#elias petterson one shot

[sweetteainthesummerx]

|◁ II ▷| down bad ! |◁ II ▷|

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nhl masterlist !

pairing: quinn hughes x famous singer! reader

warnings: fluff, smut is implied but not graphic!! use of y/n.

summary: your sister sends you an article of you and quinn being absolutely down bad for each other...

word count: 2.4 k

notes: saw one too many edits of my handsome boy on TikTok and this is the consequence :) also, this is sort of based off of taylor swift and travis kelce. enjoy!

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you're finishing up in the studio, just done tweaking one of your last songs on your new album when your phone dings! with a notification.

it's your sister, who sends a trail of emojis that don't really make sense and a link.

you press on it, confused and assuming it's something she wants for her birthday that's coming up soon.

instead it's an article that reads, TOP TEN FAN FAVOURITE MOMENTS OF NHL AND THE MUSIC INDUSTRY'S ROYAL COUPLE.

you laugh, because the cover photo is one of you and quinn from last year when you took him as your plus one to the grammy's. you have to admit, you both look really good, and so, so in love.

so you nestle into your chair to read it.

TOP TEN FAN FAVOURITE MOMENTS OF NHL AND THE MUSIC INDUSTRY'S ROYAL COUPLE

one of Hollywood's up and comings, y/n l/n and quinn hughes of canucks and nhl fame have been dating for over three years, and have been public for two. we have complied a list of fan favourite moments of the couple over the span of their relationship that show their deep (and public) affection and love for each other

10. 2023 Grammy's Award Ceremony

picture: you are wearing a light blue floor length gown, hair loose and curled. your makeup is simple and glowy. quinn stands next to you, in a clean, slate grey suit with a hand wrapped around your hip, fingers nestled in the dip of your hipbone.

the award ceremony for the grammy's - where y/n won best album for the second year in a row - was when the famous couple first went public officially, not counting the many paparazzi pictures taken in both vancouver and Los Angeles.

sources show that the two could hardly keep their hands off of each other. they were seen kissing multiple times through out the night.

it was true, quinn had been extra handsy that night, and had all but ripped that dress off of you when you got back to the hotel. you sigh at the memory, stomach warm and a little achy. you can't wait for him to come back from the roadie he left for only two days ago.

9. y/n's tiktoks

despite their massive success in their respective industries, it is easy to forget that they are also part of gen z. y/n's TikTok page features fashion, her music and most popular of all, her boyfriend. here are only some of her most viewed and liked videos:

video one: you smile into the camera, fluffing your hair in a close shot. the subtitles read: fit check with my bf! quinn pulls you against him by your waist, kissing your face over and over as you laugh, pushing at his chest. over the song, you tell him to let go so you can show your outfits. he lets go reluctantly but holds your hand, spinning you around to show off your sundress. then he grabs you and dips you low, hands dangerously close to your ass, as you giggle into his cheek.

video two: the video is taken by one of your friends who took your phone. she's on the couch and you and quinn are in the kitchen cooking for the small get together in your vancouver apartment. you lean up to smile at him, and he bumps his nose with yours. some trending love song plays in the back.

you flush at the comments gushing about how he looks at you, the height difference and how cute you guys are. there's something so sweet at seeing the two of you from an outsiders perspective.

8. quinn knowing y/n's entire discography

during media days, one interview has elias petterson and quinn hughes guessing songs and the artists. the journalist managed to sneak at least four of y/n's songs in, quinn getting all four correct, with the full name of the song, name of artist and then album, all under 10 seconds of the song playing. now that's a supportive boyfriend!

you watch the video linked, your boyfriend sweaty and hair wet. the media person is impressed, and quinn just shrugs bashfully and offers a crooked smile. you look at the time stamp and bite a grin: it's from before you guys went public. no wonder all of your fans say you guys were obvious.

7. quinn hughes: nhl player and personal bodyguard

fame in hollywood forces many in the industry to have body guards, and y/n is not exempt. for many years before she started dating the canuck's defensemen, she's had many bodyguards following her around. now, it seems like her boyfriend has taken over that job.

video: your body guard, john moves to open the limo door as you and quinn arrive to an event, but your boyfriend crosses from his side of the car to open it himself, patting john on the shoulder and gently pushing him from the entrance and helping you out himself. he helps you balance on your heels as you stand and wave at the cameras, one hand on your waist as he maneuvers you to the other side of the sidewalk so he can block you from the cars. he keeps your hand cradled in his, his other arm around your waist as he shoulders through the paparazzi.

quinn looks so attractive and so masculine in this video. you've never had boyfriends who took princess treatment so seriously, but quinn has always been a defender, on ice and off. it was a little awkward and it took a long a while for him to get you, but ever since he had you, he's made sure he tried his very best to keep and protect you.

6. getaway in hawaii

although the couple hasn't had any announcement of engagement yet, early last year they were sighted in hawaii on a trip eerily like a honeymoon: here are some pictures.

picture one: you're in a tiny pink bikini and he's in board shorts. he's taken off his hat to give to you, and you're pressing on a pair of your too-small sunglasses onto his face while both of you laugh.

picture two: the two of you are standing in the water up to your calves. he's got his fingers tangled in the strings of your bikini bottoms, and yours are on his chest as the two of you look into the horizon.

picture three: quinn has you balanced on his shoulder, smiling as you clutch at his back. one of his forearms is possessively covering your ass from the camera, and his other hand is wrapped fully around your ankle to give you a semblance of balance.

you still smile every time you think of that trip, afternoons playing in the water, romantic dinners and nights with his head between your legs, your fingers tangled in his hair. you silently remind yourself to book a vacation back there the next time both of you are free.

