The Athletic Hockey Show - Who’s the best goalie left in the Stanley Cup playoffs?

Episode Date: May 18, 2026

The Vegas Golden Knights-Colorado Avalanche Western Conference Final matchup is set, but there is still one game left to play in the East, as the guys preview tonight’s Game 7 between the Montreal Canadiens and Buffalo Sabres. Plus, which goalie left in the playoffs is the most trustworthy in net, thoughts on Mitch Marner’s Conn Smythe case, and his potential goal of the year in Game 6 against the Anaheim Ducks, VGK forfeiting a second-round draft pick after “flagrant violations” of NHL media regulations, and who should fill the coaching vacancies for the Edmonton Oilers and Toronto Maple Leafs.Hosts: Max Bultman and Mark LazerusWith: Jesse GrangerExecutive Producer: Chris FlanneryProducer: Chris FlanneryWatch full episodes on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@theathletichockeyshowJoin our Discord Server: https://discord.gg/VTm9VjkFSubscribe to The Athletic: https://theathletic.com/hockeyshow Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Hockey Show. Hey, everybody, Max Bultman here, alongside Mark Lazarus and Jesse Granger for another episode of the Athletic Hockey Show. Fellas, we have a Game 7 tonight. Sabres, Canadiens. And if you're Martin St. Louis Las, you're just rolling out the same playbook from the Tampa Game 7. Get 10 shots, maybe nine.

See what happens. It's clearly the recipe for success, right? The less you do, the better it's going to turn out. This has been such a weird series, hasn't it? Like, it hasn't been, you know, you picture a game seven between two of these amazing fan bases and environments. Most of these games have been lousy games, right? They've been blowouts. There's been one real, really good game.

I think it was game four. I don't know. I can't make heads or tails of this series. Literally anything could happen tonight, including Montreal winning with nine shots on goal, and I wouldn't be surprised. Well, they started out last game, three goals on three shots on goal. So they're already kind of kicking around the, kicking around the old formula, Jesse. Right. The only consistent thing in this series, like Mark said, they've just been bouncing back and forth, is that I feel like Montreal has just bounced back after every loss.

Like when you go even back to the Tampa series, it seems like every time they play a terrible game. And because this is a youngish team that is kind of doing all this for the first time, you start, like, they get blown out in a game and you're like, okay, is this it? Like, is the carriage going to turn back into a pumpkin? But then they come back out and look amazing the next game pretty much every single time. So I expect Montreal to come out and play a good hockey game. Now, whether that results in a win, as we're just talking about, who knows, it's hockey. But I expect Montreal to look good in this game because it's just what they've done, the entire playoffs. You know, it's interesting because, you know, these are two pretty inexperienced teams, right?

Montreal has the bubble experience, but really hasn't been in a lot of games like this. And Buffalo, it's new to almost all these guys. And you expect the momentum to maybe play into youth more than it does. but we're getting the opposite here. You expect this kind of resilience from veteran teams that know game to game things change. You saw what Colorado did, you know, bouncing back to close out Minnesota after taking a bad loss in game three. You expect that from the championship tested teams. You don't expect it from these inexperienced younger teams.

It's been really impressive how good they've been at just kind of flushing the last game and moving on, really on both sides. It's just been ping ponging back and forth. Yeah. I do think that for Montreal, I mean, some of the stars are started to kind of wake up and Demadov's kind of thrown his name into the race. in this series. I do think at some point here, Montreal is going to need its top line to have a dominant, even strength game. I still don't think we've seen that from them. They've been picked up, and you talk about the young guys. They have been picked up by some of their veterans. Josh Anderson's had a really good playoffs. They're a young team overall. Even their, even their veterans

are fairly young. But they've been picked up by their depth. And I think in this game seven, this has got to be. And Caulfield's started to wake up. I think it's got to be the Caulfield Suzuki-Slavkowski show tonight. I'm concerned about Slavkovsky. Slavkovsky does not look like himself right now. He looks, you know, the player that we saw in the Olympics, the player that we've seen throughout most of the season,

he just, you know, Arpin speculated that maybe he's playing through some kind of an injury. That's a huge factor for Montau, because he's such a clutch player. He's at both of these teams, nobody is as big game proven as Yvaj Slavkovsky is. And if he's playing at a shell of, you know, a low percentage of what he usually is,

it's a huge loss. Noah Dobson's not scoring either. Like there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, not producing for the Sabres. So both team, both teams have room where they can get better. But I have serious concerns about Slavkowski and everything had a runs through him, that top line, that power play. He's such an important piece for them that a diminished Slavkovsky really, really plays

into Buffalo's hands. Yeah, I agree with all that. And, and I think Caulfield also is not like, he's finished some chances that Suzuki have, has put on a T for him where like most guys in the NHL are going to finish those chances. But Caulfield hasn't generated his own offense, much of it at all in this series. And I think the only player of those three on that top line that's actually going right now is Suzuki. I think Suzuki has been driving play. He's been holding on to pucks deep in the zone, finding those guys in open space. So to me, it's going to, he's going to be the starter, but then you just need Caulfield

and Slavkovsky to finish those chances at a higher efficiency than we've seen. Well, and he had like the monster game five. And I think you thought, okay, now it's full speed ahead. Here comes Suzuki. The offense is flowing. I certainly don't blame game six on Nick Suzuki. It was what it was for the entire Montreal team. But I think that, you know, he's there, like you said, he's their fire story.

He's got to be the guy, I think, in game seven. And obviously that applies just as much to both guys in net. And I think that's the interesting thing here is not Dobish's finest hour in game six. But the whole series has been Buffalo trying to figure out which of its goalies it can trust here. It seems like it's going to be Ukapakalukin and Jesse tonight. But, you know, how do you size up the goalie decision for the Sabers? Yeah, it's honestly a tough one. I feel like in most of these situations, I tend to just my personality is like I'm all in on one guy.

