They didn't play on Wednesday night, so Tampa Bay had a practice instead. At that practice, the team ran the same third line they've been running their last few games with Nick Paul centering Tanner Jeannot and Ross Colton. This is being done because Michael Eyssimont was injured in Game 1 and Jeannot, returning from his own injury, was back in the lineup for Game 2.

However, there was a little twist to their practice:

#GoBolts practice lines today before flying out to Toronto for Game 5:

Stamkos-Point-Kucherov
Hagel-Cirelli-Killorn
Colton-Paul-Jeannot
Maroon-Bellemare-Perry
Eyssimont drawing in

Hedman-Perbix
Sergachev-Raddysh
Cole-Bogosian
Fleury drawing in

— Eduardo A. Encina (@EddieInTheYard) April 26, 2023

That is Eyssimont drawing into the line rushes, at times.

On my personal blog, I wrote before the series how Eyssimont, and his line with Nick Paul, had been playing very well, and why that was. I figured it could be a difference-maker for them in their matchup with Toronto, but the Eyssimont injury threw a wrench in that.

Meanwhile, here's how Jeannot and Paul have fared since the former was traded to Tampa Bay:

if my math is right, Jeannot/Paul is 43.6% xGF in their regular/playoff time together at 5v5. goal share well under 40%. that's a big ol' yikes, man.

— Michael Clifford (@SlimCliffy) April 26, 2023

Jeannot has been struggling since his return from injury, and he wasn't good with Paul in the regular season, anyway. Toronto should still win the series, but it'll be interesting to see how Tampa's third line is used in Game 5.

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Dallas provided an update on Joe Pavelski:

Pete DeBoer on Joe Pavelski today:

"Planning on traveling"
"Game-time decision"

We will see what Game 6 looks like in St. Paul… #TexasHockey

— Brien Rea (@BrienRea) April 26, 2023

Just being with the team is good news, and with the team up one game, they could hold him out in hopes of getting him some extra rest ahead of Round 2. They have to get there first, though.

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Good news on the Nikolaj Ehlers front for Winnipeg:

#NHLJets F Nikolaj Ehlers is on the ice in a regular jersey, let's see which unit he skates with.

— Ken Wiebe (@WiebesWorld) April 26, 2023

Given Pierre-Luc Dubois and Mark Scheifele weren't skating, and Josh Morrissey is already ruled out, this could be a very important development for the Jets (PLD should be fine for Game 5, by the way). It is a huge uphill climb no matter what, but an Ehlers return would help in this respect.

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For the first time in the series between Boston and Florida, with the Panthers facing elimination in Patrice Bergeron's return to the lineup, we got an overtime contest.

The teams traded goals all game long. Taylor Hall managed his fifth of the postseason near the midway mark of the third period to tie the game 3-3 and got it to the extra frame. Hall finished regular time with under 15 minutes played but as he has for most of the series, he had a huge impact.

Six minutes into overtime, Boston goalie Linus Ullmark turned the puck over behind his net, and Carter Verhaeghe took a shot that deflected off his foot as he was scrambling back to his goal. The puck kicked out to the slot, onto Matthew Tkachuk's stick, and into the back of the net for the 4-3 win. It gives the Panthers at least one more home matchups as they claw the series to 3-2. Game 6 is Friday night in Florida.

Carter Verhaeghe had a trio of primary even-strength assists on goals from Anthony Duclair and Sam Bennett, on top of the Tkachuk game-winner. It gives him 20 points in 21 playoff games with the Panthers. He truly has turned into a tremendous top-line winger. (They have changed the assist on the Tkachuk goal twice just since I started this blurb.)

Sergei Bobrovsky was outstanding in net, saving 44 of 47 shots to get his team a chance at extending the series.

*

Goals from Morgan Geekie and Yanni Gourde helped Seattle to a 3-2 win over Colorado on Wednesday night, giving the Kraken a 3-2 series lead over the Avalanche. Game 6 goes Friday night back in Denver with the Avs trying to force a Game 7.

The big story was Tye Kartye making his NHL debut – in the playoffs – and not only playing well, but scoring Seattle's second goal off a nice shot from the slot, burying a nice pass/play from Jordan Eberle. Kartye had 28 goals and 57 points as a 21-year-old rookie in the AHL and appears to have gained some favour with the big club. What an incredible moment for the young man.