5. the NHL award ceremony

the recent NHL award ceremony when quinn hughes received the James Norris award for his skills as a defenceman gave us another peek into y/n's relationship with hughes family.

video one: you're sitting between quinn and luke in your pretty dark blue gown. your hair is pulled back from your face the way quinn likes. he's got an arm thrown over the back of the seat, fingers rubbing your shoulder as you talk to Luke about his hair routine. quinn murmurs something the camera can't catch into your ear and you laugh, tucking your hand into the his that's resting on his lap. he leans back, stretching his legs as you absentmindedly rub his knee, leaning over his brothers to talk to his mom.

video two: his name is called, and you stand with him, clapping loudly. he hugs you first, and you press a kiss into the corner of his lip, but he plants a firm, real one on yours. your manicured, white nails contrast against the black expanse of his suit and broad back. you push him gently towards luke. when he's finished hugging everyone and comes back down the aisle, you quickly fix his tie and smooth down his lapels. he kisses your cheek again and goes down to the stage.

photo three: the trophy is in the middle, the whole family wrapped together. you're tucked between ellen, the older woman has an arm around your waist and your boyfriend's got is arm slung across you shoulders on you other side, everyone smiling big for the camera.

you still remember ellen and jim insisting that you get in the photo, because "you're practically family anyways," and "it's any day now" that their son proposes to you. the photo is on their fridge, to this day.

4. quinn's y/n shirt

another video from y/n's tiktok. during the christmas season, she spent the holidays with the hughes family. her future brother in law (hopefully), jack hughes got quinn a pretty special present.

video: jack is holding the camera, and it pans to you and quinn. your holding a giant sushi stuffed toy (long story) from luke on your lap as you sit next to your boyfriend.

"here," he extends a hand holding a bag to his older brother.

Quinn smiles in thanks and digs into it, retrieving shirt. but it's no ordinary shirt. it's one of those old, retro looking ones with your face blown out all over it.

pictures from red carpets, your album covers, and in gaudy, shadowy text, it reads: IF LOST, RETURN TO Y/N L/N.

Luke cackles as you bury your face in quinn's shoulder. he's letting out a deep, belly laugh as his parents smile and take pictures of it when he holds it out.

he immediately pulls off his sweatshirt and tugs the shirt on. it fits a little tight.

"merry christmas!" jack yells as he gives you a high-five.

he still wears that stupid shirt around the apartment, just because he knows you like the fit and your face plastered all over his chest.

3. y/n's songs about her boyfriend

through many new releases, we have determined a list of songs about quinn from her new album, lover.

sweet nothing

paper rings

lover

daylight

I think he knows

afterglow

good looking

wow, you think. these people must not have lives if they're rummaging through your digital footprint and media presence with your boyfriend just to link them with your songs.

2. quinn's interview

since the couple has gone public, y/n has been seen at Canuck's games with family and friends. since she's from vancouver, born and raised, she is passionate about hockey and fits right in.

video one: the jumbotron flashes your face an name; you're wearing quinn's canucks jersey, hair loose. you smile and flutter your fingers at the crowd that's going crazy. one the ice, quinn's teammates jostle and holler at him, and you blow him a kiss. he pretends to catch it, and the screaming in the stadium reaches a new level as the screen pans to him: he's pink and all smiley.

video two: the ref makes a call and you stand, throwing your hands up in the air, exasperated. you huff, sitting back down with your head in your hands. your friends watch on with disappointment, and the three of you let out complains.

video three: quinn grins while looking off camera in the middle of an interview, and the journalist laughs.

"your girl?" he asks, and quinn nods shyly.

"yeah, it's real nice to see her here supporting. I mean, she's really busy too with her tours, but it's nice to have her on my turf."

"I saw! she got really riled up for the penalty during the second period. she's wearing your jersey as well."

"yeah," he scratches his neck, scrunching his nose to hide the big ass smile on his face, "she looks great, eh?"

"glad to see her in her hometown, too."

"right. yeah, I love her so much."

you snicker at how love sick he looks, because early on in the relationship he followed you around like a clingy, lost puppy. he still does sometimes after a roadie or one of your tours. you love it.

1. karma is the guy on the rink, coming straight home to me

the internet broke when y/n changed one of the songs on her song list for her tour last year at rogers arena in vancouver: instead of "karma is the guy on the screen, coming straight home to me", which is a reference to her ex, she changes it to better fix her new romance.

video: you dance through the song, your backup dancers clueless as you reach the line.

"karma is the guy on the rink, comin' straight home to me!" your voice breaks a little in a giggle at the end, your dancers shocked laughter and gasps visible from their faces that even an iPhone camera from 25 meters away can catch.

video two: quinn's in the tent with your parents and some of his teammates and their girlfriends, all of them are vibing to the music and dancing, most holding drinks in their hands.

when the line hits the speakers, everyone is screaming so loud and filming him, and he blushes so red that it spreads to his ears and neck, even in the dim light. his boys are slapping his back, and your dad gives him a high-five. he just smiles at you, dopey and deliriously happy in his shirt of your face and the 20 friendship bracelets your fans had made for him.

you remember that show perfectly, and the night after even better. you barely got any sleep because of his attentions, and your makeup artists spent nearly half an hour covering up the bruises on your neck and chest the next morning.

all in all, we can come to the conclusion that quinn hughes and y/n l/n are completely down bad for each other, like she teased in the song list of her unreleased album. we only hope for good things in the future for this famous couple!

you smile at the closing statement, sending it to quinn to read later in his hotel room.

he facetimes you that night, hair wet and eyes sleepy.

"that article was absolutely right. I am so down bad for you." he tells you seriously, with the promise of lots of love when he comes straight home to you.

