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In this week’s installment of Eastern Edge, we’ll be taking a look at the top 25 scorers from the Eastern Conference during the 2018-2019 season.

Upon first glance, you’ll notice that this list is comprised of many dynamic duos – two forwards that played together often and took advantage of their chemistry as they contributed to each other’s point totals. Here are the ones that made the list:

Crosby – Guentzel 

Barkov – Huberdeau

Tavares – Marner

Backstrom – Ovechkin

Couturier – Giroux

Aho – Teravainen

Brayden Point – Nikita Kucherov

Some of these ‘duos’ are less defined than others. For example, Tampa Bay’s three representatives (Stamkos, Point and Kucherov) played together in various combinations of duos and even as a trio. However, as our handy-dandy line combination tool shows us, Point and Kucherov played together the most. I should also highlight Boston’s top line of Marchand, Bergeron and Pastrnak securing spots on this list despite the latter two missing a significant portion of the season with injury.

But why did I call attention to these duos and trios? Well, I think acknowledging their existence allows us to better appreciate the players who cracked the top 25 without as much help. In particular, I’m referring to Mika Zibanejad and Dylan Larkin.

Mika Zibanejad played most of last season with guys like Jesper Fast, Mats Zuccarello and Chris Kreider. Now, don’t get me wrong, those are three good hockey players. However, they pale in comparison to the duos and trios I listed above. Fast’s highest career point total is a modest 33 which he tallied in 2017-2018. While Kreider has all the tools to break the 60-point barrier, he hasn’t reached that milestone in his NHL career – which began in 2012. Zuccarello has shown the most offensive output of the three but only played 46 games with the Rangers last season before getting shipped off to Dallas. In short, Zibanejad’s career-high output during the 2018-2019 campaign was not a result of his supporting cast. With that being said, his supporting cast just got a whole lot better.

Zibanejad put up a modest 23 power-play points last year, while most of the league’s top scorers registered 30 to 40 tallies in that category. Now, obviously when new players join a team, there’s no guarantee that they’ll play well together, but I think it’s hard to ignore the amount of talent that was injected into the Rangers’ roster. If Zibanejad can find chemistry with Kaapo Kakko, Artemi Panarin and Jacob Trouba, that’s going to be one filthy power-play unit.

Then there’s Dylan Larkin, who, like Zibanejad, has been able to produce without much of a supporting cast. The similarities don’t end there, as Larkin’s supporting cast has also improved – but in a different way. Tyler Bertuzzi, Anthony Mantha and Andreas Athanasiou have shown consistent improvement in their young careers and I think they’ll take huge strides next season. Athanasiou is coming off a 30-goal season, Bertuzzi put up 47 points in 73 games and Mantha is coming off an impressive performance at the IIHF World Cup where he was one of the tournament’s leading scorers with 14 points in nine games. Fantasy hockey managers can often get caught up in the ‘sexy’ playoff teams that boast a lot of talent, but I think you’ll benefit from stealing a few Red Wings in the later rounds of your draft.

A lot goes on during the course of a season and it can be hard to keep track of every story line. During the offseason, it’s incredibly useful to review the leaderboards and familiarize yourself with some occurrences you might have missed or forgotten. Going into your draft it’s useful to keep these things in mind as they’re easy to forget. Here are a few examples of what I mean:

• 33-year-old David Krejci scored 73 points last year. It’s easy to say his production will decrease going forward, but I advise you to keep an eye on him and Jake Debrusk during the 2019-2020 campaign.

• Jake Guentzel scored 40 goals. The 24-year-old is an excellent player and has shown great chemistry with Sidney Crosby.

• Sean Couturier quietly put up 76 points in 80 games. I recall a great amount of pessimism surrounding Couturier’s production when he suffered a couple of knee injuries heading into the season.