I usually have a pretty strong conviction of this is the dude who I would go with. And if you do, if you make the other decision, it's wrong. This time, I honestly don't know. I think Lyons body of work based on the entire season and the playoffs is better. Like, his stats are better. He's been better for longer stretches for this team. On the other side, I do think that Ukopekalukinin is like just when you're looking at raw talent ability. He is the more talented goalie.

I think his ceiling is higher. I think he can steal a game that you don't deserve to win. That's more likely to happen with UPL. It's tough. Lyon was rough in that game. Like everyone talks about Dobish because of all the goals that went in. Dobish got lit up in that game and he didn't make enough saves, no doubt. but it wasn't like he was letting softies in.

Like they were tough shots to save and they, Buffalo just created a ton of those and the bunch of them went in. I thought the softest goals in that game were on Alex Lyon. Like he, there was that rister that just beat him clean on the glove. I have no idea. Like Lion has a great glove. I have no idea how that happens.

So there are so many arguments both ways. I guess UPL is probably, if you made me choose, that's probably who I would just based off of Lion, not looking great in game six. But man, it's not an easy decision for the Sabers. I think it's a really easy.

decision. I don't think it's tough at all. I think Jesse, you got your goalie blinders on right now where you want to believe the best in everybody. Alex Lyon's been atrocious in this series. He's the worst goalie in the second round significantly by statistics. And again, like you say, when he's whiffing on the shots like that, there's no question that Lukinen is the guy for Game 7 tonight. And maybe Luchin gets pulled again and Lyon comes back in because that's just the way it goes. But there's no way you can trust Alex Lyon in Nett right now the way he's playing it. I don't think it's that complicated at all here. Has Lion been the worst goal in the playoffs for you or at least in the second round for you, Jesse?

The stats are not good in the second round, but his stats in the first round were phenomenal. Like he's still, I think, I think Lion is like third or fourth in the league in goal saved above expected for the entire postseason now. And that's while being dead last in the second round in goal save above expected. Right. So it's like, goal tending is so weird and the stats specifically are weird. Like if you look at the guys playing, it doesn't fluctuate that much, but the stats do fluctuate a lot.

And I, I always tend to fall back on bigger. sample size. Like I, that's just my default is bigger sample size. And Alex Lyon has been their best goalie all season long. And like, like he is the biggest reason, goaltending wise that they're in the playoffs. And he, he was great in the first round. I agree with Mark. He hasn't been good. And that is, that is why I would ultimately choose to go with UPL. But with goaltending, I, I like bigger sample. I will argue that to the death. You like when you have two goalies and one guy gets hot for a month, but the other guy's been great for five years. It's like, give me the guy who's been great for five years every time. And that's not exactly Alex Lyon. He's a hot and cold goalie. And I totally see why you're saying UPL. Like I said, I think that I would make that choice. But I do think that it's, it's tougher than that. I think this is a larger issue here in these playoffs. I was looking through stuff yesterday, just kind of catching up on things. And I don't

trust a single goalie that's left in these playoffs. Not a single one. Look at, okay, let's go to the West. You got Vegas. You got Carter Hart. He's playing great, but he's Carter Hart and Aden Hills's backup. You go to Colorado, you got two career backup journeymen that, yes, they won the Jennings trophy this year, but they had a great season. But McKenzie Blackwood and Scott Wedgwood have never proven to be this guy. They've never done this in the playoffs before. And they're still kind of waffling back and forth. They don't have a clear number one either.

Freddie Anderson has been spectacular through two rounds, but we see this year after year where he's the one who turns into a pumpkin in the conference final. And, you know, Jakob Dobish has been, you got pulled in game six. He's had a, you know, shaky start in game five. He's in the 880s, same percentage. And then you look at Buffalo and both these guys have struggled. This is, I've never seen, like, I know we're in this age where goalies are running backs and they're all interchangeable and it's the team in front of you and all that. I don't remember there ever being a postseason where we didn't have a single guy that you could point to and say that is a true Stanley Cup winning number one goal.

There's no Vasquezlowski. There's no Bobrovsky. There's no Cory Crawford. There's no Jonathan Quick. We have, year after year now, we have mediocre goalies winning Stanley Cups. Aidan Hill has done it. You know, we saw Jordan Bennington, Darcy Kemper, anti-Niemi. I know it's possible.

But there's not a single goal he left in these playoffs that I actually have a lot of faith in. It's been a bad year for goaltending overall. Like the numbers across the league are not good. The top guys, to me, it felt like had down years. And whether that's on those guys specifically or just the fact that the top guys are on god-awful teams, like Ilya Seroquen was awesome. But his team was so bad, it didn't matter. Igor Shostirken. His team was so bad it didn't matter. Connor Hellebuck. He missed a week, and his team was so bad during that week that, like, when he had knee surgery, that it, like,

literally tanked their entire season. So I think it's a combination of the really good goalies are on really bad teams right now. And they all just didn't have their best seasons. Like, it's a down year for Bobrovsky. Vasilevsky is struggled in the playoffs for several years in a row. He clearly wasn't his peak. He was good against Montreal, but not as good as he needed to be. it's a down year for goaltending. I think that absolutely you look at these final four, I totally agree with you that, well, I guess final five for at least one more day.

There aren't goalies that have carried teams to this point. They're mostly teams that have carried their goalies the other way around. So yeah, I agree. It's a down year for goaltending. And it's certainly, it adds some intrigue to this final four because you know one of these guys is going to be awesome. And they're going to be like a massive, like we can't just say, well, we can kind of stop talking about goaltending and that won't really have an impact moving forward.

