The Colorado Avalanche had extended winger Martin Necas for eight years with an average annual value of $11.5-million, according to Elliotte Friedman. Necas was set to hit free agency this coming offseason but is another big name off the board along with the likes of Jack Eichel and Kirill Kaprizov. This will make him a top-25 player by cap hit, so cap-league managers will have a big decision to make here. He has never reached 80 hits or 40 blocks in a single season, and his first 41 games with the Avalanche have produced 103 shots on goal. Those aren't huge peripheral totals.

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Dylan Strome was back practicing for the Washington Capitals, according to Tom Gulitti, after missing the game on Tuesday in Dallas. He was in a non-contact jersey, and Washington has back-to-back games today and tomorrow, so we'll see if Strome can get in either contest. Regardless, it appears his absence won't last too much longer.

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Chris Kreider was back at practice for the Anaheim Ducks on Thursday after missing over a week with an illness, according to Zach Cavanagh. Kreider would go on to explain that he had hand-foot-and-mouth disease and was advised to stay in his hotel room for days on end. That doesn't sound like a great way to pass the time with an infectious disease, but he is back with the Ducks and on the top line so things are back to normal.

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Both Dylan Samberg and Cole Perfetti were at morning skate for the Winnipeg Jets on Thursday, per Mitchell Clinton. Both were in non-contact jerseys and have missed a lot of time, so this does not indicate imminent returns like Dylan Strome. All the same, a good sign and a big step in the right direction to getting back two key pieces of Winnipeg's depth.

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Mathew Barzal was a healthy scratch for the New York Islanders on Thursday night because he was late for a team meeting, just in case anyone was checking box scores and was wondering why he wasn't in the game.

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After getting called up on Wednesday, Dalibor Dvorsky was indeed in the lineup for the St. Louis Blues on Thursday night, skating between Mathieu Joseph and Jordan Kyrou. Yes, the Blues took a blender to their lines again, something that will keep happening until they get back on track.

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The Philadelphia Flyers are now 6-2 after losing their first two games of the season thanks to a 4-1 win on Thursday night at home to Nashville. The Predators got a lone goal from Matthew Wood, his first of his NHL career. Juuse Saros gave up three goals on 17 shots for the loss.

It was a big night for Trevor Zegras as he posted two goals (one PP), one assist, three shots, and a block. That gives him four goals and 12 points in 10 games on the season, and this was his third straight game will skating at least 18 minutes. He is now shooting 25% and won't total 60-something assists, but this is a great start after a couple of down years and a lot of injuries. Hopefully he can stay healthy and be just 80% of what he's done so far.

Jamie Drysdale scored his first goal of the year, totaling four shots and two PIMs in the game. He now has four points in 10 games and has done that while not registering a power-play point yet this season. Unfortunately, Drysdale is currently skating on the lower-scoring PP unit, so that needs to turn it around before he becomes a fantasy asset in most multi-cat leagues.

Dan Vladar was great in net once again, stopped 32 of 33 shots four his fourth win. He has now allowed two-or-fewer goals in each of his six games, giving up just 10 in total. With the injury to Samuel Ersson, it's Vladar's net now, and the Flyers have generally been a pretty good defensive team so far. For the non-believers, it may be time to start believing.

Sean Couturier left the game after the first period and did not return.

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An overtime goal from Anthony Cirelli pushed the Tampa Bay Lightning to a 2-1 win at home to Dallas. Adam Erne had the goal for Dallas as Brandon Hagel (PP) registered Tampa Bay's first goal.  

Hagel had that one goal on three shots and a hit. It gives him goals in three straight games after not scoring in the first seven of the year. Hagel is also still shooting just 10% after averaging 15.4% in his first three full campaigns with the Lightning. Even for a slow start, things haven't been too bad for Hagel.

Andrei Vasilevskiy stopped 20 of 21 shots for his third straight win. Opposing goalie Jake Oettinger saw two pucks get past him on 32 shots faced.

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Marat Khusnutdinov was the overtime hero for Boston on Thursday night, lifting them to a 4-3 win at home to Buffalo. He had started the game on David Pastrnak's win, and remained there, so he's got a new home for now.

Pastrnak, Mark Kastelic, and Morgan Geekie (PP) tallied the other three goals for the Bruins. That was Geekie's ninth goal of the year on 27 shots. After we all screamed about an elevated shooting percentage for Geekie last year (22%), he's shooting 33% to start this year. Maybe the regression was just not in the way we thought it was? (He won't shoot 33%, obviously.)

Joonas Korpisalo held the forth with 37 saves on 40 pucks thrown his way.

Rasmus Dahlin (PP), Josh Doan, and Alex Tuch all scored for the Sabres. With 11 games played, Doan is up to four goals, eight points, 33 shots, and 10 hits. He has been off to a great start to his Sabres career.

