Vladimir Tarasenko missed a game over the weekend and with his recent, lengthy injury that saw him miss most of last year and much of the year before, there are always concerns. Those concerns were alleviated on Monday as he was at practice and coach Berube said they expect him to play on Tuesday night in Philadelphia.

This got me digging around a bit on Tarasenko's season so far, and looked up his offensive and defensive impacts on Evolving Hockey. It really is something to behold:

[Tarasenko]

The flip side of that is he has 18 goals and 45 points in 44 games this year, representing a career-best point-per-game mark. He hasn't had great impacts at either end, defensive especially, yet he's still having a superlative season. What gives?

Quite simply, the team is on a tear with him on the ice. At all strengths, the Blues are shooting 13.3% with him on the ice (on-ice shooting percentage). He doesn't have a season with 50 games played and an on-ice shooting percentage above 11.9%. Relatively speaking, the team is shooting more than 10% better with him on the ice than in any season of his career. Can that maintain itself?

The simple answer is: I don't know. If we look across the league this year, there are 36 regular forwards (400+ 5-on-5 minutes) with an on-ice shooting percentage of 11% or above. We are approaching the 50-game mark. In the 56-game season last year, that number was 30. The year before that, the number was 18. Now, this is something I'll look at in the offseason, but my general theory for now is that there are some players, lines, and teams that are better at generating quality and it's showing in shooting percentages. This has always been the case in hockey, but with the emphasis over the last five years on team-wide transition, clean zone entries, and high-danger passing, perhaps the extremes are getting more extreme? That would help explain Tarasenko's season and why he may be able to sustain something close to a point-per-game. I still think he declines PPG-wise over the second half, but it may not be a cratering.

Defensively, there are concerns. No, we don't need our fantasy options to be elite defensively, and we may even want them to eschew such roles. All the same, if a line is pinned in their own zone because they can't retrieve the puck, it doesn't matter how good they are in the offensive zone. It would be nice to see a turnaround there on his behalf.

All that aside, it's been a wonderful return to the ice for Tarasenko after playing just 34 games in two years. We never know how players are going to react to long absences and injuries, and he did great.

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A fairly significant update on TJ Oshie

T.J. Oshie, Vitek Vanecek and Justin Schultz are all on the ice in full contact jerseys at Caps practice.

Oshie and Vanecek have been on IR with an upper body injuries. Schultz was injured last week, upper body as well.

— Samantha Pell (@SamanthaJPell) February 21, 2022

Oshie has been fighting injuries all year, totalling just 18 games so far this season, and two games in 2022. We should also mention that Nicklas Backstrom – now healthy – has played fewer than 20 games on the year while Anthony Mantha has played 10. That is basically their entire second line totalling fewer than 50 games this season. The Capitals, and Alex Ovechkin in particular, were brilliant in the first couple months, but this team is 9-9-2 since Christmas, failing to score more than five goals in any one of those 20 games. They need their depth back, and it's on the way.

When he returns, it'll be interesting to see what happens with the power play. Tom Wilson figures to be the guy losing his role when Oshie is in the lineup, but they've also been moving Evgeny Kuznetsov around at times, as they did last year. It wouldn't be overly surprising to see Kuzy move, though I would still expect it's Wilson to lose the top PP role.

Finally, though Oshie should be owned in most fantasy formats as long as he has that PP role, remember that he's play a lot down on the third line this year. It is not a guarantee that he slides right back with Backstrom.

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Oliver Ekman-Larsson left Vancouver's last game but was at morning skate on Monday and played Monday night. No need to worry about his status.

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Looking through some data on defensemen since Christmas, and something stuck out to me: Ryan Graves is having a pretty good fantasy season.

On the year, Graves is sitting with 0.42 points per game, a career-best mark. He has seen a drop in some stats like penalty minutes, but he's averaging a shade shy of two blocks per game, 1.7 shots per game, and the plus/minus isn't even that bad at minus-3. But he's also 1 of 15 defensemen to have double-digit shot attempts per 60 minutes at 5-on-5 since Christmas, but also at least five blocks per 60 minutes as well. But it's the fact that the numbers are improving that draws us here; he averaged 1.44 shots per game leading up to Christmas but is at 2.0 shots per game since. The ice time per game mark is within 10 seconds so it's not a TOI spike, either. He is just getting more shots, though he hasn't scored since early December.

Maybe something changes now that Dougie Hamilton looks set to return very soon, but Graves has been a good fantasy asset this season. With the team getting health-ish, maybe he retains this value even if Hamilton is back in the lineup.

