Toronto had Steven Lorentz skating on the top line with Auston Matthews in practice yesterday. We would normally shrug that aside as a filler-type thing, but Matthew Knies and Bobby McMann were both practicing while Max Pacioretty seems to be headed for a healthy scratch. This won't last, but it's notable that Craig Berube is starting to press some buttons.

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After missing a game on the weekend, New York Islanders goalie Ilya Sorokin was back at practice on Monday:

Ilya Sorokin is at practice after missing Saturday's game due to illness. #Isles

— Stefen Rosner (@stefen_rosner) January 13, 2025

It is just worth pointing out because we have seen players miss a week (or more) due to illness this season, but it doesn't seem as if Sorokin is in the position.

Also at Islanders practice, the team moved Maxim Tsyplakov back to the second line with Bo Horvat and Kyle Palmieri. I am intrigued in that line just because I've been very impressed with Tsyplakov this year.

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A positive update for the injured Colorado Avalanche (which included Oliver Kylington):

Miles Wood and Valeri Nichushkin are on the ice early in non-contact jerseys. pic.twitter.com/YrnY1ZrYRB

— Evan Rawal (@evanrawal) January 13, 2025

Colorado starts a five-game homestand Tuesday night so hopefully one (or more) of that trio can be back in that time.

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Filip Hronek has finished his conditioning stint:

General Manager Patrik Allvin announced today that D Filip Hronek has rejoined the team in Winnipeg.

— Vancouver Canucks (@Canucks) January 13, 2025

Hronek has been out since November and it's not a moment too soon as Vancouver is in a fight for a playoff spot in the West. They play on Tuesday night in Winnipeg.

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Good news for a pair of injured New York Rangers:

Kreider-Chytil-Kaliyev is a line at practice.

— Peter Baugh (@Peter_Baugh) January 13, 2025

Filip Chytil and Chris Kreider skating on a line with Arthur Kaliyev is interesting to me. Kreider likes to play below the hash marks and that's a style that can mesh with Kaliyev. Let's see how this goes.

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Utah got some good news as coach Andre Tourigny said that defenceman John Marino, who has yet to play a game this season due to a back surgery after being acquired in the summer, is now considered day-to-day. He was practicing with the team on Monday, as was Sean Durzi, which bodes well for their returns in the very near future.

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The 2024-25 Dobber Hockey Midseason Fantasy Guide is set to release later this week! My section has been sent in for review, looking at some of the advanced stats fantasy players will need to know for the stretch run. It is available for pre-order right now, and is set to release on Thursday, January 16^th.

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Philadelphia and Florida played a very entertaining game on Monday night as the Flyers escaped with a 4-3 win largely thanks to the power play (no, really) and Noah Cates. Philadelphia scored twice on the power play for the second game in a row, getting a goal from Cates and one from Frost, which powered their way to a win. Cates also scored the game-winning goal late in the third period, and finished the game with those two goals on two shots with a block. He is now up to nine goals on the season in 40 games played after scoring just six last season in 59 games.

Garnet Hathaway had the other tally for the Flyers. Samuel Ersson stopped 20 of 23 shots for the win.

Travis Sanheim had a solid multi-cat fantasy night with a power play assist, a shot, and five blocks. Sanheim now has an assist in back-to-back games, which might not feel important but considering he had just one point (an assist) in the prior 10 games, hopefully he starts to right the production ship again.

Sam Reinhart scored twice for Florida, once on the power play and once while short-handed, to give him 27 goals on the season. He managed three total shots, a block, and a hit along the way, and now has five goals in his last three games after going goalless in six straight.

Uvis Balinskis had the other goal for the Panthers. Sergei Bobrovsky allowed four goals on 29 shots to take the loss.

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Calgary went into Chicago and skated out with a 5-2 win. They got a big game from the third line as Rory Kerins made his NHL debut skating with Jakob Pelletier and Yegor Sharangovich and assisted on two goals from Pelletier. Sharangovich scored a short-handed goal, he and Pelletier assisted on a goal from Jake Bean, so that forward trio combined for three goals and four assists. A great debut for Kerins and a nice pick-me-up from Sharangovich who had struggled mightily compared to his 31-goal season last year.

Mikael Backlund scored the other Flames goal as Dustin Wolf stopped 23 of 25 shots for the win. Wolf has made 23 starts and allowed two-or-fewer goals in 12 of them. He has been a big part of the Calgary success this season and one of the best fantasy values in net.

Connor Bedard had a power play goal for the Blackhawks and Louis Crevier had the other tally. That goal from Bedard was his 100^th point in his 112^th career game, which is a 73-point pace as a teenager on the lowest-scoring team since the start of last season.

Petr Mrazek allowed all five goals on 36 shots faced.

