The Hockey PDOcast - Breaking Down What We Saw From Oilers vs. Blue Jackets, Panthers vs. Capitals, and Other Thursday Night Games

Episode Date: November 14, 2025

Dimitri Filipovic is joined by Harman Dayal to break down what they saw on Thursday night while watching Oilers vs. Blue Jackets, Panthers vs. Capitals, Kraken vs. Jets, and Avalanche vs. Sabres. If you'd like to gain access to the two extra shows we're doing each week this season, you can subscribe to our Patreon page here: www.patreon.com/thehockeypdocast/membership If you'd like to participate in the conversation and join the community we're building over on Discord, you can do so by signing up for the Hockey PDOcast's server here: https://discord.gg/a2QGRpJc84 The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Media Inc. or any affiliate.

Regressing to the mean since 2015, it's the Hockey P-D-O-Cast with your host, Dmitri Filippovich. Welcome to the Hockey-Pedocast. My name is Dmitra Filippovich. Enjoying me, as he always does on Fridays, my good buddy, Harmon Dyle, what's going on, man? Nothing much. Just excited to break down some more NHL games. from last night. It's a Friday, so we're going to pick a couple games from the Thursday night slate, break down everything we saw while watching them, try to mix it up, covering some teams that we haven't done so in previous Fridays. Let's start with this Blue Jackets Oilers game, which was a very wild contest. It finishes with a 5-4 score of the jackets, white-knuckled it

at the end and held on. It was such a chaotic game, especially that second period. I think the two teams, I stopped counting at some point just because the total got so high, but if you told me they combined for 10 posts between the two of them in the game. I'd believe you. I think Columbus hit four alone in the first. The puck was bouncing all over the place. We had Matthew Olivier stripping Connor McDavid cleanly leading to a goal, which you won't often see. The Oilers tie it with two goals in 140 of game time in the second, and then Columbus comes right back down in answers within 30 seconds. Let's start with the Oilers perspective here, because they're now eight, seven, and four in the season. They're in the midst of this brutal chunk of the schedule

where they're playing eight of their nine games in the road. They still got some contests against the canes, caps, lightning and panthers coming up here away from home. I think the encouraging development here, beyond obviously the top guys doing their thing and we're going to break that down more further, was Matt Savoy joining that mix. He got an extended look here playing on the top line with McDavid and Drysaitle. They played 740 at 515 together in this game combined for three goals, a 65% expected goal share. And he was doing a lot of the connective stuff that I think those two guys need in particular from their third running mate,

something Hyman does so well. Let's get into kind of what we saw from him here, because obviously the past couple of games, he's got a better promotion in terms of Ice Time, playing more with McDavid, but it felt like this was sort of the pinnacle of that, and he really came through for them in this one. Yeah, I think before this game,

the production wasn't necessarily there, but you could see that Savoy was starting to round into form and doing a lot of positive things. And I think last night you saw it really all come together. I thought when Noblock, went to loading McDavid and Drysettle up and having Savoy on that line Savoy as the third component on that line

was able to take some of the puck transportation load off of McDavid where sometimes when McDavid's on that line he's the only option as far as carrying puck's up the ice whereas now with Savoy he it's not just a pace that he plays at

but you can see with some of his routes through the way that he slaloms through that he's crafty he's creative and he's going to get more time and space because of all the attention that opposing teams are going to have on McDavid Drysettle and he showed last night that he can capitalize on some of that, not just through transition, but taking advantage of in-zone situations as well. He had the typical, obviously, when Bouchard had an open lane, which, by the way, I was shocked Bouchard had that much time and space to live.

let a shot go. Those are some pretty horrible defending on the part of Iger Shinikov. But for Savoy, that's the key, too, is the McDavid line, as much as we talk about them and know how fast he is off the rush, they're going to attack in multiple different ways. And I think last night against Columbus, they were terrorizing opponents in zone, especially off the offensive zone draws. So I like that Savoy was A, able to help the Oilers get set up in the attacking zone with some of his controlled entries.

but then B, it wasn't just I've created the controlled entries and now I don't know how to do some of the other supporting stuff when we are set up to continue to make sure our line hums he was able to contribute in both facets and that trio was

damn near unstoppable in the last 40 minutes of the game. I think Chino Cobb was still traumatized as PTSD from when they were here in Vancouver and he got left on an island high in the zone against Quinn Hughes and he was just shaking him and dropping them and giving him all sorts of fits and so he was like, you know what,

I'm not committed to that again. step into this shot if you want to and that was the result of it yeah and savoy i mean leading up to the mac david goal that i think made it three three he makes a really nice play in the neutral zone kind of illustrating what you're talking about there i thought the work rate around the net as well he got the tip but even in the third period there was that sequence where he's just constantly moving and eventually matthew olivier is like all right enough and he just kind of shoves him from behind and he draws a penalty and so he's providing very valuable reps here like on the year you know he him and Henrique have essentially been their top two

PK guys. He's been on the ice for just two goals against in those 27 minutes. We'll say Hyman is set to return here soon and they really miss him. And so I think that's going to shake this stuff up as well. But it's nice to see him get that bump up and ice time. I mean, that top line and part of it was they're pushing late for the tying goal and to send into overtime. They play nine and a half minutes in the third. It felt like it was even more

than that in real time. I just didn't notice them leaving the ice. And you mentioned the offensive zone draws. I wanted to highlight that a little bit here because I've been sort of tiptoeing about this concept on the show without actually doing a full breakdown, but this is maybe a good opportunity to do so. It's a play that you're seeing just executed with such volume and such efficiency around the league now. And it's very simple, but it's just so effective and puts the opposing defense in a bind where the center wins it back, usually from that left circle.