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© sweetteainthesummerx.tumblr. all rights reserved. unauthorized copying, translation, or claiming of my writing or any works as your own is strictly prohibited.

[puckinghell]

Acts Of Service | Elias Pettersson

Summary: When people have different love languages, sometimes it’s hard to understand what the other is trying to say. 4 times Elias shows you he loves you, and the 1 time you tell him.  Words: 7.5k (whoops) Note: This concept was very interesting to explore. Also yes, this entire thing was written because of that one picture of Elias in that blue sweater stepping out of the car like a fucking GQ model. 

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(Some time ago)

“Didn’t you say there’s an apartment free in your building?” Brock asked as soon as you answered the phone, forgoing the “hello”.

“Hello, Brock, my very good friend, how nice to talk to you! How are you doing?” you deadpanned.

At least he had the decency to sound ashamed. “Ah, yes, hi. Sorry. I’m just in a hurry and it’s important.”

You frowned. “Why? Are you looking to move?”

“No.” Brock laughed. “Stetch would kill me. No, it’s about the rookie. Petey? I told you about him. Swedish, quiet, best fucking hands in the league.”

Yes. Brock had told you about the rookie, although you still thought it dumb to call him that. Brock was basically still a rookie himself.

“What does that have to do with my apartment building?”

“He said no to having a billet family but everyone on the team thinks it’d be good for him to have someone to kinda look out for him a bit. He’s never been to Canada before this, you know, and he’s never lived on his own either. His English isn’t that great and everything is new for him. And since you’re such a caring, loving person, we thought…”

“You thought I could babysit him?” you finished for Brock.

“It’s not babysitting. Just, being friendly if he needs anything. Obviously we’re there for that too, but it’d be nice to have you so close by.”

Close by would be an understatement: the free apartment was across the hall from yours.

You weren’t sure if this sounded like something that you would necessarily want to do, but you did feel a bit sorry for Elias: you’d met him at a team thing earlier that week and he’d looked completely lost in the midst of all the Canadian hockey slang that you barely managed to follow, even after having been friends with Brock for years. He mostly kept to Eagle, spoke in Swedish, and his eyes flickered nervously across the room whenever anyone else approached him.

“Fine,” you sighed, “I’ll talk to my landlord. But you owe me, Blondie.”

Brock was happy enough that he didn’t even call you out on the nickname.

1. 

“Have I told you lately how much of a lifesaver you are?” You lean across your desk, resting your chin in your hands. Elias looks mildly amused as he hands you the papers.

“Nearly every day,” he says, “but then I save your life every day, so that seems fair.”

You grab the papers from his hands.

“You’re a lifesaver and the love of my life, Petey.”

You think back to when Elias just moved into your apartment building, only because Brock thought he needed someone to look after him. You could laugh, now, thinking about how wrong he’d been.

Elias is the most self-sufficient, independent person you know. You don’t think he’s ever needed anything from anyone. Like in hockey, where he can make the play and score the goal all at the same time, Elias has his life together.

Unlike you.

Despite the fact that Elias hadn’t needed much help from you, you had become very fast friends. His quick witted sarcasm always managed to make you laugh and he liked how upfront and honest you were with him about things. It was easy, too, to spend time together. With him living just across the hall, you found yourself wandering to his apartment whenever you were bored, and he showed up at yours often when he didn’t feel like cooking.

Just because he could cook, didn’t mean he always wanted to.

And ever since the two of you had become friends, Elias had your back. When you needed someone to water your plants, or feed your cat Puck – Brock had named him – or, apparently, bring you the important work papers that you forgot at home after having worked on them all weekend.

You groan as you flick through the papers. “I thought I was going to die. Without these I can’t finish my presentation.”

“When is it?” Elias asks, eyes searching behind you. You know he’s looking out for your asshole of a boss, who will use any excuse to yell at you, especially the unannounced visit of a friend.

“Tomorrow. I got all the content in these papers here, but I still have to make the PowerPoint.” You sigh. “It’s still so much work.”

“Oh.” Elias’ face lights up. “Almost forgot. Brought you this.” Triumphantly, he reaches down and comes up with a paper bag from your favorite coffee shop.

The words fall off your lips in a gasp. “You didn’t!”

“Strawberry scone and a large caramel macchiato with soy milk.” Elias grins. “I also got you a chocolate chip cookie for later.”

“Marry me,” you proclaim, as you make grabby hands for the bag. The coffee is precisely what you need and your mouth is already watering at the idea of the food.

“Get me a ring, then,” Elias jokes, as he starts getting up from the chair.

Something tightens in your stomach, so you quickly take a bite of the scone: anything to push those feelings to the side. It works a little, and at the very least it tastes amazing.

You’re just friends. If you were gonna be anything more, Elias would’ve made a move already. Or, if you’d been brave enough, you would’ve: but he’s never said anything to make you think he’s interested and quite frankly, you’re not that brave.

“Thank you,” you say, mouth still full of scone, and Elias wrinkles his nose at that as you knew he would.

“I’m going to the store now,” he says, “anything you want me to pick up for you?”

“Wine?” you ask, hopeful. “I’m gonna need it after today.”

Elias rolls his eyes at you, but when you come home after the most grueling day at work there’s a bottle of rosé sitting in your fridge, next to a bag full of your favorite Thai take out food.

Love you, you quickly text Elias, even though you know he can’t answer because the game is about to start.

You take some time showering and putting on comfortable clothes, then situate yourself on the couch and put on the game. It has already begun, and you know it’s not gonna be an easy one, against the Bruins.

It’s not until the first intermission, when you check your phone, that you see there’s a reply from Elias waiting for you.

It’s just a simple heart emoji, but it makes your heart race anyway.

2.

“This is the worst thing that’s ever happened to me.”

