NHL
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The Avalanche are the NHL's best team. But is their division the NHL's best? Tyler Schank / Getty Images
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Good morning to everyone except the 16 teams who weren’t in the playoffs on U.S. Thanksgiving. Sorry, your season is over. I don’t make the rules. Better luck next year.
There were five NHL games last night, none of which provided a highlight as funny as the New York Giants trying to kick a field goal. Welcome to the “how could that even happen” sports blooper hall of fame, Younghoe Koo, that Brad Marchand shootout attempt will be by soon to show you around.
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Anyway …
There’s no right answer to this question, because “best” is in the eye of the beholder. But let’s debate it anyway. From a fan’s perspective, which of the four divisions is the league’s best?
➕ The case for: It’s been the hardest division to predict all season, and remains so today – the two-time defending champions can’t even carve out a playoff spot here. Instead, we’re seeing a true changing of the guard, with young teams such as Montreal and Ottawa taking over, while Detroit makes its case and nobody’s quite sure what’s happening in Boston. Even the bad teams, such as Toronto and Buffalo, are fun in a trainwreck kind of way. And heading into last night, the Atlantic had scored the most goals of any division despite having played the fewest games.
➖ The case against: There’s a good argument to be made that the Lightning are the only decent team in this whole bunch. The other seven teams all have negative goal differentials, and only two teams are even at .600, which is the fewest in the league.
➕ The case for: It’s by far the closest division, with only seven points separating first from last heading into last night. All eight teams are over .500, the only division that’s true for, and everyone but the Blue Jackets is even or better in goals differential (excluding shootouts). Five teams in the Metro are over .600; no other division has more than three. All told, the Metro has the best cumulative record of any division. Also, and maybe most importantly, Matthew Schaefer plays here.
➖ The case against: Are any of these teams actually good? The Hurricanes and Devils probably are, but the rest of the division is just a bunch of so-so teams fighting over the chance to be huge underdogs in the playoffs. Also, the name is stupid.
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➕ The case for: The Central has the Avalanche, the league’s best team. You could at least make a case that it also has the second-best team in the Stars, plus the hottest team in the Wild. Oh, and it’s got the Jets, last year’s Presidents’ Trophy winner. The Mammoth are a great story — Blackhawks, too. The Blues were a 96-point playoff team a year ago, and the Predators are a cautionary example.
➖ The case against: Can a division really be the “best” if there’s no suspense over who’s going to win? The Avalanche have already pulled so far ahead that it feels like they can coast the rest of the way and still easily earn home ice. Dallas is in a similar situation. Two months in, it’s possible we already know all we need to know about the Central, beyond whether the second wild-card spot goes to the Hawks or Mammoth. Boring.
➕ The case for: The Pacific is the fun kind of chaos. Start with the Ducks, who may be the league’s best story through two months. Macklin Celebrini and the Sharks aren’t far behind. The Kings and Kraken are both better than expected. The Golden Knights are lurking as the final boss fight for the division’s young upstarts. The Oilers are absolutely fascinating. And the Canucks and Flames are at least committing to the bit.
➖ The case against: On paper, it’s the worst division in terms of points percentage. The Pacific has scored the fewest goals of any division, while giving up the second most. It’s feasting on loser points, with only Anaheim having actually won more games than it’s lost while a shameful five teams are fake .500. It looks like the division will produce only three playoff teams, and whoever comes out of the Pacific in May will get absolutely steamrolled by the Central rep.
So, what do you think? Cast your vote for the NHL’s best division here.
Let’s stay on the divisions theme, with a simple question: Can you guess which NHL record is held by Dave McLlwain?
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I’ll give you a few hints because there’s a very good chance you have no idea who Dave McLlwain is. He was a journeyman defensive forward who played 10 NHL seasons in the ’80s and ’90s, but he set the particular record we’re looking for in 1991-92. He was the first player to do it and remains the only one. In theory, his record could be matched this season (and a handful of players are already halfway there), but it would be impossible to break – at least today, because there were several years when someone could have broken it.
If you’re still stumped, a look at his Hockey Reference page will probably give the game away. Full answer down below.
🥈 Shayna Goldman is right: The loser point is out of control and the NHL needs a new standings system. Read her case here.
📉 Dom Luszczyszyn has his latest playoff report, and it’s not great news for Canada.
🏒 Our staff has quarter-mark grades for all 32 teams. See if you can guess which three teams get to take home an A+.
🥅 Jesse Granger has his first in-season ranking of all 32 goaltending tandems. Blues fans, don’t click that link — you’ve been warned.
🏆 Dom’s latest awards watch features plenty of Colorado Avalanche representation and explanations for some surprising exclusions.
🎙️ On the Monday “Athletic Hockey Show,” the guys break down the post-Thanksgiving playoff picture and try to figure out which bubble teams are destined to defy the odds.
I’m assuming you’re like me, and you hold a little party every time one of history’s biggest blockbuster trades has an anniversary. If so, it’s a busy week. If not, let’s get you caught up. You weirdo.
Sunday was Nov. 30, which makes it the 20-year anniversary of the trade that sent Joe Thornton from Boston to the Sharks. It was the first big midseason trade of the cap era, and it ended up making history – Thornton went on to win the Hart Trophy that year, making him the first and only player in the “big four” North American men’s pro sports leagues to ever win an MVP in a season he was traded.
