an even better player in terms of his stats. So I disagree. I don't think somebody like him is is interchangeable with Amika or a Bo Horbat. Don't you think you know that playing in Carolina and Dallas, they're great two way players. They are. But like those are the two most favorable environments for a forward to put up great two-way number. Almost everyone that goes to Carolina a year later has like an incredible expected goals share because they always do it.

It's who they are and it's what they do. And I think any center, any elite center that you pop into Carolina suddenly looks like an even better two-way player than they would in a different context. I guess that's like, we can never know this. It's a complete counterfactual. That's kind of, that's kind of right. Maybe this is just because I like did a big Elias. Linholm story and how he went from being like a good two-way guy to scoring 40 is like he became a two and

this is maybe me just drinking the Rod Brindamore Kool-Aid but like Elias Linholm became a good penalty killer and a good defensive setter because he learned those things from Rod Brindamore. Like I think you go into that system and become better because of the coach and because of the system. I don't think that necessarily like I don't think it's the same as saying like Keynes goalies have great stats because the canes are so good defensively in front of them because that we have seen guys go to Carolina and it doesn't work and they ended up getting traded or signing somewhere else because they don't buy into the system that they're supposed to be playing, right? Like I think there's a level of like it's on the player to like accept that role and accept

that that is the way that they are going to play if they're going to be successful. I don't know. I think I push back on that. I think it's a good debate though. Like I'd be curious to see. Did this come up, Sean? I'm like a caniac. honestly like not

not so much I think I think there wasn't a ton of pushback there I think oh I'm sorry Sean no I will say like Sean showed me a bit of the list and I do think I had said I was like I think Aho and Hince like need to be I think I was someone who was like because I think Sean at first told me like Aho and Hince might be in a different tier and I was like if they are I

wholly disagree and then he went back and looked like oh, no, no, they're where they're supposed to be. But Sean and I had a bit of a back and forth of, like, I think it's a mistake if you have those guys lower than here. I think Sabana Jad slides out of that discussion, like that group that you mentioned, Max. I think he's, you know, is he in decline? Like, I don't know if you want to say that,

but I think there's been enough of a dip over the last season and a half, let's say where you're like, he needs the beat. To me, to me, the interesting one's large. and honestly I don't on these um yeah I agree I think we're seeing right now how important he is to the

Detroit Red Wings um yes so maybe so maybe the proofs in the pudding there right but I it's clear that he needs more help and it's clear that that they're even though they go out and get to break it and I know that there's there was some good stuff happening with that forward group like they're

and they're an elite forward away at least from being at least at least one from from being legit i to me the interesting the interesting thing about lark and is like i think he could be like my my stance on him is that he could probably be a one c or he doesn't have to be a two c but you need to have like a what he could be like a one a a and you need like kind of a one b behind him does that make sense he can be your best he can be your best center but you need to have someone who's pretty close behind him and that's

where they run into problems with the Andrew Cops of the world and the, I almost said, Jesse Confer's of the world, the JT. Confer's of the world. When they bring those guys in who like, they serve a purpose and they fill a role, but they can't be your center depth chart with, for better or worse, with Dylan Larkin at the top of it, can't look like what there's, what theirs does. Well, that actually might be, I agree with you completely. That actually might be what besides this argument is that, Carolina doesn't really have a guy like that behind Aho and Dallas doesn't really have a guy like that behind him.

And those are two cup contenders. So it's very good. And think of Zabana Jed and when we're bringing back to that conversation, like the Rangers are a cup contender, but I think there was a very legitimate conversation or thought that Sean had, which was is Mika Zabana Jed, the number one seeks? It's Zabana Jed and he plays with Kreider or is it Trocheck because he plays with Panarin. like there were like interesting debates that came up throughout this it looks like of like who is the one C on this team is it the guy who you know plays with the superstar is the guy who plays the most minutes the guy who plays the toughest minutes and i think sabana jud and trochec as the kind of one a one B tandem or the top six centers in new york were one of those kind of interesting debates the other ones obviously

being in boston is pavillezaka really the one C or does you just play with pasta and even in Calgary too. I just have like a gut. And you know what? I pulled up Zabandajad while we were talking. You guys started talking about the decline and it is a little more stark than I think I gut field it. Like last year's advantage ad was 91 points and 16th in Selke voting.

And I think I just have a mental switch that goes, that's a top 10 to 12 center in the league period. Yeah. That's your profile. For sure. But it is down this year and not not insignificantly. So I may have to tap out on my own. argument here.

You're too nice. That's okay. As far as the Rangers guys are concerned, you know, I know Haley, you said this to some extent, but it is like Trocheque plays more and he plays with Panarin

and he produces more offensively, right? That's a lot of ticks in the Vince Trocheck is the Rangers 1C, you know, column, but Zabinajad starts games, which is important. Like what these, how these teams feel about their players is relevant here.

And he gets tougher minutes. So it's like, what do you value? Do you take, and he plays with Chris Kreider too, who's like, is he, or Timmy Panarin level?

