Welcome to the 2026-27 NHL season! We now have stats stories and highlights to work with, which we will get to in a minute. There are also still a lot of roster info to parse through from the roster submission deadline on Monday and a few opening day lineups yesterday. Puneet covered T.J. Hughes and Remi Poirier on Monday as two previous off-the-radar names that might now have some relevance in the right situation. I wanted to quickly go through a few other notable ones before getting to last night’s games.

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Nikita Klepov and Roger McQueen have both made the Ducks' opening night roster. After the Leo Carlsson and Cutter Gauthier contracts (and to a lesser extent Pavel Mintykov) used up all of the available cap space, the Ducks weren't able to fill their depth out like they might have been planning at the beginning of the offseason. Makes you wonder how soon they regretted the $4.25 Million per season price tag on A.J. Greer. Klepov and McQueen earned their spots through a solid training camp, though there might not have been spots to earn if the roster and cap planning was better executed. One or both could end up being fantasy relevant this year, and maybe the more likely one is Klepov who could slide up to the top line, which is where he spent a lot of time in training camp.

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Best wishes to Brock Faber who is nursing a fractured skull. He had a procedure done on it after sustaining the injury during Friday's preseason game, and he has an unknown recovery timeline – per Michael Russo of The Athletic.

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David Rittich is someone I thought was going to have a decent chance to run with a starters job in New Jersey after a solid year last year and with only Jake Allen as an experienced goalie to supplant. Instead, we now have Nico Daws and Remi Poirier to battle it out as the best option to supplant the 36-year-old Allen who has played 40 games only once in the last seven years.

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T.J. Hughes is one of the big surprises from training camp, coming into it with the Avs and not being a likely bet to make the team, and then finishing camp looking like he will begin the season on the top power play. Lots of short-term upside there.

The Nashville Predators cut and waived three NHL defencemen, and in their place claiming William Trudeau from the New York Rangers. Trudeau is a bit of an understanded but solid defenceman in all three zones, and the Predators obviously see something to be pencilling him into their NHL lineup without having participated in their own training camp. Maybe someone worth a speculative flyer in deeper cap leagues as a cheap D option.

Speaking of cheap options on defence, Logan Stanley signed with the Islanders on a one-year $1.5 million dollar deal. He's likely just going to play on their third pair or as their seventh defenceman, and for fantasy his only relevance is if you want someone who can reliably put up one SOG, Hit, and Blk per game.

Having completed all four of my drafts (two partial keepers and two full re-drafts), I was not expecting that the most common player that I drafted this year to be Trevor Zegras – selected in all four leagues. He always seemed to be a draft value where I got him, and I'm realizing that I am treating him as a point per game player entering the year where many others are expecting only 65 points or so out of him. Two of my leagues count FOWs as well, where he gets a huge bonus with his wing eligibility.

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We have an annual tradition here at Dobber Hockey that all the editors, writers, and Dobber himself send in their predictions for the upcoming season. Predictions include award winners, players to disappoint/rebound, division winners, and Stanley Cup champion. To get all our thoughts on the 2026-27 campaign, go check it out here.

If you need more projections, you can still get the fantasy guide, updated with the latest trades, cuts, and need-to-know info to manage those first FA adds and trade inquiries for the new season.

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The Stanley Cup Banner was raised, but the Canes didn't get to celebrate in thor game after that, being shut out by the Panthers and losing a tight and tense game with five seconds left in overtime. Gustav Forsling broke the deadlock, assisted by Carter Verhaeghe.

Aleksander Barkov played his first game in 469 days, playing over 20 minutes, winning half of his 20 faceoffs, and adding a SOG and a Blk. The reunited set of Tkachuk brothers each put up their usual solid peripherals, but neither found the scoresheet (via a score or a fight).

Jacob Markstrom is your current league leader in the goalie categories, having stopped all 15 shots he saw. He generally looked sharp through the game, which is a welcome sight for fantasy owners after his awful season in 2025-26. I cut bait with him in my partial keeper, and generally avoided him in drafts as I am not a believer in his ability to maintain any level of consistency at this age.