Like it will have an impact. We all know it will. We just have no idea which one's going to do it because of the pedigrees we've got less. That's kind of what's making this fun because Colorado seems so far ahead of anybody in the West and Carolina seems so far ahead of anybody in the East. But you could see goaltending being their Achilles heel. Like as good as Blackwood and Wedge would have been,

they just have never done this before. They were career journeymen that you don't all of a sudden become a world-class goalie at age 33 or whatever it is. They've been great stories. They're great to watch, and they have played great. Undeniably have been great. They won the Jennings Trophy, but they have to prove it at a different level, and they haven't. So you could see almost any outcome, even though I look at Vegas, Colorado.

I'm like, well, that looks like a sweep to me by Colorado. But because of the gold tending, who the hell knows? You can't, it really, like you said, it adds a lot of intrigue to what could be otherwise lobsided looking series. All right, let's put a pin in the West talk for now. And let's just wrap up on Buffalo here, because I don't think we gave them too much, too much solo time in the first part of that segment here. The Sabre's fighting back.

It's obviously, it's an impressive punchback. I don't think any of us are shocked that this series is going to seven. Which Sabres players have you been most impressed by through this? Let's just, let's focus on this series for a second first, Las.

Well, I mean, Ross Miss Daline kind of taking things over. I mean, we've seen that from him before. We know how good he is. He's one of those guys where, you know, he's just on the periphery of that great best defenseman in the world

conversation. You've got your, your Quinn Hughes, McCar, he's kind of in that next discussion. Zach Werensky's in that top three, I would say. But Dahlin's been sniffing around that for a while, and he's such a pain in the ass, and he's such a schnerer, as my dad would say, he's in there, and he's just making a mess, and he's getting guys riled up and getting guys under his skin.

I love watching that guy play. And I think he's, this is his star turn. This post season, if you're getting, if you're making a star out of the Buffalo Sabres, you know, it's Rasmus Dahlin doing this on the biggest stage. for me, very similar in terms of he gets under guy's skin and he's elevating his status. Zach Benson, what a playoffs. And I feel like he's a guy who, like every playoffs, you get a guy who the like Buffalo fans know how awesome he's been. He's obviously got a lot of talent. He was a high draft pick. But I don't think just general, casual hockey fans knew Zach

Benson the way they do now when the playoffs started. And it's been awesome to watch. He gets compared to Brad Marshand every night. Obviously, he is a stirer of things. around the net. But he's also just, he is so sneaky and so intuitive with the puck. Like, I feel like he the puck bounces onto his stick in scramble situations and he always knows exactly what to do with it in that moment. He's, he's awesome to watch. He is a pain in the butt for everyone in front of that net. And I feel like this is the start of him being a household hockey name that every hockey fan knows. I remember in his draft year, you know, obviously five nine winger, it's always a debate of like, you know, where should this guy be taken?

And that was Jonathan Marcheseau's Kahn smite year. And I remember that that was like, okay, like here's kind of the example, right? Smaller winger who can really step up in the playoffs. And Marshan, you're right, Jesse has kind of, it's shifted from Marcheseau, which is like, yeah, you really love Jonathan Marcheau to Marshan. It's like everyone would want Brad Marshand on their team. And the way that that evolution kind of has happened for Benson, I think it's on full display in these playoffs. To me, he's been maybe the most indispensable forward for the saber.

Certainly Dahlene, their best player, Tage Thompson. and had a great playoffs, has had a great playoffs, obviously. But Benson, I agree. He's elevated himself, like, big into the moment here. And I think he's going to be a guy that we're talking about come playoff, playoff time for a lot of years to come. He's just got that in him. Jesse, what are you seeing out of Alex Tuck in this series?

You covered him in Vegas, and he was a big-time player in big-time moments. And he had a big first round, too. What are you seeing that he's not getting done in this series? Because he's a guy that, you know, theoretically, he should be a difference maker. He scores 30-something goals every year, and he's done this in the playoffs before, one of the few guys on that team that has.

Yeah, with Tuck, it feels like sometimes the puck is finding him in every moment, and then it feels like he goes through stretches where the puck just doesn't find him. And that was the case in Vegas. And obviously now he's playing in Buffalo. He's playing way more minutes than he was. In Vegas, he was always like a third-line guy, because the Golden Knights just happened to be stacked on that wing with Stone and Patcheretti. And it, like, however good Alex Tuck,

got. He was never, he was never able to break into those top six lines. So he played less minutes. And it felt like you would see games from tuck where it's like, oh my gosh, is this the best player on the team? Like, is this the most talented player on the team? He's so big. He comes flying through the neutral zone. He grabs a puck and he's behind you before you know it. He's got incredible hands to finish the plays in tight. But then he'd go a month where it was like, you forget Alex Tuck was even on the team. And it's like, and it's almost impossible to believe that that could happen with a player that big and talented. In Buffalo, that doesn't happen nearly as often. He's elevated his game. He gets to play more minutes. That obviously

leads to less of those lapses. But it kind of feels the same. Like I, I don't feel like Tuck has been bad with the puck on his stick. I just feel like he's not around the puck enough. The puck is not finding him lately. And that is something that has happened throughout his career for longer or shorter stretches. So I don't know what it is. I don't know the answer. Maybe he needs to reload better. Maybe he needs to give his defensemen better options when they're breaking out of the zone. That's how you get Pucks, you earn Pucks up the ice by giving your defensemen good options. Maybe that's the answer. But yeah, I just think he needs the puck on his stick more and he will make plays because

this dude's electric with the puck. Not ideal timing for him, is it, to go through a stretch like this going into his walk. The good news is he is still with a bullet, the top player in free agency. If that is burdening him at all, he can unburden himself with it. It's not, you know, yeah, you want to make a great final impression, but I think the Hayes in the barn on that one. Yeah, I don't think. the pressure to perform and show you could be that guy.