No, but still pretty good, right? So, but yeah, the question turns into really, you know, how do these, how do these players own teams

and own coaching staffs feel about them? And I think that's, I think that's, relevant. Like, did I, was that the deciding factor in some, in some cases, yes, in some cases, no, but I think it's something that you need to consider. I think that if you pulled the league, I think you might actually get a hundred percent response saying that he's advantage as the one C there. Like, I didn't think that was, that was too controversial. That was of the, of the three that we talked about, if you group in Calgary in Boston in the, in the discussion there, like, like, who's the one C? I think the Rangers, the Rangers. the Rangers is the

it was the easiest call Boston's a fun one because Zaka gets Posternak which says a lot but also Charlie Coyle plays tougher minutes and doesn't have the doesn't get to slide over to the wing at times like Zaka does

and you know some tougher minutes too so I so I think it is kind of you know it when you see it sort of thing especially when you're talking about contending teams where it is kind of a relevant question. I think one of the tiers that I really appreciated was just the building on their reputation tier. Like, just the fact that you had a tier of guys who, I don't want to call them underrated, but maybe they're not as discussed as the other people who are higher than them, that being Erickson Eck, Robert Thomas, and Nick Suzuki, like,

just point blank those guys are just having like good seasons this year. And my only nitpins, would be like maybe that tier like those three should have just been like higher in the story like I think the these guys are playing really well tier could have just been placed like above the Stutzla Thompson and then the bubble tier because I don't think there is a question of like you know maybe that's unfair like I do think maybe there's a question of on a contender is erics and X your number one center is Nick Suzuki a one C on a contender like maybe people would have raise those questions, but like those aren't bubble guys to me. Those are just like really good centers having really good years this season. So maybe I should say my only nitpick would be like they

should have been placed higher than Stifflin page. No, it's a fair. That's a fair point to make. I think but also understanding this wasn't a one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight ranking. It was like tears. Right. And people and, you know, people are going to perceive it that way because that's just the way it is. But there's a reason that I didn't say like, tier one, tier two, tier six, tier, tier, tier 10. I was trying to get away from that. But at the same time, like, when you put the best players on top and the worst players at the bottom, like, people are going to draw their own conclusions with, you know, the order that you put that stuff there. Yeah, it's more like, look, I love the season. Robert Thomas is having huge bounce back from what happened last season. He's shooting the puck a lot more, which is great to see. I think Joel Ericksonac is a beast. Like, he's just an unestablished, you know, phenomenal all-around hockey players. player. In Nick Suzuki, the five-on-five play has jumped significantly. He works with Cole Cofield. He works with Slavkovsky. You know, he's another one. He's shooting the puck more after being a really good playmaker and also showing some defensive, you know, efficiency there that we hadn't seen from the

past. So I love the seasons that those guys are having. They just are where they are, you know, mainly because, you know, put them behind badard and used. It's just because the high-end kind of, kind of isn't there. That was sort of my logic, but I also didn't want to get caught up with, you know, here's one, here's two,

here's five, whatever. Okay, let's take a quick break when we come back. There's a few more little items that we need to raise with Sean from his one C tiers. We'll be right back.

Okay, Sean, I got another knit to pick here. There's a tier in here that has two of the best young centers in the NHL. two guys that we think are going to be kind of standard bears toward the top of this list for a lot of years to come. And neither of them is Tim Stutzler. And I kind of wanted to hear about how Tim Stutzler worked out of the Hughes Bedard tier.

I get that those other two are number one overall picks, but I think we're at a point where like Stutzler is going to be viewed as the best player in his draft class. And he already has like a 90 point season on his resume at his age. Like, what would he have had to do to get into that group? I just, I think, Badard and U.S. or have separated themselves from the pack when it comes to the next, the next wave of, of God.

Like, we're splitting hairs about really, really good players, right? Where you, we're using Bedard are McKinnon, Matthews, McDavid caliber talents. And Stutzla, for all his, for all his gifts, I think needs a show a little bit more there. I think the defensive, I mean, here's where he's getting into Mucky Waters,

because we are projecting on some level for the dart. And Jack has not been great this year. Like the point production has been fine, but there's been some backsliding there across the board. But, you know, he was a legit heart candidate last year. Stutzler, good as he was, you know, was not. And, you know,

he felt more of a type with Tate Thompson to me where it's like these guys, we love what they bring to the table, but there are some holes in the game there that at some point they're going to have to, you know, meaningfully, meaningfully address. I know I'm going to get killed by sense fans for this because like if there's,

if there's ever any implication that, like, coming into the season. We had them as a top 10 center, did we not? Or just like, we did the top 10. centers in the league and I think he was like 11th. Yeah. Right? It was like,

ooh, do we go with Stitzler, Breed and Point? Like, that's how highly we viewed him. But that he has not been a top 10 center this season. And that's okay. We can say that.

And he, on some level, I mean, like the goal tendings a catastrophe for them. But on some, but they've been really, really disappointing as a team. And I think he,

a few weeks ago had his first, a week or two ago had his first power play goal of the season. I think that's not I don't think I knew that I've Ian Mendez tweeted it I believe on March 9th that he scored his first playoff first power play goal of the season

like that's the kind of stuff that I does that make anybody less like Tim Stutz a less long term no it's just an indicator of the kind of season that he's had and it's in that kind of play I think is reflected in where in where he's place you know because because tage whatever

you want to talk about maybe that's unfair like tachshon's has been a major took a major backslide this year and maybe that's what's unfair is having stutzloid mixed in with him but you know you got to make tough choices if you want to come up with some kind of narrative you know thread to to carry through all this i guess this is kind of where like when you do tears it's not like the tears aren't always necessarily a pure order right like the groupings of them like because i i kind of look at what you just said. And I definitely hear the logic. And so, you know, the name of the tier here is a pivotal point upcoming. And at that pivot, Tim Stutzler and Tage Thompson, maybe, I don't know that Tage can get into the Jack and Badard tier. Stutzler can or both of them can get into the