“I can barely hear you.” Fiona’s tone is disapproving, and you pull your mouth away from where you’d pressed it into your arm to scream.

“I said, this is the worst thing that’s ever happened to me!”

She laughs. “It’s just a car, Y/N.”

You don’t necessarily like your job, but Fiona is one of the reasons you’re still putting up with it. She’s not just a colleague anymore, slowly turning into a friend and someone you confide into about everything – even about your Elias problem – and you love her, but sometimes you could murder her.

“It’s not just a car,” you bite. “It’s my only mode of transportation, because you know how much I hate taking the bus, and it’s broken, and I probably can’t even afford to get it fixed. And now I have to walk home, and it’s raining.”

“Well, when you put it like that,” Fiona admits.

After a long day at work, you couldn’t wait to get home and watch The Bachelor until you fell asleep, your cat in your lap. However, when you finally got away from the office and stepped into your car, it was clear the universe had different plans.

It didn’t start.

After trying approximately 15 times, you’d screamed, nearly cried, hit the steering wheel, and then went back inside to scream and cry a little more at Fiona’s desk.

“I just wanna go home, Fi.” You know you sound miserable, but you honestly can’t help it. Taking the bus always heightens your anxiety, so you avoid it at all costs: however, walking home in this pouring rain doesn’t seem like much fun either.

And Fiona can’t even bring you home, because she takes the bus to work like a normal person.

“There’s a simple solution to this, you know,” Fiona says. She starts to organize the papers on her desk, a clear sign that she’s getting ready to leave the office as well. “You could just call…”

“No,” you interrupt her, knowing exactly where she’s going with this. “I can’t call Elias. He’s got the boys over today and I won’t interrupt his fun with my misery. Besides, he does too much for me already, I can’t ask him for more.”

“Right,” Fiona drawls, “but when he hears that you were stuck here and didn’t call him…”

She doesn’t finish her sentence, but she doesn’t have to.

Elias would be furious.

One time, you were on a night out when you got a little too tipsy and didn’t realize your phone had died. By the time you noticed, all your friends had already jumped in their respective Ubers, but you had been too busy chatting with some girl you didn’t know to order yours, and now you couldn’t because you didn’t have a phone. 

You knew you could’ve asked any random person to order you an Uber, or at least to borrow their phone to call Elias – it’s not like you didn’t know his number by heart – but that felt like too much. It had been 3 am and he had a game the next day, so you decided to walk home.

When he found out the next day, he got so mad he didn’t talk to you for 4 days. Eventually, you couldn’t take it anymore and just sat on his couch pouting at him until he spoke to you again.

“Something could’ve happened,” he’d muttered, explaining to you why he got mad in the first place. “And I’m your best friend, and you should know me enough to know that I would much rather you wake me up than you walk home alone.”

You did know that, and he was your best friend, and you’d promised him you’d never do it again.

It’s only that promise, that causes you to reach for your phone.

“I’m texting him, but if he’s busy, I’m walking,” you tell Fiona stubbornly. She ignores you, which is probably fair enough.

Hey, you busy right now? Are the guys still there?

The answer comes right away. What’s wrong?

Damn, he knows you too well. You quickly explain the situation and before you know it, Elias is on his way to come get you, and Fiona is bidding you goodbye after you promise her you’re fine on your own for the twenty minutes it’s gonna take Elias to get there.

You’re just checking your email on your phone when you hear the bell at the front door.

“I’m coming!” you call out. You hurry to grab your bags and then walk quickly to the door, where Elias is standing with his car keys between his fingers.

“So Bella finally gave up, huh?” he asks, a sly little smirk on his face. He always teases you with the fact that you named your car.

“Yes, and I know you told me,” you sigh, and it’s clear that he immediately – and correctly – reads your mood.

Without a word, he opens his arms, and you gratefully fall into them, hugging him tightly to your body. There’s very little in the world that brings you more comfort than one of Elias’ hugs: although being on Elias’ couch wearing one of his old hoodies watching some stupid reality show might come close.

“Let’s go home,” Elias finally mumbles, and he holds out an umbrella when he lets you go.

It’s raining really hard, and you know he has to park his car a little bit away because there’s no parking in front of your office, so you take it.

“You could’ve just called, I would’ve ran out,” you tell him sternly, but he shrugs.

“But then how would you have gotten the umbrella?”

You would tell him you’re not made of sugar, but as soon as you step outside the rain clatters loudly against the fabric of the umbrella and you realize you would’ve really, really hated to not have it, so you stay quiet.

Instead, you walk after him as he runs to his car and opens the passenger door for you. It’s still running, and the heater is on: only then do you realize you’re quite cold.

This morning they said it would be nice outside, so you didn’t bother to take a coat.

It’s quiet in the car for a while, but it’s not uncomfortable. It’s the silence that only comes when two people understand each other, and combined with the soft music that is playing on the radio it lulls you into a false sense of comfort.

Until you realize something.

“Oh God,” you groan, “I’m gonna have to call someone to tow Bella to a mechanic.”

Elias raises an eyebrow. “Well, you could just leave her there.”

Normally you would’ve at least playfully punched his arm for the sarcastic tone in his voice, but right now you’re too busy freaking out.

“And how am I gonna get to work tomorrow? Don’t you dare say you’ll bring me cause I know you’ve got morning practice and it’s super out of your way. Fuck, why did this have to happen to me?”

You let your head fall against the window. The glass is cold against your cheek and it’s enough to stop the spiraling in your brain at least for a second.

“Hey.” Elias’ voice has lost all sarcastic edge. It’s gentle now, and he’s speaking low as if not to startle you. “Don’t worry about it, okay? I’ll call the tow truck and the mechanic and get your car fixed. And Brock lives close enough that he can take me to and from practice and you can just take my car to work.”