The other story is Colorado's depleted depth. When you consider they played this game missing Gabriel Landeskog, Nazem Kadri, Valeri Nichushkin, and Cale Makar from the lineup as compared to their 2022 Cup team, well, it's just missing too much. They could have overcome Kadri signing Calgary if everyone else was in the lineup, but they're not. It certainly doesn't breed confidence in Colorado winning the next two games to get to the second round.

A lot of credit does have to go to Seattle, though. They were the better team on Wednesday night with the depleted Colorado lineup, but they've also largely been the better team the entire series, Makar/Nichushkin in the lineup or not. It really has been a treat to watch them step on the gas in the postseason.

*

Today we are continuing my (fantasy) offseason series of reviewing the regular season of each team that missed the playoffs. There will be enough coverage of the teams that got there, we can't ignore the other half of the NHL.

So far, we have discussed Pittsburgh, Calgary, and Buffalo. These Ramblings will head back to the Western Conference and to one of the more interesting teams of the year: the Nashville Predators. The successes and failures endured, the improvements and declines made, as well as where the team and players go from here, are all going to be covered.

As usual, our Frozen Tools or Natural Stat Trick will be used as resources for the stats in this column, unless otherwise indicated. Cool? Great.

Successes

This reeeeeeeeeeally depends on an individual's expectation for the Predators this season, especially with the injuries nuking the fantasy value of a lot of players over the final eight weeks. My personal view was that they were likely not a playoff team, and that's exactly what they ended up being. However, it was close by the end of the year as they missed the final Wild Card spot by just three points. That was with Filip Forsberg out of the lineup for the final two months of the season, Roman Josi out for the final three weeks, Ryan Johansen missing one-third of the campaign, and both Mikael Granlund and Nino Niederreiter being traded. In that context, it was a tremendous success, and it's fair to wonder where they'd be had Forsberg, in particular, not suffered that concussion in February.

Seeing the growth from some of the young Nashville forwards was the big success of the season, fantasy-wise. Tommy Novak was called up in the middle of December and exploded immediately with 11 points in 19 games leading to the All-Star Game. That might not seem great, but he was playing 11:18 a night. That's great production for that ice time.

After the ASG, that production went to another level with 13 goals and 32 points in 31 games post-Forsberg. Per Corey Sznajder's tracking data, Novak finished above average by Scoring Chance Contributions per 60 minutes at 5-on-5 (SCC/60, or individual scoring chances plus assists on teammate scoring chances). Across the league, he compared favourably to names like Valeri Nichushkin and Elias Lindholm (inside the red circle along with teammate Kiefer Sherwood):

There are issues to Novak's season, particularly his defensive play, but the offense was not a mirage, even if some of his percentages (like personal SH%) were high. Perhaps there is pullback in per-minute production in 2023-24, but if he can maintain his level of offensive play, and add some ice time – he finished the year under 15 minutes a game – there should still be good production.

Much of the same could be applied to Luke Evangelista, who put up good offensive numbers – production, play-driving, or micro-stats – but did so in about half the sample. A good showing, absolutely, but we need more from him. But, like Novak, more of the same would have him on a clear upward trajectory.

Of course, the big success was Juuse Saros. He followed up his 2021-22 Vezina-nominated season with an even better season: second by Evolving Hockey's Goals Saved Above Expected, trailing only Ilya Sorokin. That incorporates the defence in front of him which, as mentioned earlier, was bad. Despite not finishing near the leaders in traditional stats like Wins, GAA, and SV%, he was still the #1 goalie on Yahoo! Fantasy. Being elite, even on poor defensive teams, can still lead to great fantasy seasons for a goalie. People who didn't think he was one of the best goalies in the world before 2022-23 have likely changed their minds.

Failures

While the injuries late in the season make it hard to fully evaluate the team, this wasn't a high-end roster even with everyone in the lineup. By the All-Star break, Nashville had played 48 games. In that stretch, Niederreiter, Johansen, Forsberg, and Granlund had played every single game, Matt Duchene had missed one, and the defence duo of Roman Josi and Mattias Ekholm were also 48 for 48. Juuse Saros also started over half the matchups (37/48). With all that health from their most important players, Nashville was 18^th in the league by points percentage, and 20^th in the league by expected goal share at 5-on-5. That shows the failure of the team and why I wasn't high on them to begin with. No one cracked 60 points, so while there were late-season waiver adds that were impactful, the drafted skaters were not.

