The 2024 Dobber Hockey Midseason Guide was released last week! A big kudos to Ian Gooding and Mario Prata, who both did a lot of the behind-the-scenes heavy lifting to get this done. It has second-half projections, prospects to monitor, trade deadline targets, rebounds, and a whole lot more. Help support what we do at Dobber Hockey by grabbing your copy today!

*

It seemed inevitable but a bit of news on Jack Eichel:

Eichel to IR. Season 5 was a cakewalk compared to Season 7.#Vegasborn

— Chris Gawlik (@TDChrisG) January 15, 2024

Losing Eichel is bad enough for Vegas, but not having Shea Theodore, either, is a lot to overcome for a team with underperforming players as it is.

*

Valeri Nichushkin is back in the player assistance program for an indefinite amount of time. All the best to him as he tries to get through whatever is going on behind the scenes.

*

Leo Carlsson was back in the lineup for Anaheim after missing 10 games due to his knee injury. That he's back this season, let alone this quick, is incredibly good news because that injury looked gruesome initially.

Alex Killorn scored twice in this one, including the overtime winner, to give the Ducks the extra point. Troy Terry also found the back of the next and he now has five points in his last five games. Jackson LaCombe had an assist, a shot, and a hit in nearly 22 minutes of ice time. He has now crested the 20-minute mark in three straight appearances.

Sam Bennett scored twice on five shots with four PIMs and a hit in a good multi-cat performance. Sam Reinhart scored his 32^nd of the year while Carter Verhaeghe had a goal (PP) and an assist. Verhaeghe is now up to 43 points in 43 games.

*

Buffalo won a game they were supposed to and shut out San Jose 3-0 yesterday afternoon. Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen saved all 28 shots he faced for his second shutout of the season. He has been excellent since the holiday break by allowing just seven goals in five games, going 4-1-0 and posting a .950 save percentage.

Casey Mittelstadt had a goal and two assists, one of them on the power play, and that gives him 16 points in his last 14 games. Going back a calendar year, Mittelstadt leads all Sabres forwards in both assists and total points. Rasmus Dahlin had an assist on Jordan Greenway's empty-net goal and there's a bit more on Dahlin's season later in these Ramblings.

*

Tristan Jarry had one of the easiest games of his season as he posted a shutout on 21 shots against in Pittsburgh's 3-0 win over Seattle. That was Jarry's fifth shutout of the season – a career-high – in just his 28^th start.

Seattle was without all of Vince Dunn, Matty Beniers, and Andre Burakovsky for this game and Adam Larsson left the game after the first period. Larsson had a few short shifts before exiting the contest so he tried to gut it out, whatever the issue is, but this is now a lengthy injury list for the Kraken.

Sidney Crosby scored twice while Drew O'Connor tallied the third one. That is four goals, seven points, and 27 shots in O'Connor's last 11 games. Pittsburgh may have found a good second scoring line with him and Bryan Rust flanking Evgeni Malkin.

Kris Letang had an assist, three shots, a block, and a hit in a very good multi-cat effort.

*

In a trend on the day, Boston shut out New Jersey 3-0, the third 3-0 shutout win of the afternoon. Jeremy Swayman saved 31 shots for the blank sheet and his save percentage is back over .920, settling at .922 following the victory.

Boston lined up with David Pastrnak, Charlie Coyle, and Brad Marchand on the top line and it paid off as Pastrnak had 1+1, Marchand 0+2, and Coyle with 1+0 on five shots. This game pushed Pastrnak over the 60-point mark, landing at 61 in 43 games thus far. The guy is incredible.

Luke Hughes and Simon Nemec both skated over 25 minutes (the former over 28 minutes) thanks to an injury to Brendan Smith. I wonder how often a (likely) playoff team has had two rookie blue liners skate over 25 minutes in any game.

*

Dmitri Voronkov scored twice on nine (!) shots with a pair of blocks and a hit in Columbus's 4-3 shootout win over Vancouver. Columbus put up 44 shots on Vancouver, tying the season-high for shots allowed by the Canucks (November 30^th vs. Vegas). Casey DeSmith had a solid game, stopping 41 of 44, but the Jackets got the edge in the shootout.

