Connor McDavid got tripped early in Edmonton's game in Columbus on Monday night. It was probably a penalty, but it wasn't called, and things got even worse for the Oilers from there. He was seen gingerly making his way to the bench, and then he left for the dressing room. After several minutes, we got an official update, and it's not one Oilers fans or fantasy managers wanted to see:

Per the Oilers, Connor McDavid will not return to tonight's game in Columbus because of a lower-body injury.

— Daniel Nugent-Bowman (@DNBsports) October 28, 2024

Ryan Rishaug of TSN said that the initial thought is that it's nothing serious, but obviously we'll update whenever we find out more.

Edmonton got absolutely wiped by Columbus in that game, too, by a score of 6-1. The Oilers had their chances, but the Blue Jackets capitalized on theirs and were on cruise control after building up a 3-0 lead through 20 minutes.

Sean Monahan scored twice, including once on the power play, total three shots and a block for a very solid night. He now has five goals and nine points in eight games on the season as his great start continues.

Cole Sillinger had a goal and two assists, totaling two shots and two PIMs in the win. Adam Fantilli had a goal and an assist for his first multi-point game of the season.

Mathieu Olivier and Mikael Pyyhtia had the other two tallies for the Blue Jackets.

Zach Werenski had a power play assist, three shots, and a block in a solid fantasy outing while goaltender Elvis Merzlikins stopped 31 of 32 shots in the win.

Mattias Ekholm broke Merzlikins' shutout with 27 seconds left in the game and Stuart Skinner was in net for all six goals on 25 shots faced.

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Toronto signed defenceman Jake McCabe to a five-year extension:

#Leafs announce an extension for defenseman Jake McCabe: 5 years x $4.51 million = $20.5 million.

— Frank Seravalli (@frank_seravalli) October 28, 2024

McCabe turns 32 years old in October of 2025. He went into Monday night's game with 31 points, 146 blocks, and 238 hits in 82 games with the Leafs.

Staying with Toronto, they split up their PP units on Monday night, putting the top line and Max Pacioretty on one half with John Tavares, William Nylander, Max Domi, and Bobby McMann on the other. We will see how long this lasts.

Tavares was the difference for the Leafs for their game in Winnipeg as he posted his first hat trick in nearly two years as Toronto took a 6-4 win. He finished the game with seven shots and a hit, and that pushed him to 35 shots in nine games. If he can keep doing this, a 40-goal season is on the table.

William Nylander had a big night as well with a goal, two assists, and two shots. That gives him 10 points in 10 games, though his ice time per game is still down nearly two minutes from last season.

Matthew Knies and Morgan Rielly had the other tallies. Knies finished with three shots and three hits, and he's up to 25 shots and 20 hits in 10 games. His multi-cat breakout has started.

Kyle Connor had a big night for the Jets with two goals (both on the PP) and two assists in the loss. His scorching start continues as he now has eight goals, six assists, 36 shots, and five PP points in nine games.

Gabriel Vilardi and Mark Schefiele each had a goal and an assist (PP), while Josh Morrissey had three helpers, two of on with the man advantage.

Anthony Stolarz stopped 19 of 23 shots in the win.

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Matt Roy was back practicing for Washington:

Matt Roy, who suffered a lower body injury in the season opener, has rejoined his teammates for practice. He's wearing a no contact jersey. #Caps

— Tarik El-Bashir (@Tarik_ElBashir) October 28, 2024

Roy didn't stick around for the practice but that he's back on the ice at this point is a good sign. Washington only has three games each of the next two weeks so even if he comes back, there may not be a lot of multi-cat value until a month from now.  

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Aleksander Barkov returned Monday night from his ankle injury suffered early in the season. Considering how bad it looked initially, that he only missed eight games feels like a gift.

Barkov made an immediate impact for Florida in Buffalo on Monday night as he scored late in the third period to seal a 5-2 win for the Panthers. He had a power play assist on Sam Reinhart's seventh goal of the season in the first period to give Barkov a multi-point game in his return.

Carter Verhaeghe had a goal and an assist (PP) to go with six shots, two PIMs, and a hit. Verhaeghe is now on a seven-game point streak with two goals and six assists in that span.

Reinhart had a goal and an assist, as did Sam Bennett, with each registering a power play point. Bennett now has goals in five straight games and has eight goals through 11 games. He needed 29 games to get his eighth goal last season.

Adam Boqvist was a healthy scratch for Florida and Uvis Balinskis took over the top PP unit. Something to monitor.

Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 25 of 27 shots in the win.

Jason Zucker scored a power play goal while Rasmus Dahlin had the other tally for the Sabres. Dahlin finished the game with six shots, a block, and four PIMs in a great fantasy night. Dahlin now has a goal and four assists in his last five games to go with 13 shots, three hits, and eight blocks.

Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen allowed five goals on 30 shots in the loss.