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Edmonton faced potential playoff opponent (again) Los Angeles at home on Monday, and the Oilers blanked them 1-0. Stuart Skinner stopped all 30 shots he faced for his second shutout of the season and that game pushed him over the .900 save percentage mark, landing at .902. Considering he was an .872 goalie after the month of October, Skinner has been excellent since Halloween.

Connor McDavid scored Edmonton's lone goal, registering five shots, a block, and two hits. It keeps him on a 120-point pace for the season had he not missed time.

Darnell Nurse assisted on that goal, registering three shots and two blocks.

Warren Foegele had five shots and a block in his return to Edmonton, but could not solve Skinner.

Kings goalie Darcy Kuemper stopped 29 of 30 shots but took the hard-luck loss. Since returning from injury in early December, Kuemper has allowed 18 goals in 11 games, posting a save percentage of .940. It was his first regulation loss in over two months.  

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I was poking around the tracking data that AllThreeZones has provided so far this season, and I noticed something: offence created off the forecheck/cycle has increased from 2023-24. The increase isn't a lot – a little under 2% – but it's notable because there was a huge decrease in offence created off the forecheck in 2023-24. (When discussing that offence, what is included are all shots, or passes leading to shots, created off the forecheck/cycle at 5-on-5.) In 2022-23, that number was 12.03 per 60 minutes, an increase from the year prior. However, that crashed to 8.91 per 60 minutes in 2023-24. That is why seeing the number increase thus far in 2024-25 requires a mention.

It is worth looking into which players are creating more off the forecheck, then. So, I looked at forwards with at least 100 tracked minutes last season and 100 tracked minutes, all at 5-on-5, so far this season. That gave us a pool of 215 forwards, and here are some players that stood out, both good and bad.  

Washington's Changes

When looking at the players with the largest increase of offence off the cycle, the top three names are all from the same team:

It is notable that each of Connor McMichael, Dylan Strome, and Taylor Raddysh have seen the biggest jumps, because all three have mostly played on different lines this season. That tells us the changes that Washington has undergone as a team, and the results of those changes are obvious. We will see if they can keep it up as they march towards the playoffs because they have been on a bit of a slide over the last month, but the 2024-25 Washington Capitals are definitely not the 2023-24 Washington Capitals.

The New New Jersey Devils

New Jersey hired Sheldon Keefe as their coach in the offseason, and the change has been predictable. Despite all the talent Toronto had (and has), they were (and are) a team that creates a lot off the forecheck, and Keefe brought that to New Jersey. Among 12 forwards with the largest changes in that type of offence, two are from the Devils and, like Washington's group, they play on different lines:

Jack Hughes, Jesper Bratt's most common line mate, has also seen a jump in offence off the cycle, just not as much. Similarly, Nico Hischier has been creating a lot more off the cycle than he did in 2023-24, just not as much as Stefan Noesen. All told, there has been a shift in the New Jersey offence, and it's worth pointing out that after a hot start, Hischier's rate of points per 60 minutes at 5-on-5 is at a four-year low, and 22% lower than his next-worst mark.

Florida's Depth

As of Monday afternoon, Florida is tied for 16^th in the league by 5-on-5 goals per 60 minutes. That isn't a big deal as they were 22^nd last year and look how that ended up for them, but it's important for fantasy mangers.

It did stick out, though, that of the largest decreases in offence off the cycle, two of them were from Florida's third line:

The duo of Anton Lundell and Eetu Luostarainen have played over 251 minutes together at 5-on-5 without Sam Reinhart on the right side. With anyone but Reinhart, they have scored just four goals in those 251-plus minutes. Last season, they had 16 goals in 532 minutes without Reinhart, or nearly double the goal-scoring rate. They are getting unlucky by shooting percentage, sitting at just 3.3%, but they are also creating way fewer shots and expected goals, too, so it's not just the shooting percentage. Lundell is still producing well, but 10 of his 28 points came in an eight-game span in October when Aleksander Barkov was injured. In his other 34 games, he has 18 points, or a 43-point pace over a full season. Maybe there's a reason Carter Verhaeghe has spent some time on that third line over the last few weeks besides Verhaeghe's own struggles.

Jason Robertson

When Dallas's Jason Robertson was producing his best in 2021-22 and 2022-23, he was one of the best in the league in creating shots for himself or teammates off the cycle/forecheck. That isn't hyperbole – he had a 95^th percentile mark across the league in those two seasons by that specific type of offence.

That type of offence declined in 2023-24 by 33% when compared to the prior two seasons, and his points per 60 minutes at 5-on-5 declined 24% along with it. There has been another sizable decline in that offence this season, one of the largest in the league:

Robertson's points per 60 minutes in 2024-25 (2.3) is actually higher than last year (2.17), but all of the improvement (and then some) has come from secondary assists, as that rate has jumped 27% when compared to his three-year average. There are career-worst marks this season by both goals and first assists per 60 minutes, and it's a wonder how much that offseason surgery has impacted him. Either way, he's not creating offence like he used to, and that's showing up both in the production stats and under the hood.