Shifley tier. Because if they don't fix the holes in their games, you'll be Mark Shifley, right? Is that a fair way to put it? If Cage doesn't find some way to play offense and defense at the same time, like we're going to start regarding him differently. And if, and if Stutzel doesn't, doesn't make another step or two upwards into that, into that use, you know, badard kind of, kind of group in terms of forward,

forward projection. Like here's, here's, here's, here's the important distinction to make is that I, someone say to me that badard in, for badard and use, winning a heart,

winning a cup seems like a matter of when, not if. And I don't think you can say that about, Tim Stutzley. He's a wonderful player. Getting it to 90 points is, you know, an achievement unto itself, right? And he was in the neighborhood last year. But I think there's something that separates,

not just me, but I think people league wide from putting him in the, in the Jack Hughes class. Like, whether that's fair, whether it's unfair, like, I don't know. But something, something, he needs a level up to get there. And I think that's where he's going to find himself, next season. And like, that's what the, that's what the narrative is going to be. Well, Badard will be on the wing when he wins a cup

because Macklin Celebrini will be the one C. That's not, that's not funny. Is that, you think that's what it would, you think that's what happened? Celebrini wouldn't kick over to wing? No, Celebrini, I think would be the center and Bidar would be Patrick Kane. Excuse me, Celebrity. Celebrity won't be the wing, not wouldn't be the wing. We need to talk about this.

Right. Yeah. It is not in guaranteed terms, in all sense it is for sure going to happen. I think Celebrity would be the center. That's what I think he's a little more complete. It's unreal. Frightening. Corey's, Cori's rubbing off on you.

I don't like this one bit. I mean, like, I don't think it's not a knock of badar. I think you just liberate him. Oh, no, no, no, no,

Max Bolton hates Connor Bernard. No, I don't rest his brother. I think he'd be even more freakish on the wing because you don't burden him with like, go do the center stuff down.

Yeah. You don't have to be the F1 anymore. Yeah. Just go, just go cook. I think Mark Schifley's always, always an interesting conversation because based on the response for Jets fans, I thought that you had like majorly like made a mistake honestly. It's like, oh, has Mark Shifley actually been very good this

year? And Sean just like wronged the city of Winnipeg. And like, I get it. I know that Jets fans feel like nobody watches that team. And I do think Mark Shifley has been better this year. But he's still, he's last on the team and expected goals against. Like, it's not incorrect to say that his defensive numbers haven't been great. Maybe they are good comparatively speaking, but his expected goals against per 60 is worse than any other player on the Winnipeg Jets. And his expected goal percentage, despite the fact that he does, you know, do a lot offensively is like one of the last on the Jets. So I guess I'm like confused. I think people, it's understandable because like the Jets have been slagged in a lot of, in a lot of ways, you know, over the years. And I think.

the complaints about their team writ large. About it's just Hellebuck. Criticisms. That's not true for them as a team anymore. It's not. Yeah. I think the point with Shifley was just like Mark Shifley is a very effective center. And the tier he's in is just like you can, you even had a great quote in there that like you can,

if he was on a different team, like you can absolutely win with Mark Shifley. Like you weren't saying that. can't win with Shifley. It was just like on a contender, he's like a very good one B or two C. Kind of, it's maybe not irony,

but the funniest part of his season, and I guess to some degree their season, is that this is less Connor Hellebuck than it has been in the past. Totally. They're not a, they're not a Connor Hellebuck creation. This isn't a situation where everybody's expected goals,

you know, expected goals against or, you know, high and actual goals are low. That's not true. It is true for Mark Shrevely. Like he is a guy, he, more than any other jet this season,

is benefiting from the play of Connor Halebuck, right? Like they've... It's a safe percentage really high. Yeah. Yeah. So they've, the rest of the team has done a better job in some regards of reaching Hullabuck's level

than he has. So I don't know. I had someone say that, you know, he's the engine for that team. And, you know, he's the best. of the, he's the best forward of the deepest group of forwards in the league. And like, I don't really agree with any of that. Like, this is, like, Hellebuck is still the dude on that team. And I think there's several other, several other groups of forwards that would have some qualms

with saying that Winnipeg has, has the, has the deepest group. Well, this is what I was getting at with the, with my first or my, my, my thing about this whole tier. Like, you take that quote, I agree with this quote. On a deeper team, it changed the equation. It had changed the equation. eternity you can win this guy. I think you could copy and paste that quote into Larkin and Zabinichad and Orvat and I think it's true for all of them. Yeah, but that's why that's a good tier. That's why I was right. And I'm saying that deeper team is

Carolina and Dallas. And if you put, I get it. I know, I don't know. I get it. They're deeper. They're deeper. And those guys, those guys are a little bit better. It's, it's fine. I'm more like put Mark Shifley as the 2C in Carolina. And that's like an unbelievable 1A1B condo. combo, right? And I think that's how I, like, those guys are, you know, great tandem players.

