CEHL Playoff Preview: Jacques Has a Bracket and a Beach Reservation

By Jacques LaPuck, CEHL correspondent and reluctant postseason volunteer

The regular season is complete, the playoff bracket is set, and sixteen teams remain between the CEHL and one championship. This means we can now replace ordinary anxiety with playoff anxiety, which is more expensive and comes with considerably more overtime.

The classic 1-versus-8 format has produced several outstanding first-round matchups: offensive powerhouses against dangerous lower seeds, elite special teams against stubborn penalty kills, and enough goaltending intrigue to keep every coach awake until approximately 4:17 in the morning.

Jacques, meanwhile, has a suitcase packed and a beach chair waiting. The beach chair is beginning to ask questions.

First-Round Matchups

Eastern Conference

Western Conference

Phoenix finished with the league’s best regular-season record, while Washington led the Eastern Conference. San Jose allowed the fewest goals in the league, and St. Louis enters the postseason riding a six-game winning streak.

But the playoffs are not a reward ceremony for regular-season excellence. They are a four-round examination in pressure management, puck luck, and pretending every loss was “part of the process.”

Eastern Conference

Washington vs. New Jersey

Washington enters as the East’s top seed after scoring 303 goals and finishing with a plus-69 goal differential. The Capitals also went 8-2-0 over their final 10 games, which is the sort of closing argument that causes opposing coaches to use phrases like “we have our work cut out for us.”

Nathan MacKinnon is the headline act after scoring 37 goals in only 76 games. He is surrounded by dangerous support, including Nikolaj Ehlers, John Carlson, and a lineup that can attack from every direction. Washington’s penalty kill operated at 89.0%, tied for the league’s best mark, while the power play converted at 21.3%.

And then there is Andrei Vasilevskiy, who posted a 42-14-8 record. A goaltender with that kind of record tends to make opposing forwards shoot from bad angles, poor locations, and occasionally the parking lot.

New Jersey, naturally, has Connor McDavid.

McDavid produced 89 points in 77 games, including 58 assists, while Kirill Marchenko added 24 goals and 47 assists. Marchenko also scored 12 power-play goals, giving the Devils a significant weapon if Washington becomes too enthusiastic with the penalties.

The concern for New Jersey is defensive. The Devils allowed 3.32 goals per game, posted an 82.9% penalty kill, and finished with a minus-19 goal differential. Against Washington, that may be a difficult formula. New Jersey may need to score four goals just to feel safe leading by two.

Jacques’ forecast: Washington in six.

McDavid will make the series uncomfortable, but Washington’s depth, special teams, and superior defensive profile should eventually prevail. If New Jersey wins, Washington will spend the summer asking how a team with the league’s best forward survived that much defensive turbulence.

Tampa Bay vs. Philly

This is the matchup where the numbers stare at each other across the room and refuse to explain themselves.

Tampa Bay finished second in the East and allowed only 2.79 goals per game. The Lightning’s penalty kill operated at an excellent 86.9%, although their 14.5% power play leaves some room for improvement — approximately the size of a small but important room.

Philly brings the league’s most persistent point producer in David Pastrnak, who recorded 86 points and carried a 15-game point streak into the playoffs. Kyle Connor added 76 points and a 13-game point streak, giving Philadelphia two forwards capable of turning a peaceful evening into a five-alarm defensive emergency.

Philly scored 3.34 goals per game, but its penalty kill operated at only 81.1%. That could be the series’ pressure point. Tampa Bay will want to make Philadelphia defend while shorthanded, while Philly will want Pastrnak and Connor attacking before the Lightning can establish their structure.

The crease also adds intrigue. Logan Thompson played all 82 games for Philly, producing a 36-36-10 record. That is durability, certainly, although perhaps not the kind that inspires a goaltending coach to take a relaxing holiday.

Jacques’ forecast: Philly in seven.

Pastrnak’s point streak survives, but Jacques’ blood pressure does not. Tampa Bay may own the more stable defensive structure, but Philly owns the sort of scoring talent that can make a good defensive plan look like a napkin left in the rain.

Toronto vs. Buffalo

Toronto scored 278 goals and finished third in the Eastern Conference. Buffalo scored 255, allowed only 239, and finished with a plus-16 goal differential. This is an offensive heavyweight meeting a team that owns enough defensive structure to make every goal feel like a municipal approval process.

William Nylander led Toronto with 35 goals, while Cale Makar posted 69 points from the blue line. Makar’s 53 assists ranked among the league’s best totals for a defenceman, and Toronto averaged 3.39 goals per game.

Buffalo counters with Brad Marchand’s 33 goals, Tage Seguin’s 72 points, and a team that allowed only 2.91 goals per game. The Sabres also received strong offensive contributions from their forward group and 60 points from Evan Bouchard.

The goaltending battle may determine the series. Buffalo will turn to Stuart Skinner, who appeared in 60 games during the regular season and contributed eight assists. Toronto counters with Igor Shesterkin, one of the league’s best goaltenders and the kind of netminder capable of stealing an entire playoff game when the pressure rises.

Buffalo allowed 2.91 goals per game and limited opponents to 27.4 shots per night, giving Skinner a structured defensive environment in front of him. Toronto, meanwhile, will trust Shesterkin to handle the chances that inevitably get through. If Buffalo’s defensive system can limit Toronto’s opportunities, Skinner may have the edge in workload management; if the game becomes a high-quality chance festival, Shesterkin’s ability to make the spectacular save could become decisive.

In other words, both goaltenders have a chance to become heroes, which is wonderful for the fans and terrible for Jacques’ prediction.

Jacques’ forecast: Buffalo in seven.

Makar’s puck movement gives Toronto a major weapon, but Buffalo’s defensive record, Skinner’s workload, Marchand’s ability to make every playoff shift irritating, and the possibility of Shesterkin being asked to perform several miracles give the Sabres the upset edge.