He cuts across the middle of the ice kind of drifts either to the middle of the slot or the right circle itself. And they run a little pick play in the middle of the ice there, causes a miscommunication. while he's drifting in terms of who's going to pick him up and then it's imperative for the defensemen in this case it was Bouchard who's one of the best in the league at this to identify that and send a cross-ice pass diagonally to that guy that's cutting

and all of a sudden it creates this one-time opportunity we saw them execute that with Dreis Idol scoring you're seeing Larkin doing that Ajo Tampa Bay does it very well as well with their top guys and so that's certainly something to watch for moving forward do you have any concerns about the Oilers because I think we've generally been hand-waving this start to the season as

their typical October-November performance, and once we get into the middle of the season and on, especially once they start banking more home games in the upcoming stretch after this road trip is done, we're going to see them gear up, play their best game, put up some lopsided goals, and really kind of round into form. We've seen this before, so I think that's why we're confident in saying that, yet it does feel like, especially if you look at the underlying numbers, they're playing a little differently this year, and the offense in particular isn't necessarily as reflective of this kind of hibernating juggernaut that's waiting to turn these shots into goals the way they have in previous seasons because a lot of these totals,

even when they were struggling in past October's and November's, aren't really the same this season. Yeah, I do have concerns and not concerns from the perspective of, oh, is the bottom going to fall out and they're going to be in jeopardy of missing the playoffs, but they look like a flawed team to me. We know that the goaltending hasn't been very good, and I thought Calvin Pickard again was fighting it, but defensively, on the back end, a lot of your high leverage defensemen are making mistakes out there. Evan Bouchard this year has been a train wreck in his own zone, looks lost a lot of times. You'll get Charlie coils to nothing goal. It's Bouchard with the initial giveaway for an initial chance. Then McDavid gets stripped and Bouchard's the defenseman

who's supposed to be covering coil and Olivia somehow gets a pass across to coil. There's just no way Bouchard should have allowed that pass across. And I know he had three assists and made up for some of those mistakes offensively, but in the defensive end, the level of breakdowns that he's having right now are just unacceptable right now. And then you also have Darnel Nurse at times this year turning pox over, even a guy like Jake Wallman, who was such a difference maker for them down the stretch with his mobility and secondary offensive punch,

he's been caught at times pinching up the ice and out of position. And even, it's not just the defenseman either. The Olivier second goal, I think it was the 5-2 goal for Columbus, first Cylinger is able to make a diagonal seam pass to Charlie Coyle. Coil couldn't settle it, but otherwise that's a screaming high danger chance

off of an east-west pass. So to first allow that, and then Coyle goes behind the net, the others have three or four players collapsed down low, right? They have bodies that theoretically should be in the right spot. And you've got Matthew Olivier parked in front. You can't miss Matthew Olivier around the front of the net right when he's on the doorstep. It's not like he found the quiet ice. He's right in that home plate area. And Coil is still able to get it through there.

I thought dry settle was laxadaisical there as the F3 defending low. And I think that's been a consistent theme is not just the defenseman, but their F3 defending low hasn't been breaking plays up enough. And so between the defensive play and how laxadaisical that has been, between the goaltending. And then I know you're getting more secondary juice from Savoy and Roslovick's been a good fit and you're going to get Hyman back. So those things will help the offensive contributions.

But in general, when I look at this overlays forward group as well, it's not as deep as it was last year. And I still think they're quite dependent on the big guys. Yeah, they are. On the one hand, they're 32nd and 515 PDO, including 30 second and say percentage. And so when that's the case, that's going to make everything look bad. And I think that in large part explains why they have a minus 13 goal differential at 515, only the blues and the predators are worse so far. But to the point of this not necessarily looking exactly like the previous October and November struggles for them, their 23rd and expected goal share, they're 27th in high-dated chance share, a stat that they've always dominated even when the results haven't reflected it.

And you look at their hockey biz chart for their shot map, and there's just no real 5-on-5 offensive presence kind of around the net and in the slot, and their 31st in-chance is generated so far at 5-on-5. I do think Hyman's return, not only that's an area that he excels, but also we've talked a lot. lot about how their forward lines to start the season have been so in flux as they look integrating new guys but also try to find the right fit and so i think that's going to allow a lot of stuff to settle into pace but i do wonder whether you know a big topic of conversation this week after the weekend where they give up nine goals throwlers then you've got that chris no block post game press conference when he get asked by the media if the team has lost faith in the

goaltending and he gives the the least non the least committal answer i've ever seen it was like took the longest pause possible and then it was like i don't believe so and he wasn't really fooling anyone i think where you see that manifest itself is when you just combine like a simple thing like either shot attempts or shots on goal for and against they're 27th right now in five on five pace of play in terms of events and so it feels like they are whether it's intentional or whether it's subconscious they're playing a little bit differently in terms of when this team is at their best they're not necessarily going to be the most run and gun team because they're going to grind on you and create stuff down low and half court settings and

off the cycle and those rebounds the way they have in previous post seasons, but they do need to be more explosive. And I think open things up a little bit. And they're clearly gun shy or hesitant to do so because they feel like as soon as it comes back the other way, it's probably going to result in a goal against. And this was such an Evan Bouchard game. He said so many of these this year where you look up at the end of the day and it's like, all right, he played 25 minutes. He put 11 shots on net. He had three primary assists. And then there's those individual sequences in the breakdowns and lapses where there's a turnover behind the net. There's the defending, letting coil backdoor for that goal.