It’s… a reasonable solution, but once again something that Elias has to go out of his way for, even just a little bit, and you feel something warm bloom inside your chest.

“Okay,” you answer, the stress already ebbing away. “Thank you. You’re the best.” You reach out and place your hand on his knee, squeezing slightly. “Seriously. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

Elias mumbles something incoherent. You think you see some color on his cheeks, but surely that’s just because the heater is on, because there’s no way he’s blushing over something you said.

You turn off the heater, and let your thoughts wander as Elias drives you home.

3. 

Traveling is fun, but traveling for work is instantly a lot less fun. You really don’t know how Elias does it.

You’re feeling run down and jetlagged when you come back from your work trip, which is ridiculous cause you flew to Toronto, not to freaking Europe. But it’s late at night and the three days you were away were so busy you can barely remember sleeping at all.

Fiona slept on the plane, so she looks a little more alive than you when your feet touch the ground at Vancouver airport.

“Is Elias coming to pick you up?” Fiona asks, as you’re both walking through the gate.

You shake your head. “I’m sure he would’ve insisted if he could, but he’s in California right now. They played the Kings tonight and they’re playing the Sharks the day after tomorrow.”

“I wish I was in California,” Fiona says wistfully. It’s cold and wet in Vancouver and it wasn’t much better in Toronto. The tiredness doesn’t help: it feels as if the cold of the night is slowly creeping into your bones.

“Come on then, I’ll drop you off.” You thank Fiona and follow her to her car. Normally you wouldn’t have minded taking an Uber, but right now you just wanna get to bed as soon as possible.

“If I fall asleep, just let me sleep here,” you mumble, resting your head back against the head rest. Fiona laughs as she starts the car.

“No way, you’ll freeze to death.” She squints outside. “Do you think it’s gonna rain?”

“It always rains,” you say, despite the fact that it’s not raining at the moment.

Fiona turns onto the highway. “So, are you finally gonna put up that bookcase you bought?”

Involuntarily, you groan. “Stop, don’t remind me.”

Your old bookcase is big and ugly, and it has been a thorn in your eye ever since you moved in. The person that lived there before you left it there, and you only kept it because you couldn’t really afford not to.

Four weeks ago, you finally allowed yourself to buy a new, prettier bookcase.

But…

“It’s just so big,” you whine, repeating the excuses you’ve been giving Elias every single time he raises a judgmental eyebrow at the old bookcase still standing in your living room. “It’s gonna take forever to take it apart and then it’s gonna take me even longer to somehow get it all downstairs and get rid of it.”

“And then you have to build the new one,” Fiona nods understandingly. “And you’re not good with furniture.”

“Hey,” you protest, but it’s weak. You’re not good with furniture, which was proven when you tried to help Fiona move in and didn’t manage to help her put together anything at all. Instead she ended up with a table with three legs. 

You even tried to read the manual, but it’s just not your forte.

“I’ll do it,” you add, “I promise you I will. Just, maybe not this weekend…”

Fiona laughs, but she doesn’t call you out on the fact that it probably won’t happen during the week either.

Finally, you arrive at your building. You can’t wait to go to bed, and you thank Fiona multiple times before dragging your luggage upstairs. When you open the door to your apartment, Puck comes running up to you, meowing and weaving between your legs.

“Don’t be dramatic,” you tell the cat sternly. “Petey sent me many pictures of you sleeping in his lap and I know he feeds you chicken when he thinks I won’t notice, so you got spoiled this week.”

You lovingly scratch Puck’s ears, before flicking on the light and kicking the door behind you in the lock.

Instantly, you notice the difference.

Your apartment isn’t big: real estate in Vancouver isn’t cheap and your job isn’t great. You got this place mostly for the location, and you like the big windows in the apartment and how it manages to get in light even during the darkest of winter days.

One corner of your living room, however, was always darker than the others. The bookcase took away the entirety of the white wall, and it created a dim lit, sad looking corner.

Now, it’s open and bright, as your new bookcase stands proudly in its place.

There’s only one person who would’ve done that.

The phone rings a few times, but you know the Kings game ended a while ago so you let it ring. After a while, Elias picks up.

“Sorry for the background noise,” is the first thing he says. “We’re on the plane. Taking off in a few minutes, probably.”

In the background, you hear some yelling. Probably Jake.

“You put up my bookcase,” you blurt out, ignoring Elias’ statement. “You put it up and all the books are in it and the other one is gone.”

Elias sounds a little smug when he answers. “Well, it’s not like you were ever gonna do it.”

“Thank you.” To your own horror, you can feel tears burning behind your eyes. “Elias, seriously…”

“It’s nothing.” You can hear Elias’ smile even over the phone: you know everyone always makes fun of his deadpan tone when he talks to media but with his friends, his voice always betrays everything he’s feeling. “I know you were worried about it, and I know how much you hated that old one.” He laughs. “I get why now, by the way. It took me and Brock like four hours to get that thing out.”

“Brock helped too?”

“He did.” Elias is silent for a while, but in the background you hear another voice. “Brock says to tell you that I forced him. But that’s not entirely true.”

Entirely. You know Elias definitely did force him.

“Tell him thank you too.”

“He says you’re welcome,” Elias says, quick enough that it makes you think Brock didn’t say that at all. “We’re about to take off so I have to put my phone on airplane mode. But call me tomorrow okay? I wanna hear about your work trip.”

“Okay.” For some reason, you can still feel the lump in your throat. You didn’t notice it momentarily, while you were focused on Elias’ and Brock’s bickering, but now it’s back, and with a vengeance.

Fuck. You just…

“I miss you.” You blurt it out before you can stop yourself and if anyone would ask, you would blame the exhaustion and the fact that Elias can’t see how wet your eyes are over the phone.

