There are just 10 days until the Trade Deadline and the Washington Capitals have a number of players that will garner interest, including both Anthony Mantha and Nic Dowd. Both have been injured recently, though, and that's always a concern at this time of year. There was good news at practice with Mantha back on the ice with the team and Nic Dowd in a non-contact jersey:

Anthony Mantha is on the ice in a regular jersey. He left late in Saturday's game with an undisclosed injury

— Bailey Johnson (@BaileyAJohnson_) February 26, 2024

Mantha was back in the lineup on Monday night though Dowd needs a bit more time.

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Toronto goalie Joseph Woll has been recalled from his AHL conditioning loan. It was just one game, but the team deems him ready for NHL action so he's back with the big club. The Leafs start a five-game homestand on Tuesday night against Vegas.  

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Jeff Skinner had an issue in practice on Monday:

Jeff Skinner left practice early and Granato said they're getting some imaging now before the flight to get a handle on his status. Sounds like same issue he's been dealing with for a while. #Sabres

— Mike Harrington (@ByMHarrington) February 26, 2024

We will keep the updates coming as we get them, but it's another injury setback for a team that has had their fair share this season. Tyson Jost has been recalled in the meantime.

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Montreal provided some injury updates as Rafael Harvey-Pinard was skating on his own with Jayden Struble back at practice:  

RHP a recommencé à patiner en solitaire. Dans surprise Jayden Struble participe à l'entraînement des @CanadiensMTL ce matin. @TVASports

— Renaud Lavoie (@renlavoietva) February 26, 2024

They aren't big fantasy names right now, but both Tanner Pearson and Joel Armia are, ostensibly, candidates to be moved. It could free up a middle-six role for Harvey-Pinard when he returns, though there's still a Josh Anderson-sized roadblock to the second line alongside Alex Newhook and Joshua Roy.

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In very positive news, Colorado forward Valeri Nichushkin has been cleared to return to the team following his time in the Player Assistance Program. There is no official timeline for a return to game action but that he's back with the team is a big step.

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A quick update on Tyler Seguin:

Oops, yeah forgot about him.

He has had a nagging issue and they decided after the Ottawa game that they needed to get it looks at. He flew back to Texas and Pete DeBoer said this morning that he is "week to week." https://t.co/lhbbIAcfZh

— Mike Heika (@MikeHeika) February 26, 2024

With Seguin out, Logan Stankoven was in the Dallas lineup again on Monday. With Seguin's "week-to-week" designation, Stankoven may be in the NHL for a little while yet.

That Stars game against the Islanders saw the latter move Brock Nelson up to the top line, Anders Lee down to the second line, and Jean-Gabriel Pageau taking Nelson's spot as the second-line centre. In the 12 games since Patrick Roy took over, Bo Horvat and Anders Lee have combined for one goal at 5-on-5, so a change makes sense, but it does make the lineup very top-heavy (good for Nelson's fantasy value, though).

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Lou Korac reports that Blues defenceman Justin Faulk was taking part in full-contact drills in Monday's practice, and that led to his activation off the long-term injured reserve. It looks like he’s ready to go for Tuesday’s game against Winnipeg.

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Jack Eichel is traveling with Vegas on their current road trip so it seems as if his seven-week absence may be coming to an end shortly. The team wouldn't commit to him playing any of those next four games, but that he came along with them is a good sign.

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Washington halted Ottawa's four-game point streak with a 6-3 win on Monday night. All nine goals were scored by the middle of the second period and it was even a 2-2 game at one point. Turnovers and a lack of timely saves was the difference.

John Carlson set the Capitals' franchise record for games played by a defenceman and scored (PP) in his celebration night, registering two shots and two blocks total. Aliaksei Protas had a goal and two assists with two blocks while Hendrix Lapierre scored twice for the Caps. Mantha and Connor McMichael both had a pair of helpers while Max Pacioretty scored his first goal in nearly seven weeks. McMichael now has nine points in his last nine games.

Anton Forsberg let in four goals on 10 shots and was pulled after the first period. Joonas Korpisalo allowed the other two on 10 more shots.

Darcy Kuemper stopped 18 of 21 in the win.