There was even in the first period when they're on the power play, it's, I believe Matthew Olivier coming in on a two-on-one with Cole Cillinger, and it's Matthew Olivier with the puck. I know he winds up scoring, and he's chipped in with a bit more offense, but you've got to trust your goalie to handle the shooter there, and instead he allows a pass, cross-ice, the goalie's out of position, Cole Cilinger rings it off the bar, and you can't have that kind of stuff happening. So, I don't know, there's a lot of moving parts there.

It's going to be a pretty tough stretch for them up coming here with some of those road opponents, but once Hyman comes back, I think we should revisit this. On the Blue Jacket side, it's kind of a continuation for them in terms of, the 5-1-5 metrics are really good this year. They're seventh in goal differential.

Their shot chance and expected goal shares have all creeped over 50%, even last year when they were competing for a playoff spot. A lot of it was efficiency and kind of outscoring some of their problems, but they weren't really dictating play. And this year, that's come up quite a bit. only the abs generate more expected goals than them.

So the offense is certainly humming, and they score five here. Once again, I think there's a lot to like here. I know, as I said, it was white knuckling near the end. There were some defensive breakdowns, and they were kind of at the mercy of the Oilers' top guys. But if you look at it as an at the aggregate for the season, I think there's a lot to like for the Blue Jackets, and it certainly seems like they're trending in the right direction.

Yeah, and they kept punching back offensively, and I think the perfect encapsulation of that was that Matatrick's Everson pair. rebounding after what I thought was a tough defensive start. They had the icing that preceded them getting scored on on one of the goals. Then bad coverage on Dry Settles' one-time goal where they allowed that pass across. But then through the second half of that game, you saw them generate countless scoring chances. Matecuk obviously redeeming himself by jumping on that loose puck off the end boards and scoring individually. But then other situations as well where he was pinching up the wall.

made a pass into slot. The past didn't quite work, but it ended up getting to Severson, who hit a cross bar, and then Severson later in the third period, I believe hit another bar jumping up in the rush. I think the goal, Fentilly scored as well, started with Severson jumping up into play.

So they started the night tough defensively, but then as the game prolonged, the amount of offense that they helped generate just by using their skating to get up in the play, making things happen at the point in transition. They were creating chances at bulk. And then when you also combine it with what the coil line was doing as well, which is such an interesting night for them

where they got the head-to-head matchup against McDavid line. And certainly we saw once McDavid and Drysettel were together that there were times when that Columbus third line was on its heels defending, But again, that ability to counterpunch. And not just on the goals that they created, but other situations where Olivier was finding ways to bulldoze his way to the net. Cylinger was disruptive on the P.K. He in the first period hit the bar on a shorthanded chance.

Sometimes when a line is going up against McDavid and Drysettle, they get caught into playing too passively. and they give them too much respect. They're backing off a lot. And what that means is you're just on the ropes doing your best to bend but not break all game. Whereas certainly there were shifts that looked like that. But they also manufactured enough shifts where they were applying pressure on the forecheck, disrupting the oilers on the breakout, creating chances for themselves offensively,

and making sure that you still have that attention. attack element when you're going up against top competition like that, they deserve a lot of credit for that, even though it didn't always look pretty defensively. Yeah, you mentioned them making stuff happen just with their raw skating ability. I thought that Fantilli goal was one of the best examples of that where it seems like kind of a nothing play with the puck going in the corner and Trent Frederick's going to retrieve it and all of a sudden you can just see that he's absolutely completely caught off guard by Marchenko's closing speed and he just nudges him off the puck and then, you know, they get a friendly bounce out front to Fantilli, but he converts it.

And I love an ongoing theme for me this season is, with all due respect to the Blue Jackets broadcast, I just enjoy watching Blue Jackets games with the opposing feed because you can hear the commentators who don't get to watch Marchanko every night, just kind of realizing how he's moving out there and what he's doing and what a threat he is. And as the game goes along, you can just like see that they're taking mental notes and being like, man, this guy's just one of the most dangerous players in the league. And so that's been a really fun recurring theme for me. You mentioned Sillinger there as well in that line, which, you know, Dean Everson, hard matches here essentially against McDavid and Dreysidal. They wind up being out there for 10 and a half or so of his 17 515 minutes. They win that matchup 3-1, despite some of those hairy moments come out of it with a 70% expected goal share.

And I wanted to give some love to Cole Sillinger, a player who have kind of been dubious of in the past, mostly because some of those other young forwards like Marchenko, Voronkov, Antillian, and Kent Johnson have garnered so much of the attention. and he's been sort of on the outside looking in, both in terms of where he slots in the lineup and his production compared to those guys. And he's only got the two goals and seven points so far this season. But he's a third on the team now in 515 usage amongst forwards. He's playing top PK minutes.

He was a dog on the PK, creating some of those chances in this game. And his 515 metrics look phenomenal this season. So he's kind of approaching an interesting spot where he's a 22-year-old center. He makes 2.25. He's an RFA. This summer, they've gone pretty short with a lot of their guys. and I'm very curious to see how that plays out because previously just because of my skepticism,

I had sort of viewed him as the most logical piece they could use to improve their team via trade and now all of a sudden he's playing his way into a legitimate depth role and a very valuable component of this. So yeah, and on the Blue Jackets, I mean, you look at the Metro and I said this stat on yesterday's show, but I just wanted to reinforce it. The goal differential right now amongst the league 1 through 32.

