Happy Monday y'all! If you've made it this far, you are either the champ of your league or entering the finals this week. Congrats on your season or good luck the rest of the way! Or if you just like the content here at DobberHockey, thanks for reading!

I know this is the Wild West, but I have a gripe with the whole league scheduling. We are in the stretch run here and we have teams in the East traveling westward and Western Conference teams flocking east. This travel needs to happen earlier in the season for everyone and save the final weeks of the year for conference/divisional play, much like the stretch the Nashville Predators and St. Louis Blues are on/just had. Both organizations have games against opponents they are competing against for the final wild card spot; it leads to better game action for us as the viewer and really helps distinguish who should be going to the spring dance instead of potentially getting into the playoffs with loser points at the end of the campaign.

Speaking of the Preds, like I said, they are in a stretch of their schedule right now that is really testing their team. Get wins and make the playoffs, or go home. They have another must win tonight against the LA Kings, who are right behind them in the standings. Yes, they are technically tied in points, but Nashville has (a lot) more regulation wins than LA so for all intents and purposes, we can say they are a point up.

It is crazy to look at that tiebreaker and see the Kings only have 19 regulation wins. That is second to last in the entire league! This is another reason that the point system, not the playoff format, needs to be adjusted. If the league corrected the points they award for regulation wins, no loser points, etc. we would be given a format that rewards the better teams and gives us the best playoff matchups.

Along with Los Angeles, the San Jose Sharks and Winnipeg Jets are still holding out hope for that final wildcard spot as the Sharks are only two points back (with a game in hand) and the Jets are three out. After a big contest last night against the Colorado Avalanche, the Blues sit only three points out now as well, and they hold the most regulation wins out of all of the wildcard teams. The Seattle Kraken have all but waved the white flag, going 2-6-2 in their last 10 games and currently on a three-game losing streak to drop six points behind. 

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Another team who is falling off the rails is the Anaheim Ducks. They are on a five-game losing streak and now sit in second place in the division, only one point up on the Vegas Golden Knights. The Ducks have won most of their games in overtime this season so they won't hold the tie breaker against the Edmonton Oilers or Golden Knights so they need to right the ship if they want to keep home ice advantage for at least the first round. Cutter Gauthier suffered an upper body injury against the Toronto Maple Leafs last week and has missed the last three contests. 

It is always tough to win when you don't have your leading goal scorer, but it's even tougher to win when you don't get solid goaltending and defense. Their 5-3 loss against the Calgary Flames on Saturday was the 25th game of the season that the Ducks gave up at least five goals. They are a perfect 8-0 in shootouts and only have five overtime losses on the year so they win the close games, but if they lose, it's most likely by a couple because they sit at a -14-goal differential in 2025-26.

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Jumping back to the Blues, it looks like they were right in asking for the moon in return for Robert Thomas. The center recorded a hat trick in their victory over the Avs and he has been one of the propellers in getting St. Louis back on track. Props to Doug Armstrong and the management team for the Blues, not only in keeping Thomas, but because the first round pick they received from the Detroit Red Wings for Justin Faulk is an unprotected draft pick. It does not seem like the Red Wings want to take a hold of a wildcard spot so they could be receiving a very high selection from Detroit.

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In other exciting/non-exciting (depending on how you want to look at it) news, the Vancouver Canucks were the first team eliminated from playoff contention this season, but they have already clinched the team with the highest odds to draft first overall in the 2026 Entry Draft. They may have the highest odds, but in the last 10 years, the team with the worst record has only won the lottery 50% of the time. It's a fun event if you're not on the bottom, and definitely the best system out of the major four sport leagues (maybe I'm biased).

Thanks again for stopping by and if you are still competing in your fantasy leagues, best of luck!