Maybe Mark Shifley to a lesser extent. But at the same time, if Mark Shifley was the one C to take you to a cut, then... Look, man. The Jets forward group definitely looks great when Sean Monaghan is scoring at the rate that he has been. And Adam Lowry needs some tough minutes, even though he's offensively limited. And we love what Tyler Tafoli bring. and Nicolai Ehlers is, you know, yeah, totally. That's a, it's a, I'm not knocking the group over all. I've been tooting the Jets Horn all season, so nobody better yell at me. Don't know, don't know where this, where this measurement of them is some kind of, you know, supremely talented, uh, or supremely deep lineup comes from.

It doesn't, doesn't make it. Well, I do think that they have a deep lineup. My point was just that, like, I don't know where the, like, how dare you say that Sheifley has been not great defensively when like. And they have, you know what? He hasn't been great. If they have that, if they had that deep of a lineup, they'd be scoring more than 2.58 goals, you know,

per 60, five on five. That's 16th. That's 16th in the league. That's, this is a, it's a middling group of forwards with an over-extended guy at the top of the lineup. It's just the way it is.

And that doesn't mean they can't win anything because they've got the talent elsewhere to do it. They've got the goaltender to do it, but can't lie to ourselves here. That is not some kind of A1, you know, top tier group of forward talent. It's just not. I mean, I think, see, now I think this is like harsh on the Jets because like they're first in the central with a game in hand over forward groups that we've been like talking about

all season and we're like Dallas. We love their top nine. Colorado, I mean, they're not a particularly deep forward group, but they have like superstars at the top of the lineup and the Jets. Yes, because Connor Hellebuck is. a part of that team. That's always the frustrating part of the Jets conversation is when people are like mad about

the hellabuck thing. It's like he's part of the team too. Like it's it's okay that you have an elite goalie. It's okay that you have the best goal in the league. But like I think we need to give the Jets some credit. Like having a conversation about Shifley, having a conversation about Shifley not being like great

defensively doesn't mean that the Jets are like not actually deep and very good. They are first in the central. They're one point back of first in the West from the Canucks. If they were the deepest group of forwards in the league, they wouldn't be 15th in goals. But they're first in the central. Totally. I mean, I'm with you. But there's a, forwards can add more value than just scoring goals. There's a gap between saying that someone has the deepest group of forwards in the league and in being it, you don't need to have the

deepest group of forwards in the league to be first in your division. And I think the jets are ample proof of that. Florida's got the deep. deepest group of forwards in the league, right? Florida, Dallas. Yeah, Florida, Dallas, like, I don't think that the Jets have the 15th deepest group of forwards because they're 15th goals.

Yeah, I think that's what I mean. I'm just thinking like that got a little harsh. I don't think they are the deepest, but I also don't think they're like do-do. I don't think saying, I don't think they are either. And that's just like saying that Mark Shifley

is a bubble one seed isn't saying he's you do either. There's, we don't, we don't hate your guys. Are you from Winnipeg? Like, have you been hiding this from me?

Are you a Winni? Oh, Haley. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, you guys. I spent some time in with you,

Sean. Sorry, Max. No, I, I think, uh, we confuse sometimes when we talk about depth.

I think half of the time people want to measure it on how good are your third liners liners compared to another team third liners. Versus how good is like the aggregate. of your forward lineup. And the top of Winnipeg's lineup can't, in my opinion, be the deepest, they can't be the deepest forward lineup because the top of their lineup can't touch the top of Florida's and Florida's third line is really good, right?

Like it's, they don't lose the comparison on, you know, Cole Profetti on the fourth line. That's awesome. If you want to sit here and say that they have the best bottom six or the best third line, like I got all the time in the world for that conversation. but that's not the conversation that people want to have. Yeah, that's where I'm at.

That's a great way to put it. I think I understand Jets fans a lot now because I just got like deeply offended by you guys attacking Mark Shifley. Even though I was the one that said, even though I was the one that said I don't understand why fans are mad about the Mark Shifley thing. And then I was like, wait a second. Why are you being so mean to Mark? There's just something that's always going to be compelling about Mark Shifley because I feel like we've been having the same conversations about the same. guy for several years. But like, and no, but it's, I don't know, it's just, he's very, very good.

But everyone's got like, I don't know. It's not his fault either. Like, that's, that's kind of what I come back to in a lot of, in a lot of regards here. Like, when we talk about these guys as being like, man, can they be your best center, whatever? More often than not, that should be taken as an indictment of the team that's been built around them, right? And I certainly think that's true in Mark Shifley's case.

And it's true for Bill and Markham, too. anything else that you particularly hated Max about Sean's article? No, I thought it was really good. Other than like the overall. No, I love these kind of articles because of doing exactly what we're doing. This is what it's there for, man. Like people can disagree and people can be normal in that disagreement. I'm agreeing with them.

Yeah, that was my thought. The only other thing we could maybe squeeze in here is I just, you know, I love the young guys, right? So, like, you had the section on Mason McTavish and Maddie Baneers, and they're the, they're the maybe someday. I think Mason McTavish will not be the one C long term here. I don't think so either. He is right now. Carlson, right?

He is right now. What I want to know is, is Maddie Baneers. I would like to say yes. And because it's just who else is it? Like, I don't think Shane Wright's going to be better than him. But it has, has this you put any doubt into your mind that if you, when you read you read you this in three years? I know, because both.

both you guys like you like you tell me like look at the offensive numbers he's at 0.4 4 points a game you know a lot of his production last year they look mattie baneers is a is a really good player he's still a really young player he's still a pretty inexperienced player like there's a lot of meat left on the bone for him in terms of development and whatever else but i don't think you can look at his offensive numbers crashing out the way that they have. And again, a lot of this is fueled by not just his own shooting percentage, which was 16 last year, which is too high. Now it's dropped down to 8, which is too low.

