Welcome to the Eastern Edge, the landscape of the Eastern Conference has changed shape quite a bit over the last week. Carolina has jumped into the top three teams, Toronto is on a three-game winning streak without Auston Matthews, and Buffalo is now tied for the final Wild Card spot.  

Florida Panthers // 11-3-1 // L7 Days: 2-0-0

Carter Verhaeghe has turned on the jets lately with half of his twelve points have been accumulated in the last five games. 19 shots, three goals, three assists, two power play points and a sky high PDO that indicates some self correction in his season. Strangely enough, in these same two weeks Carter has seen his ATOI drop and PPTOI rise. The season to date time on ice compared to his last two games has fallen 13.5%, and his PPTOI has risen almost 42% and all the while he's getting more done at even strength than he has all season. Hockey is weird. 

Uvis Balinskis is on the first power play unit, his time on ice is also steadily rising into the 17-minute range as his PPTOI rises in tandem. Two PPPs in his last five games and one in his last two, he's certainly worth checking out as it seems like Head Coach Paul Maurice will do anything to keep Aaron Ekblad as far away from the top power play unit as he can.

New Jersey Devils // 10-6-2 // L7 Days: 3-1-0

I continue to be impressed by Jesper Bratt as six points in four games this past week brings his season's point pace to 87. Bratt's SOG/60 is up 4% over last year, his hits are up an astounding 72.5% – over a hit per game – and he's contributing at an almost 52% higher clip on the power play. 

Carolina Hurricanes // 10-3-0 // L7 Days: 2-1-0

Jordan Martinook shares the throne with Martin Necas for team points lead this past week in Carolina. Over three shots a game, four goals and almost 16 minutes of ice time in these three games. 

Filtering out the players with one or two game cups of coffee like Daemon Hunt and Matej Blumel – Jack Roslovic's SOG/60 is 10th in the league at 5v5 amongst players with more than 50 minutes of 5v5 ice time. Of note, Ottawa's David Perron is first, and fan favorite Connor McMichael is fourth. 

Dmitri Orlov is doing things. Five of his eight points come in the last five games, a period in which Washington has scored 27 goals – almost 6 goals per game. Sustainable or not, they are there. Hot hands are what wins us weeks. 

Washington Capitals // 8-3-0 // L7 Days: 2-1-0

Maybe I should keep a running tally of how many weeks in a row I talk about Connor McMichael and how unbelievable his season has been. Fourth in the league in 5v5 SOG/60, first in G/60 and ixG/60, Fourth in Points/60 just being Ovechkin, 21st in iCF/60, 3rd in iSCF/60, 9th in iHDCF/60, 10th in rush attempts/60 and 4th in rebounds created/60. Yes, the shooting percentage screams that he will slow down, but all of the underlying metrics are also screaming "BREAKOUT SEASON". All aboard S.S. McMike. 

Dylan Strome has assisted on every single one of Alex Ovechkin's 10 goals. Ovechkin, a career 12.9% shooter, is currently scoring on almost twice as many shots at 20% shooting. 18 of Strome's 22 points on the season are assists, and 10 of those assists are coming from an unsustainably hot Alexander Ovechkin. Washington as a whole is red lining, but we've seen players and teams red line for full seasons before. Will it end? Yes. Will it end this season? Couldn't tell you for sure. 

Toronto Maple Leafs // 9-5-2 // L7 Days: 3-0-0

The Toronto power play has de-monkeyed its back. A successful power play in each of their last four games – totaling eight power play goals – something seems to have clicked into place. You would have to go back 25 games, to March 24th of this year, to find another eight power play goals before this four game stretch. 

