NHL Morning Coffee Headlines – December 30, 2024
Penguins captain Sidney Crosby breaks a franchise record, Red Wings forward Patrick Kane reaches a career milestone, Capitals captain Alex Ovechkin moves closer to Wayne Gretzky’s goals record, and more in today’s NHL Morning Coffee Headlines.
RECAPS OF SUNDAY’S NHL ACTION
NHL.COM: Pittsburgh Penguins captain Sidney Crosby collected his 1,034th regular-season assist, passing Mario Lemieux for the most in franchise history in a 3-2 win over the New York Islanders. Michael Bunting and Philip Tomasino each had two points for the Penguins as they’re 4-2-0 in their last six games. Anders Lee and Bo Horvat replied for the Islanders, who’ve dropped four of their last six contests.
Pittsburgh Penguins captain Sidney Crosby (NHL Images).
SPECTOR’S NOTE: What a difference a month has made for the Penguins. They were near the bottom of the Eastern Conference standings just after American Thanksgiving and seemed to be fading fast. Today, they’re one point out of the final wild-card berth. Penguins defenseman Kris Letang was a late scratch from this game with a lower-body injury.
Detroit Red Wings forward Patrick Kane had a goal and an assist to reach his 1,300th career regular-season point as his club doubled up the Washington Capitals 4-2. Lucas Raymond also had a goal and an assist while Alex DeBrincat tallied twice as the Wings got their first win under new head coach Todd McLellan. Capitals captain Alex Ovechkin scored to reach his 870th regular-season goal, putting him 25 away from passing Wayne Gretzky for the most goals in league history.
SPECTOR’S NOTE: Capitals center Lars Eller returned to action after an illness sidelined him for four games.
Vegas Golden Knights goaltender Ilya Samsonov made 31 saves in a 3-0 shutout of the Calgary Flames. Brett Howden, Victor Olofsson and Tanner Pearson scored for Vegas, who’ve won six straight and sit atop the overall standings with 53 points. Dan Vladar stopped 34 shots for the Flames.
SPECTOR’S NOTE: The Flames’ points streak ended at five games (3-0-2).
The Anaheim Ducks scored four unanswered goals to upset the Edmonton Oilers 5-3. Cutter Gauthier, Robby Fabbri and Mason McTavish each had a goal and an assist as the Ducks collected their second win in their last five games. Leon Draisaitl scored twice and Connor McDavid had two assists for the Oilers.
SPECTOR’S NOTE: Ducks forward Brock McGinn missed this contest with a lower-body injury. He’s been placed on injured reserve.
Third-period goals by Josh Norris and Claude Giroux gave the Ottawa Senators a 3-1 victory over the Minnesota Wild. Leevi Merilainen stopped 30 shots as the Senators snapped a two-game losing skid to hold onto the final Eastern wild-card berth with 40 points. Wild forward Frederick Gaudreau scored his club’s only goal.
SPECTOR’S NOTE: The Wild got some good news as Joel Eriksson Ek returned to action after missing 11 games with a lower-body injury. However, superstar Kirill Kaprizov missed his second straight game with what’s been called a minor lower-body injury.
Montreal Canadiens center Jake Evans scored to extend his goal streak to five games in a 5-2 upset of the Tampa Bay Lightning. Joel Armia had a goal and an assist, Alexandre Carrier collected two helpers, and Brendan Gallagher netted his 10th of the season for the Canadiens. Nikita Kucherov and Brandon Hagel scored for the Lightning.
SPECTOR’S NOTE: The Canadiens have won four of their last six (35 points), sitting five points behind the Ottawa Senators for the final Eastern wild-card spot. Speaking of the Habs, goalie Cayden Primeau cleared waivers and was sent to their AHL affiliate in Laval. Meanwhile, Lightning winger Jake Guentzel missed this game with an upper-body injury and is listed as day-to-day.
The Los Angeles Kings nipped the Philadelphia Flyers 5-4 on two third-period goals by captain Anze Kopitar. Adrian Kempe had a goal and an assist and Kevin Fiala tallied his 14th of the season as the Kings picked up their seventh straight home victory. Flyers forwards Scott Laughton and Matvei Michkov each had a goal and an assist.