Florida vs. Carolina

Florida and Carolina are separated by only one point in the standings, making this the Eastern Conference’s purest coin toss. Florida scored 276 goals, while Carolina scored 282. Both teams allowed more than 248 goals, suggesting that this series may feature plenty of offence and several goaltenders reconsidering their career choices.

Florida’s power play converted at 19.0%, compared with Carolina’s 16.2%. Carolina generated the league’s best listed shot volume at 29.6 per game and allowed only 25.8 shots against. The Hurricanes should be able to dictate territory, even if Florida owns the more efficient special teams.

Florida’s attack is led by the dangerous combination of Kuzmenko and Barabanov. Kuzmenko recorded 69 points, including 26 goals, while Barabanov contributed 10 power-play goals. Florida’s offensive depth gives the Panthers several ways to punish Carolina when the Hurricanes overcommit in the offensive zone.

Carolina counters with a deep group featuring Jake Guentzel, who recorded 75 points and 58 assists, along with Mitch Marner’s 76-point campaign and Dylan Larkin’s 74 points. Carolina also owns a strong defensive presence and the ability to create pressure through sustained shot volume.

This series has all the ingredients of a seven-game argument conducted at maximum speed. There will be momentum swings, special-teams debates, and at least one coach insisting that the team’s problem was “a lack of detail,” which is coach-speak for “I would like to blame somebody without naming names.”

Jacques’ forecast: Carolina in seven.

Florida’s power play and offensive depth make this a dangerous matchup for the Hurricanes, but Carolina’s shot advantage, defensive structure, and balanced scoring provide the narrowest of edges. Jacques would explain the prediction further, but the beach brochure has a picture of a hammock.

Western Conference

Phoenix vs. Winnipeg

Phoenix is the regular-season juggernaut, finishing with 111 points, 308 goals, and a plus-74 goal differential. The Coyotes scored 3.76 goals per game, led the league with a 23.6% power play, and killed penalties at 84.4%.

Then there is Leon Draisaitl, who scored 49 goals and recorded 57 assists. He also produced four hat tricks and shot at 20.7%. This is the sort of season that forces a columnist to use words like “unstoppable,” after which the player immediately goes three games without scoring because hockey enjoys humiliating writers.

Tom Wilson added 36 goals and 12 power-play goals, while Aleksander Barkov produced 82 points and carried a seven-game point streak. Jack Hughes finished at plus-38, and John Carlson added 58 points from the blue line.

Winnipeg is not helpless. The Jets scored 261 goals, allowed 250, and received an eight-game point streak from Sam Reinhart. They also have Mackenzie Blackwood, who recorded three shutouts.

Still, Winnipeg faces a Phoenix team that scores nearly four goals per night and owns a power play that appears to have been designed by someone with a personal grudge against penalty killers.

Jacques’ forecast: Phoenix in five.

Winnipeg steals one behind goaltending and desperation. Phoenix wins the other four and sends Jacques searching for a resort with no televisions. If Draisaitl starts the series with a hat trick, Jacques will begin packing before the second intermission.

San Jose vs. Vegas

San Jose finished second in the West with a plus-72 goal differential and only 205 goals against — the best defensive mark in the league. The Sharks also posted an 89.0% penalty kill and allowed only 2.50 goals per game.

Their offence is hardly decorative. Mark Scheifele scored 34 goals and recorded 80 points, while Sidney Crosby added 24 goals and 50 assists. Zach Werenski produced 70 points from the blue line, giving San Jose an important offensive outlet beyond its forward group.

Vegas matched San Jose’s 277 goals during the regular season. Robert Thomas recorded 76 points, Anthony Cirelli added 68, and Vegas averaged 3.38 goals per game.

There is also an injury rumour surrounding Crosby heading into the playoffs. Nothing has been confirmed, but even the possibility is significant. If Crosby is limited or unavailable, San Jose would lose a premier centre, a key faceoff presence, a power-play contributor, and the veteran calm that becomes especially valuable when playoff games tighten into one-goal contests.

The Sharks’ defensive structure could keep them competitive, but their margin for error against Vegas would become much smaller. A healthy Crosby gives San Jose the centre depth and experience to control the series. An unavailable Crosby could force the Sharks to win every game through defence and goaltending, which is a perfectly reasonable strategy until Vegas scores twice in six minutes.

The challenge for Vegas is that San Jose can turn each game into a slow, unpleasant contest where every inch of ice is guarded like the last available parking space near the arena. The Sharks allowed 2.50 goals per game and killed penalties at 89.0%, while Vegas allowed 2.94 goals per game and posted a 77.3% penalty kill.

Jacques’ Bold Prediction

Vegas defeats San Jose in seven games.

This pick goes against the regular-season defensive numbers, which strongly favour San Jose. The upset X-factor is the Crosby injury rumour. If Crosby is limited or unavailable, San Jose loses its most important centre and a major source of composure in close games. That could allow Vegas to win the middle of the ice, force the Sharks’ remaining forwards into heavier defensive minutes, and turn the series from a San Jose-controlled chess match into a Golden Knights track meet.

If Crosby is healthy, San Jose remains the safer choice. But Jacques has been told to make one bold prediction, and he has already made enough safe predictions to fill an entire filing cabinet.

Jacques’ forecast: Vegas in seven.

The statistics say San Jose. The rumour says check the emergency exit.

Edmonton vs. Anaheim

Edmonton scored 267 goals, allowed 225, and finished third in the West. The Oilers also received a major deadline boost when Brayden Point arrived from Washington, followed by Nico Hischier from Buffalo.

Point gives Edmonton another elite centre and a dangerous special-teams weapon. He finished the season with 36 goals, 46 assists, four shorthanded goals, and a league-leading 14 power-play goals. Hischier adds another high-end two-way centre, giving Edmonton extraordinary depth through the middle and forcing opponents to deal with difficult matchups on every line.

