For all the bellyaching I've done about the NHL's playoff format – and it does need to be changed – we went into Monday night's action with a little over five weeks left and the East had six teams within four points of each other for two playoff spots. Some have more games played than others but this is going to go right down to the wire, and health could be a big factor for some of these teams. Buffalo is already without Alex Tuch and announced Mattias Samuelsson was out for Monday night's game:

Per the #Sabres, Mattias Samuelsson and Riley Stillman are out tonight. Day to day with upper-body injuries.

— Bill Hoppe (@BillHoppeNHL) March 6, 2023

Samuelsson has fought injuries this year and that's made his performance a bit inconsistent. He doesn't turn 23 years old until next week, though, so there's more development to come. He already has the look of a very good multi-cat fantasy defenceman and that should only get better moving forward.

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Aleksander Barkov was not at Florida's practice on Monday:

Cats lines at practice, looks like Barkov is taking a maintenance day.

Luostarinen- White – Duclair
Verhaeghe – Bennett – Tkachuk
Lomberg – Lundell – Reinhart
Cousins – Staal – Fitzgerald

Forsling – Ekblad
Staal – Montour
Mahura – Gudas

Bobrovsky
Lyon

— Jameson Olive (@JamesonCoop) March 6, 2023

The team would later say that it's a maintenance day, but fantasy players know that Barkov has been fighting injury basically since Christmas, if not earlier. He had been producing very well regardless with 30 points in his last 25 games but it's a wonder how healthy Barkov actually is right now. Florida is another one of those teams chasing down a playoff spot that needs all its players to have a real shot at getting a postseason position.

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Evander Kane was skating for Edmonton at the team's morning skate before their game in Buffalo:

Evander Kane is on the ice for morning skate today in Buffalo

— Bob Stauffer (@Bob_Stauffer) March 6, 2023

Kane has been in and out of the lineup all season with injuries, most notably that brutal skate cut he took. That Edmonton has been rolling – second in the league by 5-on-5 expected goal share over the last half-season and are 16-7-6 in 29 games since Christmas – largely without Kane should be a terrifying prospect for most of the West. Fantasy owners could get Kane back sometime this week though with just two more games, and those games being in Toronto and Boston, things don't seem to line up well for fantasy value, especially without top PP time.

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John Tavares was wearing a grey jersey at practice on Monday, meaning he was an extra:

#Leafs practice is underway Ryan O'Reilly is not on the ice. John Tavares is wearing extras grey, Luke Schenn is also not on the ice.

— David Alter (@dalter) March 6, 2023

It looks to be an injury as coach Sheldon Keefe talked about Tavares being a bit banged up lately and they're just trying to give him some rest. We will certainly provide more updates as we get them because this news, on top of Ryan O'Reilly going on LTIR because of a broken finger, is a pretty big development for those in head-to-head fantasy playoffs.

There might be something more to this as Tavares was not on either PP unit at practice, either. Stay tuned for more as we get it.

The team losing Ryan O'Reilly is a very interesting development. He can hopefully return for playoffs but they traded Pierre Engvall, who was likely their best bottom-6 forward. That had forced the team to put O'Reilly on the third line in recent Toronto games. With Engvall in New York, and O'Reilly hurt, it's now the Sam Lafferty show on the second line right now, and shortly the third line once Tavares returns. Lafferty is going to get the chance to prove that the Leafs going out to get him was the right line to take this season. Let's see what he does with it.

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Calgary had some new lineup combinations for their game in Dallas on Monday night:

Projected Flames Lines in Dallas

Pelletier Lindholm Toffoli
Ritchie Kadri Huberdeau
Mangiapane Backlund Coleman
Lucic Dube Lewis

D stays the same

Markstrom

📢 advertisement:

— Ryan Leslie (@ryanlesliemedia) March 6, 2023

Dillon Dubé had just one goal and 12 shots in his last eight games as his line was somewhat inconsistent over the last couple of months. Nick Ritchie is getting a shot with a pair of very good offensive players, even if Jonathan Huberdeau is having a down season. We will see how long these last but if it's anywhere near permanent, Dubé's fantasy value has just been nuked.