Both Brady Tkachuk and Shane Pinto had a goal and two assists. Tkachuk finished the game with three shots, a block, and three hits while Pinto had one shot and one hit. Pinto also has 13 points in 15 games since his return, and he's showing fantasy managers why he could be a very good option come drafts in September.

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Logan Stankoven registered the first goal and assist (PP) of his career, but the Islanders defeated the Stars 3-2 in overtime. Bo Horvat had the tally in the extra frame while Ryan Pulock and Kyle MacLean had the others. Pulock finished the game with two shots, five blocks, two PIMs, and a pair of hits in the victory. Horvat had seven total shots, a block, and two hits along the way.

Stankoven skated 14:20 at even strength, which was second-line usage for the night. Regardless of Seguin's health, he may be working himself into a roster spot.

Thomas Harley had a power play assist, one shot, one block, and two PIMs. He is up to 35 points in 57 games and if we include the 25 regular season/playoff games from 2022-23, he has 46 points in his last 82 NHL games.

Ilya Sorokin stopped 30 of 32 shots in the win.

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Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Leon Draisaitl, and Evan Bouchard each had a goal and an assist (each of them having one power play points) in Edmonton's 4-2 win over Los Angeles. Draisaitl finished with five shots and a hit while Bouchard had three shots, two blocks, two PIMs, and a hit.

Zach Hyman also scored once on three shots, adding a block, and Connor McDavid had two assists with three shots and two hits. McDavid now has 27 assists in his last 13 games.

Alex Laferriere and Trevor Moore scored in the loss for the Kings. It was Moore's first goal in 13 games and that was just Laferriere's second goal in 17 games.

Matt Roy had an assist, two blocks, two PIMs, and four hits.

Stuart Skinner saved 38 of 40 shots faced for the win.

In Los Angeles's last 34 games, only Chicago has posted a lower goals/60 at 5-on-5. Yes, they have been worse than San Jose by 5-on-5 goal scoring rate. Incredible, isn't it.

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Seattle took a 4-3 shootout win on home ice against Boston on Monday night. Jordan Eberle (PP), Oliver Bjorkstrand, and Vince Dunn all scored for the Kraken while David Pastrnak scored twice while Charlie Coyle added the other Boston tally (PP).

Pastrnak assisted on that Coyle goal to give him 47 assists on the season, tying his second-highest mark of his career in 10 fewer games played. He needs six assists over the balance of the season to set a career-high and that will be while he cruises past 40 goals.

Philipp Grubauer stopped 29 of 32 shots, plus all three in the shootout, for the win. That was just his eighth win in 20 starts on the season.

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One of the ways the NHL has changed in the last 10 years is the involvement of defencemen in the offence. Being able to make a first pass has always been important, but being able to carry the puck out of the zone, jump into the play, and become another attacker in the offensive zone is vital to producing points.

To that end, let's look through data from AllThreeZones to see which defencemen have improved (or declined) in offensive areas other than just points to see which might be ready for takeoff in 2024-25, or might be hit with a red flag. With fantasy trade deadlines approaching, being able to identify rearguards making genuine improvements is important to rebuilding fantasy rosters for future seasons. We will limit our search to players with at least 150 tracked minutes in both seasons. That will necessarily preclude rookies from consideration.

Today, we will look at those jumping into the rush. The tracking data has both shots off the rush and assists off the rush, and they combine for overall rush offence. There are four blue liners that have added at least two shots/assists per 60 minutes off the rush at 5-on-5 from last season:

These four players are all worthy of their own blurb.

Adam Pelech

The Islanders are fourth in the league for share of their 5-on-5 shot attempts coming from defencemen with only Carolina, Colorado, and San Jose (?) ranking higher. The Islanders are not a team that plays off the rush very much though as they have the sixth-lowest rating in rush offence this season. Pelech's point production has suffered because of his one goal (and zero at 5-on-5) but missing so much time due to injury gives us a wonky sample. With a new coach in town and the core locked up for a while, Pelech doing more of this should be good for future seasons, though this is now two years in a row he's missed at least 20 games, and he turns 30 years old this summer.