The deadline additions make Edmonton substantially more dangerous than its regular-season numbers alone suggest. Point brings speed, finishing ability, and special-teams production, while Hischier adds defensive responsibility, puck control, and another centre capable of playing major playoff minutes. Washington and Buffalo may both discover that trading with conference rivals is less enjoyable than advertised.

John Tavares added 37 goals, giving Edmonton multiple ways to hurt opponents at even strength and on special teams. The Oilers also finished with a 2.74 goals-against average, a strong number for a club built to attack.

Anaheim counters with a stronger penalty kill at 86.6%, a 2.65 goals-against average, and Connor Hellebuyck’s 35-24-6 record. Hellebuyck also recorded seven shutouts, which is not merely goaltending — it is an administrative obstacle with pads.

The Ducks scored 256 goals and allowed 217, the best goals-against total among the Western playoff teams. They are not simply hoping to survive Edmonton. They have the defensive profile to make the Oilers earn every goal.

The matchup comes down to this: Edmonton owns the bigger special-teams punch and improved centre depth, while Anaheim owns the better defensive numbers.

Jacques’ forecast: Anaheim in seven.

The Ducks’ defence and Hellebuyck steal a series Edmonton expects to win — although with Point and Hischier arriving at the deadline, Jacques may be making the most dangerous prediction of his career.

Dallas vs. St. Louis

This may be the most evenly matched series in the entire bracket. Dallas finished with 98 points and St. Louis with 97. Dallas scored 256 goals and allowed 233, while St. Louis scored 264 and allowed 239.

St. Louis enters hot, riding a six-game winning streak. Filip Forsberg delivered 74 points, including 53 assists, while Matt Boldy contributed nine power-play goals. The Blues converted at 18.1% and killed penalties at 85.5%.

Dallas has its own reliable offensive structure. Pavel Zacha produced 75 points with a plus-33 rating, and the Stars allowed only 2.84 goals per game. Dallas also posted an excellent 87.4% penalty kill.

This series may be decided by special teams, which is excellent news for Jacques because it gives him something to write about besides “both teams are very good.” The bad news is that it may go seven games, which gives Jacques seven opportunities to miss his flight.

Jacques’ forecast: St. Louis in seven.

The Blues’ form, stronger power play, and slightly superior offensive output give them the edge. Dallas will make every game uncomfortable, which is apparently the official personality of playoff hockey.

Numbers To Watch

Jacques’ Picks

That gives us a projected conference final of Washington versus Carolina in the East and Phoenix versus Vegas in the West, with Draisaitl’s Coyotes looking like the team everyone wants to avoid and nobody wants to admit they fear.

The regular season rewarded Phoenix, Washington, San Jose, and Tampa Bay with the best seeds. The playoffs will reward whoever survives the injuries, bounces, goaltending debates, deadline-trade consequences, suspicious officiating decisions, and postgame press conferences where somebody says, “We just have to play our game.”

Now, if everyone could kindly finish the first round in six games or fewer, Jacques LaPuck would appreciate it. The suitcase is packed, the passport is somewhere in the desk, and the beach chair has been waiting since October.

The beach chair has now been informed that Jacques may be delayed by seven games. It is not pleased.

My apologies folks! I have returned from vacation!

Good to everyone and let the sim resume on a normal schedule!!!

Trade Deadline Update

We've officially reached the Trade Deadline Break!

This short break gives all teams an opportunity to finalize any remaining trades and complete pending contract extensions before the final deadline.

As an added bonus, the league salary cap will receive a temporary increase of $1.5M for the remainder of the current season, rather than the usual $1.0M increase. This brings the salary cap to $54.5M for the rest of the season.

Please note that the salary cap will return to $53.0M at the start of next season.

As a reminder ALL UFA extensions must be signed before the deadline. RFA extensions can be extended until the END OF REGULAR SEASON ONLY! You will not be warned again!

Final Trade Deadline

🗓 Monday, July 20
Make sure all trades and extensions are submitted before the deadline. Good luck to everyone as we head into the final stretch of the season!

Claims draft is in!

Please see the results below! The claims will be added to your normal claim list and visible on the player claims page.

Please note: If the audit teams find you have an invalid player (either on someones team, or wrong age), they will be removed and you will NOT get a replacement.

Round 1 — forward (LA → Tampa Bay)

Round 2 — reverse (Tampa Bay → LA)

Round 3 — forward

Round 4 — reverse

Round 5 — forward

Final tally

• 52 of 160 picks made — 15 teams drafted, 16 forfeited entirely (no list).
• Full 5 picks: Boston, Rangers, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Vegas, Tampa Bay
• Vancouver / Montreal / New Jersey / Edmonton / Carolina / Detroit 3 · Ottawa 2 · Columbus / Washington 1 · Toronto 0

Claims - Technical Difficulties

Sorry folks we have had some technical difficulties with submitting claims. Can you please RECHECK your claim list on your claim draft submission page. (My Team - My Offers → Claims)

If they were saved correctly, you should see your fully ranked list, even if you leave and come back to the page. If you have no players listed it DID NOT WORK.

I will be moving the deadline to Thursday night at midnight as a result to make sure everyone gets their claims in.

Please also see the draft order for the rounds 1, 3, 5.. rounds 2, 4 will be reverse order.

Get your claim game ready!

Claims are back and we are shaking things up. The initial claim window will be a 5 round blind draft based on the current season reverse standings. Rounds will be snaking so current last place team (LA cough) will pick 1st in the 1st round, 32nd in the 2nd round, and 1st again in the 1st round and so on.

Teams will be allowed to submit up to 10 picks, but you will only be able to acquire a maximum of 5 picks. You will have a little while to do this, I will be giving 10 days to submit your board on the site. Please make your way to the name claim section. (MY CEHL → My Offers → Extensions → Player Claim)

You will be able to rank your potential claims 1-10. PLEASE make sure to do your ranking properly, your #1 ranked claim will be taken with your first pick if available and so on. 