The Metro has second, fourth, 7th, 8th, 12th, 13th, 18th, and 20th. And the Blue Jacks are 20th. They're top 10 at 515 specifically. But it's an absolute murderers role right now. It's still early in the season. We're only in mid-November or so. But just in terms of the playoff projections and how these teams are going to kind of slot in, if this keeps up, it's going to be very hectic and very difficult, I think, to predict who's going to come out of this pack beyond the New jerseys and Carolinas of that division. Yeah. And it's especially telling you because Washington, who also played last night, is currently eighth in the metro.

And yet when I've watched the play, I've actually, for example, last night, I know they gave the game away in the final 30 minutes, but I've actually liked a lot of what I've seen from them. And I had some fear that, all right, could the caps after having everything go right for them last year be in line for some regression? And I thought it would be a dog fight for them to get into the playoffs. And certainly that has manifested itself in the record so far. And yet when I watch them play, I still see a lot of qualities in our game that I like. And that's the team that's eighth place in the division right now.

Yeah. It's a wild. The thing on part of that is I think they've won just two of their last nine games and they're eight, eight and one now. But let's get into that then because Panthers Capitals was next on my list and that's a perfect segue for us here. Once again, and in a much different way than last year, the Capitals are one of the more perplexing teams statistically to figure. out, right? Because you look at the 5-on-5 metrics, and their fourth in shot share, third in high-danger chance share, second-in-expected goal share, and second-in-goal share behind just the abs in those last two categories, and yet the results don't reflect it. Their shot chart

is very encouraging in terms of where they're generating from. It's all just packed in the high-danger areas. They're generating a ton of chances and expected goals, and yet no one is, it's not really leading to the actual results you're looking for. And they're also, I mean, they're getting great goaltending. I know they give up six here with the empty netter at the end. but Logan Thompson has been phenomenal. No team gives up fewer five-on-five goals than them. They generate 40 shots here against a Panthers team that does not give up a lot of shots, and yet they don't have the win to show for it.

So part of it is just the special teams, right? They're 26 on the PK, they're 29th on the power play. They're generating just five goals an hour with a man advantage. And some of that is just predictability and stagnation. And you watch when they're out there, it's kind of everyone knows the book in terms of where the puck's trying to be funneled to, what they're trying to cook up and create. But I don't really know what to do with them because you watch them and they pass the eye test.

They've got a lot of good players. I think they don't have a single skater who's played at least half their games that's below 50% in expected goal share. Like they're doing all the underlying stuff you're looking for for a team that might not win a cup, but it's certainly a playoff team and should be one of the better regular season teams in the league. And yet they're hovering along at this 500 pace and 8th in the Metro, as you said. Yeah.

And that performance against the Panthers, I really believe they gave. that game away because for the first half of it they were playing so well it it was a really interesting game as well where it felt like each this period was its own distinct story in terms of the playing style in the first period it felt like it's very tight checking on both sides neither team had much space and transition to create controlled entries and manufacture rush offense it was more of that playoff style grinding forecheck type game and this is where The caps, I thought, were controlling the neutrals on really well defensively. They were jumping into lanes.

They were intercepting and picking off plays. It was fascinating because the Panthers, when they were able to get to the red line in the first half of the game with speed and then rim it in, that's when they were able to give the caps and troubles on their zone exits. But the way the caps are counteracting that was they just made sure there weren't many instances in the first place where Florida could actually get to the red line with pace, with numbers to, to recover those pucks off the dump and chase situations. In the offensive zone, I thought the caps were covering so many pucks down low. And then in the second period, it felt like things were really starting to open up.

The caps are creating some looks off the rush. They were peppering the Panthers, I thought, in terms of zone time and shots. And it wasn't just shots from anywhere. They were getting some legit looks on Terosov, who I thought was playing really well. But then you take the back-to-back penalty.

I thought that completely derailed their second period momentum. Sam Reinhardt ended up scoring to give them a multi-go lead headed into the third period. And then the third period was so strange, too, the first five or six minutes because it was almost a frenetic pace and the caps had a lot of zone time. And it started with Protis and in that line creating a lot of havoc. But then they got sloppy and just completely lost their shape defensively. I counted five screaming high danger chances that were created against the grain at a time when the capitals had so much zone time. And by that point, the game just got away from them.

So it really, like you said, kind of tough to really get a grip on what exactly this Caps team is. I've liked a lot of what they're doing at 5-on-5, but just not able to get the results wins-wise. Yeah, and the Panthers are, and we're going to talk more about in a second, They're so good defensively, like they have in the past couple of years, winning cups in protecting the house and keeping stuff to the outside. And I thought the caps throughout this game did a really good job, partly because their defensemen were so active with Carlson and Sandy and kind of all over the place. And Chikrin certainly activating and getting into these spots and in pockets of the IC, either receive passes or corral rebounds. And they were giving the Panthers a lot of trouble. And yet, Teresov just made the saves.

