Welcome back to another edition of Lining Up! Following the article from last week, we will continue going through each team and highlighting noteworthy line combinations from the early few weeks of the season.

Let's dive in.

Minnesota

After starting the season playing alongside Marcus Foligno and Frederick Gaudreau, fantasy owners are finally seeing early indications that Marco Rossi can become the player everyone thought he could be. Whether he is at last recovered from his long COVID health issues and is back on track in his development or that Minnesota is seeing what he can do with a more favourable situation, Rossi has joined Matt Boldy and Kirill Kaprizov on the top line. In his last two games he cracked the 20-minute mark and even saw over 5:00 of PPTOI against the New York Rangers. Rossi already has six points in his last six games to show for it including 16 shots in that span, just shy of three per game. He is unlikely to be had in dynasty leagues, but Rossi is only rostered in 16% of Yahoo leagues at the moment and Minnesota has four games this week. Stream him in while you can.

Montreal

Sean Monahan is red-hot lately with five points in his past five games which is great to see after being plagued by multiple injuries over his last few seasons. All of his advanced stats indicate that he will see some regression but conversely, Monahan is seeing the most TOI and power-play usage since the 2018-2019 season in Calgary. That power-play usage by the way is on the heavily used top unit where he is averaging over 4:00 so far. His point pace, shots, even FOW% are all the highest they have been in four seasons. At only 35% rostered in Yahoo leagues and with four games, three of them against Atlantic division teams, still to come this week, stream Monahan while he is hot.

Nashville

Ryan O'Reilly and Filip Forsberg have really formed some chemistry early on in the season. Both players have seven points in the last four games and O'Reilly is doing his best Auston Matthews impression with five goals during that span, including a hat trick against the hapless Oilers Saturday night. His shooting percentage is double what it normally is so that will regress but O'Reilly is seeing his highest power play usage since the 2020-2021 season and as opposed to his tenure in Toronto, is being heavily utilized as the one to centre Forsberg.

New Jersey

With the injury to Jack Hughes, Michael McLeod has moved up the lineup to join Tyler Toffoli and Jesper Bratt. This is a player who has seen some time with Bratt but a lot of time as well with Curtis Lazar and Nathan Bastian, so needless to say adding Toffoli to the mix and having an extended look while Hughes nurses himself back to health is an excellent situation. McLeod already has 11 shots and two goals in two games while seeing virtually no power play time and he should be widely available in all leagues since he is only rostered in 4% of Yahoo leagues.

New York Islanders

It could be nothing, but Semyon Varlamov has started two of the last four games for the New York Islanders. Normally this would not be too noteworthy but neither of those starts were back-to-back games and he posted consecutive shutouts. At the very least, he will start next week when the Islanders play against Vancouver and Seattle in successive nights, but it may be worth monitoring this week to see if he gets an extra start. There should be no doubt that Sorokin is the starter, but some teams have been alternating their goalies and if Varlamov continues to play well he may carve out some additional time in the crease.

New York Rangers

In a similar situation to New Jersey, Adam Fox has left a big hole in the lineup since departing with an injury and Erik Gustafsson is the lucky beneficiary who is absorbing all of that quality power play deployment. Since Fox left early in the game against Winnipeg on November 2^nd, Gustafsson has seen over six minutes of PPTOI and averaged a 71.5% share of the power-play time. He also notched a goal and an assist in the last game against Minnesota. So long as Fox is out, Gustafsson is immediately worth rostering as the lone defenseman on a heavily used Rangers unit.

Ottawa

Vladimir Tarasenko started the season playing predominantly with Mathieu Joseph and Ridly Greig but has more recently joined Drake Batherson and Josh Norris. He had a hot stretch over the first few games but lately has cooled off a bit, having four points in his last five games but including two scoreless games as the Senators try to get themselves back on track. He is also playing on the second power play unit with Claude Giroux which is still a decent spot to be in as Ottawa splits their units closer to 60/40 than other teams with a loaded top five. The improvement in even strength linemates though is at minimum, enough to warrant a stream for a big divisional matchup against Toronto tomorrow, a Toronto squad which is currently tied for fourth in Goals Allowed so far.

Philadelphia

With Carter Hart nursing an injury, Philadelphia has turned to Samuel Ersson who is coming off a big 5-1 win against Buffalo. The team has struggled lately but they play one of the few teams having an even more difficult time in San Jose tonight. If you need a spot start or your league counts saves or shots, Ersson or even Petersen would be a great stream in tonight as they man the crease in place of Hart.

Pittsburgh

Reilly Smith has recently replaced Rickard Rakell on the top power play unit and just in time as he scored two goals and added two assists in the decimation of San Jose over the weekend. That has brought him up to over a point per game pace on the season and with this increased deployment, he has seen over 7:00 of PPTOI as Pittsburgh tours California. He is also still lining up with Evgeni Malkin at even strength so consider streaming Smith in while he is being deployed so favourably.