The injuries kept all the relevant fantasy skaters – at least at the draft table – from being fantasy successes. Josi had taken a big step back in production (1.2 points/game to 0.88) and then got hurt; Forsberg had taken a big step back in production (1.22 points/game to 0.84); Johansen had tak- you know what, I think we get the point.

Improvements

Whether we want to call this an improvement or not, the team shifted to a lot more offence off the cycle than off the rush in 2022-23. The same tracking data linked earlier shows Nashville ranking in the middle of the league by offence off the cycle last season, but a top-5 team this season.

The reason we might not want to call it an improvement is who was taking the shots off the cycle: Josi, Dante Fabbro, and Alexandre Carrier led Nashville skaters – by a good margin – in shots per minute off the cycle. There is a need to get the defence involved more in this era in the NHL, but if Alex Carrier is shooting off the cycle nearly 60% more often Filip Forsberg, it's fair to wonder if the improvement is actually worth it. When we include just shots off the forecheck/cycle, the five Nashville leaders on a per-minute basis were Yakov Trenin, Niederreiter, Fabbro, Ekholm, and Josi. Niederreiter is fine here, but having none of Forsberg/Duchene, or even Cody Glass, highlights the problem with the offence: the wrong players had an outsized impact on the team's shooting/shots.   

There was a noticeable improvement offensively at 5-on-5 before the injuries. Until the All-Star Game, Nashville was tied for 8^th in the league in expected goals-for at 5-on-5 with Toronto, and ahead of teams like Boston and Dallas. A poor shooting percentage (regression!) kept them from more goals, though, ranking 19^th and behind Los Angeles. If they can replicate that shot generation, with a healthy roster, they could rebound back the other way in 2023-24.

That is why this is a fascinating team to monitor in the offseason. We'll talk more about it later, but this roster could go a lot of different ways over the coming months.

Declines

There were obviously a lot of declines here, even before the injuries, and a lot of it related to just natural regression. The 2021-22 Predators saw numerous players have career years and, predictably, they didn't improve upon that. That natural regression was the first decline, but not one worth discussing further.

Nashville's team defence took a huge hit, and that was before the injuries. Using that same 48-game span, the Predators were 26^th in 5-on-5 expected goals against, worse than teams like Buffalo, St. Louis, and Philadelphia. Even with the third-best save percentage in that span, the team was 13^th by goals against because they gave up so many shots. That was not the case the year before. It is nice that Saros can have a great season behind a bad defence, but we shouldn't expect him to do it year after year. If he isn't Vezina-calibre in 2023-24, perhaps playing closer to average, and gets this defence again? He'll get lit up like John Coffey in 'The Green Mile'.

The other notable decline came from Josi. Even before he got hurt, his SCC/60 dropped from 2021-22 to 2022-23, going from a league-leading 5.52/60 to 4.90/60, and fourth in the league. Not that it's a death-knell or anything, but when a player has a career season at 31 years old and then declines a bit at 32 years old, including an injury, we should take note.

Where To Go From Here

Niederreiter is in Winnipeg, Granlund is in Pittsburgh, but everyone else that was a regular should be back. There are some RFAs like Carrier, Cody Glass, and new Pred Cal Foote and Rasmus Asplund, but none will be expensive. With Mark Borowiecki and Zach Sanford being their only true free agents, per Cap Friendly, and nearly $20M in cap space, this team could go out and make a big free agent signing if they want. The question is if they want to because this is a borderline playoff roster as it is and they have nearly $40M in cap space tied up as a far as 2025-26. They have to decide if they want to try one more kick at the can over the next couple seasons with their core under contract or start turning the roster over to the kids. The concern is splitting the difference and being neither a contender nor a rebuilder. Being in that squishy middle is a fast-track to sustained mediocrity. It is hard to see a team with four skaters making $8M+ annually for each of the next three seasons and Saros in net for two going full rebuild, so look for Nashville to make a splash in free agency.

Unless the young guys like Glass, Novak, Fabbro, Evangelista, or the prospects yet to come, make a huge impact, it's hard to see this team being considerably better in real terms. For fantasy, though, a healthy year and some rebounding percentages should see the top guys regain some semblance of their usual form.