And then ultimately, once the game opened up a little bit, it felt like it got away from them. I thought Ryan Leonard's performance was very encouraging. He only plays the 15 minutes, but he gets seven shots on goal. He had a scintillating rush. I was texting you about how it feels like whenever I'm tuning into a Caps game now, he does that once a game at least where he a seemingly nothing play where the other team has a defender back or even has good numbers to defend. And he just makes something out of nothing with a dangle or a dangerous shot

where he kind of pulls it in and threatens the goalie. And he's only got the three goals to show for it so far on 84 shot attempts. But with that talent, I expect that to increase significantly. And he had an awesome sequence in zone in the third period, just causing havoc with a couple chances, and then eventually getting into a battle with a defenseman. I think I might have you been Anton Mandel in the sequence that led to Sandine's kind of goal from the point through traffic.

For the Panthers, they're an interesting spot because the results are whatever. They're 9, 7, and 1 now a couple of nice wins against the Golden Knights on the road to close their road trip, and then this game coming back home against the caps. They're starting this stretch, though, and I was texting you about this as well. Their broadcast was talking about it. A 12 game stretch coming up here where 11 of them are at home, including against some pretty soft competition. You've got games against the flames, a couple against the Predators, some of the weaker teams in the league. They're all of a sudden only three points back in Montreal for first in the Atlantic.

And I'm very curious to see what these next 10 games are so look like for them, whether they're able to generate enough offense to win a meaningful amount of them. Because despite the 40 shots against here and some of the troubles, the cap. gave them for the season they've once again been arguably the stingiest defensive team in the league and so there's a nice kind of foundation there to build on for them as they just try to stick around the playoff race and hang afloat until at least Matthew Kachuk comes back midseason and I think they're going to do it because they've got these games where they just kind of lock it down especially once they get a lead it's so difficult to create meaningful offense against them and this is a nice little win for them for sure and

it was also telling this was the kind of game where again through the first half of the game I didn't think they had much offensive juice I thought the lundell line with marshand was creating sparks here and there but outside of that I thought at five and five the bennett line was pretty quiet I thought the reinhart line for the first half of the game was pretty quiet but then as you alluded to as soon as they go up in a game the opposition when they're forced to to press the panthers are just so good at punishing opponents in again that third period where even though the caps had some zone time five or six just unbelievable opportunities you saw that as the game opened up they still had that gear offensively to make the capitals pay and

that's when you saw reinhart first you know on the power play at the end of the second period and then at five on five he helps put put the game away and you saw some of the other players get involved as well. And even in the, even in the earlier stages of the game where I thought the capitals were the better team, it was interesting to me that despite them not having a lot of speed to the neutral zone, not having a lot of controlled entries, they're still so good off to forejack that when they are able to break out of their zone cleanly and rimpocks around, They still find ways to not just recover because you have a lot of teams that try and play dump and chase and they recover for pucks, but then they're stuck on the perimeter. This Florida forecheck is just able to somehow always convert that into meaningful offense as well.

Now, part of it is they just seal the boards off so well. As an opposing team, it's just so funny trying to see teams playing the Panthers try to rim pucks around or jam it up the wall thinking it's going to work, knowing that their defensemen are pinching. And on the Rodriguez goal, you can see how far deep Mekola is so early in the play, what they do creating off the forecheck and then also when they go up in games, finding ways to punish opponents when they're taking risks and pushing for offense. I think the combination of that makes me believe that they have enough juice offensively, even though for some stretches of games,

you look at them in at 5-on-5, they can go quiet. Yeah, something they do better than anyone, and they execute as to perfection in the playoffs, certainly against the Oilers, but it's that purposeful, hard rim around the net to essentially switch sides and cause miscommunication, and they allow their defensemen to be the first guy that all the way down, pretty much the hash marks along the wall,

to pick up that puck, and then they send a hard cutter through the slot for either a tip or if he throws it on net and the goalie kicks it out with a pad, all of a sudden it's there in the slot for the rebound. That's what happened on the Rodriguez one. And that came like 20 seconds or so after the caps who had had chances early on, finally break through. They get a goal from De Hame.

And then 20 seconds later, this seemingly harmless play all of a sudden results in the one-one goal. And that must be so demoralizing. And they do that better than anyone. I thought it was a monster game for Marshaan, Lusterinen, and Lundel. Lundel set up one of them with this beautiful kind of seal to gain possession behind the net. And then in one motion, he sweeps it out front for a goal. Luster Rinen, I mean, as you'd expect, he gets his stick on such a high percentage of pucks.

I'd love to see that stat because whether it's disrupting or actually gaining possession, he's just all over the place. And then Marchand's really one of the only guys on this team right now who has the puck carrying juice in terms of creating in space and stick handling through defenders and taking it to the net. And he had a couple good opportunities here. He also hits the 1,000 point mark after a luster. an empty netter and we're at the point now where I know Marshawn's in his age 37 season his 10 5-1-5 goals lead the league he's got 13 5-1-5 points second on the panthers his foursling with eight and he's got 20 total

points in londell is second on the team with 14 so he really is carrying them right now offensively and that line is getting it done for them right harm let's take our break here and then we come back we will jump right back into it cover a couple more games from thursday night's late you're listening to the hockey pdf cast streaming on the sports net radio network All right, we are back here on the Hockey-Ocast, joined by Harmon Dial during our usual Friday show covering some games from Thursday night that caught our eye. Do you want to talk about Jets cracking, especially the Jets perspective here? I know they wind up losing this game.