His on-ice shooting percentage, as in the rest of his teammates, was way out of whack last year. Seattle was on an 80-game heater as a team, which is all well and good, but regression came from this year. But I don't think that explains, everything, right? Like, I don't think that, I don't think you can just write this off as being like, yeah, it's just one of those unlucky years. Like, there's some level of, I think there should be some level of maybe not concerned, but you start to wonder, like, is this dude going to be

that 85 point guy at the top of the lineup that you want to see from an actual contender? I just don't think that was ever who he was supposed to be. I think in the world where he's a one C, he's Nick Suzuki or Eric Seneck. is how I'm viewing it, right? I think that's the tier. Yeah, when he rebounds, that's where he'll be. Yeah, I'm with Max. I think you look at Maddie Paneers and like that total package that he brings.

Like I wrote a big story about Maddie last year, you know, just on like the great rookie season he was having and how basically like he was just the shoe in for the Calder all year, which he ended up winning. And I think a lot of the things that are defining traits of his style of play is, is like how smart he he is it's the hockey IQ thing it's like you know he's got good instincts in his own zone like i think mattie bnere's is supposed to be that like two-way one b2c type right like i think he is best to be behind an elite number one center or you know again it's it's we keep going back to tundams right and it's like no it's obvious why a lot of the teams that are like

the true stanley cup contenders have like two elite centers not just one the ones where we're like having arguments where Sean's getting text from AGMs being like, why didn't you include our guy? He's very good. Well, he's your 2C or he's your 1B, things like that. So I feel like Maddie Baneers projects to be like a very good top six player, not necessarily an elite number one center, which I think highlights an area of need for the Seattle Cracken moving forward, right? Yeah. Because Shane Wright's probably not going to be that guy either.

He's not, is he's, I don't even think he's got called up yet. and the crack in season's been kind of done for a while. Like there was, to me, there's no harm in calling up Shane Wright and getting him comfortable in the NHL, getting him reps, and then sending him back to Coachella for the playoffs. But, like, he's still cooking in the American League. And in the meantime, like, Maddie Baneers has 28 points in 62 games.

Like, it's tough. And, you know, what shit happens, though? Like, I'm never going to be someone who dumps on, like, a young player who's, you know, five minutes into their career. Everyone, yeah, I'm not. I'm not saying you're doing that, Sean. I'm making a point. Everyone who, like, just completely demolished 18-year-old Jack Hughes.

And now this guy's, like, you know, it's a when, not if he's going to win a heart in a Stanley Cup. So I always just pump the brakes on trashing young players. But I also don't think there's anything wrong with saying Maddie Ben-Jars is going to be a very good top six player versus an elite number one center. I think that's it. I think the only other one we didn't hit on was the, you had an interesting nugget on Sean Couturey of like, he would be lower in this if he wasn't only 30. Like you had a,

you know, you had a source who said like, don't give up on him yet. And then he got scratched. And you had a great conversation with Frankie Corrado on, on the Wednesday show with Sean with two Sean's, one Frank. What do you call that? Sean and.

Two Sean's and a Frank. Two Sean's and Frank. I thought that was a great conversation with Frankie. If people haven't listened to that, I recommend it. Don't listen to what I think about John Tortorella, listen to a guy who actually played for him. But yeah, the Catruriate timing was interesting. Yeah, because one person was like,

don't stick a fork on them, and then someone else was like stick a fork in them. And then a few days later, he gets scratched. It was very interesting. Like, whoops. Okay, well, that's mostly the list. We didn't get into the tier that I think a lot of people enjoyed,

which was just like somebody asked to take the opening face off. Although I did see some Cps fans who were like, Connor McMichael's not the one C. That's Dylan Strome. It's like, really? Are we doing this right now? It's fine. I've been wrong about the Capitals,

guaranteed playoff team in a month from here. I've been wrong about them all season long, so I'll just, I'll gladly continue being that. But no, man, Conor MacMichael, he plays with Alex Silveskin. play with Alex Ovesh and you're the one C. It's the way it goes.

How many times have we wishy-washyed on the Washington Capitals this year? Like, I'm at the point where I'm just not speaking about them ever again. I've been strong anti on them for the last six months. So whatever. I'm being wishy-washy on them for the first time. I was the one guy that picked him in the playoffs last week, by the way, in our staff. Wow. Is it you?

It was me. That's really funny. What was the one that I always feel bad? because we do like Sean, Shana and Jesse Granger and I will like audit and like write little comments about some of the results. And I kind of,

sometimes I feel bad because I'll just like randomly hammer our colleagues. And I think one of them was like, I would love to know who picked the blues to make the playoffs over like the Kings. Because everyone in the Western conference, everyone in the Western Conference had 100% of the vote,

except for the king. and they lost two votes, one to the blues and one to the wild. And I was like, I just really want to know who did that. I'll tell you how it really happened. Not Jeremy Rutherford was not him.

I can guarantee you that. J.R. is way too sweet to do that. The thing I always assume when I see that is it someone covered a game live where the Blues boat race the team they cover and just went, oh, these guys are really, I've been guilty.

