Back before the 2023 Draft, I had a Ramblings that covered some of the prospects I was keeping an eye on. As always, I am not a prospect evaluator, but I do read a lot from sources I trust and try to get an idea of what each player might be. One of the prospects in that article was Dalibor Dvorsky, who ended up going 10^th overall to the St. Louis Blues.

Dvorsky didn't get much ice time with his team in Sweden and some fairly surprising news came down on Wednesday morning:

In 10 games, Dvorsky had no points, was used as a 13th forward past two games. Not sure yet where #stlblues    will place him here in North America. The Sudbury Wolves of the OHL own his rights and logic says he goes there. Don't think they'll rush him to Springfield. https://t.co/F2lTrHY1X8

— Lou Korac (@lkorac10) October 18, 2023

A subsequent tweet let us know that he will indeed be heading to the OHL to play for Sudbury. I would have liked to have seen him go to the AHL, but he will be in North America for the balance of this season.

What Dvorsky ends up being in the NHL is a long way off, but I don't see this as a mark against him or his upside. It is not uncommon for teenagers to get almost no ice time in the European men's leagues – more in the KHL than elsewhere, but still – so him wanting to go elsewhere doesn't really mean much to me. It will be interesting to see if he can dominate the OHL or not. That will be a lot more telling than going from Sweden to Canada to play his first post-draft season.

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Columbus defenceman Zach Werenski was on the ice for Columbus on Wednesday, taking contact during practice. This is less than a week after he sustained a leg injury that appeared, at first blush, as if it may take a huge chunk of his season away. That he looks to be well on the mend, after his injury-plagued 2022-23 season, is a good sign. The Blue Jackets need him in the lineup.  

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I watched the Los Angeles-Winnipeg game on Tuesday night for one specific reason: Arthur Kaliyev. No, I wasn't overly interested in the Pierre-Luc Dubois vs. Winnipeg Fans matchup. I was interested in a player I was very high on in his draft year but whose performance, outside of the power play, left something to be desired. Kaliyev skated just 12 minutes but had a pair of points in the Kings' beatdown of the Jets.

The line of Trevor Moore, Phillip Danault, and Kaliyev absolutely torched Winnipeg, managing eight shots in fewer than 10 minutes 5-on-5 time, scoring thrice. Kaliyev looked engaged in the offensive zone, but he was also hard on backchecks and that's something that scouts worried about as a draft pick. He doesn't have high-end straight-line speed or anything, but the effort was there, and if he maintains that effort level, the results will follow.

It will be very interesting to see how this line performs moving forward. Viktor Arvidsson may be out a while and he was very good on the Danault line. Kaliyev can't directly replace him, but if he can keep that line dangerous offensively, it gives the Kings three legitimate scoring lines. It also gives their second PP unit a big boost, too.

Los Angeles's next 10 games are as follows: @ MIN, vs. BOS, vs. ARI, @ ARI, vs. VGK, @ TOR, @ OTT, @ PHI, @ VGK. That is a good mix of non-playoff and playoff teams alike, so it should give us a good idea of what we might expect from Kaliyev as long as he stays on one of the top three lines. We are, in a word, excited.

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We got some new Toronto lines at practice, though it's worth noting Tyler Bertuzzi had a maintenance day:

#Leafs in practice:
Gregor-Matthews-Marner
Knies-Tavares-Nylander
Domi-Minten-Jarnkrok
Benoit-Kampf-Reaves

Rielly-Brodie
McCabe-Liljegren
Giordano-Klingberg

Samsonov
Woll

Bertuzzi absent (maintenance)

— Terry Koshan 🇺🇦 (@koshtorontosun) October 18, 2023

The team has tried some different iterations of their second and third lines already this season, and now we get Matthew Knies back where he was at times after getting to Toronto last year. Whether this lasts or not, we'll see, but it's a great chance for the rookie to show his offensive skills.

This is where I note that so far this season, Toronto is carrying just 44% of the shots, 42% of the expected goals, and 38% of the actual goals scored at 5-on-5 with their Big Four off the ice. Since the trade of Pierre Engvall last season, with those Big Four attackers on the bench, Toronto has carried 46% of the shots, 44% of the expected goals, but 55% of the actual goals. The only reason that last number is over 50% is getting .940 goaltending behind them. If that number is the team's average (.921, which is still very good), they're sitting at 48%. In the season and a half leading up to the Engvall trade, the team carried 53% of the shots, 52% of the expected goals, and broke even by goals for/against.

Pointing out the bottom-6 struggles serves two purposes:

1. It allows me, a Canadiens fan, to take an unnecessary shot at the Leafs.
2. To highlight that the struggles of the bottom-6 has forced a lot more ice time to the top guys.