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Steven Stamkos returned to Tampa Bay for the first time, but it was the Lightning who squeezed out a 3-2 overtime win. Stamkos had two assists (one on the PP) with six shots, but it wasn't enough to lift the Predators to the two points.

Brayden Point scored his sixth of the season, assisted on Mitchell Chaffee's goal, and had three shots. Point now has six goals in nine games on the season but has just 16 shots. He needs to start firing the puck a bit more to keep up anywhere near this goal-scoring rate.

Nick Paul scored the overtime winner, which was assisted by Jake Guentzel, his second helper of the night. Despite Paul losing his PP role this season, he is on a point-per-game pace with three goals and six assists.

Ryan O'Reilly scored the PP goal for Nashville while Gustav Nyquist had the other tally.

Andrei Vasilevskiy stopped 35 of 37 shots for the win.

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Jared Spurgeon was back skating for Minnesota:

Jared Spurgeon looks good as new in #mnwild practice. Flying

— Michael Russo (@RussoHockey) October 28, 2024

After missing most of last season, Spurgeon has played just 2 of 8 games this season due to a lower-body issue. It is good news for fantasy managers, as the Wild have a four-game week starting November 5^th, and three of those games are against Anaheim, San Jose, and Chicago. He won't get top PP minutes (yet), but he's a name to keep in mind.

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Chicago went into Colorado and skated out with a 5-2 win. Ryan Donato had two goals and an assist with four shots and three hits in a great fantasy performance, even if two of those three points came in the final minute with the empty net.

Philipp Kurashev scored his second goal of the season while Ilya Mikheyev and Lukas Reichel had the other markers.

Alex Vlasic had a PP assist, two shots, and four blocks in a nice fantasy performance.

Petr Mrazek stopped 24 of 26 shots for his third win of the season.

Nathan MacKinnon (PP) and Casey Mittelstadt had the goals for the Avalanche. Mittelstadt is quietly having a great start to his season with six goals and seven assists in 10 games.

Cale Makar assisted on MacKinnon's PP goal and extended his lead on defencemen in point production with 17 in 10 games, managing at least one point in every game thus far.

Alexandar Georgiev took the loss, allowing three goals on 24 shots.

Ross Colton left the game after blocking a shot and did not return. After the game, coach Jared Bednar said Colton will "miss some time".

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San Jose managed a miracle comeback against Utah as they trailed 4-1 with under five minutes left in the game but scored three times in a two-minute span late in the third period to push the game to overtime. Alex Wennberg scored on the power play in overtime to give the Sharks their first win of the season. Truly one of the nuttiest games we'll see this season. It was reminiscent of the game against the New York Islanders last season when they trailed 4-1 late in the game but scored three goals in the final nine minutes of the third period to push the game to overtime, and eventually the win.

Mikael Granlund had a goal and two assists (one on the PP) with two shots and two hits. He now has 13 points in 10 games on the season and is averaging 3.6 shots per game. That is… wild.

Fabian Zetterlund scored twice on three shots, pushing him to five goals on the year, while Wennberg and Tyler Toffoli each had a goal and an assist, the latter having his helper on the power play. Toffoli has nine points in 10 games to start his Sharks tenure.

Jake Walman had three assists, four shots, a block, and a hit in 24 minutes of ice time. He also got his top PP role back as Jack Thompson was scratched, which is big news for Walman. He has yet to score, but has five assists, 29 shots, 17 blocks, and 13 hits in 10 games.

Dylan Guenther and Logan Cooley were moved alongside Clayton Keller and Guenther replied with a goal on three shots with two PIMs, and a hit.

Mattias Maccelli scored twice, his first goals of the season, and Mikhail Sergachev had the other tally.

MacKenzie Blackwood stopped 19 of 23 shots faced for the win. Connor Ingram made 40 saved, but faced 45 shots and took the loss.

Josh Doan was sent back to the AHL by Utah before the game, which is probably good for his development because he was not off to a good start this season.

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Vancouver made a third-period push with a pair of goals, and that got the team to overtime, but Sebastian Aho scored in the extra frame to lift Carolina to a 4-3 win. Aho stays on a point-per-game pace to start the season and has 27 shots in eight games, so there's a lot of good here even if he hasn't taken off yet.

Martin Necas assisted on Aho's OT winner and scored earlier in the game himself, and that was Necas's fifth multi-point game in eight appearances this season. He didn't get his fifth multi-point game last season until the final contest before the Christmas break.

Jack Roslovic and William Carrier had the other goals for Carolina. Roslovic now has four goals in eight games for the Hurricanes, though he is shooting over 22%, about double his three-year average.

Shayne Gostisbehere kept his hot start rolling, assisting on Aho's OT goal, and posting two shots, two PIMs, and three hits. Ghost has seven points in eight games to start the season.

Brock Boeser and Quinn Hughes each had a goal and an assist. Hughes had six total shots, too, and now has 31 shots in eight games. The peripherals are great to see, but he started last season with 45 shots in 12 games before finishing with 199. He needs to do this for two more months before we can start believing in a genuine peripheral change.

