NHL Morning Coffee Headlines – May 7, 2026
The Sabres take the opening game of their series with the Canadiens, the Ducks even their series with the Golden Knights, the Selke Trophy finalists are announced, and more in today’s NHL Morning Coffee Headlines.
NHL.COM: Early goals by Josh Doan and Ryan McLeod powered the Buffalo Sabres to a 4-2 victory over the Montreal Canadiens in Game 1 of their best-of-seven second-round series. Doan and McLeod each finished with two points, Jordan Greenway tallied the game-winner, Zach Benson collected two assists, and Alex Lyon stopped 26 shots for the Sabres. Nick Suzuki and Kirby Dach replied for the Canadiens. Game 2 of this series is on Friday in Buffalo at 7 pm ET.
SPECTOR’S NOTE: The Sabres did an excellent job capitalizing on the Canadiens’ early mistakes in this game. Benson is emerging as a reliable playoff performer for the Sabres.
The Canadiens had difficulty at times adjusting to the Sabres’ speed and offensive play after coming off a tight-checking series with the Tampa Bay Lightning. They’re still not getting even-strength offense from their top line of Suzuki, Cole Caufield, and Juraj Slafkovsky.
Anaheim Ducks center Leo Carlsson (NHL Images)
The Anaheim Ducks tied their series with the Vegas Golden Knights at a game apiece with a 3-1 win in Game 2. Lukas Dostal made 21 saves while Beckett Sennecke, Leo Carlsson, and Jansen Harkins scored for the Ducks. Mark Stone tallied in the final seconds for the Golden Knights. The series shifts to Anaheim for Games 3 and 4.
SPECTOR’S NOTE: The Ducks used their speed at both ends of the ice to bounce back from their Game 1 loss. They also did a good job killing off five penalties. Dostal shook off his shaky performance in the opening game and was solid throughout this contest.
NHL.COM: Anthony Cirelli of the Tampa Bay Lightning, Brock Nelson of the Colorado Avalanche, and Nick Suzuki of the Montreal Canadiens are the finalists for the Frank J. Selke Trophy, which is awarded annually to the league’s top defensive forward as voted by the Professional Hockey Writers Association.
SPECTOR’S NOTE: All three are worthy candidates. Suzuki is considered the favorite to win the award this season.
SPORTSNET: Elliotte Friedman reports the NHL officially informed teams that the salary cap for 2026-27 will be $104 million. That is an increase of $8.5 million over this season’s $95.5 million cap.
The salary cap minimum will be $76.9 million, and the midpoint $90.4 million. The maximum salary for individual contracts will be $20.8 million.
SPECTOR’S NOTE: The league is confirming its 2026-27 cap projection from last year. The cap for 2027-28 is projected to reach $113.5 million.
This will provide teams with another significant annual boost to the salary-cap payroll. However, not every club will spend to that ceiling. Some clubs (usually the rebuilding ones) will be closer to the cap floor.
PHILLY HOCKEY NOW: A lower-body injury will sideline Flyers center Noah Cates for the remainder of his club’s second-round series with the Carolina Hurricanes. Cates suffered the injury during Game 2.
Flyers center Christian Dvorak is listed as day-to-day with an undisclosed injury.
RATINGS.ORG: Marco D’Amico reports University of Michigan center Adam Valentini could be a sleeper pick in the 2026 NHL Draft. The 5’9”, 190-pounder had 27 points in 40 games this season.
Valentini, 18, is projected to be selected in the second round or later. His speed, two-way play, and work ethic have Michigan head coach Brandon Naurato comparing him to Florida Panthers winger Brad Marchand.
Much I hate the habs the Sabres are going to have a tough time with Montreal. With the Canadiens there’s a lot to like. Even more than my dislike for Montreal I really hate the draft lottery the invention of Gary and his cronies The bruins have been fleeced twice with this no I don’t think it’s rigged. But I just don’t like the system .
Hopefully when the next Commish comes in he gets rid of it. McKenna’ would have looked awfully good in the black and gold.
If there was no lottery the black and yellow wouldn’t have gotten McKenna either…
If any team has a right to bitch about the draft lottery it’s the Vancouver Canucks! Over the years they have held the highest odds numerous times and yet have never had the 1st overall pick since their formation in 1970. That inaugural year they came into the league with Buffalo … and lost the 1st overall in a coin flip! That pick was Gilbert Perreault.