They're currently concluding a six-game road trip out West that's gone pretty rough for them. They've lost four of the first five in regulation. The only win being that game in Vancouver. Hoover, I'm of two minds with this team because on the one hand, the start of the season was always going to be similar to the Panthers about just surviving with all the injuries and key absences that they had. And so they've accomplished that despite this losing streak. They're tied for third in the central. So they're in a pretty good spot still. Yet on the other, when you look at the way the abs are playing and then the stars, despite not playing that well, have been banking points

as well. Those two teams are kind of distancing themselves pretty rapidly for the top two spots. in the central and the underlying numbers themselves look quite dreadful. Now, I don't expect that to be reflective of what this team's going to look like for the next 60 games now that they have some of these guys back, but still it's to a point where they're amongst the bottom three teams in pretty much every five-on-five category that you look at. And I do think that is pretty concerning and suggest some of the stuff we were worried about in terms of the team speed eroding with Eiler's gone,

but also just bringing in some vets who obviously at this point of their career aren't going to be able to compensate there. I think that's in part what's causing some of these woes for them. Yeah, I think the next 15 games are going to be really telling because, like you mentioned, I always expected them to get off to a pretty tough start with no Dylan Sandberg, no Adam Lari, who's recently returned to the lineup. Cole Perfetti was out for a little bit. So it was always going to look ugly.

And as you said, it was going to be about survival. And now that they more or less have most of their bodies back, now I'm going to be paying close attention to how the process looks like are they better controlling 5 and 5 play I thought despite Dylan Sandberg having a pretty polished return to the lineup making his season debut that the Jets were still underwhelming as a whole I thought defensively this is a team that in front of Connor Halibuck last year on a lot of knights just would give opponents nothing. We're so suffocating. And especially against a Cracken team that has very little juice offensively, I thought they, I thought the Cracken

got more looks than they should have, especially that Demella Morrissey pair had some breakdowns. And it was a little bit strange because I thought Winnipeg actually defended the rush pretty decently. There were a lot of Seattle breakouts where, especially in the second period, a defenseman to try making a play up to a forward and then you'd have a Winnipeg defenseman right on top of them and the forward wasn't really able to make a play but in zone the Cracken were still able to get looks I mean the Caco redirect goal to open things up

now Vince Dunst streaking through and pouncing on that rebound and then the worst of all I thought was Eberley wrapping around the net in the third period and losing Dylan DeMello on that on that play and then you pair that with the Jets not creating a lot offensively in that game either especially I thought they had a lot of one and done sequences in the offensive zone where the amount of missed shots from the wing and it rims around and leaves his own point shots not getting through a little high pass is missing the mark it was just a game where they gave

up more than I would have liked to see them surrender from a defensive standpoint and And though they created a couple of goals off the rush, I really didn't think they manufactured a lot of sustained zone time and pressure. No, and that's been the case all year. And I think that's what I was sort of hinting at with some of the team speed, right? One element of that is they're at 5.6 rush chances per game, the corner sport logic, only the Preds, Wild, and Sharks average less. But I think more concerning for me because they're never going to be beyond the top line,

a very prolific rush team with the way they're currently constructed. they're 28th in offensive zone possession time. The only team spending more time in their own zone defending are the sharks, Blackhawks, and Canucks. And a lot of that's led to this volume, both in terms of quantity and quality against, where they're 30th and expected goals against, 30th in slot shots allowed, 28th and inner slot shots allowed. And even with Connor Hallibuck as the last line of defense,

it's certainly not a recipe for success or the way they want to play. Now, I think Dylan Sandberg's return, and you could see flashes of it in this game. are going to rectify a lot of that. They threw him right back into the deep end, basically. He plays 23 minutes in this one, making his season debut off that broken wrist, including four and a half scoreless minutes on the PK.

In his 18 and a half, five-on-five minutes, shots, eight four, goals, goals, goals, he makes that play at the blue line, forcing Riker Revens, I believe, into a turnover. Pionk quickly stretches it to Shifley for a breakaway goal. In Sandberg, somehow doesn't, I guess he didn't get a stick on it necessarily, but he doesn't get a point on it, And that's probably the perfect encapsulation of Dylan Sandberg's impact where he makes the play leading to the goal, but doesn't have anything on the score sheet to show for it. The trickle-down effect his return is going to have on this decor can't be overstated.

Not only the impact he's going to have on his partner, Neil Pionk, who without him had a 40% expected goal share and got absolutely caved in at the start of the season with Hayden Flurry before they made the switch with pairs. It also bumps Luke Shen out of the lineup because I think that even they realize they can't. play him with Logan Stanley, and I've got this crazy Luke Shen stat for you. So dating back to game three round one against the Blues last postseason, he's played 275 on five minutes since then. The jets are down 17 nothing in that time, which is just absolutely mind-blowing. I know. I had to triple check it just to make sure. I know it's been bad, but that putting a number like that to that really clarifies it. And then it frees up the Morrissey pair. I think I know they struggled in this one with the goals against, but just to do more often.

offensively handling some lighter matchups and getting to create more. And they're going to need it because the secondary scoring with Eler is not here with Perfetti kind of making his return. He's played three games now only as the one secondary assist so far. They're going to need to find ways to create enough offensively, even if the defense improves, right? They've scored 32, five on five goals this season. The top line has been on the ice for half of them.

The three guys, Shafley, Connor and Vilarity have scored 14 of those 32. And so it's just been tough sledding, finding not only sources of offense, but then figuring out how to sustain more possession and keep the puck farther away from your net. And so I think Lowry Perfetti and Sandberg Back is going to help with a lot of that. I want to give them 10 games together before I even care about the underlying numbers. But man, right now it's pretty tough. And the early returns haven't necessarily been that encouraging. Yeah, I think they'll be fine in the regular season.