With this free agency class, he doesn't have to do that. He could play 12 minutes a night and just stand in a corner by himself and he would still be the best free agent available this time. You know what? There was a stat in Arpin and Matt Fairburn had a story today, kind of setting the stage for Game 7. And since 2000, this stat blew my mind. Since 2000, there's been eight times where a team playing a Game 7

has gone up against a team that's swept in the previous round. In other words, you know, whichever team wins tonight will get Carol which swept in the second round. And the game seven winner, the team that's been pushed, won seven of those eight series. Is Carolina still the heavy, heavy favorite? You know, we always have the rest versus rust debate. But that's a fascinating stat to me,

and I can kind of understand it. It's like when you have those eight-one matchups, those, you know, with a team that scratched and clawed its way into the playoffs, it's really like fighting and in that mindset versus a team that coasted into the playoffs. It kind of has that same vibe. That's fascinating. Seven of eight is a strong argument.

I was not expected. I mean, that caught me off guard. I was expecting you to say they won more than we expected, just by the way you set it up. But seven of eight is, I mean, I still think Carolina is the better team. I think they're going to pressure these teams in a way that they haven't been pressured. And I think that specifically the way Montreal and Buffalo play, where they are kind of loose, they throw a lot of hope passes through the neutral zone.

And those hope passes do not work against the Carolina hurricanes. And they get you in a hurt. Like, they make you pay immediately for them. I think stylistically wise, I still feel pretty confident Carolina is going to win. But that's 7 of 8 number. It has me rethinking it a little more than I was before it. We'll find out who they play Monday night, 7.30 p.m. on ESPN. Let's take a quick break right there.

We'll come back. We'll talk Vegas, Colorado. All right, we are back. And the Western Conference final is set. It's Vegas, Colorado. We got some off-fi stuff to talk about. I want to start with the actual hockey of it all. Jesse, what is, you know, Colorado, I think, is the,

favorite of this series. To me, they've been the favorite wire to wire. What is the key for Vegas to come through in this series, though? It's going to be how good their centers can play defensively and specifically through the neutral zone. I think that you look at how Colorado just thrashed Minnesota. And like, I could argue that the Minnesota Wild is the second best team in the league and they didn't look like they belonged on the same ice rink as the Colorado avalanche. So that just tells you how good Colorado is, but I will say that the one area, like Vegas is not as good as Minnesota, but the one area Vegas is significantly better than Minnesota is up the middle. And Jack Eichol is as good of a 200-foot center as there is in the NHL. He obviously has great talent with the puck and that speed and that

explosion, those first couple steps are what make him great without the puck. And then you look down the lineup, they got William Carlson back in the last round. And he's not quite at peak Carlson form, but he's still a great skater who defends and is defensively responsible and stays above players. Mitch Marner has been bouncing back and forth from wing to center, but he's a great defensive forward in the middle of the ice for this team. Tomash Hurtle, Brett Howden, Nick Dowd is a good fourth line shutdown checking center. This team has, they're overflowing with defensive forwards. And to me, against the Colorado Avalanche, they love scoring and transition and they love using that trailing player. Like they did it against Dallas. They did it against Minnesota.

SOTA, this team loves to use its speed to push the defense into its own goalie. And then that second wave, that trailing wave is who scores the goals. Like, NACA just swoops in behind McKinnon and scores the goal. I was talking to Vegas forwards the other day. And they said, staying above the player, staying above the player. If you can stay above that guy, then there isn't anyone to drop it to. And now suddenly you either have to dump the puck and try to forecheck it back or make a risky pass that can turn back the other way.

If Vegas's forwards can consistently be in those positions, they will make life infinitely more difficult on the avalanche. And I think that there is a chance that their counterstrike offense can work. It's going to take an A plus effort in every game for Vegas to win this series. But I do think that they are specifically built to give Colorado more problems than maybe their like overall talent level suggests. Yeah, this Western Conference final really does underscore why teams when they're drafting and assembling a team, they want all the centers they can get their hands on. And this draft is unusual with the wingers up top, but this is why centers are so valuable.

Colorado and Vegas have centers all over the ice, all over their wings. You know, you have guys, so, you know, Minnesota had Joel Ericksonek, and basically that's it. Ryan Hartman's not a number one center. Michael McCarrant is not a number two center. But with these other teams,

they can interchange so many different players that having that center depth and having it all over the ice is so important defensively, it's so important structurally and all that. Jesse, here's the thing I wanted to ask you. There were stretches of this season where Vegas was so bad that we were wondering if they were going to even make the playoffs.

What is different now? What has clicked for them now? What has, let's give John Tortorella some flowers here. What has he done to get this team to look like the Vegas that we all know from the last several years when there were significant stretches of this entire season where they just looked awful? Yeah, I mean, this team, I would argue this is the worst Vegas team they've ever had. Like even the year they missed the playoffs, that was just mostly like injuries just decimated that team. This year, most seasons, they probably don't make the playoffs. They were in a bad

division. They, and again, we may be overrating this team just based on the fact that they played Utah and Anaheim. That's two relatively easy opponents to get to this point. But they're still in the conference final. I will say the number one thing is just goaltending. They had bottom three safe percentage in the league all year. Aiden Hill struggled out of the gates, then got hurt. Akir Shmid fought to keep this team's head above the water. But he, I mean, he gave them. as much as he could give, but he is a backup goalie who was in the HL most of his career. And then Carter Hart came in and wasn't any good when he first got to Vegas, which isn't surprising after not playing hockey as long as he did.

But this team just got poor goaltending all year long. And I think that just that alone, Carter Hart has been playing relatively well in these playoffs. He's had a couple stinker games, but for the most part, he's been a strength for this team. So that alone just automatically changes things. And then I also think that the thing that Tortorella has done more than anything is, having them play on the front foot, not thinking so much. Bruce Cassidy is a brilliant coach, but he is very strategic X's and O's. This is exactly how we're going to do things.

