I don't think there are any more playoff drafts at this point, but just in case – you can pick up my Playoff Draft List here.

Later this week I will set up the shop for pre-sale of next season's items. If you're a subscriber and the payment went through, then you're already signed up for those items as soon as they are ready to download. For anyone else – the Ultimate Fantasy Pack, the Keeper League Pack, etc. will go on sale later this week. Follow me on Twitter for the announcement. This all begins with the Fantasy Prospects Report which is planned for release on July 10, five weeks later than in usual years. The Fantasy Guide release date will be August 14, two weeks later than usual years – but since free agency opens July 28 instead of July 1 this year, that's a pretty fast turnaround. We won't even have a clear idea as to team rosters until August 6^th or so.

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The scrappy Preds aren't being put down easily. It's odd that a scrappy team is out-scrapping a scrappier team, isn't it? I mean … Rod Brind'Amour's team is losing hardworking overtime battles. Who'd'a thunk?

The Junkyard Dogs line of Erik Haula, Calle Jarnkrok and Nick Cousins are really coming together for the Preds at the right time. From a fantasy standpoint, what you see is what you get here: Haula 'can' be a 50-point player if he ever stayed healthy. But we can't seem to count on him for that. Cousins is a solid 30-point player and that's probably not going to change. Jarnkrok is ready to have his first 45-point season, and would have twice now were it not for pandemics and schedule reductions. At this point in his career it's difficult to imagine him exceeding that number by very much though.

The line of fantasy interest for Nashville right now is Luke Kunin with Mikael Granlund and Eeli Tolvanen. I'm not sure how long Tolvanen will be a part of that line, as he seemed to be hand-in-hand with Victor Arvidsson, who is hurt. But Kunin and Granlund sure work well together and both of those players were trying to find their way in the first half. But in the final 23 games plus four playoff games, Granlund has 18 points (or about two points for every three games). Kunin has been posting similar numbers, with 16 points in his last 25 regular season and playoff games. Granlund is a UFA this summer again.

Brett Pesce led both teams in ice time in that double OT game – he played 39:51. With Jaccob Slavin still sidelines, Pesce is being leaned on heavily.

After two great wins early in the series, Alex Nedeljkovic has now dropped two in a row in double overtime. Enough to shake things up and put Petr Mrazek in? Ned faced 97 shots in those two 2OT games, giving up nine. Overall he boasts a playoff SV% of 0.928. I say ride him another game.

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The Avs move on. That's the problem with drafting players from such a great team in a playoff pool – they're going to play minimal games. You get just four games out of them in Round 1.

St. Louis post-mortem

First, it was great to see Vladimir Tarasenko finally get his mojo. His two goals were elite sniper goals, as if the first one got the monkey off his back and the second one would have been the beginning of floodgates opening had it not been their last game. Remember, he had just four goals in 27 games leading into Sunday as he returned from shoulder surgery. Getting the strength and timing back takes a while, and it's great to see him head into offseason training on a personal high note.

Robert Thomas was also taking a while to recover from his return from injury, managing just four points in 12 games in the regular season after returning. But he had three assists in four playoff games and was up over 17 minutes in ice time on Sunday. That's his highest ice time since returning from injury (in fact he had never reached 16 minutes in the prior 15 contests.

The top playoff producer on the Blues was a tie at three points in four games: Thomas and Ryan O'Reilly.

Jaden Schwartz was third among forwards in ice time, yet was pointless in four games. In two of his last three seasons his 82-game scoring rate was 43 points. In the other season it was 66 points. Which version will we see next year? Prognosticators such as myself would probably go somewhere in the middle. The coward's way out. I suspect it will be black or white here – no grey area. Either he gets 65+ or gets gets low-40s. But the "coward's way out" is probably the right call at the draft table in the fall. Picking him as a 55-point player will mean you're either getting a good player who exceeded expectations by 10 points, or a bad one but he only fell short by 10 points.

Mike Hoffman has probably played his last game with St. Louis. He is a UFA in the summer and given the dip in ice time, the healthy scratch, and his treatment in general, I don't see him wanting to stay and I don't see St. Louis wanting to keep him. He had 15 points in 16 games after his last healthy scratch, and he did it with about 14:30 of ice time per game. This was following his two most productive seasons in the NHL. I think if he wants to accept a salary lower than or equal to his current $4M then he'll have no shortage of suitors.