When entering your picks, the player names will be validated against players currently on rosters, prospects lists, and unassigned FOR YOU. You will get a hard stop if you enter a duplicate name, and a warning if you enter a name close to one that already exists to assist you.

PLEASE spell the name correctly. If i feel you did not even attempt to do so you may lose your pick. (Mike vs Michael for example is ok.. completely spelling the name wrong because you are being lazy will result in disqualification of the pick)

Draft will occur the week of July 6th so get your ranked picks in!

As a reminder eligible players must be 22 years of age or older and not on any roster, prospect list or unassigned list. 

UPDATE! Extensions are ONLINE

I'm please to announce that contract extensions will now be performed through the site in the My CEHL section. Please also see the updates rules and ‘Site Guide’ section of the site as it has a detailed explanation of how to use the extensions module. Site Guide can be found at Other→Site Guide on the site menu.

Actual contract rules have not changed, this is just a new way of communicating with your agent and submitting offers. 

If anyone has previously accepted offers via email, PLEASE resubmit them through the site again. I will not update the ones submitted by email. Agents will be forced to honor any previously accepted contracts.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Here is a basic how to for how to access the section:

Open My CEHL > My Offers > Extensions when extensions are open. Extension offers are for next year, so check the current deal, player age, rules, and guide before you choose terms.

1. Start from Extension Candidates and open the offer button for the player you want to extend.
2. Send years, salary, signing bonus, and a short note if it helps explain your offer.
3. Track Open Extension Offers, Countered By Agent, Accepted, and Rejected rows.
4. Use View, Revise, or Re-Offer when those choices are shown.
5. If the agent sends back a counter, compare it with your offer and decide whether to change it, send it again, or leave it alone.

CEHL All-Star Game: East 7, West 6 (OT)

Thirteen goals. Two committed defensemen. One of them was on the wrong team.

Twenty-four hours earlier, the West walked out of the Skills Competition with a 4-3 win, a conference title that does not technically exist, and the kind of swagger that gets a team in trouble. The deal for tonight was simple: take that swagger, 46 of CEHL2's best, one sheet of ice, and a gentle request to play something resembling defensive hockey. What the league got instead was a 13-goal demolition derby that needed overtime to settle, six combined goalies who took turns apologizing to the crowd, and a closing trophy ceremony expensive enough to put a sim franchise into luxury-tax hell.

Some context for the uninitiated, because the standings matter even on a night nobody pretended they did. Mark Scheifele arrived as the league's lone 50-point man, serene as someone who stopped reading the standings in October because he already lives at the top of them. One point back and visibly aggrieved about it sat Leon Draisaitl at 49, who spent the Skills Competition the night before stealing the Breakaway Challenge from McDavid and clearly came in looking to steal something else. Behind those two, a 41-point logjam that resembles a knife fight in a phone booth. This is the league these players left at the door tonight — and then, for sixty-plus minutes, cheerfully set on fire.

Tampa's Filip Gustavsson drew the start for the East and spent the opening thirty-one seconds looking for the defensive structure that made him a 20-win goalie. It was not coming. It was, in fact, already in the back of his net. Sergei Bobrovsky got the West nod and discovered the same cruel truth from the opposite crease about ninety seconds later. Between them, Scheifele and Draisaitl ran the West like a power play that forgot to expire, while Kent Johnson decided 44 points had earned him the right to attempt, in a single game, every move he'd been hoarding since training camp.

It should not have been close. The West had the momentum, the skills title, and the better top end. It went to overtime, and then it went to the one player nobody on the West remembered to cover.

Box Score

Shots: West 41, East 38 Power plays: West 1/3, East 2/4 Goalies (W): Gustavsson (TB) → Hill (FLA) → Shesterkin (TOR), 35 combined saves Goalies (L): Bobrovsky (PHO) → Kuemper (EDM) → Hellebuyck (ANA) Game-winner: McDavid (NJ), OT — unassisted

Scoring: West — Draisaitl, Stutzle, Scheifele, Cirelli, Hagel, Aho. East — Tippett, Vilardi, Point, Kucherov, McTavish, Marchand, McDavid.

FULL BOX: https://www.canadianelitehockeyleague.ca/games.php?override=cehl2-allstar-boxscore

Period-by-Period

First Period — West 3, East 2. Draisaitl scored at 0:31, a league-record-fast All-Star goal that owed everything to the fact that nobody on the East had yet agreed on who was covering whom. Owen Tippett answered for the East — a 24-goal man stranded on last-place Columbus all year, finally getting a stage that didn't punish him for it — burying a one-timer Bobrovsky waved at out of principle. Stutzle restored the West lead and watched his absurd +24 climb higher, as it does, apparently, even in exhibitions. Then Artemi Panarin slid a between-the-legs feed to Vilardi that the broadcast replayed four times before conceding an assist had legally occurred, knotting it 2-2. Scheifele closed the period with a wrist shot from the slot and the body language of a man who'd already drafted his trophy speech.

Second Period — 4-4. This was the "everybody wants the clip" period, and the defense responded by taking a smoke break. Cirelli opened it for the West — the league's +23 Selke type, scoring in the one game all season where back-checking was strictly optional — to make it 4-2. Then Washington's Brayden Point and Nikita Kucherov reminded everyone they're a real-life passing-and-finishing machine by doing it twice in ninety seconds, Kucherov threading a saucer feed that Point one-touched home and then Kucherov simply scoring himself when nobody picked him up. 4-4. Somewhere in here Cale Makar technically played a defensive shift; witnesses described it as brief and reluctant.