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Carter Hart was a game-day scratch for the Flyers with an eye infection. Nothing beyond that was given so we'll have to play it day to day, but any eye problems for a goalie should raise some concerns.

Staying with the Flyers, Rasmus Ristolainen was activated off the IR and played on Monday afternoon. Though his point production has cratered this year, he still has 227 blocks+hits in 42 games this year. Those peripherals are still coming through strong.

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Winnipeg put Cole Perfetti on the injured reserve and lined up the newly acquired Adam Brooks on the second line. Being a waiver addition and heading right to a line with Kyle Connor isn't a bad way to be, but we’ll get back to this.

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Speaking of waiver additions, Ryan Dzingel was picked up by San Jose off waivers. Coach Bob Boughner said that he'll come in on the wing and could see some PP time:

Boughner says Dzingel will join the Sharks in Anaheim tomorrow. Could play power play, will line up at wing. So Sharks may have another recall tomorrow morning to fill 4C

📢 advertisement:

— Sheng Peng (@Sheng_Peng) February 21, 2022

This is kind of interesting, at least for deeper fantasy league. Dzingel is a guy who converts on a very high percentage of his shots, so if he can climb into the top-6 with the likes of Hertl, Meier, and Couture, there could be something here.

At the same time, if he slides in on the fourth line with secondary PP time, this isn't much to write home about. We'll have to see where he ends up, but this is not nothing.

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Some defense news out of Vegas:

Alec Martinez is back on the ice today too. pic.twitter.com/EaOYxP0yUn

— Ben Gotz (@BenSGotz) February 21, 2022

Alec Martinez hasn't played since Remembrance Day, which is a reminder of the injuries this team has endured this year. He will need some time to get back to his usual self, but check waiver wires in all formats for a depth option that may have been dropped by now.

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Boston laid the wood to Colorado in a 5-1 beatdown on Monday afternoon. It should be said that for Colorado, who play out of the Mountain time zone, this was kind of like a Monday morning game. Maybe they can be forgiven for not looking their best.

The top line did a lot of the damage with David Pastrnak (2+1), Patrice Bergeron (1+1), and Taylor Hall (0+3) had three goals and five assists in the game. They also combined for 18 shots on goal, so this was a very good outing across the board for them.

Charlie McAvoy had a great across-the-board performance with two assists, one shot, one block, three hits, and a plus-1 rating.

Nathan MacKinnon had the lone goal for the Avs, landing seven shots on goal in nearly 20 minutes of ice time.

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It wasn't Calgary's best game of the season, but they're one of the top contenders in the West and managed to squeak a 3-1 win against Winnipeg. We had a 1-1 game in the final minute when Elias Lindholm scored his for the eighth straight contest, lifting them to a 2-1 advantage, with Tyler Toffoli adding an empty-net marker.

It should be mentioned that Toffoli was moved to the top PP unit in this game, though because of his depth role he still didn't crack the 15-minute mark. But, that is a big improvement for his fantasy value, provided he stays there.

Adam Brooks started the game on Winnipeg's second line but finished the game on the bench as Evgeny Svechnikov took his spot. Just keep an eye here because we have seen The Other Svech skate in that role at times this year.

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Carolina got a ridiculous overtime goal from Brett Pesce, who batted a pass out of mid-air, took a quick cradle, and went shelf for the 4-3 win:

Brett Pesce got this puck out of midair for the OT winner 🤯 @Canes pic.twitter.com/LTn899mBFy

— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) February 21, 2022

Not often you see a defenseman do that, particularly one we don't consider among the Makar/Hedman tier offensively. It just shows how incredibly skilled all these guys are.

Vincent Trocheck had an excellent fantasy effort in the victory with one goal, one assists, five shots, a hit, and a plus-2 rating. That was his first multi-point game in a month, and hopefully is a harbinger of more to come.  

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The Habs came out and raced to a 5-0 lead in their game against the Leafs on Monday night. Montreal would eventually hang on for a 5-2 win, and the top line were the stars here. Josh Anderson (2+1) and Cole Caufield (1+2) combined for three goals and three assists, with Anderson posting four hits to go with that production. Jeff Petry had an assist in this one, making it four straight games with a point for him. He also had a shot, two blocks, and a hit for a pretty good fantasy evening.

Petr Mrazek stayed in for all five goals with the Leafs playing on Tuesday night. It was not a very strong night from him.

Sam Montembeault saved 35 of 37 for the win in a stellar performance.