“I’ll be back soon,” he answers softly, and his voice is gentle in a way that makes you think he knows about the tears, anyway. “And when I am, we’re gonna take a whole night to eat food and stare at that bookcase, because it needs to be appreciated after the effort I had to put in to build it.”

You laugh before quietly saying goodbye to Elias and hanging up the phone.

In the kitchen, Puck sits in front of the fridge. When you open it there’s a pan with chicken.

For Puck the note next to it says, and you send Elias a picture of Puck with his chicken.

“He spoils you,” you tell your cat. You decide to ignore the fact that he kinda spoils you, too.

4. 

When you open the door to your apartment, you’re met with the smell of garlic.

After yet another shitty day at work, you can already feel the lump in your throat building again. You didn’t even tell him, this time. In fact, you carefully avoided his texts because you knew he’d clock that something was wrong.

Fuck. That’s probably where you went wrong in the first place; usually you never ignored Elias’ texts.

“Hello?” you call out into your own apartment.

There’s soft music playing and there’s light coming from the living room, but the amazing smell that tickles your senses is clearly coming from the kitchen, so that’s where you go.

Elias is standing at your kitchen counter, chopping a carrot.

“Hey,” he greets, smiling your way. “I’m making dinner.”

It’s almost too much, how domestic it looks. And how right: like he belongs there in your space, waiting for you to come home.

Suddenly there’s the overwhelming urge to go towards him, so you do. His arm immediately lifts, creating space for you in the crook of his body, and you slip under his arm easily.

“How did you know?” you mumble into the fabric of his worn Canucks hoodie. It smells like him, a scent that reminds you of home as much as your mother’s signature dish.

“You didn’t answer my texts,” Elias hums. His arm tightens around your body. “So I figured you could use some good food and a bath.” His head motions towards the general direction of the bathroom. “I’m running it as we speak.”

God. You love him.

It hits you, then. You knew you had a crush on him, knew you wanted to kiss him and hold his hand and feel his hands on you. But it’s more than that, now.

It’s the realization that you want to share everything with him. The ups and the downs. The bad nights and the bright mornings. You want him in your kitchen, but more than that, you want it to be his kitchen, too.

Fuck. You’re so royally screwed.

Because he does this, and he does so much for you, but he’s never said anything, anything at all, to indicate that he wants that. Or has even considered it, thought about it.

Maybe it’s never even crossed his mind. Maybe he takes care of you like he would take care of a sister.

“Hey.” Elias’ voice is gentle as it pulls you out of your thoughts, back down to earth. “You’re shaking. Go take a bath, and I’ll finish dinner, and then we’ll watch How I Met Your Mother. I wanted to watch the next episode but I waited for you.” His grin is a little lopsided. “Isn’t that chivalrous of me?”

It is, and normally you would tease him for it, but you can’t really think or speak, so you just nod.

“There’s wine in the fridge, if you want a glass,” Elias says. He holds out a wine glass, already waiting for you on the counter.

And who cares that it’s only a Tuesday: you deserve it, damn it, so you open the fridge to find the wine.

You’re met with more than just that.

“You bought groceries?” you ask, your eyes traveling through your fridge. You hadn’t gone grocery shopping in like a week, and when you left for work this morning the fridge was basically empty. Now it’s so full you wonder how you’re gonna close the door.

“How else was I gonna cook anything? You only had cat food left,” Elias tuts. You’re not surprised to find Puck at Elias’ feet, waiting for him to inevitably slip him some human food.

“Did you get…”

“Your coconut yoghurt? Yes.”

He did, and he got basically all your staples, and nothing you wouldn’t buy yourself.

“Honestly,” you say, as you finally reach for the bottle and pull your head out of the fridge. “I don’t know what to say, Petey. Thank you. I had such a sucky day and now it’s already endlessly better.”

This time you know you’re not imagining the flush on Elias’ cheeks.

“It’s fine,” he says. “You should go take that bath before it goes cold.”

You want to say more: to tell him time and time again how amazing he is, how much he means to you, how thankful you are. But you know once you start, you can’t be trusted to not say the one thing you don’t think he wants to hear.

So you say nothing, and simply go to take your bath.

+1

But you think about it.

You think about it all throughout Christmas, where you don’t see Elias at all. You think about it during NYE, when you get a drunk SnapChat from Elias with his brother, right at midnight.

At least, you figure, he’s not kissing any girls.

You’re not kissing any boys, either. You’re at a NYE party with Fiona and it’s fun, it is, but it’s not the same as it would be if Elias wasn’t all the way in Sweden.

You miss him like a limb, and you know it’s not fair because he rarely gets time to go home to Sweden and he deserves that time with his family, but you can’t say you didn’t wish his time off ended already.

When it finally does, it’s not Elias you see first. Troy is throwing a late New Years party, just to welcome everyone back to Vancouver as they get ready to start the season back up, and when you arrive at his house it’s early enough in the evening that there’s only a handful of people there.

“Y/N!” Brock calls out, opening his arms to give you a big hug as you enter. “Missed you!”

You laugh. “Get off of me, you giant. I’m gonna drop the wine.”

“Not the wine,” Troy says dramatically, tearing it out of your hands. His eyes are sparkling when he thanks and hugs you, and then Brock is ushering you into the living room, where Jake is talking with Quinn.

Or talking at Quinn. To be honest, you never really know when Quinn is paying attention.

“Y/N!” Jake exclaims, much like Brock had. “I’m glad you’re here, we need your input on something.”

“Okay?” you ask, curiosity instantly taking over. Whenever Jake and Brock get together, it promises to be an interesting evening.

“We’re trying to decide Brock’s love language.”

