A quick mix of the things we gleaned from the week of hockey.
1. Tired of sitting around the house and tapping the SIM LOTTERY button on Tankathon.com?
Curious if you really know the names of your favourite hockey team’s 19th-best forward, 11th defenceman, and fourth goalie?
Well, come on down to Scotiabank Arena Saturday night and watch two teams stuck at a .494 points percentage try to leave a few more on the table.
It’s a must-lose between the Toronto Maple Leafs and Florida Panthers. Yes, the two best clubs in the Atlantic Division are trying to lower their available talent in order to up their draft lottery odds.
While players don’t overtly tank and coaches are wired to win, both rosters have been ravaged by injury.
Injured Maple Leafs: Auston Matthews, Chris Tanev, Anthony Stolarz, Brandon Carlo, and Dakota Joshua.
Injured Panthers: Aleksander Barkov, Seth Jones, Matthew Tkachuk, Dmitry Kulikov, Evan Rodrigues, Aaron Ekblad, Jonah Gadjovich, Sam Reinhart, Brad Marchand, Anton Lundell, Uvis Balinskis, Niko Mikkola.
The nightmare scenario for the Panthers, whose first-round pick is top-10 protected, would be getting leapfrogged with a few wins and some crummy lottery luck and forfeiting 2026’s 11th-overall choice to Chicago.
The fright for Toronto is more real.
And while some have been critical of Toronto for tanking too late, the Leafs have lost four straight. They’ve gone 5-12-5 since returning from the Olympic break, and only one of their wins has arrived by more than a one-goal margin.
They’re trying pretty hard not to try too hard.
The captain-less Leafs now own the worst goal differential in the East (minus-39), while the captain-less Cats (minus-37) are on their heels.
It’s difficult to perform much worse. Parity works both ways, folks.
Finish lower than bottom five, and they’ll hand over a fantastic prospect to rival Boston.
Yes, welcome to Opposite Day.
A smart home crowd will be root-root-rooting for the road team, as we could be looking at Saturday’s result as the difference between the prospect-thin Leafs getting a sweet top-five pick or nothing at all.
2. Neither MLSE nor hired recruiter Neil Glasberg will confirm or deny, but one head of hockey operations candidate for the Maple Leafs (not named Mike Gillis or Sunny Mehta) is believed to be Ross Mahoney.
An assistant GM with the Washington Capitals for 12 seasons now, Mahoney served as the club’s director of amateur scouting for 16 years prior. He is believed to be open to a promotion elsewhere should the right opportunity arise. Circle him as a person of interest in the search.
Mahoney may be low on the radar, but he’s long on experience.
The 69-year-old Regina, Sask., native is a hockey lifer who oversees the Capitals’ draft strategy, developmental programs, and evaluates the opposition’s prospects.
When Alex Ovechkin hoisted the franchise’s first and only Stanley Cup in 2018, Washington’s roster featured 12 players drafted under Mahoney’s watch…
3. Can’t recall an April like this one, where teams are getting the jump on spring cleaning.
John Tortorella hasn’t lost in regulation since he flew to Vegas. Peter DeBoer’s Islanders are 1-0 despite and not because of Ilya Sorokin. And Sheldon Keefe has joined Craig Berbue as coaches left twisting in the wind now that the GMs who hired them have been given the early axe.
Both Berube and Keefe have two more seasons beyond this one on their contracts. Owners never enjoy burning money for nothing, but those salaries can be made up in playoff gate — assuming you hire the right coach to get you there.
While Tom Fitzgerald is already said to be in the mix for the Nashville gig, the next boss in New Jersey will have two critical calls to make early.
One is on Keefe.
The other biggie is Nico Hischier, whose sweetheart AAV of $7.25 million will skyrocket come 2027, when the captain can test free agency.
Stud two-way centres are nearly impossible to find, and Hischier can re-sign as early as July 1.
Jersey’s new GM must determine whether to sign Hischier to the richest contract on the team or begin exploring trade options.
While there’s certainly no reason to believe Hischier wants out, if negotiations do go sideways, GM TBD has been given an out. Hischier only holds a 10-team no-trade list.
That means 20 teams will be happy to prep an offer.