And I think at times this team looked like they were thinking too much in games, not just playing on instinct and playing with aggression. Tortorella came in and said, look, if you're going to make mistakes, it better be aggressively. Like, you better make mistakes because you're too aggressive. Safe is death. Safe is death. That's the Tororellism, yeah. He loves that.

And I think that it has got them playing faster. they are playing more on instinct. And I think it's also unlocked. This team has really good offensive blue liners in Shea Theodore, Noah Hanofin, Rasmus Anderson. And I think that under Cassidy's more conservative system, those guys weren't, their talents weren't being utilized maybe to their max. Whereas Tortorella, having those guys jump into the play, not be afraid to give up a two on one the other way, has unlocked those players. And just getting more out of those three guys who are three key players on this team has sent ripple effect. to the forwards, I think.

What did you make of the Bedner comments that it's going to be a harder series than the Minnesota one? I think he has to say that. What's he going to say? Well, we got through the tough team. Now we get to beat up on whoever came out of that terrible division on the other side of the bracket. I mean, that might be the truth, but he can't exactly say that. Like I said, I think the center depth. I think that if you're Colorado and you're looking, why will this team give us problems?

It's that. It's the fact that Minnesota already didn't have great centers. Eric Seneck goes down. It was a massive, massive disadvantage for the wild in that series up the middle of the ice. And I think that specifically the way Colorado attacks you in transition, your centers have to be good. They've got to be slowing people down in the neutral zone. You don't have to have to have big hits. You just have to get in guys way.

Give them a little bump here and there, throw them off their route. Now all of a sudden these tick-tac toe passes that are happening in transition, the timing's off, the guys aren't there. you have players in passing lanes. And I expect Jack Eichel and Mitch Marner. They have been phenomenal. The Utah series, early in the series, Logan Cooley and Dylan Gunther, it looked like, oh, here we go. This is their breakout. By the end of that series, they were completely invisible because Marner and Eichel and Eichael and Eichael and Eichael erased them erased them. Same thing happened with Anaheim. Early in the series, Leo Carlson was the man. He was making all the plays. Cutter Gautier, here we go. This is their breakout. By the end of the series, Eichael and Marner had erased them from the series. And I don't think they're going to erase Nathan McKinnon. That's a much taller. but I think that they can at least give him some, there's going to be more resistance there than Colorado's faced over the first two rounds. Not only is it always a tall task to try to erase Nathan McKinnon. It feels like an especially tall task right now, Laz.

He scores every single game at this point. I mean, he's the best player in the world. I mean, no offense to Connor McDavid. Nathan McKinnon is the best all-around player in the world right now. He is such a beast. He is such a singular entity, the way he plays, the way he attacks. I mean, can you think of anything scarier in the world than being a defenseman and seeing Nathan McKinnon bearing down on you through the neutral zone.

He is so good and he is so angry all the time. He's like the Hulk. You know, like feeds him. His misery and his unhappiness on the ice make him stronger. And he's so motivated and he's so good. And, you know, he has won. He's done this before. And I'm not, I don't think there's a better player in the league right now, right, than Nathan McKinnon.

All right. Let's go to the off-ice stuff for Vegas, Jesse. And I know it's probably been a long. week there. For people who maybe are not as glued to their phones following the happenings of the league, do you want to just kind of give a synopsis of what happened after game six of the Golden Knights Ducks series? Sure, but we got to hurry because if we don't leave in 10 minutes, Tortorella's going to leave us. So what happened was, look, after the game, first, we were told that they're not going to open the locker room, which is not ideal, but also it was fine, because

the Honda Center is small. It is an old building that is not built the same way modern buildings are built. And we were in the locker room for the first two games down there. And it was tough. Like the equipment staff trying to get bags and equipment out of the locker room. It was chaos. So they were like, instead, let's do it in a side room. That's fine. They only brought one player out and he only spoke for less than two minutes. So that wasn't ideal. And then the players came to the podium and Mitch Marner said basically what I just said. He's like, all right, guys, hurry up with these questions because we have 10 minutes and Tororella's going to leave us with the bus. And we all laughed. And Marner's like, no, seriously, he will leave us. And Marner wasn't lying because Torderella did not show up. He was, he was not there for the post game press conference. And the NHL decided that that was worth a $100,000 fine. I have to think that his many fines in his past played into that decision. And then the more surprising thing was the NHL docked the Golden Knights a 2026 second round pick, which is a pretty harsh penalty for media relations, but as they said in the email or in the press release, it is, the team has been warned multiple times for violations of media relations. So that was part of the reason that that second

round pick was taken. Let's preface all this with the full acknowledgement from the three of us that nobody cares about the plight of the sports writer, right? Nobody feels bad for us. Everyone thinks we're a burden. We get it. Everybody hates the media. That's not the point here. This is not us like, you're not letting us do our job. This is part of their job. It is collectively bargained. It is part of their responsibility as professional athletes is to do media. And it's not a huge burden.

It's a couple of minutes, a couple of times a week. And this is not the first time Vegas has done this. There's been a lot of times where you get to the conference final or the Stanley Cup final and you really don't go in the room very often because they're too small. Boston's visiting room is so tiny. And, you know, the old Nassau Coliseum and a lot of these rooms, are really bad. Dallas is a bad room. Last year, Dallas Edmonton,

Dallas, yeah, Dallas Edmonton in the conference final, we didn't go into the locker room for Edmonton after games because it was too crowded with the Canadian contingency there. So they brought guys out. Anyone we requested they brought out and we did big scrums. It wasn't ideal, but it was kind of agreed

to and nobody put up a fight about it. The fact that Vegas did this without really asking, from what I understand, and that they have a history of this. You know, Vegas' adversarial relationship with media, not just local, but national, with rights holders. This is not a, this is, it's an open secret in the NHL how they treat people. And this is what happens. This is a multiple, like, this is not, if, you know, if Colorado did this tomorrow, they would not be docked to second round pick and find $100,000.