I just think they have so many different ways to win that even if the process doesn't always look pretty, that they'll find a way to get enough wins. You still have Connor Hullabuck back in Net, who is having another strong season. That top line with Shifley, Connor, and Vilarity is still so nasty. The power play dating back to last year, we know how deadly it's been. Sambra coming back is going to help stabilize that top 4D.

You expect Morrissey and Demello to pick it up as a season goes on. And then even Lowry's return gives you that third checking. line that is just so difficult to score on. I mean, the last two years, the Jets have surrendered less than 1.5 goals against per 60 with that Adam Lowry line on the ice. And I think he and Aiafalo have been really good the last few games. And so even though they are in a quick line and the Jets as a whole don't have a lot of speed in their forward group, you at least know now with that Lowry-led third line that even though they may not consistently manufacture much offense, despite scoring back-to-back games, that they're at least going to be so suffocating

defensively. And Lowry, in my mind, is one of the most underrated third-line centers in the league. So having his stability back in the lineup, plus all the other factors I mentioned, I expect them to be fine in the regular season. It's just a bigger question of them as cup contenders. And that's where I think when you get to the playoffs and you have to go up against some of the best teams of the Central Division,

that's where I worry that some of that lack of speed on your second line, the inability to control play at a really, really high level. And we know that Connor Hallibuck hasn't always been a game changer in the playoffs. That's where I'm concerned about them as Stanley Cup contenders, not as far as can they have a successful regular season and get into the dance again. And to your point, Lowry's played five games since returning from his injury from last

postseason, zero goals against at 5-1-5 with him on the ice, so he's doing it. Yet again, I think you mentioned him and I follow Nita Ryder has been awesome for them this year as well. Let's end with AvSabbers. And just quickly, I can't think of two organizations going in more opposite directions. Right now, the Avs improve to a remarkable 12-1 and 5. They've played 1100 minutes. So far this year, they've led for 600 of them.

They have a plus 30 goal differential now, which is so far in a way the best in the league. Second best is Carolina, I think, still at plus 13, so more than double that. The top line is scoring 6.3 goals per hour of 515, which is more frequently than their own power play is. I want to talk about Gavin Brindley, though, a player who I feel like we spent a disproportionate amount of time talking about on this show this season because he's generally played a fourth line role. And Drans and I hyped him up on Sunday because we were going to go watch that abs game live and he delivers with the overtime winner there. He's in an interesting spot now where Valatruchin's going to be out for the foreseeable future. He gets promoted and steps into that second line, essentially, playing with Ross Colton and Brock Nelson. He helps create two beautiful goals off the rush here, one with a nice little connective pass to spring.

Brock Nelson, I believe, and then scores one off the rush himself, beating Ugo Pekyllukin. And the reason why I wanted to talk about him, though, is because the abs just did it again in terms of not only getting him from Columbus and getting this production out of him, but the contract itself where this week they sign him to a two-year extension at 875K per. And now to put that into perspective, that dollar figure, the second year of that deal in 27, 28, when he'll be 23 and kind of entering his prime and presumably being very productive in an elevated role for this team, that AAV is going to be lower than the league minimum, just to show you what kind of value that's going to be. I mean, this year he's playing 922 per game. He's already producing at a 20-goal pace.

He's got three goals, five points in four games this month. It's going to get a long look here, playing some elevated minutes with better players, and I expect that to continue. And so another home run acquisition for them, a great piece of business, and another really fun player that I wanted to get some shine to you because I think it's very easy to talk about the best players on this team, but pretty much everyone right now is doing it for them. Yeah, and you only had two points in this first 12 games, but watching the abs play, you could

see that he was still generating, he was still buzzing around, he was still manufacturing off zone entries. Right from the season opener against L.A., he stood out to me as well. In limited minutes, he is creating offensive opportunities. This is a guy I had made a mental note of to keep an eye on as far as being a potential difference maker further down the lineup because we've touched on this before, but the abs in previous years post the 2022 Cup win losing a lot of their key depth players, they lost some of the secondary scoring they had further down the lineup and they became

disproportionately reliant on that that. top line to manufacture offense and then I remember a couple years ago you you would see the ice time on some of these guys playing 23 24 minutes a night and it just wasn't sustainable and burnley is part of this avs team having some more scoring further down the lineup now you're seeing the production is catching up with the process and just by and large too it speaks to something we were touching on last week where it's not just the avs top end of lineup that can play with a ton of speed and skill. It's further down the lineup too now that you've got got guys like Brindley and on the back end with with the third pair to have a transporter like Sam Malinski. That's why it

feels like the avs can come at you in waves. It's not just that deadly elite top line trio in McCar and Taves. They've let other drivers further down the lineup that are making fun things happen offensively. And it's terrific value to have him under contract at well below one million in for another couple of years. Yeah, and we also saw adding to that, embarrassment of riches, Sam Gerrard's return. This was his first game since October 9th. You're always curious when a guy misses that much time,

especially a prolific skater like him, how he's going to be moving. And sure enough, he pulls out a patent, it's been moved on his first shift, I believe. And it's like, all right, he's back. And they played him here with Malinski now. It bumps the guy like Jack Ashon out of the lineup. And I love what I saw from him in that role.