No less than. 10 times in those ballots over my career. Someone has walked into LCA and put eight goals on the Red Vings. I'd go, oh, they're going to the third round. It was just that they played the Red Wings. Mac and do had a fun. I'm not going to retell up, but Mac and do had a funny story kind of like that as relates to the Selke

trophy that he told that he told today, if you guys haven't listened to that one yet. I'll have to go back and hear that. Yeah, I haven't listened. I'll tell you off air. I just said I listened to the Karato thing. And then said I haven't listened to the podcast. I don't know how to reconcile that information that I just shared.

Memory holds. It's fine. Okay, we're going to take a break and when we come back, we're going to do a little, another PWHL hot stove. Except I think Jeff called it an air friar, and I'm not sure why. I think I called it, though. Why? Anyways, we're going to be right back on the athletic hockey show.

All right, we're back. So I have to apologize to Jeff. actually Sean who called this the PWHL air fryer. And I guess it was because he just thought hot stove was like stupid. So welcome to the PWHL air fryer. It just doesn't roll off the tongue the same way. But I do have an air fryer. I love it.

It's so easy to make chicken. I don't have to wait for the stove to free heat. Are we sponsored by an air fryer? Yes, ninja brand air fryer. Yeah. Find folks at Ninja. For my brand new air fryer. They're truly our life-changing.

But this is time for the anyways. I don't know. I'm just like, you know, sometimes I like panic and just end up rambling. And then I can't get it back on the rails, which is the host job. The big news in the PWHL today. So on Wednesday, kind of early afternoon, I think they went on sale at 10 a.m. That's still the morning. Depends if you're a morning person. 10 a.m. tickets went on sale for the...

That's the morning for everybody. Is that the morning? This is really not a good segment for me so far. And this is supposed to be my bread and butter. So on Wednesday morning, tickets went on sale officially for the Toronto-Montreal game that's been moved to the Bell Center.

For context, that is the second largest capacity hockey rink in the world behind the arena in Russia, I believe Ska. Is that what it's called Max? So, I don't know what the arena is called.

It's their arena is the biggest one in the world. Bell Center is the largest capacity NHL building in the second largest in the world and it's sold out in about 30 minutes. Over 21,000 tickets sold for a PWHL game that's happening in April.

It's just unbelievable. And I think that's the big news. It's a rough day for people who think that nobody watches women's sports. And like, that's going to be the new record. That's going to be the new all-time record for attendance after it was just broken by Toronto at Scotia Bank Arena with like 19,000 fans in the building. I think it's just unbelievable. That's the news.

They're going to have to go outside to break it now. That's it. There's only one step left. At this point, do they go a month without breaking records of some kind? Like they did a U.S. record last weekend at L.C. I mean, they obviously had this Gosha Bank game. Now they'll have this game. Like, okay, it's year one.

Obviously, we expect a lot of records to fall, but it is impressive. I know. It's been funny. It's been funny. Like, so the Toronto team, and we're recording this on Wednesday night. So by the time it, this post, that Toronto's either going to have lost and ended their win streak or be on an 11 game win streak. But like, they're on a 10 game win streak right now.

And every time they win, it's just like, okay, this is now the longest one streak in league history. It's just going further and further on of trying to break stuff. But Max, you were at the game in Detroit. You watched your first PWHL game at Little Caesar's Arena. What was the vibe like? Did you have fun? I did. It was great, actually. Not actually. It was great. I'm so surprised. Yeah, no. I didn't know what to expect in a building that big was my kind of going in. 13,000. They packed the lower bowl. They packed the lower bowl. They Hacked a mezzanine. They had a lot of the upper bowl.

Closer to 14,000, right? Yeah, 13,000, 762, I think. Yeah. It was awesome. It was a kind of a happy crowd, which was really cool, right? Like, you could definitely feel the passion of the fan base there to have the league in town, tons of kids in hockey in their, like, you know, youth hockey jerseys. And Michigan's estate that has, like, kind of embarrassingly low women's hockey presence

above, like, the 19U level. Yeah. And I think that game twisted the knife on that a little bit of just like look at what you are missing out on. The thing that stood out to me the most, Haley, we talked about this in the run-up, it was such a more physical game than I expected as someone who was primarily watched international women's hockey in the past. And I know that that was an area of emphasis when they created the league was to have more

of that in league play than the double IHF lets you get away with. And holy smokes did the crowd go crazy. for it. There were some really big physical moments, one directly preceding a goal. The crowd was eating it up. I was eating it up. That was my absolute number one takeaway out of the game was that the physicality of this league is far beyond anything I've seen in women's talking before. Yeah. Didn't Emily Clark kind of deck someone and then go top shelf for like the game triangle or something? Absolutely. And Emily Clark particular, like she's a brick. I've seen her drop people before. She's a bully for sure. I think the thing that's really interesting,

Max that you brought up is like, yeah, a lot of people watch the international game and it's just like, come on, like let them hit or let them be more physical. The rulebook in the PWHL and the IHF rules are the exact same. Like that is like a common kind of, and not a misconception because not everyone's reading rule books, but that's been this like really interesting conversation point is everyone's like, oh, well, they must have changed the rules. There must be allowing more. I think that just speaks to the way that the IHF referees call the book. Like, that's the if you talk to women's hockey players and like they're comfortable with you, like the conversation will get to like how brutal refereeing can be at like world championships

or IHF competition because especially when Canada and US are playing against each other and things get fiery. A lot of stuff gets called. They end up on the power play all the time, PK. Or when Canada and US are playing like, you know, maybe a smaller team or a team that's not quite at that level, then Canada is just in the box like constantly because they're, you know, bigger and more physical. So I think there was like a real point for the PWHL was like getting referees that are going to call the book the way that it is written, which is that there is allowed to be body contact if you are going to play the puck. Like you are allowed to rub somebody out on the boards.