SPECTOR’S NOTE: Michkov was benched in the third period of his previous game but responded well with a better showing in this contest.
Five unanswered goals powered the Dallas Stars over the Chicago Blackhawks 5-1. Jamie Benn and Matt Duchene each had a goal and two assists as the Stars (43 points) hold the first Western Conference wild-card berth. Connor Bedard scored his 10th of the season for the Blackhawks.
SPECTOR’S NOTE: Blackhawks winger Tyler Bertuzzi received a game misconduct for elbowing Stars center Colin Blackwell. Reports indicate the league will fine the Stars for violating a CBA rule prohibiting on-ice activities and travel on specified dates during the Christmas holiday break. The team held an “optional practice” on Dec. 26.
The Buffalo Sabres collected their third straight win with a 4-2 victory over the St. Louis Blues. Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen kicked out 35 shots while Tage Thompson and Jason Zucker had a goal and an assist each. The Blues got goals from Brayden Schenn and Nathan Walker.
4 points out of Florida for the Habs. There is a little holiday cheer for a fan. A long way to go yet, but nice to see some progress.
I wonder if teams will stop playing their backups against the Habs on this road trip.
Congrats Sid on breaking Mario’s record.
Pens almost blew another one dur to defensive blunders and overall lack of defensive discipline
Setting aside the first 10 days of the season when games played by teams are vastly different; Pens have been above the cut line for s total of about 5-6 hours. 3 times that they have been “in” the playoffs; become “out of the playoffs” just s couple of hours later when (all 3 times) the Sens win their (later played) game.
It is good to see the rebound from earlier season basement dwelling; but let’s face it. Sens deserve to be in.
Sens are 7-3 in last 10; and only 6 points out of 1st in Atlantic with a game in hand on Panthers/Leafs (tied for first) and 2 games in hand on Bruins (4 points ahead); and a point up on Pens (with Sens having 2 games in hand).
Sens last night beat Wild in Minnesota
Right now, I’d think Sens have a far far better chance of making the playoffs than Pens
8787, I wouldn’t count the Penguins out just yet. As matters now stand in the East, and with a pretty good sample size of anywhere from 35 to 39 games played they, along with 5 other teams (Toronto, Ottawa, Philadelphia, Montreal, Buffalo), are averaging 3.1 goals for per game, behind Tampa (3.9), Washington (3.7), Carolina (3.5), Florida (3.4) and Columbus (3.3). Boston sits near the bottom in that category with 2.7 gfpg, tied with the NYI, just back of the NYR (2.8) and ahead of only Detroit (2.6) in terms of having an anaemic offense.
That shows in individual stats with a big drop-off on the Bruins after Pastrnak (37 pts) and Marchand (31 pts) down to Lindholm (19 pts) and Zacha (18 pts). The Penguins, by comparison, have 6 players before reaching someone with just 19 pts (Crosby (40), Rakell and Malkin (31 each), Rusk (27), Karlsson (25), Bunting (21), and Grzelcyk at 19.
It’s in goals allowed per game where Dubas has to shore up. The top teams in that category are N.J. (2.5), Washington (2.6), Toronto and Carolina (2.8 each), and Tampa and Ottawa (2.9 each). Then comes Boston at 3.0, Florida and NYR (3.1 each), NYI (3.2), Detroit (3.3), Buffalo (3.4), Montreal (3.5 – and shrinking), Columbus (3.6), and Philadelphia and Pittsburgh (3.7 each).
Agree George Re: Pens “It’s in goals allowed per game where Dubas has to shore up.”
Absolutely it is the goals against. It is NOT however on the goalies. It is the overall defense for the entire team.
Sullivan repeatedly sends out costly defensive culprits. He actually rewards them with more time and/or moving them up the lines/d-pairings.
Pens absolutely need a 3rd pairing RD. We only have 2 RDs. That is it. The experiment of putting two Lefties out is failing, and failing badly.