It’s sudden enough that you laugh. “His what?”

“Love language,” Jake explains. “Like, how he shows people he loves them. He says it’s quality time, but I think it could be physical touch. He’s always touching people.”

“Jake is deflecting because his love language is physical touch,” Brock scowls. “I think I know my own love language, Tuna.”

“Hold on.” Unfortunately, you have to press the pause button on their discussion. “What options do we have?”

You’ve got no idea where they got this from, but it doesn’t really matter. You’re always down to share your opinion on stupid stuff with your favorite boys.

“There’s gifts, quality time, physical touch, words of affirmation, and…” Brock pauses, and you can nearly see the wheels in his head turning.

“Acts of service,” Quinn offers, which proves that he was actually paying attention.

“Mine is physical touch,” Jake says determinedly. “When I care about someone, I always wanna be touching them, and when I’m in love with someone that’s like twenty times worse.”

“Poor girl,” Quinn mutters, and the conversation gets paused in order for Jake to put Quinn in a headlock.

“I think yours is quality time, actually,” you tell Brock when Jake is done murdering the rookie. “Your ex was always on her phone during your date nights and I remember it drove you crazy.”

“See,” Brock says proudly. “Quality time baby. If I’m there I’m there.”

“What about yours, Huggy?” Jake asks. “Physical touch would make sense, since you’re called Huggy.”

“I’m not called Huggy,” Quinn deadpans. His face is devoid of any emotion, but you know him well enough to recognize the mischievous twinkle in his eyes. He reminds you of Elias, when he does that. “And if we were going by nicknames your love language would be fishing.”

Everyone cracks up on that, and then the doorbell rings and Bo arrives.

The topic gets put on hold, then, because Bo is instantly talking about Gunnar’s first Christmas and Brock is talking about becoming an uncle again and you feel warm and happy on the couch with your wine, squeezed between Brock and Troy.

Until, a little later, you realize someone is missing.

“Where’s Petey?” you ask Troy. “Isn’t he coming?”

Troy shrugs. “Should do. But you never know with Pete.”

It’s not entirely true: if Elias promises he’ll be there, he will be there. But, to be fair, he usually doesn’t promise that to anyone but you, and you hadn’t asked him to come, this time.

You figured he just would.

“What about Petey’s love language?” Brock asks idly, not knowing he’s opening Pandora’s box for you. “Definitely not words of affirmation, huh.”

Troy laughs.

“Nah, Petey’s an acts of service guy. He’s always doing shit for Y/N.”

You would protest if you trusted your voice not to shake. As it is, you stay quiet and hope the flush on your cheeks gets mistaken for a wine flush, and not an Elias flush.

Brock brightens. “Oh, yeah! Getting her car fixed, making dinner, building her stupid bookshelf, feeding her cat… He is a typical acts of service guy.” He bumps against your shoulder playfully. “I hope you appreciate his showing of love, Y/N. He rarely does that shit for me.”

Troy snorts. “That’s cause he’s not in love with you, Boes.”

“He’s not in love with me either!” you squeak, unable to stay quiet any longer. You know if you don’t derail this trail of thought very soon, it’s gonna end badly for you.

Both Troy and Brock look unimpressed, at that statement.

“Yes, he is,” Brock says slowly, as if explaining something to an unruly child. “He drops whatever he has going on to do small things that make your life easier. That’s literally the same as him screaming I’m in love with you from the highest rooftop in Vancouver.”

“He’s not like you,” Troy continues, a little more gentle. “When people have different love languages, they don’t always understand what the other is trying to say. Your love language is words of affirmation. You’re always telling Petey how amazing he is. But he doesn’t see that as a declaration of love, or whatever. He thinks you tell everyone that they’re amazing.”

You do, to be fair, but not as often as you tell Elias. Because he’s…

Well. Amazing would be an understatement, actually. He’s everything to you.  

Things are starting to make sense, like puzzle pieces fitting into place. Suddenly, you start wondering if there’s more to his acts of service than plain friendship, or him being a good guy.

It’s not like he does stuff like that for all his friends. He helps them out, sure, but he always goes above and beyond for you, usually not even needing to be asked.

But he’s not in love with you, surely? He hasn’t said anything…

But maybe words aren’t his thing. Not like they are yours: the way you can’t stop yourself from gushing into Elias’ ear even when you know you should stop.

What if Brock and Troy are right?

You don’t get much time to think it through, because that’s when Elias finally appears in Troy’s living room, looking endlessly cool in his blue sweater, wearing his glasses. He’s sending death glares at Jake, who wolf whistles from the corner, but then his eyes meet yours and they soften.

“Hi there,” he smiles, reaching out to you. You immediately jump up and launch yourself at him, any previous conversation about the two of you momentarily forgotten as you curl your body into his, his arms tightening around your waist.

“Missed you,” you hum into his shoulder, and you’re rewarded with a grin you can feel against the skin of your neck.

“Are you sure hers isn’t physical touch?” you hear Brock ponder, and you would flip him off if you could be bothered.

You can’t. All you can be bothered doing is plastering yourself to Elias’ side and not leaving him alone even for a second, the rest of the night.

It works at least for a while, until he asks: “Do you want another drink?”

“I’ll go with you,” you say, not willing to part with him yet, and you ignore the knowing look Brock shoots you as the two of you find your way to the kitchen.

Elias immediately goes for the wine, because he knows you better than anyone else.

“I asked my dad about the job,” Elias mentions casually, as if it’s not a big deal at all. “He thinks he can get you an interview.”

“Wait, what?”

Suddenly your heart is ticking in your throat. Before he left for Sweden, Elias had mentioned that his dad knows a guy who works for a similar company as you’re working for now: apart from the shitty boss you have or the ridiculous low salary you get paid. It’s your job, but better, and Elias promised you he’d get his dad to ask if there were any open positions.