Dahlin stuffed the score sheet with that one goal on four shots, an assist on the Tuch goal, three blocks, two penalty minutes, and a hit.

Alex Lyon gave up four goals on 23 shots for the loss.

Elias Lindholm left the game in the second period after a collision with Jordan Greenway, who was making his return to the Sabres lineup.

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Ottawa has now won four of their last five games thanks to a 4-3 shootout win at home to the Calgary Flames. Lars Eller, Artem Zub, and Jake Sanderson had the goals for the Sens. Sanderson managed a whopping eight shots with three blocks. That moves him to 11 points, 29 shots, and 22 blocks in 12 games to start the season. He has 33 points in 37 games going back to the Four Nations Cup break in February.

Lars Eller had a multi-point night with a goal and an assist, adding a hit. Not that he has fantasy relevance, I just always liked Eller as a player.

Linus Ullmark got back in the win column thanks to 27 saves on 30 shots, plus both shots faced in the shootout.

Yegor Sharangovich and Matt Coronato both scored PP goals for the Flames while Nazem Kadri posted his third tally of the year. Funny enough, Coronato also has three goals, though Kadri hasn't been a healthy scratch.

Devin Cooley had a good game for Calgary, stopping 35 of 38 shots in regulation/overtime, but he was bested in the shootout.

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With the Carolina Hurricanes still missing K'Andre Miller, Jaccob Slavin, and Shayne Gostisbehere, they laid the wood to the New York Islanders by a 6-2 score on Thursday night. Both Logan Stankoven and Andrei Svechnikov had a goal and an assist while Jackson Blake, Jordan Martinook, Bradly Nadeau, and Mike Reilly all scored.

Stankoven is up to four goals and seven points in 10 games on the season and has done all that without registering a power-play point. The team is also +4 with him on the ice at 5-on-5, so it's safe to say the Stankoven second-line centre experiment is working so far.

Brandon Bussi got the start in net for the Hurricanes and stopped 26 of 28 shots for the win.

Matthew Schaefer and Simon Holmstrom taliied for the Islanders. Schaefer now has three goals, eight points, and 31 shots in 10 games. It is pretty unreal.

David Rittich took the loss, giving up all six goals on 33 shots.

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The St. Louis Blues took another loss, this time at home to the Vancouver Canucks, and this time 4-3 in a shootout thanks to a sublime Kiefer Sherwood performance. He had a hat trick on five shots and also posted four hits. Sherwood is up to nine goals on the season, tied for the most in the league. He is shooting 37.5%, but it doesn't change the amazing month he's had.

Kevin Lankinen was excellent in net for the Canucks, stopping 36 of 39 shots for his second win.

Jordan Binnington was in net and gave up three goals on 18 shots. Binnington and Joel Hofer have combined for an .827 save percentage on the season. Remember last year when Colorado had abysmally-bad goaltending in October that led to them completely swapping their goaltending depth? They had an .837 save percentage. Binnington and Hofer have been worse than that.

Brock Boeser left the game in the first period and did not return. He blocked a shot somewhere in the lower two-thirds of his body – stomach, testicles, somewhere? – and looked to be in a lot of pain.

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The Pittsburgh Penguins have finished October with an 8-2-2 record thanks to a 4-1 win in Minnesota on Thursday night. Ryan Shea and Bryan Rust both had a goal and an assist, with Rust's helper coming on the power play. After missing the start of the season, Rust is up to 10 points in 10 games with 14 blocks and 24 shots to go with that production.

Anthony Mantha and Ben Kindel both scored for Pittsburgh. Kindel's goal was scored on the power play as he was moved back to the top unit with Rickard Rakell out of the lineup. That was Kindel's 10^th game of the season, so it seems as if he's stick with the Penguins for a while. It is no guarantee he doesn't get sent down at some point, but the team has now burned the first year of his ELC.

Tristan Jarry had another solid night with 26 saves on 27 shots faced. He finishes the month of October with a .923 save percentage, his best month since November of 2023.

Kirill Kaprizov had the lone goal for the Wild as Filip Gustavsson allowed three goals on 33 shots for his fourth straight loss, a stretch where he's given up 15 goals.

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After seven good-to-great games, things started coming back down to Earth for Spencer Knight as he allowed six goals on 32 shots in Chicago's 6-3 loss in Winnipeg on Thursday night. It isn't to put it all on Knight – and he still had a very good month – but it's more to highlight that the entire Blackhawks team is (was) due for some regression that has now begun.

Winnipeg's top line had a huge game with all three members having a three-point night: Gabriel Vilardi (2+1), Mark Scheifele (1+2), and Kyle Connor (1+2) combined for four goals and nine points. Vilardi totaled five shots and a block and is up to a point-per-game status with four goals and 11 points in 11 appearances.

Josh Morrissey (1+1) and Vladislav Namestnikov had the other goals. After a slow start, Morrissey now has eight points in his last four games, and is up to 10 points in 11 games.