A reasonably cheap acquisition of say Deharnais would do the trick at 3rd pairing RD.
Deharnais in; and sitting/sending down and/or never playing some 100’/defensively apathetic/defensively poor players; and then we might talk about Pens chances at the playoffs.
This line-up COULD get Pens into the playoffs:
Crosby Rust Rackell
Malkin Bunting Tomassino
Glass Pulljaarvi Beavillier
Lizotte Poulin and any one of : Ponomorev, Puustinen, Bemstrom, etc
Depth Fwds: Ponomorev, Puustinen, Bemstrom, etc
Letang Pettersson
Karllsson PO-J
Deharnais Pickering
Depth D: Graves and Hollowell
Jarry/Blomquist
The above requires only one external move (Deharnais). That’s it.
Throwing out the same line-up game in game out; Pens will not get in.
George O,after viewing your stats on Boston and looking at the standings,how can Boston and their poor stats be only 2 points out of first place?I realize they have played more games than other teams at this point! If they figure things out and play to their expected statistics,along with getting Lindholm back I think they could be a wildcard team that no one wants to play!
More gp to date – and who they’ve played so far – all fact or in, of course, Sr … but so too does the number of back-to-backs ultimately figure in significantly which, among other things, means a team’s best goalie can start more games.
That shows, to some degree so far anyway, in Winnipeg’s record and the fact they have the fewest scheduled back-to-backs with just 8.
At the other end of the scale yu have Toronto and Carolina with twice as many (16) and Montreal at 15.
In between there are 3 teams with just 10 each schedules – Boston, St. Louis and Vancouver.
Then come Calgary, Dallas and Detroit with 11 each, and 10 teams at 12 apiece (Chicago, Colorado, Columbus, Minnesota, NYI, N.J., San Jose, Seattle, Tampa and Utah).
Facing 13 each are Washington, Anaheim, Buffalo, Philadelphia and Vegas. and with 14 each are Edmonton, Florida, L.A., NYR, Nashville, Ottawa and Pittsburgh.
Huge win by Ottawa on the 3rd back-to-back of this marathon 9-game road trip, which gives them 4 wins out of the 6 played so far.
Now they face another back-to-back with games in Dallas (Jan 2) and St. Louis (Jan 3), before finishing up in Detroit on Jan 7 before finally returning home to face a resurgent Sabres on Jan 9.
With Ullmark expected to be out for the remainder of the road trip, and no firm word on when Forsberg will be back – nor Zub, Perron and Bernard-Docker for that matter – this is a golden opportunity for youngsters like Merilainen (who got his 2nd win on this trip last night). Matinpalo (just over 10 minutes of 3rd-pairing D alongside Kleven), Ostapchuk and Reinhardt (8 minutes each of 4th line duty), to demonstrate their ability to play at this level without hurting the team.
Big Mads Sogaard, however, has to be better in goal than he was in that 4-2 loss to the Jets where 2 of the Jets goals were definitely of the soft variety after the team had built a 2-0 lead over 2 periods.
I figured the only way they’d remain in contention heading into the 2nd half is if they came out of this trip at least .500. With 8 points of the possible 12 in the bag so far (a .667 pace), they need just 1 more point over the remaining 3 games to finish the trip at .500. To do so with not one, but 2 rookie goalies would make it all the more significant.
During the pre-season I offered the opinion that, at the end, the distance between the WC teams and the last place team in the Eastern Conference would be the smallest it’s been in years. That’s starting to show with a talented young Buffalo team, although currently last, finally showing signs of shaking off their first-half woes which has them 8 back, tied with Detroit who knocked off the leading Capitals, Columbus (4 back) showing they are no pushover for anyone following that devastating loss, Pittsburgh (1 back) demonstrating the talk of their collapse to be greatly exaggerated, a mostly-young Montreal, steadily coming together and pulling off huge wins against top teams putting them just 5 back, same as the NYI, leaving only the Rangers (7 back) currently in free-fall. And there’s just too much talent on that team for that to continue.