New York Rangers // 9-3-1 // L7 Days: 1-1-0

Alexis Lafreniere is still enjoying some time with Artemi Panarin and Mika Zibanejad on the top line. With as well as he is playing I wouldn't be betting on him on the top PP anytime soon though

iXG/60 Rank ( >30 mins PPTOI ):

Kreider: 5th, Panarin: 61st, Zibanejad: 66th, Trocheck: 85th

G/60 Rank ( >30 mins PPTOI ):

Panarin: 8th, Kreider: 13th, Trocheck: 76th, Zibanejad: 140th 

A/60 Rank ( >30 mins PPTOI ):

Trocheck: 28th, Zibanejad: 45th, Panarin: 49th, Kreider: 166th

SOG/60 Rank ( >30 mins PPTOI ):

Kreider: 2nd, Panarin: 7th, Zibanejad: 56th, Trocheck: 91st

Trocheck is 1st in the league in FOW/60 on the PP, if Zibanejad (55th in FOW/60) were to be bumped off that top unit to make room for Lafreniere you no longer have two options on that top unit for power play faceoffs. Granted they're both righties, it's always good to have two options. Alexis Lafreniere is also dead last on the team for PP SOG/60 and only Adam Fox and Reilly Smith have less iXG/60 and iCF/60. There just isn't a justification for it, analytically at least.

Boston Bruins // 7-7-2 / L7 Days: 1-1-1

Since the 2nd game of the season, Charlie McAvoy has one point. One point in his last 15 games has fantasy managers at their wits' end. During this cold streak, McAvoy has the 2nd best SOG/60 amongst BOS defensemen, the 3rd highest iXG/60, 2nd best iCF/60, 2nd best iSCF/60 and 2nd best iHDCF/60. In all cases Hampus Lindholm outranks McAvoy. Hampus Lindholm getting some run on the top power play for the Bruins. 

To put it lightly, let's say David Pastrnak is having a bit of a down year. 110 points in 2023-24 and now on pace for 74 points in 2024-25 – a 36-point pace drop. For reference, Jonathan Huberdeau's disastrous first season in Calgary was a 60-point drop from his previous season. Huberdeau's drop was the single worst loss of production in one season in NHL history, beating Bill Barber's fall from 112 points to 55 by 3 points in 1976-77. For anyone curious, the largest positive point gap was Eric Staal gaining 69 points in a single season – not a single year, because these two seasons spanned three years and bookended the 2004-05 lockout. 

Pastrnak's shooting rates are down 16.6%, his TOI is down 2%, the on-ice shooting percentage is down 35%, his personal shooting percentage is down 26% and is contributing to the oiSH% drop, he's 41% less productive on the power play, and somehow his IPP has gone up 2%. 

The Bruins are scoring 35% fewer goals while Pastrnak is on the ice. David Pastrnak is on pace for 34% less goals than last year… Still too early to start sharpening the pitchforks – we can put those away for now – but something is definitely up in Boston on the whole. 

Yes we can see which stats are down, but it's hard to know why they are down. One can only hope time can fix the issues for our star players in Boston. 

Tampa Bay Lightning // 7-6-1 // L7 Days: 0-1-1

4, 1.67, 1.25, 1.5, 1.5. These are Nikita Kucherov's Pts/GP rates for each week so far this fantasy season. 

Nikita Kucherov has yet to go a week under 1.25 Pt/GP. He's also 2nd on the team in ATOI, behind only Victor Hedman on the team. He's playing an unreal amount of ice time and making every minute count.

New York Islanders // 6-6-3 // L7 Days: 2-0-1

Anthony Duclair is eligible to return this week and Mathew Barzal on November 25th. Whether Duclair is ready to come back or not is unclear, but he will be eligible.

Bo Horvat is doing everything he can to clear the stigma that "Long Island is where offense goes to die". He has five points in his last three games, eight points in his last seven and point per game or better since October 23rd.

Buffalo Sabres // 7-8-1 // L7 Days: 3-1-0

Tage Thompson left Monday's game versus the Canadiens and did not return. He took one shift in the second period before leaving the game. Head Coach Lindy Ruff did not have an update on his status following the game. Alex Tuch took Thompson's spot on the top power play unit. 

Ottawa Senators // 7-7-0 // L7 Days: 1-2-0

Brady Tkachuk put up 12 shots against Boston this past week. He scored a goal, added an assist on the power play, dished out eight hits, had the game-winning goal, tallied two penalty minutes and even won four faceoffs as a winger. We were one short-handed point and a single block away from one of the greatest single game category stuffing fantasy stat lines of all time. 

Pittsburgh Penguins // 6-8-2 // L7 Days: 1-2-1

Evgeni Malkin gaining LW eligibility was a photo finish ending and he's back on Line Two centering Bryan Rust and Michael Bunting. 