Third Period — 6-6. Hagel buried a rebound to nudge the West ahead, 5-4, the kind of honest blue-collar goal that felt out of place at a party this loose. McTavish answered for the East off the rush. Aho restored the West lead — 6-5, Dallas connection humming — and for one genuinely tense minute it looked like the West might actually close a hockey game. Then Brad Marchand, doing the exact thing he has done to opponents for fifteen years, materialized at the side of the net, irritated three defensemen into ignoring him, and tied it 6-6. The night's lone act of real goaltending followed: Igor Shesterkin entered for the East and stopped three straight grade-A chances, a sequence so foreign to the evening that the crowd reacted like they'd seen a comet.

Overtime — East wins. McDavid took it at his own blue line. The West's coverage scheduled a personal day. He did not pass, because he has spent a whole season dragging New Jersey to 37 of his points by himself and saw no reason to start delegating now. 7-6.

Big Plays

• The 0:31 Opener — Draisaitl (PHO). Fastest goal in All-Star history, achieved by skating into the exact space five East players assumed someone else had.
• Tippett's Stage Revenge (1st). A 24-goal season buried on a dead Columbus club; one clean look at the West's best goalie, one rocket, one season's worth of justice the standings never gave him.
• Panarin's Between-the-Legs Feed (1st). The Breadman set up Vilardi through his own skates. Three officials and a replay crew confirmed it was a pass and not an accident.
• The Washington Two-Punch (2nd). Point and Kucherov, real-life linemates, needed roughly a minute and a half to turn a 4-2 hole into a 4-4 tie. Nobody covered Kucherov. Nobody ever does.
• Cirelli's +23 Vanity Goal (2nd). The league's premier defensive forward scored in the only game all year that asked nothing of him defensively. The plus-minus went up anyway. It always goes up.
• Tanev Blocks a Shot (3rd). In a 13-goal exhibition with zero stakes, Chris Tanev slid in front of a slapper and took it off the shin pad. He could not help it. The shin pad is who he is.
• Marchand's Net-Front Heist (3rd). Tying goal scored by being so annoying in the blue paint that three defenders forgot the puck existed. The purest expression of his entire career.
• McDavid, Party of One (OT). End-to-end, unassisted, no eye contact with a teammate. The winner, and a documentary about doing it yourself.

The Hardware ($250K – $1M)

$250,000 — The "He Physically Could Not Help It" Award → Chris Tanev (VAN). Third period, 13 goals already on the board, zero stakes, and a West point shot came in toward a net no one was guarding with any conviction. Tanev got down and blocked it with his shin anyway. There was nothing to protect and nothing to gain. Somewhere in his nervous system, "puck heading at net" overrides self-preservation, common sense, and the entire concept of an exhibition. The cheque is for the only man who treated this like a real game.

$400,000 — The "One Stage, One Rocket" Award → Owen Tippett (CBJ). He answered the West's record-fast opener with a first-period one-timer that Bobrovsky waved at on principle — the East's first goal of the night. Tippett spent the whole year burying chances for a Columbus club the standings would rather forget, and the one time he got a clean look at the league's best goalie in a game people were actually watching, he ripped it past him. The award is for the goal. The dead-team subtext is on the house.

$600,000 — The "Replay Booth Needed Four Looks" Skill Prize → Artemi Panarin (CAR). The first-period feed to Vilardi went between Panarin's own skates, no-look, onto the tape of a teammate he could not possibly have seen. It was improbable enough that the booth replayed it four times before grudgingly conceding an assist had occurred — on the grounds that the puck did, technically, end up exactly where he meant it to. Most players make a pass. The Breadman submitted a magic trick and dared the league to rule it an accident.

$750,000 — The "Only Man Here Who Played Defense" Award → Igor Shesterkin (TOR). For 50-plus minutes the goaltending was a rumor and the six netminders took turns waving at things. Then Shesterkin came on in the third and stopped three straight grade-A chances — an act of genuine goaltending so foreign to the evening that the building reacted like it had seen a comet. In a game everyone else used as a highlight audition, he was the lone professional who remembered what the job actually was.

$1,000,000 — The "Did It Entirely By Himself" Award → Connor McDavid (NJ). The overtime winner had exactly one participant. McDavid collected it at his own blue line, watched the West's coverage quietly clock out for the night, and went end to end without a single glance at a teammate. Unassisted, uncontested, unbothered. He spent the whole night as the fastest man on the ice and saved the proof for the only shift that decided anything. The million is for the goal that ended it — solo, the way he so obviously prefers.

The Hush Money ($250K Each, No Questions Asked)

Not every cheque tonight was a reward. Three were settlements. The league — flush with money it has never once successfully accounted for — quietly pays $250,000 to any player whose evening was bad enough that the kindest available option is to buy his silence. Same denomination as a skills-event win, same crisp paper, entirely different energy. The envelopes are unmarked. The eye contact is optional. The shame is real, but it spends.

$250,000 — The "Statistically, You Were Here" Cheque → Bobby Brink (COL). At 30 points, Brink arrived as the lowest-scoring All-Star in the building — an invitation extended strictly on the technicality that Colorado was legally required to send somebody. He honored the distinction with the quietest sixty minutes of any skater on the ice: no goal, no assist, no shot the goalie had to genuinely consider, and one shift in the second period where he carried the puck into the offensive zone, surveyed the bonfire of a game unfolding around him, and calmly passed it backward to no one in particular. In a 13-goal track meet, he found the one square foot of ice where nothing was happening and stood on it. The cheque clears. The anonymity is complimentary.

$250,000 — The "Minus On A Night Defense Was Illegal" Cheque → Alexander Romanov (LA). There was exactly one defensive responsibility available tonight, and it was optional. Romanov — a −8 on the season for a Los Angeles club the standings keep politely at arm's length — still found a way to be on the ice for goals against in a game where being on the ice for goals against required real, sustained, almost artistic effort. He was out there for Point's one-timer. He was out there for Marchand's net-front heist. At one point he gestured at open ice as if to say that's your guy, a gesture that would have landed better had any West forward been within thirty feet of him. The $250K is for reaching all night and grabbing nothing but air.