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Despite starting two hours after the FLA/CAR game, the first goal of the 2026-2027 NHL season came from William Nylander:

Nylander added a second goal later in the third period, but it wasn't enough as the Habs managed to bounce three pucks past Sergei Bobrovsky on 27 shots.

With Montreal coming off a big jump up the standings and the Leafs looking to rebound with a revamped roster coming off of a very poor season, this game felt like there was a lot more on the line than even your typical home opener featuring the long-time rivals.

The newly acquired Kirill Marchenko made his Leafs debut and did look sharp, but couldn't bury his best scoring chance off a nice feed from Jack Roslovic. Roslovic was sharp as the third member of the top line centered by Auston Matthews. It could be a productive slot by him, and his fantasy outlook likely jumps a little as a result of the Marchenko/Matthew Knies swap.

David Reinbacher was cut from the Canadiens, but I would expect him to force his way up mid-season. The D-core isn't elite to the point that they will be able to hold him back, and he is likely the best long-term partner for Lane Hutson. Alex Carrier held onto that spot for the time being though, and his goal and an assist make for a great first impression there to start the new season. Josh Anderson also posted a goal and an assist to help lead the way for the Habs.

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The Boston Bruins and New York Rangers also played a quiet game for the first 55 minutes before the Bruins scored twice on Igor Shesterkin and then adding an empty netter for good measure. Jeremy Swayman stopped all 24 shots for the shutout, immediately usurping Markstrom as the top goalie after the early games on day one.

James Hagens should get LW designation in Yahoo in short order, if that's something that would be of use to those of you who have him on the bubble of your roster for this year (obviously hold him in keeper leagues). His debut was fairly unremarkable, notching only one SOG and two Blks, playing on the left side of the third line.

In a bit of a surprise, Alberts Smits made the opening night lineup for the Rangers. He is in a rotation with seven others, so he may not play every day, at least at the beginning. However, the names at the bottom of the depth chart are expendable, so Smits could easily become a fixture for the Rangers. His opening day debut was fairly unremarkable, picking up two Hits in third pairing minutes, while finishing a little below even in the shot-share column.

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Tristan Jarry got the first start of the season for the Oilers, and is hoping that this year is better than whatever happened last season. Now being used to the team in front of him, and now being fully settled into Edmonton, Jarry has been one of my favourite value goalies picks late in drafts. Someone in Edmonton is going to win games, and Jarry was generally pretty solid last year and in previous years, prior to last year's mid-season trade.

With Frederik Andersen out for a couple more months and Devon Levi unlikely to have a long leash from Mike Babcock, there is at least a lot of opportunity for Jarry to settle in.

Opening night didn't go so well for him though, allowing six goals on 23 shots in the OT loss. Paul Cotter scored two of the goals, while Evan Bouchard (three) and Vasili Podkolzin (two) did all the scoring for Edmonton.

With Ryan Nugent-Hopkins on the shelf for the first two weeks of the season, Leon Draisaitl shifted back to play second line centre, meaning Alex Formenton and Zach Hyman ended up being shifted up to play with Connor McDavid. There was a bit of line juggling, but despite the Oilers chasing the game, the lines remained relatively intact.

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The Blackhawks were outmatched in their game, with Roman Kantserov making his NHL debut as a top-line center. He went minus-one with a SOG and three Hits, while winning one-third of his 15 faceoffs.

Trevor Connelly was also making his debut, and scored his first career goal. He's going to have lots of opportunities to score if he keeps it simple and gets to the net like he was doing yesterday.

Jack Eichel led the way for Vegas with three points in the 5-2 win. Shea Theodore had a power play assist, and skated with the top unit the whole time. He's in for big rebound if that keeps up.

Marc Gatcomb had eight Hits and is my pick to lead the league in that stat this year.

Patrick Kane played 21:30 in the game, over three minutes more than the next Blackhawks forward Frank Nazar. Kane scored a very nice goal in his return to Chicago, showing off some speed and his trademark hands and patience. It looks like Kane is going to be relied on heavily early on. As is Bowen Byram and his 25 minutes of ice time.

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In other news:

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All stats courtesy of Frozentools.

See you next Wednesday, and if you have any fantasy hockey questions or comments you can find me on BlueSky @alexdmaclean.