They'd be chided and slapped on the wrist. But Vegas, as the release very clearly said, has a history of this. And, you know, you violate the rules, you violate the rules. If you sleep in and you miss a morning skate, you get scratched that night. There are consequences for your actions. And John Tortoella made a decision and there are consequences for it. Vegas has the opportunity if they want to to appeal this. And I think if they do, they're going to get their pickback, is my guess.

I think we all think that, yeah. Yeah, I would be surprised if the NHL actually keeps that. But this to me screams like, just so everybody knows, Vegas and otherwise, like, we care about this. You're not, you know, you're not going to get away with it. And this is what the range of the puns. is going to be. So think long and hard about it. My guess is they get their pickback, but the message still kind of gets received knowing this is what it's going to cost you. Yeah, look, I'm as critical of Gary Bettman as anybody in a lot of different respects.

But he has always been steadfast about this stuff. Remember during COVID, when we were out of the locker rooms for a year and a half and doing things over Zoom, he was the only major commissioner of all the major sports that said, our reporters will be back in the locker room as soon as we can. We want them in there. It's important that they're in there. And, you know, it matters to the league. Look at the ratings of the of the playoffs this year on ESPN and TNT. They're massive by NHL standards. We're seeing the bump from the Olympics and people are into this are into these years. There's interesting teams. There's new blood. There's star players. Things are going really well. And the media is not the reason why that's happening, but it's part of the ecosystem.

It's part of getting these guys out there. And if you're not willing to put yourself on camera, when everything is going great, the league is going to be mad about it. And Gary Bettman has been steadfast in his idea that an active and healthy media grows the game. And it does. You have teams in the NHL. I won't name names, but there are some small market teams that have like no beat coverage at all, right? Nobody travels with the team all year. And I've talked to PR guys on those staffs who have said they will call the local radio station and tell them bad things that are happening to their local team just in an effort to get them to be talked about. Like these teams need to be talked about. So when you're actively going against that, this is what happens.

happens. Well, and, you know, to your point, like, especially when good things are happening, right? This is a series win. This is you're on the way to the conference final, right? Everything should be about Mitch Marner and the playoffs that Mitch Marner's the goal that. The goal that I don't know that I've ever seen a playoff goal like that. That's like, that's the kind of goal that I would see a junior hockey player score and I would go, yeah, but he's never going to be able to score that in the NHL, let alone in the playoffs. It was ridiculous. And that's what all the focus should have been. on and instead it's on something like this. But either way, like, I think that the point for the NHL is, in order for moments like those to go as viral as they should, to be as widespread, NHL has a great opportunity right now. I'll have to NBA playoffs or on Amazon.

Like, you can't even find them channel flipping. This is the NHL's opportunity here to grab some market share back at this time of year. And one of the ways to do that is to have cameras on players talking about moments like that. And Marner right now really should be, he might be the story. of the playoffs, Jesse.

Yeah. Well, I just want to say real quick, like, if you don't think that having these guys talking to Bisonet and Gretzky and Lundquist after the games matters, then you're not paying attention. That stuff absolutely matters.

Those are the interviews that go viral. Those are the things that happen. And sometimes it happens in a scrum in the locker room. And sometimes it's a one-on-one and someone writes a really great feature that tells you something new about a player. Like, this stuff does matter to the league.

It might not matter. You might think as a fan that it doesn't matter to you, that you just want the little tiny mic stuff that their team's Twitter accounts are doing. and that's fine. That's your right.

But the league thinks this is important. And you work for the league. Like, to your point, early on the show, Jesse said Montreal keeps bouncing back. And I was very tempted to cut him off and say bouncing forward because Martin St. Louis at a podium said that. And then I was thinking about how Martin San Luis earlier these playoffs talked about how he watches Seinfeld. And I was thinking about that's kind of like a Costanza-esque thing. Like, no, no, no, no, Jerry. I don't bounce back.

I bounce forward. Right. But these are all things that I learned from Mark. I wasn't at any of these. Like I'd learn these from Martin San Luis press conference moments. Like stuff like that, it ends up adding to the character, the characters that were falling. Think of all the Paul Maurice pressers we've had over the last couple of years that have just been, you know, all penetrating and insightful and interesting and also hilarious. This stuff matters.

Yeah. It's not about the one press conference because John Tortorella was going to go in there and not answer our questions anyways because that's what he does. We were, like, I was, my story was changed almost nothing by that press conference not happening. Like Mitch Marner did say he got our swagger back, and maybe I could have asked him to explain a little bit of that. But the quote wouldn't have been any good anyway because he's John Tortorella. And he just doesn't value giving those answers. So that singular interview is not what it's about. Like you guys said, it is about the big picture of you can't let this erode because part of what makes sports great is the narrative.

It's a soap opera for all of us, right? Like it's just our different version of a soap opera. and if you don't know the player's personalities and the coach's personalities, then the hockey isn't as much fun. It's just a rec league. It's not the dramatic soap opera that we all love so much. I know the NHL has that commercial where it's like, no, but it is a soap opera.