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Sam Steel was seen on Minnesota's second line at practice on Monday:

For my #lineheathens #mnwild

Kaprizo – Hartman – Zuccarello
Steel – JEEk – Boldy
Foligno – Gaudreau – Sundqvist
Shaw – Dewar – Reaves

Middleton – Spurgeon
Goligoski – Dumba
Merrill – Klingberg

— Jessi Pierce (@jessi_pierce) March 6, 2023

Steel had been a scratch a lot lately but was back in the lineup on the weekend, and has now been moved up to play with Joel Eriksson Ek and Matt Boldy. Steel had done great work on the top line for a couple months but seemed to lose a bit of steam. Perhaps some rest in the press box and returning with skill players can rejuvenate not only his production but that of Boldy and Eriksson Ek as well. Boldy has just six points in his last 15 games, and two of them came in that 3-0 win over Calgary on Saturday. Eriksson Ek has nine in those 15 games but six of them came on the power play, so perhaps Steel can help boost the even-strength scoring here and help give Minnesota two legitimate scoring lines. Though Marcus Johansson was packing up some stuff in Washington so maybe Steel's spot isn't assured.

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Watching the trade deadline unfold brought some exciting trades but also some underwhelming performances from the GMs of a few franchises. It did get me thinking about a couple lessons that could be applied to fantasy hockey.

The first one is this: you don't have to win every trade. In fact, there are trades you should lose, even on purpose. What is meant by that is that it's not necessary to extract every bit of value out of every trade in order to help your fantasy roster. If a fantasy owner has a team in second place in a keeper league, and they need to bolster their wingers, they may have to lose the trade in the long term to win in the short term. Maybe a top prospect like Yaroslav Askarov or Alex Holtz is necessary, along with some draft picks, to acquire even a mid-level fantasy talent like Chris Kreider or Claude Giroux. Personally, if I feel I have a chance to win a fantasy title, all options are on the table. If I don't need an Askarov or a Holtz to win this year, they are available. Long-term, Askaraov-plus-picks would likely be much more valuable than Giroux, but Giroux is much more valuable to a fantasy roster this season than that entire trade package. Moves like that are losers in the long run but can help attain a championship this year. Flags fly forever, as they say, and being unwilling to lose a trade to push for a championship is something fantasy owners do far too often.

The second lesson is to not nibble at the edges. Far too many teams come out of the trade deadline adding a third-line winger and a number-6 defenceman and think they've done something to bolster the roster. Fantasy leagues will vary in what owners will ask in a trade, and hopefully it wouldn't take Askarov-plus-picks to get someone like Kreider, but at least he could make an impact on a fantasy roster. In the real NHL, just look at what Pittsburgh and Calgary did at the deadline, which is basically nothing. Adding Mikael Granlund and Nick Ritchie, respectively, does not move the needle. Boston going out and getting Tyler Bertuzzi and Dmitry Orlov does move the needle. Similarly in the fantasy realm, if a trade is going to be made, and it's from a trailing position in the standings, go get someone that can have a significant impact on the roster. It'll cost more in a trade but the whole point is to improve the roster to maximize its capability down the stretch. Acquiring ancillary pieces like a bench centre or a fourth goalie is not the route to take unless it's simply shoring up the depth of a fantasy roster that's in first place anyway.

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It has been a tough season for Troy Terry who has missed a few games due to injury and has been largely split from Trevor Zegras for some time now. His goals per game is down nearly 40% from last year, though his 82-game pace is still for 25 goals so it's not as if the goal-scoring has disappeared entirely. But the drop from shooting 19.3% a year ago was predictable, and shooting under 11% might be a bit far but it's not extreme.

When going through some of Corey Sznajder's tracking data, Terry's stuck out because his are still very strong. What made him a breakout candidate after the 2021 Bubble season was extremely strong scoring chance contributions at 5-on-5 (individual scoring chances plus assists on teammate scoring chances). That persisted last year and was a reason for his breakout:

The problem this year is his scoring chances and scoring chance assists have declined. He is still a strong contributor, but there has been a noticeable drop-off. It is a wonder how much the team is affecting him, though, because he is the only player on the roster to be above average in both scoring chances and scoring chance assists:

They are in a league with only Chicago by this regard, as even San Jose, Columbus, and Arizona each have two players above average in both categories. With this team being so bad, we could be forgiven if Terry took a step back in some measures this season.

All told, over the last two seasons, Terry's points/60 minutes at 5-on-5 is 2.15. Just ahead of him are names like Jack Eichel, Evgeni Malkin, and John Tavares. Terry has one year of RFA status left before he hits free agency, and it'll be interesting to see what he and the team decide to do this summer.