$250,000 — The "We Saved You A Seat" Cheque → Morgan Geekie (SEA). Seattle's lone representative, 33 points, and a man who played tonight as though informed the building enforced a strict no-contact, no-effort, no-being-noticed policy and intended to honor all three to the letter. Geekie took shifts so anonymous the broadcast twice credited his ice time to a linemate, declined every puck battle he could plausibly avoid, and finished with a plus-minus of exactly zero — the genuinely rare feat of being so uninvolved that even a 13-goal demolition derby could not pin a single thing on him. The cheque comes stapled to a note reading Morgan Geekie Was Definitely Present, which the league means as both a payroll record and an open question.

Final: East 7, West 6 (OT). Combined plus-minus of every defenseman on the ice: legally redacted. See you next season — Gustavsson has requested he not be invited.

Midseason Draft Board: The 2026 NHL Draft and the Teams Holding the Cards

Halfway through the season, New Jersey has turned the draft into a private asset summit.

By Brodie St. Germain

Halfway through the season, the 2026 NHL Draft is already exposing which front offices have a plan and which ones are hoping the standings eventually soften the blow. The teams with the least success right now are getting first access to the future, and that is usually where the strongest teams are built — or at least where the best excuses are made.

This is not just a mock draft. It is a midseason map of leverage, and the Devils are the clearest outlier. New Jersey owns eight first-round picks, which is enough to make the rest of the league feel like it showed up with a coupon while the Devils arrived with the warehouse key.

Buffalo’s blueprint

Every team in this draft wants to be the next Buffalo — not because of the pain, but because Dr. Richard Painter proved last season that a real plan, executed with conviction, can turn a reset into a winner faster than anyone expected. That kind of season changes how the rest of the league views a rebuild. It also raises the bar for every front office that thinks patience alone counts as a strategy.

Buffalo’s example matters because it showed that asset collection only works when it leads somewhere. The lesson is simple: build with purpose, move with discipline, and make sure the picks are part of a plan rather than just a pile.

Draft capital check

New Jersey enters the draft with the most leverage by a wide margin. Eight first-round picks is the sort of haul that turns one team into the gravitational center of the entire opening round. Columbus and Minnesota also have enough capital to shape the class, but they are still operating in the Devils’ shadow.

At the other end, Dallas and Vegas are light on draft assets, which makes each pick more important and each miss more expensive. When one club can absorb mistakes and another cannot, the gap between the two can widen very quickly.

The teams holding the room

New Jersey has the clearest ability to influence the entire first round, not just because of volume, but because it can move in several directions at once. Shawn Lawrence can swing for a franchise player, scoop up value later, or simply keep everyone else guessing all weekend. Todd Parry has the chance to land multiple core pieces in Columbus, while Jake Mednick has the flexibility to strengthen both Minnesota’s top end and its depth.

Grant Semelman in Washington is in the rare spot of drafting against the backdrop of league power, and Ryan Shumay in Los Angeles has the kind of first-round leverage that tends to get whispered about long before the actual pick is made. Mark Mead in New York has enough ammunition to stay active, while Ryan Williams, Chuck Clark, and Colin March all have enough leverage to matter in their own way. None of them, though, are holding the kind of draft capital that has turned New Jersey into the room’s loudest presence.

That said, it is still early enough that anyone treating this mock like stone tablets is probably the same person who calls the first week of preseason a final evaluation. The rankings will move, the board will shift, and general managers will keep pretending they saw it all coming.

Full first-round mock with ownership

1. New Jersey Devils — via LA 1. Gavin McKenna is the kind of player who can change a franchise’s direction fast, and New Jersey would be taking the obvious swing.
2. Colorado Avalanche — COL 1. Ivar Stenberg brings pace, creativity, and a real scoring touch, which fits Brodie Ellis’s style well.
3. Vancouver Canucks — VAN 1. Chase Reid is a smooth defenseman with top-pair upside, and Ryan Williams reportedly has his eyes on him.
4. New York Rangers — via OTT 1. Carson Carels offers size, calm, and strong two-way projection, the kind of profile Mark Mead tends to value.
5. Montreal Canadiens — MTL 1. Keaton Verhoeff is a heavy defenseman who can eat minutes and move the puck for Josh Gordon.
6. New York Rangers — NYR 1. Caleb Malhotra is a powerful center with play-driving ability that fits a club trying to stay dangerous. 
7. Boston Bruins — BOS 1. Tynan Lawrence adds pace, edge, and competitiveness, which feels very Blair Marshall.
8. Seattle Kraken — SEA 1. Nikita Klepov is a creative winger with dangerous hands, the kind of upside Colin March can dream on.
9. Minnesota Wild — MIN 1. Ethan Belchetz is a big winger with speed and a heavy offensive game, the sort of bet Jake Mednick likes to make.
10. Washington Capitals — via DET 1. Oscar Hemming is a skilled forward with pro habits, a strong fit for Grant Semelman’s board.
11. Los Angeles Kings — via ANA 1. JP Hurlbert is a smart scorer who finishes plays, and Ryan has usually leaned toward that kind of profile or has he? 
12. Philadelphia Flyers — PHI 1. Ilya Morozov is a competitive center with pace and detail, a useful fit for Jeffery Dyck.
13. Chicago Blackhawks — CHI 1. Wyatt Cullen is a poised offensive talent with quick processing, the kind of player Matthew Rehman can build around.
14. Winnipeg Jets — WPG 1. Maddox Dagenais is a power-forward type with upside, which suits Chuck Clark’s appetite for directness.
15. Columbus Blue Jackets — CBJ 1. Ryan Lin is a smooth puck-moving defenseman, a Todd Parry style pick if there ever was one.
16. New York Islanders — NYI 1. Adam Novotny is a skilled winger who can play through contact, a useful piece for Andrew Moorhead.
17. Nashville Predators — NAS 1. Tommy Bleyl is a reliable forward with a well-rounded game, very much in Fielding Howard’s lane.
18. New Jersey Devils — via NJ 1. Xavier Villeneuve is a modern defenseman with mobility and offense, exactly the kind of value Shawn Lawrence keeps stockpiling.
19. New York Islanders — via BUF 1. Yegor Shilov is a creative forward with a sneaky scoring touch, another nice swing for Andrew Moorhead.
20. Carolina Hurricanes — CAR 1. Benjamin Macbeath is a versatile forward with good habits, the sort of player Chad Wise can slot into a system.
21. New Jersey Devils — via PIT 1. Liam Ruck is a skilled winger with pace and edge, a useful addition for Lawrence’s pile.
22. New Jersey Devils — via STL 1. Brooks Rogowski is a high-motor forward with pro traits, giving New Jersey another versatile option.
23. Edmonton Oilers — via CGY 1. Markus Ruck is a play-driving winger with energy and skill, a clean fit for Andrew Bradley.
24. New Jersey Devils — via DAL 1. Casey Mutryn is a smart forward who handles pace and detail well, a steady bet for Shawn Lawrence.
25. Washington Capitals — WAS 1. Ryder Cali is a rangy skater with upside and touch, and Grant Semelman gets another useful option.
26. New Jersey Devils — via VGK 1. Chase Harrington brings work rate and secondary scoring, the kind of depth swing New Jersey can afford.
27. New Jersey Devils — via EDM 1. Adam Nemec is a cerebral offensive player with real touch, another piece for an already absurd pile.
28. Florida Panthers — FLA 1. Ryan Roobroeck is a big winger who profiles well near the net for Mike Clarke.
29. San Jose Sharks — SJ 1. Jaxon Cover is a creative forward who can make something out of nothing for Brent Abell.
30. Anaheim Ducks — via PHO 1. Rudolf Berzkalns is a responsible defenseman with quiet upside for Dan Rudd.
31. Toronto Maple Leafs — TOR 1. Jakub Vanecek is a steady defender with a clean projection for Mark Kostovski.
32. Tampa Bay Lightning — TB 1. Mathis Preston is a high-upside forward with pace and skill for Pierre Ouellette.