Connor Hellebuyck is back into a tie for first in the league with six wins thanks to holding the Blackhawks to three goals on 24 shots.

Teuvo Teravainen, Alex Vlasic, and Andre Burakovsky all scored for Chicago. The Burakovsky goal was a between-the-legs effort that is one of the best we've seen so far this season:

OH MY WHAT A FILTHY BETWEEN THE LEGS GOAL BY ANDRE BURAKOVSKY 🤢 pic.twitter.com/ju3HdGFJsa

— B/R Open Ice (@BR_OpenIce) October 31, 2025

Connor Bedard and Connor Murphy each had a pair of helpers in the loss. Bedard is up to 14 points in 11 games.

Jason Dickinson injured his shoulder again and left the game late in the second period. Gustav Nyquist was injured halfway through the first period and also left the game.

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The New York Rangers staged a great third-period comeback as they visited Edmonton on Thursday night. With the Rangers down 3-1 and 12 minutes remaining, Braden Schneider scored his first of the year, followed by a Taylor Raddysh goal four minutes later. J.T. Miller secured the extra point with an overtime winner, his third goal of the year. Schneider assisted on the Miller goal to give him his first multi-point game since November 12^th, 2024.

Jonny Brodzinski tallied New York's first goal, and netminder Igor Shesterkin stopped 33 of the 36 shots launched at his net. A nice rebound from him after giving up 11 goals in his last two games.

Darnell Nurse scored twice for the Oilers and Matt Savoie had the other. Nurse has three goals, seven points, 29 shots, 34 blocks, and 22 hits in what has been a marvelous start to his fantasy campaign: Nurse is the only defenceman with at least eight games played who is averaging at least 0.5 points, 2.0 shots, and 3.0 hits+blocks per game (Nurse is at 4.7 hits+blocks per game, far ahead of anyone else with at least 0.5 points and 2.0 shots).

Stuart Skinner allowed four goals on 34 shots and now has just three wins in eight starts.

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San Jose's top-6 forward mix came through in a big way on Thursday night as they got goals from William Eklund, Philipp Kurashev, Alex Wennberg, Will Smith, and Tyler Toffoli to take a 5-2 win at home to the New Jersey Devils. After losing their first six games of the season, the Sharks have now won three of their last five and have scored 21 goals in that span.

After some healthy scratches and low-TOI games, Kurashev has five points in his last three games and has averaged 20:49 in ice time in those three games. I still don't think he's anywhere close to this type of player, but the Sharks seem to think he is, at least for now. Starting tomorrow and going to next Saturday, the Sharks have five games in eight days, including light Sunday, Wednesday, and Friday games. Something fantasy managers looking for deeper streamers to keep in mind.

Dmitry Orlov had an assist, a shot, four blocks, two PIMs, and three hits in a great multi-cat effort. He is still not on the top PP unit, ceding way to John Klingberg, but the San Jose power play has been light-years better with Orlov than Klingberg, so it may not be long before Orlov is back in that PP1 role.

Alex Nedeljkovic had allowed just two goals on 31 shots for the win.

Dawson Mercer scored two power-play goals for the Devils in the loss, totaling four shots and a hit along the way. Mercer is back to a point-per-game status with 11 points in 11 outings, but he's shooting 30% individually and the team is shooting over 18% with him on the ice – he has never had a season where the Devils shot at least 12% with him on the ice. That all screams heavy regression.

Dougie Hamilton assisted on both PP goals, had four shots, and posted two hits. After a slow start of his own, he has six points in his last four games. On the year, he is up to 30 shots, 16 blocks, and 14 hits in 11 games. He was back on the top PP unit in this game and the Devils went 2-for-3 with the man advantage. What a surprise!

Jake Allen was in net for all five goals against on 28 shots faced.

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Detroit held off a late comeback from the Los Angeles Kings to skate away with a 4-3 shootout win. After taking a 3-1 lead with 5:15 left in the game, the Kings scored twice in the final 2:15 to tie things up and secure a point, but they couldn't get the next goal to secure the two points.

Marco Kasper scored twice (one PP) and Alex DeBrincat had a power-play goal of his own to help the Wings to get to overtime, adding an assist on Kasper's second goal. After failing to score in the first eight games of the season, DeBrincat has now scored in three straight outings. He has 12 points in 11 games and is still shooting just 7.9%.

Cam Talbot was excellent in net for the Red Wings, holding the Kings to just three goals on 38 shots, and stopping all three shots he faced in the shootout. A nice bounce-back game from Talbot after giving up seven goals in his last outing.

Corey Perry scored twice for the Kings and Alex Laferriere had the other goal. Perry now has five goals and seven points in six games since getting into the Kings lineup, but he's also shooting 41.7%, so buyer beware and all.

Darcy Kuemper allowed three goals on 27 shots to take the loss.