Adam Boqvist had an assist (PP), two shots, and three blocks in a solid fantasy effort. He also skated 3:24 more in ice time than the next-closest Jackets blue liner. He has four points in four games since returning from injury and seems to have the trust of the coaches right now.

*

Pierre-Luc Dubois had a goal and an assist in Los Angeles's 5-2 win in Carolina on Monday afternoon. It was his second multi-point game since the calendar rolled to 2024 and now has five points in six games. Perhaps his regression is starting to kick in.

Phillip Danault had a goal and two assists while Trevor Moore scored twice, including the empty-netter. That made 20 goals for Moore this season, his first of his career. Danault now has points in five straight, totaling seven points in all.

Antti Raanta was pulled after allowing four goals on 20 shots. The result wasn't really his fault but it wasn't a sterling start for the netminder who has struggled all season.

*

Jonas Brodin returned to Minnesota's lineup and seemed to be a difference-maker immediately as the Wild won 5-0 over the New York Islanders. The team outshot Minnesota 8-4 with Brodin on the ice at 5-on-5 and outscored them 1-0. He makes a big difference for them defensively.

Joel Eriksson Ek had a pair of goals (one on the PP) on four shots, one block, two PIMs, and three hits in another great fantasy night (he's had a lot of them this season). Marcus Foligno and Mats Zuccarello each had a goal and an assist. For everyone worried about Brock Faber's role, he skated nearly 26 minutes and had a power play helper as he kept that spot.

Marc-Andre Fleury saved the 21 shots he faced for the shutout. That win pushed him into second all-time ahead of Patrick Roy. Whatever happens for Minnesota this season, Fleury is headed to the Hall of Fame not long after he retires.

*

Montreal's top line had a good power play game at home against Colorado in the Canadiens' 4-3 win over the Avalanche. Nick Suzuki had a pair of PP assists while both Juraj Slafkovsky and Cole Caufield scored on the man advantage. That was Slafkovsky's first goal since December 22^nd, and he did it with six shots on goal; he had just six total shots on goal in his previous nine games. There have been improvements to his game this season, but he needs to shoot a lot more to pump up his fantasy value. Suzuki's two PPPs pushed him to 19 on the season, surpassing last year's mark of 17 in 82 games, and he’s now one off his career-high 20 PPPs set in 2021-22 (again in 82 games).

Cale Makar had a goal, two assists (one PP), and six shots in the loss. It pushed him over the 50-point mark on the season, a mark he has passed in every season of his career save the COVID Bubble year where he played 44 games.

*

After yesterday's schedule, 30 of 32 teams have played at least 40 games. This allows us to take a measured look at which players have improved or declined in various fantasy stats in their most recent first 20-or-so games as compared to the first 20-or-so contests of the season.

Data from Natural Stat Trick or Frozen Tools, unless otherwise indicated, and are as of Monday morning. We will limit it to players who've managed at least 10 games in both 'halves' to give us some sort of sample to work with. We will quickly hit on the important points to try and cover as many players as possible.

Improvements

Nazem Kadri

Aside from Jacob Markstrom (.926 SV% through 12 starts in this sample), one of the biggest reasons for Calgary's recent surge is Kadri. He had 4 goals, 10 assists, and 66 shots in 22 games to start with but has 10 goals, 10 assists, and 70 shots in his last 21 outings. Part of the credit goes to Connor Zary, too, but positive regression is a hell of a drug.

Bo Horvat

On the topic of positive regression, Horvat's points/game has risen 60% over the two halves as his line with Mathew Barzal finally saw their shots find the back of the net (Anders Lee deserves a nod here, too). New York has split up this duo recently but keeps reuniting them for the third period. It is little wonder why.

Sebastian Aho

Though he didn't have a bad start with a point-per-game mark through 17 games, Aho has 10 goals and 21 assists in his last 22 outings. Notably, Aho has added over 0.3 shots/game to his repertoire, and that's push him north of 3.1 shots per game in that second half. He and Andrei Svechnikov have been on another planet.