That's what we love about sports is the story and the narrative that goes around it, and you do miss some of that without it. And to Max's point, the Marner narrative, what a narrative that has been. We don't, like, that's like, if we don't have players, talking to media and media writing stories about players, then like Golden Knights fans have been all over me lately for after everything that happened. They think I took a second round pick from the Golden Knights. That clearly didn't happen. But the thing is, every goal Mitch Marner scores as a Golden Knights fan, you enjoy it more than you otherwise would because of the narrative

that followed him out of Toronto. If Rich Marner was just some guy who came up through your system and was scoring goals and like he was a waiver claim that was scoring these, goals, then they don't have the same meaning as they do when you can look to Toronto and see, it was you. It was your fault. Look at this guy. We finally got him away from that. And he's, he's the, he's the playoff performer. Like Mitch Marner wasn't an elite playmaker all season for the Golden Knights. He had points. He's still a good player, but he was not electric carrying this team. And now the playoffs get here. And again, it's, it is important to note that it was Utah and Anaheim that he did it against. But this is playoff hockey where everyone's checking hard. The time and

space has gone away. Mitch Marner isn't just making plays. He's making between the legs goals with Jackson Lacombe on his back and Lukash Dostal trying to lock him off in front. It was an amazing play. It is a small anecdote for what Mitch Marner has been for this team in the entire playoffs, which is their best player by a long shot. And it's, again, it's one of those narratives that makes sports so great. and Mitch Marner on his way to, if Vegas wins the Stanley Cup, he's going to win the Consmithe. And that's a pretty amazing thing to happen

after what has gone on in Toronto for nine years. I've seen how he's talked about it. He's not going to victory lap, and I told you so and all this stuff. But I still think like the moments of Marner talking after games like that, like that, it just after everything he had to endure, after however many countless, you know, late series games

where it was all spotlight on him. I want him in the positive spot. spotlight right now. He's absolutely earned it. He might not be the one looking to like maximize it, but that's what I want? I'll ask you this, Jesse. What do you think the difference is? Is it being in a new environment? Is it lessons learned? Is it, you know, Laz certainly feels, and last show, Laz felt like this is, the narrative to begin with was just bullshit. Like, what do you think of the turnaround here for Arnor? I think it's a little bit that the narrative was not entirely accurate. I think he was playing good for Toronto. He did have some games where he didn't show up. I also think confidence is a hell of a

thing for players. And early in the playoffs, he was not scoring goals. Like, I think it took him till game five of the Utah series before he got his first goal. And then he has this monster game where he scores two goals and he is the reason they win the game. And all of a sudden, now he's shooting. And like, I remember talking to him after that game. And he's like, I asked him like, what can you learn from this? And he said, to trust your shot and to trust that you can score in situations. Like, he's like, there was a time I was on the ice with the puck in the exact same spot earlier in the series. And I didn't shoot it.

I passed it up. And tonight, I shot it and I beat the goalie. And it was a huge moment in the game. And so that's what I'll take from that is to trust myself in those moments. And then you do it the next game and you score a hat trick. And then it's like all of a sudden, you just feel like I can, like, I'm just going to score now. I'm not, I'm not looking to defer.

I'm not looking to pass to playmate. I'm just going to start shooting the puck. The puck starts going in. It's a snowball effect, and he's, he's been awesome. And I think it's allowing that you start playing a little looser, you start feeling yourself a little more. And now you're willing to wall a guy off and go between the legs on a breakaway when maybe he doesn't even attempt that shot a year ago in the playoffs for the Maple Leafs, because he doesn't have that same feeling that he does now.

I think it's just playing for the Maple Leafs is just awful. I think it's just, I think the vibes are just always really bad. And I think it affects these guys. They're you. Because they talk to the media too much. That must be it. This is what's the our fault. I mean, Mitch Marger is just a world-class player.

He was number one on my Selky ballot this year, and he's a hundred-point guy, and he's always on my Selky ballot. He's a terrific hockey player who has been pretty good in the playoffs. He hasn't been great, but he's been on a team that has had this just endless issue in the postseason. It's a cumulative thing. It's a team thing. It's not a Mitch Marter thing.

And now he's on a team that's won before. He's surrounded by guys that are confident and know how to do this, and the vibes are just better. And I think that it does, I think just the, I really do think the environment you're in, the atmosphere you're in, the team you're on really does make a difference with a lot of these guys. Some guys will just be like, if you put Nathan McKinnon on, you know, the Vancouver Canucks tomorrow, he's going to be really good no matter what because he's Nathan McKinnon. Not everybody can be Nathan McKinnon. I do think that some players are affected by the overall vibe around a team, the pressure, the atmosphere. You know, that's, you know, you can laugh that off. You can say that makes him soft or whatever you want to do. That's human. These guys are human. And I think it's easier to play in Vegas than it is to play in Toronto. There's no question about it. All right. Anyone want to be brave and pick the Golden Knights to win this series?

Dude, I'll pick it a sweep. It's Colorado and a sweep. And then I didn't ask you for your game seven picks. What do you guys got tonight? I think Buffalo is going to win it at home. I got Buffalo too. I have Buffalo coming out of the east. That's my upset.

I took Montreal coming into this series. I'm going to stick with it, but I do not feel great about it. I think that place is going to be a madhouse tonight, and I think the way that game six went. I mean, we'll see, Laz. You love your momentum question on does it carry over? We're going to see tonight. Well, I mean, the thing is,

is Buffalo's been bad in front of those awesome credit. They've been great in Montreal. You know, I love the story that I think Matt Fairburn was saying, like the local fans should be chanting, oh, lay, oh, lay, in Buffalo just to give their team the road vibe. That's right. All right, let's say quick break right there. We'll come back, wrap this up.

All right, we're back. And before we wrap up today, I just want to talk about a couple of the high profile coach openings on the market right now. Jesse Edmonton, I think, is the most interesting. This is the team that stakes are as high as they can possibly be. They have to win probably next year. And a guy who you're pretty familiar with, I think, has kind of been connected to them. I don't know. Have they been granted permission to speak with Bruce Cassidy at this time?

I'm not sure. If they're able to interview him ever at any point in the future, they will almost certainly hire him. I would be stunned if Bruce Cassidy's not the coach of the Oilers next year just because of the fact that there's interest for them. I can't imagine Bruce Cassidy isn't interested in coaching the Oilers. He has made it very clear since the moment he was let go in Vegas that he is not, he doesn't want to spend a year in the media as good as he has done on TNT. He's brilliant on there. I mean, he's a natural. He doesn't want that.