Between 2016 and 2019 they experienced 4 straight drops despite having the best odds – from 3rd to 5th in 2016, from 2nd to 5th in 2017, from 6th to 7th in 2018, and from 9th to 10th in 2019. That bad luck continues this year when they fell from 1st to 3rd.
Not once in their history (56 years) have they ever moved UP in the draft. Talk about being snake-bit!
Actually, it was a carnival prize wheel that decided the 1970 draft lottery, held at the Queen Elizabeth Hotel in Montreal.
No but they could have ended up with the 6th overall.
Yeah, of course … thanks for the reminder, Wally. I remember that now. Rank confusion. The Canucks were assigned numbers 1-10 on the wheel and Buffalo nos. 11 to 20 (why they didn’t assign the numbers from 1 to 20 alternately was a big complaint afterwards).
Clarence Campbell initially proclaimed that the wheel pointer landed on 1, and of course the Canucks were happy. But Punch Imlach, then with the Sabres, asked for confirmation and, upon closer examination, it was 11 … not 1.
That’s a flippin’ bizarre story guys.
Sounds like the boys may have had few before the event. Campbell couldn’t see the 10 and 12 beside the 11?
Without the draft lotto leafs woulda been drafting 5th I believe. So Boston wouldn’t have gotten the pick anyway? Am I missing something?only 4 teams had less points than Toronto
Nothing is going to change unless the league has a desire to or to try something different. The Commish’s directives are driven by the board that he answers to. Whether it is Gary, or Larry Curly or Moe in the future.
I l think the current lotto is as fair as it gets and works well enough.
As for the Habs, yea they are a good team but Sabres have a lot to like as well. I particularly like their D. Not only big but mobile and skilled.
Ya who knows if they struck a decent balance 1Oilerfan. They wanted teams to not throw games away at the end of the year and sit guys. Other than Florida with like more than a dozen guys out, and Leafs right at the end, it pretty much worked. Or did it not?
I also believe the worst teams deserve a chance to get better, how else can you do that if it’s not the draft?
I dunno, tanking is still a thing, and it’s a viable strategy. I would do the same thing if I was the GM of a crappy team. In fact I would do it sooner than most teams do, but it’s not my money.
Lottery makes it a little harder to do it and can extend the pain, so maybe it acts as a deterrent to ownership and on down to MGT. If so, it worked.
Or it’s just a waste of time and hasn’t changed anything. Would need to poll ownership I guess.
Listening to Bettman talk about the new system is to make teams not tank, by sitting out players and flushing their team of talent, like the top 3 or 4 teams have done. I think only Toronto and San Jose didn’t flush out the team of their talent and still tried to win which was evident by the rosters iced.
It’s a new system and we need to see it more before one can criticize it.
I also think the ramifications of this draft in particular to the Burins is especially concerning for their retool. With a top pick no longer coming their way, and Pasta’s cup window closing, by the time they get to pick a late unprotected 1st round 2028 pick for the Carlo trade, is going to be too late and not in that NHL ready prospect to help the team if ever. I don’t think we need to change how protected picks get transferred or anything like this, although a better system would be nice but this kind of situation isn’t common enough to warrant a massive overhaul. But man this draft has drastically changed the trajectory of both these teams in complete opposite directions. The season of what the f is this s#it now continues.
I think the NHL needs to follow the lead of some of the amazingly innovative things the PWHL does (one being the redemption rule, that I really love).
The Gold Plan is fair and provides much more exciting hockey to round out the season.
For those unfamiliar:
“The first overall pick in the 2026 PWHL Entry Draft will be determined by Gold Plan Points, an innovation used to encourage competitive play by all teams throughout the full regular-season. Once a team is mathematically eliminated from playoff contention, the standings points earned (using the league’s 3-2-1-0 system) in their remaining regular-season games are classified as Gold Plan points, earning them progress toward the top pick in the 2026 PWHL Entry Draft. The team with the most Gold Plan points will hold the first selection in each round of the 2026 Entry Draft. The remainder of the draft order of selection will be determined by Gold Plan points among non-playoff teams and playoff results for the four teams who qualify.”
Tanking is a bad look for a professional league, the commish had to do something about it and the draft lottery is what they came up with. Its better than nothing.