4. The NHL’s job carousel is often a game of connect the dots.
Long-serving Oilers assistant GM Bill Scott is among a shortlist of candidates had multiple interviews for the Predators’ front-office vacancy.
Bill is the son of longtime agent Gil Scott, who represented Nashville’s departing manager, Barry Trotz.
5. Quote of the Week.
“Definitely prefer him on my left side than going against him.” —Connor McDavid on Macklin Celebrini, shortly after hanging five points on the Sharks and reminding everyone who the real MVP is
6. What the undrafted Darren Raddysh is doing this season on a $975,000 salary is ridiculous.
The late-blooming defenceman easily leads all impending UFAs with 70 points. (Next most productive is forward Alex Tuch, who has played five more games, at 63 points.)
And Raddysh already broke Tampa Bay’s single-season franchise record for goals by a defenceman (22). No small feat when you consider all those productive campaigns by Victor Hedman and Dan Boyle running point.
The Lightning will surely take a run at retaining Raddysh, but GM Julien BriseBois, like Steve Yzerman before him, has a reputation for setting a limit and allowing free agents to walk if they aren’t willing to take a little less to sign.
Every move BriseBois makes this off-season will be secondary to locking up Kucherov, who is eligible to re-sign July 1.
If maxing out a payday is Raddysh’s aim — and we wouldn’t blame him, as he’s never made seven figures — Toronto makes a ton of sense.
The Maple Leafs want to be competitive in 2026-27.
They have cap space and a clear need for a righty who can drive offence from the back end and jolt their middling power-play. Oh, and it says here Raddysh is from… Toronto.
7. Spencer Carbery’s Capitals have a better goal differential (plus-12) and more regulation wins (34) than the Flyers, Red Wings, Islanders, and Blue Jackets — all of whom they must leapfrog to avoid elimination.
“Well, this year I’d certainly like that 3-2-1 (points) format, because I saw we’d be in right now,” the head coach says.
“We’re on the outside looking in and have zero margin for error, and need a little bit of help. It’s just one of those odd years where there’s a lot of quality teams in the East, and it’s made it difficult to make up ground. Just feels like there’s been eight teams that have just been scratching and clawing and playing playoff hockey for the last month plus.”
While Carbery says it’s “tough” to know that one of the NHL’s best regular-season performers, Dallas or Minnesota, is already certain to be eliminated in Round 1, he is a traditionalist content with a 16-team playoff format.
Even if the league expands to 34 teams. Even if the absence of an NBA-style play-in round means his Caps are out.
That said, while he understands the league’s goal of hyping up geographical rivals in the first round, Carbery prefers the old 1-versus-8 seeding.
8. As Ovechkin skates into what may be his final NHL weekend — a poetic back-to-back versus Sidney Crosby’s Penguins — a couple of Leafs shared their earliest impressions of the sport’s most dangerous, prolific, and exuberant goal scorer.
Jake McCabe: “I was probably 21 or 22, and he was in that shooter set off a faceoff. I jumped pretty good, and the puck was just kind of lying there on edge. And I just remember how quick he was able to scoop and get that thing off. Went right off the bar. And I remember just thinking: Holy s—. How quick that thing came off his twig. Holy cow, this guy’s good.”
Steven Lorentz: “There’s certain guys in the league that, once I got here, it kind of seems like a video game when they skate by in front of the bench. The only two guys, really, for me, for that feeling, was Sid and him. So, to be able to go out and compete against him on a handful of nights throughout the season is pretty special. It’s something I’ll be able to tell my grandkids and my kids about.
“Coming into the league, he was celebrating goals. It didn’t matter if it was an empty net or his fourth goal of the game. He was celebrating the same way. And I think that rubbed a few people the wrong way at the beginning of his career. You just know his passion for scoring goals is on another level. You see it in minor hockey now — these kids scoring these big goals, and they’re doing these big celebrations. And he just brought a life of his own to the joy of celebrating scoring goals. It’s little things like that that go a long way with progressing the game in the right direction.”
9. The Los Angeles Kings are the best argument against expanded playoffs.
L.A. enters the final weekend holding down a playoff spot with a minus-22 goal differential and a paltry 20 wins in regulation.