Jordan Binnington. Since that miracle Cup and end-of-season run, his numbers have been that of a very good backup. A 0.910 SV% over 92 regular season games and 0.870 SV% over nine playoff games (and zero playoff wins since holding the Cup). Since signing that six-year contract extension, Binnington is 9-12-5, 2.76 GAA, 0.909 SV% and just 37.0 QS%. Plus a 1.15 GSAA (goals saved above average). The Blues took a chance that signing him early would give them savings – what if he led them two rounds into the postseason? But that roll of the dice blew up in their face. Winnington indeed: now we should flip the last n with the t in that nickname.

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Washington post-mortem

The Caps outshot the Bruins 41-19 on Sunday, yet they lost 3-1.

Ilya Samsonov had one great start, but lost in OT. And he lost it this way:

Which led to this:

And he wasn't the same after that. The two starts since that goal were BRU and TAL. All in all, a forgettable season for the 24-year-old. And Vitek Vanecek is still very much in the conversation for Caps' starter. Next season will be interesting.

Nicklas Backstrom was rested for a game late in the season. It didn't do him any good, as he had just one point in the five playoff games. A great season marred by his managing just three points over his last 10 contests. The 33-year-old should still be good for at least another 0.90 points-per-game season.

Anthony Mantha: six points in six games after joining Washington. Four points in 13 games after that, including two in the playoffs. Steve Yzerman may have committed highway robbery, but let's see how things shake out next season.

Daniel Sprong should have been used more. Scratching him was a mistake and I think he should have seen more ice time than the 10 minutes or so that he was getting. Despite playing just three games, he was fifth on the team in SOG (including four on Sunday), and he was one of the few players on the team that wasn't a minus in the series. They had been ramping his ice time up as the season went along, until he was averaging over 13 minutes per game in the final quarter. He had 12 points in his last 22 regular season games.

Evgeny Kuznetsov had three points in his last nine regular season and playoff games, which puts the cap on a terrible season for him and his fantasy owners. The most concerning thing with Kuznetsov the trend with his points-per-game average: 1.05 in 2017-18, and then 0.95, 0.83, 0.71 this season. That's a pretty steady decline. He just turned 29 last week and shouldn't be declining at this stage in his career but here we are.

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Mike Reilly has blossomed into a fantasy-worthy defenseman. The 27-year-old ended the season with zero goals, but 27 assists in 55 games. Add two assists in five playoff games (both Sunday). He has 10 points in 20 games since joining the Bruins. He is a UFA this summer. Pay attention to where he signs and for how much. Especially if he keeps contributing in these playoffs. His ice time by quarter this year: 17:30, 18:52, 19:53, 20:58. This suggests the coaches like what they see and gain confidence in putting him out there. The fancy stats suggest luck wasn't a factor, although his secondary assists were a little high at 70.4%.

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Top 5 goalies by SV% so far:

1. Marc-Andre Fleury 0.966 (four games)
2. Connor Hellebuyck 0.958 (three games)
3. Ilya Sorokin 0.944 (two games)
4. Jack Campbell 0.943 (two games)
5. Tuukka Rask 0.941 (five games)

Worst goalie of the playoffs so far, by SV%: Sergei Bobrovsky 0.841. A close second? Chris Driedger 0.871. But that's probably gonna happen when you face the league's most potent offense.

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The Oilers were up 4-1 with about eight minutes left in the game. The Jets scored. Then two or three minutes later this happened:

Wow. And before you start talking about Connor McDavid needing to 'escape' Edmonton – he's a big reason why that tying goal even happened. McDavid, who had been snakebitten in the first two games, compiled three points. As did Leon Draisaitl.

It was interesting to note that Jesse Puljujarvi played 21:55 in the game (that went nine minutes beyond regulation). He's really come along this year. Kailer Yamamoto played just 12:24 and was playing on a depth line, while Ryan McLeod was on a scoring line (with RNH) and saw nearly 15 minutes. McLeod has just one point in 13 regular season and playoff games.

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Pierre-Luc Dubois is happy Nik Ehlers is back. Ehlers scored twice including the OT winner, and Dubois assisted on both. Dubois was pointless in 11 games heading into Sunday.

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See you next Monday.