Pyotr Kochetkov stopped 24 of 27 shots in the win. Kevin Lankinen allowed four goals on 32 shots in the loss.

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Vegas shut out Calgary by a 5-0 margin and thanks to Winnipeg's loss, the Golden Knights now have the best goal differential in the league (+19). Adin Hill faced just 16 shots but held the fort for the clean sheet. It was his first shutout since November of last year.

Keegan Kolesar had two goals and an assist with four shots and a hit. Nicolas Roy had a goal and two assists with four shots himself. Mark Stone also scored once on three shots, and he now has five goals and 18 points on the season, leading the NHL by point production. The team is in Los Angeles on Wednesday and Stone has a good chance of closing out the month on top of the NHL's point production leaderboard.

A very notable fantasy performance here from Alex Pietrangelo with a goal, four shots, and a block. His 12 points in 10 games trails only Makar by total points on the season, and he is 1 of 8 defencemen with at least a point per game thus far.

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At this time every season – teams nearing the 10-game mark – fantasy owners have a big decision to make: which players off to slow starts are in line to turn it around, and which might be in for a down year? There is only so much time for draft value to be recouped in a trade, so here are three players that have genuine concerns about the start to their season beyond just boxcar stats. Data from Natural Stat Trick and Frozen Tools.

Matthew Tkachuk

Even with the illness to Tkachuk and injury to Aleksander Barkov, plus an .884 team save percentage heading into Monday night's game against Buffalo, Florida leads the Atlantic Division by points percentage. Tkachuk has two goals, four assists, 18 shots, and nine hits in his five games played, which is a good start despite that illness. There are two issues with that start, though.

First, the team is shooting 15.9% with him on the ice. His career year in 2021-22 with Calgary saw the team shoot 13.7% with him on the ice, the league leader last season was J.T. Miller at 15.6%, and the highest mark in any of the prior three years was Ryan Nugent Hopkins in 2022-23 at 15.8%. Florida is converting shots into goals at an obscenely high rate with Tkachuk on the ice, and the safe bet is that drops and hurts Tkachuk's production moving forward.

The second problem is his ice time. Tkachuk has yet to reach 19 minutes in any of his five outings, and is averaging 17:06 per game. He had one stretch like that in February of last season, so maybe this is just an early blip at the wrong time, but there's a big difference between skating between 18:30-19:00 and between 17:00-17:30. Florida has three games this week – Monday in Buffalo before they head to Finland for two games against – so we should have a better idea as to what his real usage will be very soon. If I were a Tkachuk fantasy owner, I would view this as a pivotal week to his fantasy season regardless of his actual point production.

Elias Pettersson

Pettersson scored his first goal of the season over the weekend, which was nice to see. It is a reminder that he has four points in seven games to start the season and is averaging 1.7 shots per appearance. Going back to last season, he has 29 points in his last 40 regular season games, averaging a shade over two shots per outing. That is… not good.

On the bright side, his line has performed better at 5-on-5 since Conor Garland and Nils Hoglander were moved to his wings. The downside is that he's still not shooting very much: Pettersson has 13 shot attempts in the four games since Jake DeBrusk was moved off his line. He has six shots on target in those four recent appearances compared to five shots in his first three games. This is a player who thrives on efficiency – he has shot at least 15% in every NHL season – so a sizable shot decline is an issue; he has 24 shot attempts in seven games this season and had no seven-game stretch with that few shot attempts last season.

At the end of Vancouver's playoff run in the spring, Pettersson talked about knee tendonitis that he dealt with down the stretch. During training camp, he discussed changing his training regimen to work around the injury. I went to check the NHL Edge data for skating data, and everything is down (dark grey web) from last season (light grey web):

There should be genuine concerns as to whether Pettersson is trying to play through a knee issue right now, and fantasy owners must decide whether they want to risk keeping him for a down year or whether he'll bounce back to be a 35-goal, 95-point player. My guess is he won't reach those marks.

Charlie McAvoy

Last season, according to Frozen Tools, McAvoy earned 38.3% of the team's even strength ice time per game. This season, that number sits at 35.6%. Based on Boston's total even strength ice time in 2023-24, if McAvoy is around that 35.6% mark all season, he'll lose over 100 minutes of EVTOI. That isn't ideal.

The bigger problem is Boston's entire team. On the season, they are 28^th in the league by high danger shot attempts per minute at even strength, and that's translating to 18^th in goals per minute. Last year, they were 11^th by high-danger attempts, translating to 14^th in goals per minute. Everyone not on the fourth line or named David Pastrnak has really struggled, and if they can't turn things around in a big way, McAvoy might be staring down a double-whammy of declining ice time and below-average team goal scoring. The Bruins have four games this week, and that should tell us a lot about McAvoy's ice time moving forward.