He wants to be coaching a team and he wants to be coaching. He has said, like, my priority is winning. and I don't see a better situation out there for a coach to come in and try to win right away than Connor McDavid and Leon Drysidl barely a year removed from two back-to-back cup finals trips. And Cassidy has a history of being brilliant right off the bat. He came to Vegas. They won the Stanley Cup in the first year. He came in.

He installed his defensive systems. He took a team that was pretty close. They were trying to get over the hump. Over the hump in his first season. That's exactly what Edmonton's looking for. I think that from a just he's the best coach available. They're the best team available. That's a perfect match.

And stylistically, I think if he can get this Oilers team to play a little more buttoned up defensively and now you don't need five goals a night, you only need three. Well, Connor and Leon are going to get you three every night. So I think it's a, it's a perfect match from just about every standpoint. I don't have any inside information that they've spoken to him or that they've interviewed him. But like I said, I think just from reading between the lines, I'd be stunned if Cassidy's not in Edmonton. And it just makes sense, right?

I mean, typically when you see a coach get fired, the team kind of swings in the other direction, right? So Chris Knoblock was a very calm, composed, you know, chill kind of guy. So you bring in a more fiery coach like Cassie. Or if it's not Cassidy, you know, a Craig Barubei would come in. Meanwhile, you look at Toronto and they just had Barubei, you think that maybe a Knoblock would come in and maybe be that more chill guy who's been done a good job managing superstar players.

You know, he can come in and help out Matthews and Nielander. You tend to see that kind of pendulum swing. So it just makes sense for a harder ass. Is that even a word? I don't even know if that's a word. But that kind of a coach, more of a hard-ass coach to come in to Edmonton and try to whip things into shape

in this very narrow window they have with Connor McDavid. I'm good with harder ass. I like that. You mentioned Toronto. I mean, that's a very different task here. I mean, I'm sure with Matthews, like there is still pressure to win fairly quickly and certainly the way that everyone's talking

that seems like an important thing in Toronto. I also look at the situation. And anytime you have the first overall pick and a bottom five record in the league. You've got to be a little realistic. There could be, you know, a proper rebuild on the horizon, although not having their next two first-round draft picks certainly hurts that. That to me makes the Toronto job a doozy. I mean, it's an original six market. There's only 32 of them. I don't think anyone's turning down the Toronto job because, oh, it's too bad of a situation. But I don't think it makes it as appetizing as it might have been

two years ago, for example. I think it depends on how much you believe that Austin Matthews can become Austin Matthews again, right? Like, has he hit his decline earlier than we expected? Or is this a couple of year blip when he can get back to being a 60-goal guy? Because Toronto, especially after winning the draft lottery, they're thinking retool now. Like they might have been thinking rebuild long term had it not gone that way. But you win that draft lottery, you get a guy like Gavin McKenna in there right away. And you start thinking maybe we could do what Boston and Pittsburgh have done and kind of get right back into the mix.

So if you're a coach and you believe in Austin Matthews, there's still a ton of talent on that team. there's money to spend. It's a place people want to go to, despite all the pressures that come with it. That's an appealing job. Anyone wants to be the guy to bring glory to Toronto. You will be bronzed forever on Youngstreet if you can bring Toronto a championship.

And everybody wants that challenge. So if you think Austin Matthews can become what he used to be again, that job is still very appealing. Who's the right kind of fit? I mean, you mentioned, I mean, last mentioned, knoblock. Do you see something like that? Do you look at a guy who's maybe worked with young players a lot more, Jesse?

It's such a good question. Like, I don't know the answer to that. That's a tough decision for Toronto to make in terms of do you go with the veteran guy, like the Cassidy who could, are they trying to get Bruce Cassidy? They still might be. I don't know if he would want, if he would pick Toronto over Edmonton,

I'd be surprised by that. But do you want the guy who can come in and maximize this year with Austin Matthews? and like force him to stay, right? Like, just like the Oilers are trying to make sure Connor McDavid doesn't leave. The Leafs are also trying to win now and prevent Austin Matthews from hitting free agency or asking for a trade. If, like, if you're the guy who goes in to do that, if you're the win now coach, you're the veteran coach who's used to getting the most out of guys. You're not maybe the young developmental guy. It's going to be a pretty short, like short life.

Like your leash is not long. You either win right away and turn this team around or you're going to be. be fired quickly and they're going to start the rebuild and Matthews leaves and it's all built around Gavin McKenna and at that point you want the young developmental coach who you feel like can be your coach for the next decade or whatever. I, if you're going to be that guy who comes in and wins right away, it is a, you're not going to have a lot of time to prove that you're the guy. I think it's going to be very quick and then you're just going to be a blip on the radar and it's going to be the next guy coming in to be the developmental guy.

I think Jay Woodcroft has done a lot to kind of like reburnish his reputation. in Anaheim. He's a guy who's got, he's been a developmental coach, he's been in the HL, and he has worked in an environment where star players in the NHL have thrived under him

with his offensive mind. I think he could be an appealing choice for Toronto. He's going to get a second job. Everybody always gets a second chance. Everybody gets a second chance in the NHL. And Woodcroft is an interesting guy. I've always been kind of on the fence about him.

I don't know if I like him as a coach or not, but he has the kind of track record that might play well in Toronto with what they're trying to do, balance that kind of development with letting your veterans thrive. A lot of intrigue to unfold as the offseason progresses there. For now, that's going to do it for us. Thanks for listening to this episode of The Athletic Hockey Show,

Gentile, McEndo, and Frank Corrado. Have the next episode for you on Wednesday. We'll talk to you soon.