What matters most

The headline is not just who drafts first. It is who drafts often, and whether those front offices can turn volume into actual direction. New Jersey has the clearest chance to own the first round by sheer repetition, and the Devils have the kind of draft inventory that can change the organization’s timeline in one weekend. Columbus and Minnesota can add legitimate building blocks. Washington, Winnipeg, and Seattle all have room to matter, but none of them are operating with that kind of reach.

That is why this draft is already shaping the league before the picks are ever announced. Some teams are drafting for June. Others are drafting for survival. New Jersey, meanwhile, is drafting like it found the league’s lost and found and decided to keep everything in it.

CEHL All-Star Skills Competition: West 4, East 3

Seven events, three indignities. Two conferences. $2.5M in cheques nobody asked the accounting department to approve. And not a single backcheck all night.

There is exactly one evening a year when CEHL's best players are invited to show off with no opponent, no defensive responsibility, and no consequences whatsoever — which, if we're honest, is the precise set of conditions most of them have been quietly requesting since October. The Skills Competition is hockey with the hard parts removed: skate fast, shoot hard, thread a pass, embarrass a row of cones, and collect a quarter-million dollars for the trouble.

The stakes were arranged to matter just enough. Seven events, one $250,000 cheque per winner, and whichever conference banked the most events would walk into tomorrow night's game carrying the bragging rights — and the smugness, which is the real prize. The game itself is twenty-four hours away. Tonight was the cold open: a chance for forty-six stars to establish, loudly and at great expense, who fully intended to be a problem.

The West intended to be a problem. Here is how the evening came apart.

Event 1 — Fastest Skater

The one event with no suspense, contested purely because the schedule had a hole in it. Connor McDavid (NJ, East) put down a lap so fast the timing crew quietly asked him to run it again, on the working theory that their equipment had broken. It had not. He has won this thing in real life enough times that the league more or less stopped sending out invitations, and tonight he treated it like a man jogging to his own coronation. Mathew Barzal — an actual former champion of this exact event, a detail worth pausing on — gave it an honest, full-effort run and finished a clean, distant second, the gap between them rendering like a printing error. There was a brief, beautiful moment where the East bench allowed itself to believe one win meant something. It did not. It meant McDavid is fast, which everyone already knew.

Winner: Connor McDavid (East) — $250,000. Scoreboard: East 1, West 0.

Event 2 — Hardest Shot

The one night a year a defenseman is permitted to be the main character, and Mikhail Sergachev (EDM, West) had no intention of spending it being gracious about it. He wound up from the point and put a puck through the radar gun hard enough that the operators stopped to inspect the gun for structural damage. A booming slapshot is the single thing a sim blueliner waits all season to be appreciated for — the assists go unnoticed, the minutes go unthanked, but the cannon, the cannon gets a trophy — and he accepted the gratitude with compound interest. Draisaitl posted the hardest number among the forwards and it was still, comfortably, a rounding error behind. Somewhere in the stands, every defenseman in the league nodded once, in solidarity, and said nothing.

Winner: Mikhail Sergachev (West) — $250,000. Scoreboard: East 1, West 1.

Event 3 — Accuracy Shooting

Four targets, four pucks, and Nikita Kucherov (WAS, East) approaching the whole exercise as a minor administrative interruption to an otherwise quiet evening. He cleared all four in an order that strongly implied he'd run the geometry in his head before stepping on the ice, then turned and skated off before the final target had finished its descent to the floor. The defining image of the night was his complete refusal to celebrate — no fist, no glance, nothing but the faint irritation of a man who felt it had taken a beat too long. Aleksander Barkov, precise as a Swiss customs official, needed one extra puck, hit all four anyway, and looked genuinely apologetic about the inefficiency. It was the most polite second-place finish in the building's history.

Winner: Nikita Kucherov (East) — $250,000. Scoreboard: East 2, West 1.