Like those things are allowed in the IHF. The refs just like don't call it. I do think we've gone a little bit too far. Like there's been some headshots and there's been some hits and like interference that haven't been called. Like, I do think the refs and the PWHL need to be more consistent because I think what's a hit and what's a penalty and what's not on a nightly basis can be a little bit different. But I agree. I think the physicality is awesome. And I know it's something that the players wanted.

Like, these players are strong. They're good at hockey. Like, they can hit and they can take it. And they wanted that reflected in the game more. Yeah, and it was. I mean, it was a one-one game, tight checking. I mean, that is kind of part of like this amazing atmosphere, right? is like it really helps that the product gave you this two one shootout game with a Hillary

night shootout winner like it's pretty hard to not have a good time at a game that's that like holds the tension the whole way like that right absolutely yeah Sean what do you think you went to the PWHL Pittsburgh game I went and I sat with three of my friends each of whom has a daughter between the end of like four and you know seven or eight And I didn't, I had a nice old Sunday. That was great. Because it was great, it was great. I was also like kind of paying attention to the game,

but I was more just like, I had a, had a beer or two and was, was BSing and laughing and laughing at the kids. Yeah, doing the Taylor Swift sing along. I was, that's what I was about to say. I was informed that that was like, that, that they did one of those at Detroit, too. Yes. It would know it was so good that the commissioner, Jane Hafford talked to intermission.

She mentioned it unprompted. And post game, I forget which coach it was, but one of the coaches went out of their way to mention. Like the players and the commissioner were like, it made an impact on them of like how. I didn't even realize that it was deliberate. Like I just assumed that,

you know, they played a Taylor Swift song just because that's what happens at arenas now. And everybody knew the words because everybody knows. all the words to every Taylor Swift song, it seems. So, no, it was, it was great. I'd have, I'd a very great, very great casual watch. It was, it was Toronto and Toronto and Montreal. And, I don't know, hopefully, hopefully we get a couple more of these teams down the, down, down the road.

I think there's no, I think, like, it's not reading into it too much to think that Pittsburgh and Detroit are, like, very high on the list in terms of potential expansion markets. I mean, the penguins have gone on the record with me and Rob specifically saying that they really want a team in Pittsburgh and they are actively taking steps to like check the boxes of things that need to happen to get a team in Pittsburgh. Max, you mentioned the void that exists for like women's hockey in the state of Michigan, despite the fact that there are like really good youth programs in the state, like honey baked and little Caesars. Like there are a lot of like young girls who play hockey in the state of Michigan, but they have to go somewhere else to go and play college. If they were. want to play D1 hockey, you can't play it at home, right? And there's been this like huge conversation happening the last year or so since people found out how much money the Michigan, you know, club level team has to pay just to get ice. And there's been this huge conversation of like, why the heck is there not a D1 hockey team in the entire state of Michigan? And I think a pro women's hockey team as evidenced by that game would work in Detroit for sure.

So I don't think people are, it's not crazy to think that those are high in the list. I just think the conversation is like, when will expansion actually be realistic? Because we saw in the WMBA, like rapid expansion turned into years of teams being sold, folded, and moved. So it's this balance of how do we go into the right markets, how do we expand so that players aren't retiring when they're 25? and how do we also make sure that this like business stays healthy? It's also just,

and it's cool to see like in when Detroit and Pittsburgh, I mean, it's worth saying that like, I don't want to compare it to the Bell Center selling out in a half hour or Scotiabank Arena, you know, doing the numbers that they did or anything like that. But these are like unaffiliated teams that are coming and playing in American cities.

Like people in Pittsburgh showed out to watch Montreal versus Toronto without having, like, whatever. There's not, there was, Hillary Knight wasn't there. You know, Kendall Coins Gofield wasn't there. Like, like, there's, these aren't players that, um, American sports fans are like intimately familiar with, right? And still showed out, still packed the lower bowl and all that, all that stuff. It was, it was fun to see.

The, say, I agree completely, Sean. I mean, in the Detroit game, Boston had three Michigan-born players and, and one of them actually ended up getting traded to Ottawa like two days later, Cheyenne Darcantzor. She was still on Boston for the game. And it was very noticeable. And I think the league took notice too. When you can get that kind of turnout for teams that aren't your local teams, that shows a serious, like, interest in the league and in the sport overall. My question, Haley, you mentioned the WMBA.

And I want to know how you feel that the PWHL being like league operated more so than like necessarily, individual, like, each franchise has a different owner. Does that give them an advantage when they do the expansion process in that way? Interesting. I think it gives, I think it, I don't know if I would call it an advantage. I think it's like a very unique situation. And if anyone listening is familiar with like major league soccer, it would be how MLS expansion works. Right. So like there's two ways that the PWHL could expand, which is sticking with their single entity ownership model, which means Mark Walter and Kimber Walter own all the teams. And then they just decide we're going to expand and we are going to spend the money to expand

ourselves. Now we've gone from 16 to 7 to 8 and they are still currently owned and operated by us. They could completely deviate from that model and then start selling new franchises and have different owners involved. Or they could kind of stick with, again, that single entity and do the MLS route, which is like, investor operators. So instead of like having the Pittsburgh penguins owning their own franchise, the Pittsburgh penguins would invest in the league and operate the team that's in Pittsburgh.