Dylan Samberg

When perusing defensive stats, every once in a while, Samberg's name pops up where I do not expect it to, and this is one such situation. His rush offence/60 has improved greatly, going from one of the worst marks among regular defencemen in 2022-23 to just inside the top-third of the league in 2023-24. He already has 12 assists at 5-on-5, three times as many as last season (4) in seven fewer games played. Beyond that, his 10.9 shot attempts/60 is also borderline top-third in the league (65^th percentile). He even has 128 hits+blocks in 56 games while averaging just 15:29 per night. If he can ever get to 20 minutes a night, he could be around 240 hits+blocks in an 82-game season, and that's stellar peripheral multi-cat production.

Samberg's problem is Josh Morrissey will have the top PP role for the foreseeable future and that will keep Samberg's point production down. Both Brenden Dillon and Dylan DeMelo are free agents once the season ends, so more 5-on-5 time is in the offing but expecting more than 30 points in the near-term is expecting too much. However, 25 points, 150 blocks, and 90 hits is doable with a bigger role, and that's fine for multi-cat fantasy leagues, and particularly in salary cap formats.

Charlie McAvoy

Playing at a 64-point/82-game pace, McAvoy is enduring his second consecutive season where he's pacing for at least 60 points. Missing games due to injury may keep him from actually getting to that mark, but the production has been steady despite the losses of Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci.

At this point, McAvoy is a known quantity in fantasy. He can provide high levels of hits and blocks, partially due to his high levels of ice time, but is not a shot-volume option. The lack of shot volume means he won't be dual-threat offensive star like Brent Burns in his prime, or Cale Makar more recently. However, now that he has a firm grip on the top PP role, he can be a Victor Hedman-like option (the Hedman of 4-5 years ago, anyway), and getting involved more off the rush is helping keep that offensive upside alive.  

Travis Sanheim

After a few down seasons, Sanheim has turned his fortunes around under coach John Tortorella with career highs in both assists/60 and points/60 at 5-on-5. It isn't just Sanheim, either, as Owen Tippett has broken through, Travis Konecny has reached another level, the younger options are taking steps forward, and there is a lot of promise for the future. This defender getting involved so much off the rush means getting involved a lot with those burgeoning offensive weapons, and that's great to see.  

Sanheim's problem is one that everyone on the team is enduring: a poor power play. Just 2/34 points for him this season have been with the man advantage as he's been part of a top PP rotation where no one has really thrived. The next level of fantasy value requires that PP production will improve, and the talent is there to make it happen, but we have to see it before we believe it.

Let's touch on the other extreme quickly, or defencemen that have lost at least 3.8 shots+assists/60 off the rush from last season:

We will ignore Damon Severson (going from New Jersey to Columbus doesn't require much explanation) and Dougie Hamilton (injured since November).

Ryan Graves

It has been an awful production season for Graves at 5-on-5 as he has a career-low points/60, a career-low shots/60, and the Penguins have scored just 2.0 goals/60 with him on the ice, a distant last among their regular blue liners. He is not involving himself much off the rush, rating worse (2.84/60) than even Marcus Pettersson (3.02/60). Graves is being asked to hold things down defensively as he mostly plays with either Erik Karlsson or Kris Letang, and his fantasy production is suffering because of it.

Shayne Gostisbehere and Jakob Chychrun

It is interesting to see both these names here considering they were both traded from Arizona last season. Both are not getting involved as much offensively as they were in the desert, which makes sense as they both play for teams that have deeper forward groups than the Coyotes did in 2022-23. It isn't a surprise, then, that both Gostisbehere and Chychrun have three-year lows by points/60 at 5-on-5. In fact, through 67 total games with Ottawa, Chychrun has just 13 assists at that strength; he had 15 in just 36 games last year with Arizona. Both players may be with new teams by the start of next season, so things could change quickly.

Rasmus Dahlin

As we've mentioned often in these Ramblings, the Sabres have sacrificed their high-end team rush offence of 2022-23 at the altar of better team defence in 2023-24. On the whole, it has led to an improved defensive performance, and a higher share of the 5-on-5 goals when compared to last year, but it's hurt the production of all their top stars, Dahlin included. Combine that with a power play that has struggled for a calendar year now, and Dahlin's points/game has declined, though he’s still been a very good multi-cat option.

Buffalo is still a young group (10 of their 20 regular skaters this season are under 26 years old) with more prospects on the way. The hope is they eventually figure out a way to play faster while not being atrocious defensively, but the way they've approached their offence this season is a short-term concern.