There was a bit of buzz about Matt Grzelcyk potentially being QB1 on the Penguins top unit, but it seems to have fallen back to Erik Karlsson. 

The Dallas Stars scored three goals on Joel Blomqvist who made five saves on eight shots, and then pumped Alex Nedeljkovic for another four goals on 32 shots. Tristan Jarry was recalled from the AHL recently, I wonder if they will give him another look while in the shadow of hardship in net. In order to find a Pittsburgh goaltender with a total save percentage above .900, you would have to go back to October 22nd. Since then, both Nedeljkovic and Blomqvist have been below a .900 save percentage. The Penguins are 3-4-2 in this span while controlling 53% of the shot share and sit at a minus-8 goal differential with a team save percentage of .891. The Pens are giving up the 2nd most GA/GP, the 3rd most SA/GP, 

Detroit Red Wings // 6-7-1 // L7 Days: 1-2-0

More than half of Lucas Raymond's team leading 13 points are power play points, Raymond is currently on pace for 41 PPP. The most recent Red Wing to score 40 or more PPP? Pavel Datsyuk in 2007-08, and only seven Red Wings have scored 40 or more PPP in the history of the franchise. Lucas is also pacing for 70 assists this season, a feat that has only been done three times in the history of the Red Wings, twice by Steve Yzerman – most recently in the 1992-93 season, and once by Marcel Dionne in 1974-75.

Especially when considering that 12 of his 13 points are assists, and having scored 31 goals last year, one could argue he's likely to regress positively back to those production levels and build on his 0.93 Pt/GP rate at which he's currently producing. 

A cursory glance at Raymond's surface stats and advanced metrics would make it easy to believe that his 4.4% shooting percentage might indicate that he's entitled to generate more goals and, by extension, point production. He scored 31 goals last year, so for him to be on pace for six goals this year doesn't make a lick of sense. Regardless of how he is getting it done, he is still on pace for upwards of 70 points. The unsustainably low goal production and unsustainably high assist totals could easily wash out and meet somewhere in the middle. 

Columbus Blue Jackets // 5-7-2 // L7 Days: 0-2-1

Kirill Marchenko, Sean Monahan and Yegor Chinakhov continue to be one of the best lines in hockey. Using MoneyPuck's "Lines" tool, and filtering for a minimum of 75 minutes of shared ice time, that line is 4th in expected goals for percentage, 13th in xG/60 (two places above the red hot Ovechkin-Strome-Protas line), 16th best xGA/60, 6th in shot attempts for percentage, 10th in CF/60, and 13th in goals for percentage. They are dominating possession and production together. Adam Fantilli was seen on the top line in Columbus's most recent game, though.

Philadelphia Flyers // 5-8-2 // L7 Days: 1-1-1

Matvei Michkov is back in the lineup. He received his warm John Tortorella welcome this week being benched twice, and then relegated to the third line. Michkov scored a breakaway goal and added an assist tonight over the San Jose Sharks. 

Jamie Drysdale will be on the shelf for a couple of weeks. He was placed on IR, and Emil Andrae was quarterbacking the top power play unit. 

Owen Tippett seems to have righted his ship; he leads the league in shots on goal over the last 7 days with 22 shots and three points in four games played. 

Montreal Canadiens // 5-9-2 // L7 Days: 1-2-1

Cole Caufield leads the league in goals with 12 in 16 games. I was surprised how far down I had to scroll to find him amongst shot leaders – Caulfield has one more game played than Kyle Palmieri, and one shot on goal more than Kyle Palmieri. All this to paint an elaborate picture of Caufield's 29.3% shooting efficiency. A 50-goal season is an honest reality here, he might even flirt with 60 goals, but the 70 he is currently pacing for feels like an easy under to bet. 

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I remember exactly where I was standing when my Philadelphia Flyers took Cam York instead of Cole Caufield. The entire bar was chanting "CAULFIELD! CAUFIELD! CAUFIELD!" When York's name was announced the bar went silent… Anyway, that's your Eastern Edge Eastern Conference update for the week. Thank you for reading, as always feel free to chirp me in the comments below, in the Fantasy Hockey Discord or you can reach out on X – @FHFHockey. In the meantime you can catch updates from me on the Five Hole Fantasy Hockey Podcast.