In short, in the Eastern Conference the points back from the last WC slot to last place ranges from 1 to 8, while out West it’s 1 to 16.
Starting to look like your Sens have found the missing ingredient, George. If they keep playing above .550 I like their chances now over the Bs and the Pens.
LJ. it’s shaping up to be a tight, competitive race to the wire over the 2nd half in the East, with absolutely NO automatic “easy” 2 points for anyone – except possibly in the case of the Rangers. And, right now, their funk is almost indecipherable. Yeah, Trouba and Kakko are no longer there, but whereas Boston is sitting with 44 pts in 38gp and only Pastrnak (37 pts) and Marchand (31 pts) producing consistently, the Rangers – 9 pts back of Boston with a game in hand – have Panarin (38 pts), Fox (27 pts), Cuylle (24 pts), Trochek (22 pts), Lafreniere ( and Zibanejad (21 pts each), in Boston it drops of to Lindholm (19) and Zacha (18).
And both Swayman (.890) snd Korpisalo (.895) are sub-.900 in save %, while Shestrkyn and Quick (.908 an .907) are both above.
With nothing else appearing to work (2 and 8 over their past 10 while scoring 18 goals and giving up 36 – with Boston going 6 3 1 with 31gf and 29ga over the same stretch), it seems like Laviolette’s days have to be numbered. They have already made two significant deals which haven’t helped, so what else do they do to try and salvage the season?
Right now it looks like the Islanders, Rangers and possibly Boston – all playoff team from last season – could conceivably miss with N.J. (for sure) and any two of Ottawa, Pittsburgh, Montreal, Philadelphia and Columbus edging in. Makes for an exciting 2nd half for sure if it plays out that way.
Comparing with Ottawa in terms of team points producers, the Senators have
Stutzle 40; Batherson 36; Tkachuk 35; Giroux 24; Norris 22; Sanderson 21 – before dropping to 17 each for Gaudette and Chabot
Re Sen’s Goaltending….
After seeing Both Sen’s back ups this year from Belleville AHL Affilitae
Mads Sogaard, who has just turned 24 this month
who has Not posted Good numbers over the past 2 shots in the NHL Season.
–2023-24 Season G, 2, SV%, 5.24 GA,0.800.
–2024-25 Season, G, 6 SV%, 4.05. GA,0.859
&
Leevi Merilainen, who will be 23 next summer
2024-25
–G, 3. GA, 2.68 SV%, 0.900
I think has played quite well for the Big team, maybe he just need to be given a chance to play a little more and get more NHL experience & time this season in the NHL,
Sen’s need a back up next year so the job is sitting Open… if its not working they need a back up🤔
The playoff race in the East,
Teams in the fight for the 8th wild card spot…
1-Ottawa,50%
2-Philly, 25%
3-Pen’s, 25%
Looks like the following tears will Not make the playoffs this Season ….❓
NYI, LOU gets let go, Hire a new GM P.Roy❓
NYR, A New GM & New Coach coming soon🤔
CBJ, the Re-build continues
George O you brought up some great points! How can the NHL have such an unfair schedule! Ottawa playing 9 away games in a row is ridiculous,even with a WJC in your city!The discrepancy in back to back games is also criminal! Does the league get challenged about this!Back-up goalies have never been more important!
This season’s messed-up schedule is brought to you by the 4 Nations Face-Off in February. The 4 Nations Face-Off: Showcasing some (but not all) of the world’s best players in a “tune-up” for the 2026 Olympics. The 4 Nations Face-Off: Hey, at least we’re not the All-Star Game!
That, combined with the World Juniors in Ottawa certainly cramped Ottawa’s schedule, Lyle – but how do they think it’s even remotely fair to give Toronto, Carolina and Montreal 15-16 back-to-backs, and the Jets just 8? You would think the 4 Nations affects all equally, with only Ottawa also having a lengthy tournament affecting their rink.
George, West teams have a lot more kilometres to travel every season. It’s never apples to apples. That said, some teams having almost 2x more back to backs then others is definitely a bit unfair.