Alex Iafallo

This is a good news/bad news situation. The good news is that Iafallo added 2.7 blocks/60 minutes compared to his first half, which meant a rise from 0.6 blocks/game to 1.2 blocks/game. The bad news is that Kyle Connor is nearing a return to action so Iafallo may lose not only his top PP role, but his top-6 role. With just two points over the last four weeks, his fantasy-relevance run may be over (for now).

Arthur Kaliyev

In another good news/bad news situation, Kaliyev has seen his shots/60 rise to 11.25, which was a 93^rd percentile mark for the second half sample. He also saw a monster rise by individual expected goals/60 from 0.72 to 1.32. The problem is he also saw a big shooting percentage drop and that, along with Los Angeles's bottom-6 goal-scoring being non-existent, has crushed his production.

Rasmus Dahlin

The All-Star has seen a massive jump in his shots per game, going from 2.2 in the first sample to 3.7 in the second. While his points/game has been relatively consistent, the added shots (and resulting added goals) have been a huge boost to his overall value. All that is missing now is the team's power play coming alive, and that's been a problem for a calendar year now.

Timothy Liljegren

It has been quite the push from Liljegren, who has been very productive since returning from injury; he had one point (an assist) and six shots in 10 games before his high-ankle sprain, but has 2 goals, 6 assists, 19 shots, 37 blocks, and 21 hits in 14 games since his return. That is very good across-the-board production for a guy that doesn't get top PP minutes.

Declines

Leon Draisaitl

In a weird twist, despite Edmonton's scoring rebound, Draisaitl had 19 assists in 20 games in the first half but just six helpers in 19 games in the most recent stretch. He has even seen his shots/game drop by 0.3 in that span. The note here is that his Individual Points Percentage (IPP, or the rate at which he registers a point on goals scored) fell from 77.8% to 51.5%. He has zero seasons with at least 50 games played where his IPP is below 70%, so a rebound should be coming.

Mason McTavish

It has been tough sledding for the second-year forward as he was injured in early December and missed nearly three weeks. With that said, he has seen sizable drops in goals, assists, and shots per game. The concerning part, aside from all of Anaheim's injuries/trades, is his shot attempts/minute fell 34.5%. Regression hit his line, but the collapsing shot volume is the red flag.

Brayden Point

Small drops in goals and shots per game don't mean a whole lot when splitting samples like this, but Point has seen a massive drop in his assists going from 0.82/game to 0.27/game. He has just six in his last 22 contests, and that's a problem for a guy who doesn't normally offer high peripheral levels. He isn't an elite playmaker so it's likely just regression from the fast start he had, but it's something to monitor.

Tommy Novak

Another player hit by injuries, Novak has just one goal in his last 18 games. That stretch has also seen him post just 23 shots in that span while skating 13:05 a night. Those are all bad signs for his fantasy value over the next three months. The good news is that his playmaking, as tracked by AllThreeZones, is better than last year and he now has 83 games across two seasons of excellent playmaking data.

Michael Eyssimont

The two calling cards for Eyssimont are supposed to be a high shots/minute rate and a high hits/minute rate. Unfortunately, both have declined in the second half of our sample and that has resulted in his hits/game dropping a whopping 46%. If he's not laying the body, there's little fantasy value in multi-cat formats.

Alex Pietrangelo

It would have been a natural assumption that with Theodore injured, Pietrangelo would have seen a big rise in fantasy value as he assumed the top PP role. The reality is that his goals, assists, and shots per minute have all declined. On top of that, he has dropped from 3.1 blocks/game to 1.8/game. It has been a disappointing stretch for him and the team, and with Eichel's injury, it's a big question of how much (if at all) his fantasy value improves in the near-term.

Shayne Gostisbehere

It has been a mixed bag for Gostisbehere who got off to a great start with 18 points in 19 games but has just 11 in his last 23 contests. His problem is that he got a huge portion of his point production on the power play (10/18 points were on the PP to start the year), and as that has dried up for Detroit, so it has dried up for Gostisbehere. Considering the team is splitting their PP units now, and nearly 60% of his production has been on the man advantage, it doesn't bode well moving forward.