So like in MLS when like we see expansion in Major League Soccer, like these owners don't actually own the team. They just have, they just invested in the league and operate the team at the local level. So it's very different, whereas in the WMBA, when they expanded, or even when it started, NBA teams had to own and operate teams. Like there were individual owners everywhere, which kind of has, ends up having, like, a difference in investment and resources, et cetera. And I know the league has, like, been very steadfast in saying, like, we're not moving

away from the single entity ownership model. Like Stan Kasten would have been around for the beginning days of the WMBA when NBA teams had to own and operate, right? And he would have seen that like that didn't necessarily work for everybody as well as it should have. And they've been very consistent. Like we are not changing our single entity ownership model. So I do think that would be like, I'm very interested to see how expansion might look. If it's just the league saying like, yep, we're just going to expand and we don't need anyone else's money. They're going to like have an outside investors and operators or they're going to totally change course and like start selling.

franchises. It's going to be kind of interesting to see its very unique situation for women's pro sport. It is. I'm fascinated by that aspect of it. It's not, I didn't, admittedly, I don't follow MLS. I don't hardly anything about how they run their lead. There's super unique ownership structure.

Yeah. Yeah. Like, it's going to be interesting to see. Those were, that's the hot stove. I guess the first trade deadline passed. I did some trade grades. I think the, as Max mentioned, Chey and Archangelo,

got traded to Ottawa for Lexi Aegea. And that was kind of a shocking one. I think Ottawa fans were really upset because Lexi has really become a fan favorite in terms of her personality. Like she surprised a young girl for her birthday in Ottawa. You know, she was like a big game day fit person, big on TikTok, big on social. Fans really gravitated to her. So I think a lot of Ottawa fans are upset by the move.

But I think Ottawa also traded for Teresa Vanashova, who was like a really, good top six forward. And so I think what they did was they upgraded their forward group, I think, because Vanashova is an upgrade over AGEA. And then they thought, okay, instead of having like all these skilled forwards, let's get in a veteran who's won in Cheyander, Angelo, who was the captain of the Toronto six. She won an Isabel Cup in the PHF like a year ago.

It's like, let's bring in something a little bit different for the bottom six. I think when I look at that as a whole in terms of Ottawa's moves at the deadline, it makes a little bit more sense, but I also know that fans are really upset by it. And the other move is Montreal got Amanda Boulier from Ottawa on that Vanishova deal. It was not a not a trade deadline frenzy like we see in the NHL, but it was actually busier than I thought it was going to be. Like I was, I was prepared to just sit around and do nothing all day. And then like around two, three o'clock, it was like, oh, there's some trades in the hopper. They didn't come out to like six or Ottawa.

Yeah. Ottawa GM Mike Hirschfeld for that one. Thanks for giving me something to do. But the trades didn't come out officially until like 6 and 7 p.m. And I've just got to say like the league needs to streamline their central registry process because like you can't have trades being announced like three hours after the trade deadline passed. But it's year one. So they'll figure it out. Yeah.

I don't know that you need to have a splashy deadline in year one either. Right? Like it's let the teams kind of figure out who they are first too and their own mix. Like, you know, most of these teams have not played enough games to really feel like they know what their glaring hole is. Yeah, exactly. For sure. And like they're not allowed to trade draft picks in year one. They can't trade draft picks until the summer.

And look, I'm sure there would have been teams who would be like. And then it's interesting though, because you can't really, you can't really tank because like, yeah, maybe New York would just start selling on. to get as much as they can to get Sarah Filier, but then they will probably lose a bunch and then they won't win the first overall pick with the gold plan. So it's interesting. It's not going to be the same deadlines as the NHL has if teams actually want to win the lottery under those rules.

So that's been the PWHL air friar. It was kind of a busy week. I'm super excited. The reason we're recording on Wednesday night is because I'm flying to Boston and driving up to New Hampshire for my first Frozen Four. I've never gotten to actually go and cover the college tournament before.

And I think now that we're doing women's hockey full time here, like you have to go and cover college. So I'm really excited. I'm betting on a Wisconsin, Ohio State repeat final. As the Big Ten, Homer that you are. Yeah.

Big Ten, they're in the WCHA, you bum. Yeah. Everyone knows that that's the Big Ten. Can't be the Big Ten if Maryland's not in it, baby. that's what I always say. It's actually funny to talk to people who are just like Hoops fans

versus like women's. I was actually having a chat with one of our other editors and it was just like, oh, I'll reach out to somebody from the ECAC and he's like, what's that? And I'm like, what? What do you mean? He's like Big 10 ACC, like, what do you mean? I was like, oh my God, okay, never mind.

It's a, it's, it's, the ECAC and the WCA are important when it comes. to women's hockey, okay? Those are the big tens of the world. Okay. Okay. Well, I'm turning off the air fryer now. That's the end of the episode.

I have nothing else to say. Other than, leave us a five-star rating and review for you enjoy the show. Max, do you have a show on Friday? Not this week, next week. Okay, so I should just believe what our lovely producer Jeff writes in the script and just read it instead of being an ass.

The next athletic hockey show is coming up on Monday with Ian, Mark Lazarus, C.J. and Pierre. Thanks, everyone, for listening. We'll be back next week.