I like the idea of determining 1OA and following by giving it to the team that gets the most points after they are officially eliminated from the playoffs. management would be motivated to win until season’s end, coaches would be under the gun and players would have something bigger to play for after elimination.
Under that scenario teams like vancouver that were officially eliminated in February would have a couple months to acrue points and be assured of getting to keep the pick they earn.
If tanking is a bad look for a pro sports league than it’s bad for all of them. The points system isn’t a bad idea, not sure how much it would change things though as the first team out would have the most games to accrue points. So just tank sooner in the season? It might change the TDL? I dunno. Might be over complicating it.
The whole point of giving bad teams earlier picks is so that all teams have an opportunity to compete eventually after their core ages out etc.
All the NA pro sports leagues do it the same way to some extent. The NFL doesn’t have a draft lottery, you finish last, you pick first. They seem to be doing pretty well.
The rest do, and all fairly similar with minor differences. But the worst teams have the best odds so still pays off to tank if you suck.
Seems to be unanimous, and probably because it makes the most sense.
IMO it’s here to stay, and I’m fine with it because I can’t think of a better way to do it.
Bruins…
Their after season presser is always a joke .. they spent millions and millions on depth players last offseason and got lucky making the playoffs .. they were a playoff team that really wasn’t a playoff team .. they went the get tougher and hard to play against route but the problem was the 4th line was the only tough hard to play against line .. other 3 lines and 4 of their Dmen were easy to play against … Now Neely says they need more speed…. Sweeney/Neely played this game they know how it works you blend speed in with toughness … The Bruins D had a #1…#3… #4 … the rest were depth Dmen …
Bruins need to figure out what to do with Neely and Sweeney their thought process is getting boring every year … maybe it’s about time to move on and get new ideas .. the drafts haven’t been good .. the UFA ‘s signings haven’t been good … the trades have been a toss up …
If I am reading puck pedia correctly there are several teams who s time may be coming to trade high draft picks for established young NHL players or stars looking to relocate and get a fresh start.Teams that have multiple picks include St. Louis 3/ SJ,Wash.,Vanc.,NYR,Seattle,Calgary,all have 2 first round picks in this years draft.If you look down the road Calgary has 6 1st round picks in the next 3 years!
Doan and Benson are becoming a troublesome pairing, carrying over from the regular season.
It will be interesting to see if Carrick is inserted back into the lineup for Game 3 when the series shifts up north and Montreal gets to make the last line change before face-off. The FO% advantage they had was noticeable.
Post had a very active game, with a few near-misses, but I can’t count on seeing as much action in Game 2. This game could have gone either way under different circumstances.
Bad break for Hutson on his t/o as well.
I thought MTL played pretty well coming off the big game 7 win. Some bad breaks and paid for their mistakes.
I think they will be even better in game 2.
But, Buffalo is a handful. They can strike fast and have guys who can make plays up and down the lineup, including their D. Have to play almost perfect to keep them off the scoresheet. Tough to do for 60 minutes.
That pain in the ass Benson set up 2 beauties. Byrum was calm, cool and lethal on his PP goal.
Top line didn’t really produce anything for either team at 5 v 5.
These are the two best teams in the east right now. Both deserve to be in the finals. Exciting, hard playing hockey the way we expect to see from good teams that deserve to be there. I’m hoping for seven games from these very entertaining teams.
As a Hab fan(til next season begins) I have seen this team come back many times when I thought they were done.
Oh Hell, yeah. They are consistently resilient. Besides, no one predicted a 4-game sweep for either.
Did Leafs losing 8 of last 9. games help their cause ?
Sbres played their game, Habs built up to their’s, seemed like a comedown after Tampa. That’s not meant to take anything away from Buffalo or sour grapes.
It was a good game, fast and hard hitting, refreshing after the opening series cheap shots and scrums.
Don’t know why folks are riding Benson,, he’s a pest but clean, high motor who doesn’t quit lol the kind of guy you don’t want in your face.
I look forward to a series of great hockey.
I agree with ray bark, buffalo pounces quick on opportunities, they have skill&speed. Montreal can beat them perhaps but not giving the puck away/ or failure to clear their zone it seemed to me.
The Avalanche need to keep doing what it’s doing; never mind what the wild think. Can’t believe the delay in days before the next game. Disrupts the flow of the series; just like the olympkcs, lol !! Let’s keep it going.