Story Archive

Hutson put up 78 points and a plus-17 on-off as a sophomore, and Montreal's blue line collapses without him. The most exciting thing about the Canadiens is also their biggest structural risk.

Forsberg scored 40 and Stamkos 42, so the stars were not the problem. Juuse Saros finished nine goals below average while his backup was eight above. Nashville's miss was a goaltending story.

Tkachuk played 31 games, Marchand 52, Barkov barely at all. Florida did not decline; it got hurt, and Bobrovsky cratered at the worst time. The whole season was a health report.

Clayton Keller scored 88 points and drove a plus-15 on-off, and he is not alone: Guenther, Schmaltz and Cooley give Utah a young, plus-possession core the league still isn't watching.

Shesterkin saved 21 goals above expected and Adam Fox drove a 60 percent share, and the Rangers finished near the East basement anyway. When the goalie and the No. 1 defenceman are that good, the forwards are the problem.

The NHL added two games per team and cut 40 back-to-backs. It paid for the extra dates by deleting the 20-day Olympic break, and it handed Buffalo 26 back-to-backs while Dallas got 12. Every game of the 2026-27 schedule, counted.

Winnipeg fell twenty-five places in a single season, the largest collapse of the salary cap era. Connor Hellebuyck ranked twenty-sixth of fifty-two goalies in goals saved above expected, and both ends of the ice went at once. The Jets should not trade him.

The Bruins look like a comfortable playoff team on paper. Underneath, they were out-chanced most nights and saved by one of the best goalie seasons in hockey. Going into the new year, that is not a plan.

Crosby keeps producing like a top-line centre deep into his career. The Penguins keep hovering, neither contending nor rebuilding. The numbers say that middle ground is the one outcome that wastes what is left of him.

The consensus is that McKenna wins the Calder and drags Toronto back to the playoffs. The first part is fair. The second misreads why the Leafs collapsed, because their stars were never the problem.

McDavid could have forced the issue and did not. He took a short, team-friendly extension and handed Edmonton a deadline. The numbers say his brilliance was never the problem, and that the clock on everything around him is now very short.

Nathan MacKinnon scored 127 points, buried 53 goals, and Colorado controlled 65 percent of the expected goals with him on the ice. The gap between him and the field last season was not close.

Anaheim made the playoffs and knocked off Edmonton, and it did so while scoring 21 fewer goals than its chances deserved. A young core that already drives play plus normal finishing luck equals a problem.

Binnington's reputation says franchise starter. The numbers say he cost the Blues more goals than any goalie in hockey last season, while the backup they barely play was one of the best.

Minnesota was already a 104-point team with one of the league's best play-drivers in Kirill Kaprizov. Adding Quinn Hughes, whose old team fell apart the moment he left the ice, turns good into dangerous.

The young centre is the face of a rising Blue Jackets team, and the raw tools are obvious. But the five-on-five data says Fantilli is still a work in progress, and that is exactly why Columbus should be patient.

Most champions coast on reputation the following summer. Carolina added to the best possession team in hockey. Entering 2026-27, the numbers say the Hurricanes are not just defending, they are favoured.

New York's young defenceman is reportedly in line for a franchise-altering extension. For a 59-point season that dragged a weak team uphill, the data says he has earned it, with one caveat worth watching.

Detroit's captain is the subject of a summer of speculation. The numbers on Dylan Larkin tell a more complicated story than either his believers or his critics want to hear.

With his future in Dallas one of the summer's talking points, the analytics on Jason Robertson are blunt. He is a genuine top-line star who scores and drives play, and the Stars should pay whatever it takes.

The Senators drove play like a Cup team and finished like a wild card, because their goaltending cost them two dozen goals. Fix the one fixable thing and Ottawa is a genuine problem.

Ask who the best goalie in hockey is and you hear the same few names. The number that isolates goaltending from everything in front of it points somewhere else entirely: Washington's Logan Thompson.

A week after breaking down a 103-point centre who barely moved the needle, here is the opposite kind of player: fewer points, a far bigger footprint, and a fraction of the fame.

81 points, a huge two-way workload, and a young team he dragged to the edge of the playoffs. Zach Werenski's season belonged in the Norris conversation. Playing in Columbus made sure it wasn't.

The longest drought in the sport is over, and Buffalo earned the celebration. But a 49 percent team that got 50 goals of good luck is not a 109-point team. The numbers say enjoy it, and prepare.

Mark Scheifele had a top-10 scoring season. At 5-on-5, the Jets were no better with him than without him, and heavily sheltered at that. Why Winnipeg's 103-point star and its collapse are the same story.

New Jersey finished with 87 points and a shrug. The underlying numbers say they were one of the most robbed teams in the league, average at 5-on-5, buried by cold finishing and a hurt Jack Hughes. The mirror image of Montreal, and a genuine 2026-27 sleeper.

The Canadiens' 106-point breakout was the feel-good story of the season. But at 5-on-5 they were a bottom-third team that won on unsustainable shooting and goaltending. The young core is real. The record wasn't.

Chicago just extended Connor Bedard as he heads for shoulder surgery. His points keep climbing, but three years in, one underlying number says the franchise player hasn't arrived where it matters most.

The romantic wants the Chicago reunion. The numbers say Patrick Kane, at 37, is still a real top-six player - and that's exactly why he shouldn't waste it on a rebuild. Why Buffalo is the fit where the heart and the head finally agree.

His save percentage fell off a cliff - .925 to .895 in a year. But the expected-goals math flips the story: elite on the hard shots, leaky on the easy ones, buried in volume behind a broken team. What the numbers really say about the best goalie on the market.

The NHL just expanded to 84 games for the first time in three decades. The official line is "more hockey for the fans." It's really about revenue - and it comes at a cost to bodies and the record book.

Steve Yzerman just stepped down as Red Wings GM - with his captain asking out and the rebuild stuck. Where that leaves Dylan Larkin, and why he may be stuck in Detroit longer than he wanted.

The reflex take is that $18M for a 67-point player is an overpay. The underlying numbers - a 55% on-ice expected-goals share at 20, an elite power play, penalties drawn - tell a more interesting story.

The new NHL 27 cover athlete scored 115 points at 19 - and San Jose now has to pay him, possibly more than anyone in hockey. Inside Macklin Celebrini's record-setting extension question.

The reigning Hart winner is coming off a down year, on a team that collapsed from the Presidents' Trophy to the lottery - and he's made clear he wants a change. Inside the Connor Hellebuyck trade situation, the suitors, and what a deal would cost.

Seven benches turned over this offseason - Babcock's controversial return, a fired-then-hired domino from LA to Toronto, and a Vancouver promotion with a family twist. Every new NHL head coach, and the job each one is walking into.

The Cup champion, a healthy dynasty ready to reload, and a McDavid team that finally fixed its net. After a franchise-altering offseason of trades, the draft and free agency, here's where all 32 NHL teams stand entering 2026-27.

Philadelphia tried to steal a 21-year-old franchise centre with a poison-pill offer sheet. Anaheim matched it - and took on the largest cap hit in the NHL. Inside the boldest gambit of the offseason and who actually won it.

The salary cap leapt to $104M, but the biggest money never hit the open market - it went to extensions. San Jose spent big around Celebrini, Toronto rebuilt its crease, and the Kings quietly bargain-hunted their way through a thin class. Who won July 1.