Specific to that last point, through three games, both Auston Matthews and Mitch Marner are skating over 23 minutes a game. Matthews finished with 25:49 in their game against Chicago, the most for him in a non-overtime game in nearly one calendar year (26:46 against Dallas on October 20^th of 2023).

Whether those extreme ice time levels stay consistent remains to be seen because a big part of the Matthews TOI jump is getting some time on the penalty kill. Regardless, the shot rate he could bring if he's skating 22-23 minutes rather than 20-21 would be a sight to see. Something to monitor over the next couple of weeks.  

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An interesting note on Cale Makar:

CALE MAKES HISTORY 🥬

Makar becomes the fastest defenseman in NHL history to reach 250 career points.

The record was previously held by Bobby Orr.

(H/T: @ESPNStatsInfo) pic.twitter.com/ZTQSzR8oL9

— TSN (@TSN_Sports) October 18, 2023

He gets a lot of praise but sometimes I think it's not enough.

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Pavel Buchnevich was not at practice after leaving the team's win against Seattle a few nights ago. The team has already ruled him out for Thursday night's game at home against Arizona. Brandon Saad was in his spot at practice and Kasperi Kapanen was the player who took Buch's role on the power play over the weekend.

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Gabriel Vilardi was not at Winnipeg practice after leaving the team's game on Tuesday night and there are big fantasy implications of that:

As he did for a good chunk of Tuesday's game after the departure of Gabriel Vilardi, Nikolaj Ehlers is working with the #NHLJets top power play unit.

— Ken Wiebe (@WiebesWorld) October 18, 2023

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Some transactional news for San Jose prospect blueliner Henry Thrun:

D Henry Thrun has been assigned to the @sjbarracuda.

— San Jose Sharks PR (@SanJoseSharksPR) October 18, 2023

One of my concerns about Thrun in the offseason was that San Jose had a lot of defencemen with NHL contracts and Thrun was the guy that wouldn't need waivers. As to how many of those defencemen should be on the NHL roster of a competitive team is another question entirely, but there was a logjam. It gave the Sharks a clear out to not have Thrun playing in the NHL. He'll be back at some point.

We will also forget about me saying that Jacob MacDonald was a guy in line for top PP time with Thrun likely being shipped to the AHL.

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An update on Panther center Sam Bennett:

Maurice says Bennett (lower body) won't play tomorrow, but will hopefully be ready to return at some point during this current four-game homestand.

Gadjovich (upper body) should be back next month.

— Jameson Olive (@JamesonCoop) October 18, 2023

This should be a bit worrisome for Evan Rodrigues fantasy owners. He would almost certainly be the odd man out if they team wants to use Bennett on the top PP unit (and they have). Something to keep an eye on.

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Jared Spurgeon was skating for the first time since suffering an upper-body injury a couple of weeks ago. That he's skating is obviously a good sign but there's still no official timeline for his return.  

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Josh Norris was back in the Ottawa lineup on Wednesday night as his return from his shoulder surgery last year was a bit more complicated than anticipated. He started the game on a line with Drake Batherson and Dominik Kubalik, and slotted on the top PP unit, booting Claude Giroux to the second unit. Jake Sanderson also was moved to the top power play unit in place of Thomas Chabot. I am not entirely sure what happened there considering the power play was 3/11 to start the season. I suppose two of those goals came from Sanderson and Jakob Chychrun so maybe it's trying to ride a hot hand? Anyway, not great news for Chabot.

Ottawa laid a beatdown on Washington by a 6-1 margin. Norris scored twice in his return to the lineup, one of those coming with the top power play unit. Batherson had a pair of helpers while Stützle had three of them. Both Claude Giroux and Vladimir Tarasenko had a goal and an assist with the latter adding a pair of hits to his total. For Tarasenko, that makes six points in four games to start the season and three straight multi-point contests. A pretty good start for a guy looking for his last big contract next summer.

Sanderson had a goal and an assist as well while Chabot had a helper with three shots and a block. John Carlson scored the lone Washington goal, totaling three shots, four blocks, and a hit. A very bad game for the Caps but a very good game for their star blueliner.

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Alex DeBrincat is on his own proper tear to start the season, managing two goals on four shots, and an assist and a hit, in Detroit's 6-3 win over Pittsburgh. That is eight points (three on the power play) in four games for DeBrincat in a Red Wings uniform. Safe to say the team is happy with his performance thus far.

Andrew Copp (x2), David Perron, and Ben Chiarot also scored. Those were Copp's second third goals of the season, and it took him until December 4th to score his second goal last year. A more Copp-like season from him would do wonders for this team's middle-6. He has 17 shots in those four games, by the by.

Dylan Larkin had a trio of assists, one on the power play, to go with four shots, a block, and seven PIMs. He has five points and 22 shots in four games, but just one goal. Imagine what his stat line is going to look like once those shots start going in.