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The Bruins got three players in return: Wayne Primeau, Brad Stuart and Marco Sturm, the team’s current coach. Over the years, various Boston fans have made half-hearted attempts to defend the deal, arguing that Thornton’s exit freed up cap space and lineup room for other players, indirectly helping the team towards its eventual 2011 Cup win. Still, it’s hard to argue that this one was even close in hindsight. The Sharks took a big swing, and they landed a Hall of Famer in his prime. Read more in our behind-the-trade feature from 2023.
Going back even further, this coming Saturday will mark 30 years since the Canadiens traded Patrick Roy to the Avalanche. This is another lopsided one in hindsight – and as a certified old guy, I can tell you that it absolutely felt that way at the time, too. The Habs sent Roy and their captain, Mike Keane, to Colorado in exchange for Andrei Kovalenko, Martin Ručinský and Jocelyn Thibault. Of those three, Kovalenko was gone a year later, Rucinsky peaked with 25 goals in Montreal, and Thibault was their starter for parts of four seasons. It’s fair to say the Avs won the deal. Oh, and the Stanley Cup a few months later. They won both of those things.
All that said, it’s important to remember that Roy had forced the Canadiens’ hand here, essentially walking out on the team after getting shelled a few nights earlier. (Tonight is the 30th anniversary of that game, in fact, so don’t forget to troll any Habs fans you know.) The wheels were already in motion for Roy’s exit, but that game was the final straw.
Two trades, four franchises changed, multiple future Stanley Cup wins determined, and a million debates over how the deals went down, and when, and why. Exactly the sort of stuff that makes it so much fun to be a fan.
In related news, your favorite team’s GM just gave yet another news conference saying it’s too hard to make trades during the season.
📺 Senators @ Canadiens
7 p.m. ET on ESPN+ / TSN2 / RDS
It’s too early to start thinking ahead to possible playoff matchups, but that’s no reason not to do it. Both teams have absolutely looked like playoff locks at some points so far, and like longer shots at others. It’s been more of the latter lately for both teams, meaning someone’s going to get a chance to change direction tonight.
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📺 Maple Leafs @ Panthers
7:30 p.m. ET on ESPN+ / Hulu / TSN4 / TVA
The last time these two teams met, it was in Toronto and it was a winner-take-all Game 7 of their second-round series. The Leafs wilted, the Panthers dominated, and not much has been the same in Toronto ever since. Putting the symbolism aside, both teams need every point they can get in a wild Atlantic race.
📺 Wild @ Oilers
9 p.m. ET on ESPN+ / SN1
It’s the two teams that were featured in the latest Weekend Rankings, some nice synergy that I’ll pretend was intentional. The Wild have been red hot, while the Oilers are under a microscope. Kirill Kaprizov versus the Oilers defense and goaltending feels like the sort of thing that could go very badly for the hometown fans.
Full NHL schedule here. Try streaming games like these for free on Fubo.
We believe that in hockey, as in life, there are no dumb questions. So if you have something you’ve always wondered about the sport, ask away by emailing us at redlight@theathletic.com.
Last week, we had a question about how the league determines what counts as a shot on net. I realized there was one area I didn’t directly address, and a few of you have asked about it, so let’s cover that ground.
I kind of hate this question, because it’s going to force me to think like a goalie, and I prefer it when my brain works properly. But in this particular case, the goalies have a point, so here we go …
A puck that hits the post doesn’t count as a shot on goal because it wasn’t, well, on goal.
If a player winds up for a slap shot from the point, and he ends up blasting it into the upper deck, nobody thinks that should count as a shot. If he slams it into the corner boards, that’s not a shot. If he whiffs on the puck and then spins around like Daffy Duck’s beak before shooting the puck backwards into his own zone … well, you get the point. It’s not a shot on goal if you miss the net.
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Well, hitting the post or crossbar is also missing the net. It’s just barely missing, sure, but that doesn’t matter. A goaltender has a very specific four-by-six-foot area to cover, and the iron resides outside of that.
That means that, as I’ve argued before, a shot that hits the post isn’t a lucky break for the defending team, or a bad one for the team that almost scored. Almost isn’t enough. You missed. It’s not luck.
And as you now know, it’s also not even a real shot.
Dave McLlwain is the only player in NHL history to play for teams in all four divisions in the same season.
Back in 1991-92, he went from the Smythe’s Jets to the Adams’ Sabres to the Patrick’s Islanders to the Norris’ Leafs.
He’s one of four players to play for four teams in the same season, but the only one to hit four different divisions in the process. That record of four divisions in one season is now unbreakable, but in theory, there was a window during the six-division years when someone could have. Nobody did, so Dave McLlwain stands alone.
(Bonus trivia: There’s a second answer to the question “What record does Dave McLlwain hold?”: Of everyone who’s ever played in the NHL, his last name starts with the most consecutive consonants. I saw that on his Wikipedia page and thought, “What kind of deranged person would figure that out,” so I followed the reference link, and it turns out it was me. I’m not sure how to feel about this.)
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Sean McIndoe has been a senior NHL writer with The Athletic since 2018. He launched Down Goes Brown in 2008 and has been writing about hockey ever since, with stops including Grantland, Sportsnet and Vice Sports. His book, “The Down Goes Brown History of the NHL,” is available in book stores now. Follow Sean on Twitter @DownGoesBrown
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