Event 4 — Stickhandling / Obstacle Course

Through the cones, around the pucks, over the line and back — Tim Stutzle (VGK, West) turned the obstacle course into a personal highlight reel and dared the clock to keep pace. The kid is carrying an absurd +24 in the sim, the best mark of any forward in the field, and he handles the puck like it owes him money and he intends to collect in front of witnesses. Kent Johnson ran it flashier — there were two moves in there the broadcast had to slow down to confirm were legal — and Artemi Panarin ran it prettier, all silk and misdirection. Stutzle simply ran it faster, and the obstacle course, much like opposing defensemen, has never once cared how pretty the thing was that just went by it.

Winner: Tim Stutzle (West) — $250,000. Scoreboard: East 2, West 2.

Event 5 — Passing Challenge

The least glamorous event on the entire card, and the one Sebastian Aho (DAL, West) appears to have been quietly manufactured in a lab to win. Bank passes off the boards, give-and-gos, saucers laid flat onto a dime from thirty feet — every target struck dead center, every repetition executed with the facial expression of a man calmly filing his quarterly taxes. There was no flourish. There was no wasted motion. Roughly half the building did not realize he had won until the scoreboard informed them, which is, in fairness, the single most Sebastian Aho way for anything to ever happen. He collected the cheque, nodded, and was nearly out the tunnel before the applause caught up to him.

Winner: Sebastian Aho (West) — $250,000. Scoreboard: East 2, West 3.

Event 6 — Save Streak

Goalies, a conveyor belt of the league's most dangerous shooters, and one simple rule: stop them until you can't. With every elite scorer in the building lined up for a free run at him, Igor Shesterkin (TOR, East) turned the event into a public statement of intent the night before puck drop. He stoned shooter after shooter with the visible, simmering personal offense of a man who had heard the over/under on tomorrow's game and chosen to take it as a slur on his character. McDavid he robbed. Kucherov he robbed with feeling. Connor Hellebuyck, the best goalie in the field and the unluckiest man in the league by a country mile, matched him stop for stop and lost on the final shooter by a single save — which is, depressingly, the most accurate summary of his entire season anyone has yet produced.

Winner: Igor Shesterkin (East) — $250,000. Scoreboard: East 3, West 3.

Event 7 — Breakaway Challenge

Tied 3-3, the conference title on the line, and the league — in a decision it will spend years defending — handed the deciding vote to the fans, which is to say it handed the deciding vote to pure chaos and a decibel meter. Connor McDavid went first and did something genuinely outrageous: full speed in, between the legs, toe-drag back, top corner, the entire arsenal in a single motion. The building roared, assumed that was the title, and began reaching for their coats. Then Leon Draisaitl (PHO, West) stepped up, deadpan as a tax audit, made it look like he'd been woken from a nap to do it, and pulled off something fractionally more absurd at what appeared to be one-third the effort. The fans gave it to him by a margin thin enough to start a genuine, multi-year conference grudge. McDavid was robbed. The East bench filed a formal written complaint that, to this day, no one has read and no one intends to.

Winner: Leon Draisaitl (West) — $250,000, and the conference title. Final: East 3, West 4.

Final Scoreboard

Conference title: West, 4 events to 3. Prize money distributed: $2,500,000 — ten cheques, zero receipts, and an accounting department that stopped answering its phone somewhere around the sixth.

The Hush Money ($250K Each, No Questions Asked)

Seven cheques went to the winners. Three more went, just as quietly, to the men who turned a no-defense exhibition into a public examination of their limitations. The league pays these out at the same $250,000 rate — partly out of fairness, mostly to ensure nobody describes what they saw to the press. Real money, unmarked envelope, no eye contact. Bombing in a skills competition is hard to do. Doing it this thoroughly deserves compensation.

$250,000 — The "We Logged Your Lap As A Stoppage" Cheque → Ross Colton (OTT). Ottawa needed a representative and Colton, a fine honest checking forward whose entire professional value lives in the defensive zone, was the name that came up. They entered him in Fastest Skater. He posted a lap so unhurried the timing crew initially recorded it as a whistle, then a TV timeout, then — once a skater was confirmed to be involved — a personal-best for a man who has never been asked to do this and clearly hopes to never be asked again. The cheque is for showing up to a sprint event built for the one thing he was not invited here to do.

$250,000 — The "That Was Your Hardest One?" Cheque → Brock Faber (WPG). A defenseman gets exactly one night a year to be appreciated for a cannon, and Faber — 25 points, a −7, and a Winnipeg blueliner whose game is built on tidy first passes rather than blowing the net off its pegs — stepped into Hardest Shot and registered a number the radar gun normally reserves for a warm-up wrist shot. Sergachev's winner arrived with a structural-damage warning; Faber's arrived with a polite request that everyone please not make this weird. The $250K is for a slapshot that the gun, in fairness, did technically detect.

$250,000 — The "All Four Pucks, None Of The Targets" Cheque → Jack Roslovic (MTL). Montreal's man in Accuracy Shooting, where Kucherov needed four pucks for four targets and treated the whole thing as an imposition. Roslovic needed all four pucks too, and a couple of bonus ones the officials located for him out of pity, and at the end of it the targets stood largely undisturbed, like a row of witnesses who saw nothing. He left the ice to the specific silence reserved for a man who has just performed a magic trick in which nothing disappeared. The cheque is for the effort, which was visible, sustained, and entirely unrewarded by the scoreboard.

The West walks out with the skills title, the swagger, and a one-event head start on the trash talk. The East walks out with a former fastest-skater champ finishing second, a goalie who took the whole thing personally, and a breakaway grievance it fully intends to litigate. None of it counts tomorrow. The puck drops in twenty-four hours, the scoreboard resets to zero, and Draisaitl and McDavid — who split the headline acts tonight down the middle — get to do the only kind of settling that actually matters. Bring a coat. It may go long.