Think about that: A team that has won less than 25 per cent of its games before the 60-minute mark could be competing for the Stanley Cup.
The last team to make the playoffs in an 80-plus-game season with 20 regulation wins or fewer? The 1987-88 Maple Leafs.
10. Stat of the Week!
Quinn Hughes surpassed Ryan Suter (51) for most points in a season by a Wild defenceman in franchise history, even though he played the first 26 games with Vancouver.
By his 47th appearance in green, Hughes had already racked up 53 points, adding credence to Bill Guerin’s biggest trade swing.
While Hughes admitted the transition to a new city, system, and teammates was more jarring than anticipated, things are working out just fine.
“If you’re working for a company for seven years and then you go to a new company, you don’t know anyone. I mean, that’s going to be a change for you, I bet,” Hughes said. “You have to be you.”
Despite being part of a deeper blueline, Hughes’s ice time (27:52) is actually higher in Minnesota than it was in any of his seven-plus seasons with the Canucks.
But when your room also boasts two 40-goal men in Matt Boldy and Kirill Kaprizov, a weight lifts.
“It’s not the Quinn Hughes show,” Hughes said. “There’s great players here, and it’s a great team, and I just want to do my part.”
11. Nick Robertson grew up in L.A. playing for the Jr. Kings. Anze Kopitar was the future of the city’s NHL team then.
But Robertson had never met the man until last Saturday, when all the Maple Leafs shook Kopitar’s hand and congratulated him on his Hall of Fame career.
“Just to meet him after the game, congratulating him, it was pretty cool,” Robertson says. “He’s done a lot for the city of L.A. and for youth hockey, which I benefited from.”
Berube believes Kopitar’s consistent two-way greatness may be underappreciated because “he’s not a flashy player” and because most of his games begin at 10 p.m. ET.
“He’s like Bergeron on Boston. Similar type player. There’s not a lot of them, to be honest with you. (Players) that do all that work in the D-zone and taking D zone faceoffs while leading their team in points at the end of the year,” Berube says. “They’re guys you win with.”
“I think I speak for every player in this league: There’s a lot of admiration for him, what he’s been able to do, and the player that he’s been. And there’s a lot of guys in this league who, as younger players, look to him and try to model their game after him.”
Troy Stecher, who got to play 17 games with Kopitar’s Kings in 2022 as a playoff rental, describes him as a “third defenceman,” the “ultimate pro,” and “a dream come true” in the defensive zone.
In the offensive zone, Stecher sees a “Jagr-esque butt” helping Kopitar fend off foes to the tune of 1,314 points.
“You know, he just sticks it out. He’s so big and strong, it’s hard to get around him. And if you do, you’re probably wrapping him up and it’s a holding penalty. So, he knows his strengths, and he uses them well.”
Leadership-wise, Stecher draws a comparison to Henrik and Daniel Sedin.
“Just really professional, down-to-earth, respectable people, first and foremost,” Stecher says.
Then he tells a story about Kopitar’s L.A. pad.
“At the end of the (2022) season, we went there for a family barbecue dinner wrap-up party with all the guys and wives and kids, at his house. I’d heard he had a pool, and there was no pool,” Stecher says.
“I was like, ‘Kopi, where’s your pool?’ And he’s like, ‘Follow me.’ Then he clicked a button, and the ground, like, lowered and then the water started to fill in. I was like: This is NHL.”
12. The Pittsburgh Penguins, billed all summer long as the only team willing to take a step back in 2025-26, have punched their ticket to the post-season. And they’re sticking it to their doubters, as is their right:
Unpredictability is why we love sports, isn’t it?
We came into this season thinking Sidney Crosby’s only chance to compete in high-stakes hockey was at the Olympics.
We wake up in mid-April and Crosby couldn’t play at all when Team Canada faced elimination (still a bummer), yet he has driven his beloved Penguins to their first playoff berth in four years.
GM Kyle Dubas is fond of saying that success is not always linear.
Well, neither is the fall-off. As Crosby and Evgeni Malkin and Erik Karlsson and Anthony Mantha and Egor Chinakov and Stuart Skinner are all proving.
Here’s to surprises! (And spite.)
