Regressing to the mean since 2015, it's the Hockey PEDEOCast with your host, Dmitri

Filipovich.

Welcome to the HockeyPedioCast. My name is Dmit Dmitra Filipovich and joining me as always on a Sunday, my good buddy Thomas Drance, Tom. What's going on, man?

Not much, buddy. It's been another, you know what? I think this was my favorite week of hockey yet this season. I'm serious. I thought you had like that Vegas Golden Knights Ducks game last night was incredible.

Obviously, that Habs' Capitals game was like only beautiful goals allowed.

And there were, what?

A lot of them.

Ten of them with the goalie in the net.

It just felt like the vibes were high around the league, and the hockey watching was of high quality. You also had the Badard-Colibrini dueling hat tricks. I mean, this was a wild week. That feels like ages ago, and yet it wasn't. It's just that this weekend's games were so good that it's already receded into the back of my memory. Yeah, on the one hand, the vibes were high. I agree on the other. You watch these games, and even on Saturday, and I agree the slate was phenomenal. I enjoyed it throughout just sitting on my couch all night. There was an element of you tune into whatever game, let's say, Florida, Edmonton, obviously, the Stanley Cup final rematch, and it was very closely contested, came down to the very bitter end. And yet you've got like Uttu Lus serene and out with like a barbecue related injury. Yeah. Ekblad is a late scratch. Obviously, Kachuk and Barkov been out the entire time. Washington, Tampa Bay, Kutrov gets hurt in the first period of that game. They have a decimated blue line after finally

getting healthy up front. And it seems like around the league, there's this like pervasive element of just injuries throughout to key players. Everyone's missing like three or four guys. And yet the quality of play, I think, hasn't suffered necessarily. But it does take a little bit of the sizzle out of it for me, just that you're not going to see these fully formed teams kind of trading haymakers at their very best. But hopefully it's a bit of an early season thing. And as we get later into the season, guys will get healthy and we're going to finally see that. And I guess just something to remember the next time we're all getting mad about Olympic participation, right? There is a real cost to this. and back in the world before the IHFs cut the NHL a squarer deal, you know, it's totally understandable why owners would look at what we're seeing, look at the product, look at the absences that they're feeling and the fact that, you know, it's not even that big a deal. For example, I obviously cover the Canucks. They've been wildly injured. I mean, their coach repeatedly citing nine or ten absences. And over their last

stretch of games, you know, they played Dallas without Deshaen or Harley. They played the Tampa

Bay Lightning with number one defenseman Dasdou. Yep. They played, you know, Florida, obviously, without Kachuk, Barkov, or Lus Duranen. The Carolina Hurricanes with like 30% of their opening day roster out of the lineup. It's been like a week and a half since they played a team that wasn't as banged up as them. And injuries has been the main story around the team. So, you know, that's where we're at. And I just think it's worth being conscientious of the condensed schedule and what that impact is. So we don't really have a gimmick for today's show. It feels like the past couple weeks we've had our projected Olympic rosters, tears and all that stuff. I thought we'd get back to our roots a little bit. And because the hockey has been so fun to watch, we're going to bounce around, talk about some of the stuff that's caught our eye over this past week, some of the big picture significance of all of it as well. And I want to start with that game that you referenced right off the top, Golden Knights Ducks, which served as an awesome nightcap on Saturday night after a fun day of hockey. it really was the second meeting between these two teams, I thought, that felt like a marquee

matchup this early in the season, both because of how well they're playing, but also the stakes in the Pacific with this one being, winner take all, at least for the time being, of course, for first in the Pacific. And both those meetings between these two teams have really delivered. I think they were both four or three overtime wins for the ducks that showcase some of the best elements of both these teams. Unfortunately, they don't play each other again until February 1st, I believe, in Anaheim. I really wish we could almost fast forward to a series between these two because the hockey's been that good. And on Saturday night, Vegas jumps out to these two quick goals in the first five minutes, you're like, all right, they came to play. They're taking this very seriously, and we're going to talk more about that in a second. And then the ducks just answer with two just quick attack goals off the rush that really highlighted and demonstrated why we're so excited about this team, right? The first one, Carter Go Gochi kind of lobs this alley-you pass. Beckett Seneca receives it on the fly, the blue line between his skate, circles around, gives it the Lacombe, who rips at home. Then on the second one, Troy Terry, and he's made an art form of this over the years, but it really feels like he's on one lately, play with better players. Challenges, too, guys, the blue line on entry, kind of puts it in the triangle between

their skate and sticks, gets it over to Zellweger, who rips it home, and then we were

just off from there, and it was just an incredible game.

Yeah.

The lateral movement preceding the point shot, I mean, those shots might be from 40 feet

out, but they are wildly dangerous shots, not just because the pass is moving

east-west. It's one-timed, it's one-timed hard and low by both defenders, but also there's

wild amounts of layered traffic in both instances, and the ducks are good at setting these up.

The fact that, you know, I like that Manchukov got in and played really well and played huge minutes.

But I thought the big story for me anyway, coming out of that game was what the Ducks did in terms of rejigging their forward lines,

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