It goes to show you that what you have an environment and infrastructure like this in place, just put in anyone who can move and they're going to look really good as part of that process but I want to see more reps from Gerard and Malinsky who were so good together last year it's going to keep Burns and in Manson together which I'm not sure is the ideal fit come the postseason

but Malinski's been absolutely awesome this season and so it just gives them another guy who can facilitate and be part of this well-oiled machine the last thing on the abs and then we can quickly close on the sabres they also another contractual thing they did this week is they re-up Scott Wedgwood next year for 2.5 million and just add that to the list of another potential option taking off the UFA market at that position.

I was looking at the list this summer. And sure enough, there's going to be a lot of teams that come July 1st are going to be like, oh, man, we want to change up our goal tend and we want to do something. There's 11 total goalies right now, I believe, that are going to be on the UFA market that are actually in NHL this year. And a couple of them, like a Bobrovsky or quick, will probably be back with their teams if they decide to keep playing.

And so it's going to be so thin. And hopefully that's going to facilitate some fun trades, like the Gibson one we saw at the draft this past year. But I thought that was a really nice little piece of business for the AFS as well, considering Blackwood's health and the fact the Wedge would has played as good as he has so far this season for them. Do you want to end on the Sabres? And in particular, I think reaching this impasse now where it might have been the case anyways,

although I'm sure they want to keep a guy who wants to stay there and who has the ties that he does and as much as he's meant to them the past couple years. But with this losing streak and now they've, you know, they fall into last. in the east. They're 30th in the league in point percentage. They've gotten blown out, at least in terms of score the past four games down 20 to 8 in that time. What's going to happen with Alex Tuck? Because another recurring theme for us has been that UFA market for skaters as well and how few guys are going to be available, what the guys who do hit the market with the cap going up are going to be able to command in terms of price tag. And Tuck's going to be 30. He's been playing at a very

flat 4.75 since 2019, I believe, with like no signing bonuses. no perks, just the most cookie cutter contract you can have that he signed previously with Vegas. And so he's certainly going to want to cash in. But for Buffalo, I feel like you're going to have to bite the bullet in terms of accepting the fact that he's probably going to go somewhere good and look awesome in that environment. But from a business perspective, it's probably a tough decision. I think you're going to have to make between now and the deadline. Yeah, I think they're caught between a rock and a hard place because everybody knows the situation that the sabres are in right now. You'd imagine that they're not just going to have

have to pay market value, which market value in it of itself for Alex Tuck with the inflating salaries for top players around the NHL would be significant. But now, I imagine there's a Buffalo tax. They've been bad for so long. And to retain a player, like Tuck who, even though he's got Taisi area and presumably would stay for the right price, are you going to have to pay him $10.5.11 million on a long-term deal? And especially when it's on a saber, team that isn't exactly going anywhere anytime soon, does that investment even make sense for you? But then the alternative is one of the few top forwards you do have, especially a guy that is on the older end on a team where all you've really got are players in their early 20s to

lose a piece like talk when you've already been stuck being bad for so long. It just makes it harder to dig your way out of that hole. So I'm not sure what exactly they're going to do, but it doesn't feel like either option is particularly appealing. Well, it's not only the market in terms of who's going to make it to UFA, but also in season if you're thinking about the value of a trade, partly because there's been just so many close games this year. And it seems like every other game is going to overtime.

The standings are so condensed right now. And I think that's presented a situation where a couple of the teams we thought we're going to be sellers this season, the longer this continues, the less likely they're going to be to pull the shoot on the season. They're going to kind of at least play it out or try to weigh closer to the deadline. And so that lack of true sellers, I think, is going to, just from a supply and demand perspective, going to put the savers in a pretty intriguing spot. I think the best thing they can do. And I know it's a very small server lining because of how we had some hope heading into this season. And then they had that stretch when Benson was healthy and they were grinding out points. And you're like, all right, they're on the uptick. And now this happens. And now this happens. happens again is going long term, I think, with their RFAs. And I know they didn't do so with a guy like Jack Quinn this past off season, but man, with Benson, Doe and McLeod using some of this cap space you're going to have to buy up as many future years as you can from guys who have actually made a difference and have tried to be part of the solution on this team when so many others haven't, I think is going to be

the most important piece of business they can do over the next calendar year or so. All right, harm. That's all for another Friday edition of the PDO cast. We're going to get out of here. I'll let you plug some stuff because I know you've been working hard. hooking up things at the athletic, let the listeners know a little bit about that. Yeah, I just dropped a story today on some of my favorite under the radar sophomore players that are breaking out, a lot of Jackson Blake Love, Josh Don't, who you mentioned, has been

one of the few silver linings. That was fun to break down with numbers, with video analysis. So for all the nerds that love reading about some of these under the radar guys, I'm sure you're going to love that piece. Nice shout out at the end, too, for our guy Emil Heineman. who's seven goals in 17 games and has looked really nice for the Islanders this season. All right. If you want to listen to more PDCast, subscribe to the Patreon. We got extra shows in the feed this week with Kevin Woodley, Pete Blackburn, some really good stuff in there.

The invite link is in the show notes. You can get access to everything we do moving forward. A lot of fun stuff planned. So join us for that. Join the PDCast Discord as well. If you become a subscriber, you get access to the mailbag channel, which will be taking questions from in future editions of the show. Give us a five-star review. wherever you listen and that's all for another week of shows i hope everyone has a great weekend

and we'll see you back here on sunday night for the sunday special with drans thank you for listening to the hockey pdocat streaming on the sports night radio network