There were. And you sent in your application not thinking there was gonna come much from it, but now…

Something warm washes through your chest, like your heart grew three sizes. Of course he asked, of course he made it happen. Looking out for you, always and at any time, from any distance.

“It’s not a done deal,” Elias warns, oblivious to your mental breakdown. “But he said he thinks they’ll like you and he’ll put in a good word for you.”

You squeal and throw yourself in his direction once again. Elias laughs as he catches you, fingers curling in your hair where your face is pressed against his chest.

“Thank you,” you mumble.

“It’s about time you get rid of that dumb job.” You can hear the frown in Elias’ voice. “They don’t take good care of you at all, it’s not good for you.” The distaste is obvious and it’s adorable. You pull away.

“I don’t need them to,” you say, carefully. You can still hear Brock’s words in your voice, and you figure it’s worth a try, probably. “Because you’re always there to take care of me.”

Elias’ cheeks darken substantially.

“I mean it when I say I don’t know what I’d do without you, Elias.”

“You’d be fine,” Elias waves away the compliment as you figured he would. But this time you’re not backing down.

“Maybe I would be. But I wouldn’t be as happy.”

They say when you really love a person, you’ve got to show them. But you’ve never really known how to do that, instead you always use your words to tell them. But it seems like Elias isn’t believing you, not even now.

And you’ve got to fix that.

It’s not until you’re in Elias’ car on the way back home that you bring it up again. The party wasn’t really the time and place, but the conversation with Brock and the guys has been nagging in the back of your mind since it happened.

If you didn’t realize Elias’ acts of service meant something, maybe he doesn’t realize your words of affirmation mean something. And even if it doesn’t mean he’s in love with you �� you’re really not that sure about that – you need him to at least know how much you appreciate him.

“You know I’m always there for you, right?” you start, carefully breaking the silence in the car. Elias shoots you a glance from behind the steering wheel.

“What?”

“Like, even if I’m maybe not as good as you are at realizing what you need me to do, if there’s ever anything I can do to help make your life a little easier or better I wanna do it. I’d do anything for you.”

It’s too honest, probably, and too much all at the same time. But Elias doesn’t look that surprised. In fact, there’s a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

“You make my life better by just being you, Y/N. You don’t have to do anything for me.”

Butterflies erupt in your stomach and you wonder how you’re gonna get through this conversation. But it’s one that needs to be held, so you press on.

“What is your love language, Elias?”

Now he frowns. “Have you been talking to Brock?”

Of course Brock talked to Elias before he talked to you. The traitor.

You decide to ignore that, for now. You’ll talk to Brock later.

“You know my love language is words of affirmation, right?”

Elias shrugs. “Brock did say that, but I didn’t know what you thought it was.”

“And yours is acts of service,” you hazard a guess. You keep your eyes firmly on Elias’ face, which is the only reason you catch the slight change in his expression.

Like a wall, crossing over his features. He’s trying to protect himself, although you have no idea why. Does he not get where you’re going with this?

“I can tune it down if you want me to,” he says, a little grumpily. He’s staring straight ahead at the road, stubbornly refusing to look your way.

And oh God, he’s truly not getting it, and this is going the exact opposite way you want it to go.

Troy did say that when people’s love languages don’t match, they don’t understand what the other is trying to say. But you honestly don’t know how you can make it any more clear to Elias.

Well, except…

“I love you,” you blurt out. “Like, in love with you love you.”

The words ring loudly in the quiet car. For a second, nothing about Elias’ expression, almost like he didn’t hear you. You can almost feel your heart sink into your stomach.

Then, he pulls over the car.

It comes to a stop at the side of the road, two wheels on the pavement and two still on the road. It is, objectively, not super safe, but it’s also 3am and there’s no other cars to be seen. Very carefully, without looking at you still, Elias turns on the hazard lights.

And then finally, finally, he turns to you and kisses you.

You weren’t expecting it but it doesn’t really matter: it’s like your heart and head both light on fire, and everything outside of the car simply disappears. It’s just you and Elias, and his lips on yours and his hands on your body.

It feels right. Like it was always meant to end up like this.

After what feels like ages, he pulls away. He’s smiling, and his eyes are bright blue in the dark car.

“I thought you said those kinda things to everyone,” he admits, quietly. His thumb is rubbing your side, his eyes fixed on that spot. Almost as if he can’t really believe he’s allowed to do that.

You don’t want him to ever do anything else.

“I thought you did those kinda things for everyone,” you shoot back.

Elias raises one eyebrow. “That bookcase weighed at least 300 pounds.”

You can’t help it: giggles are escaping your lips and suddenly you’re both laughing. The tension in the car dissipates instantly, and suddenly it’s just Elias again, your best friend.

Your best friend that you’re now allowed to kiss. So you lean in and press your lips against his again.

After all, kissing is a love language you think everyone understands.

(+2)

“I’m home!” Elias’ voice sounds through the empty apartment, and you immediately leave your spot behind the kitchen counter to run into the hallway.

With a squeal, you fly towards him, and he catches you easily as you knew he would.

“Hey, babe,” he laughs quietly, pressing a kiss into your hair before returning the hug fully. “Is that my sweater?”

“Maybe,” you admit, as Elias’ hands make their way under his own blue sweater, that you definitely steal from him most evenings. “Missed you. And I’m very proud of you.”

“I missed you too,” he answers. “Watched the game?”

“Obviously.” You roll your eyes, even though you know he can’t see it with your face still buried in his shoulder. “A hat trick, huh? I think that needs to be celebrated.”

“Oh?” Elias pulls away then, one eyebrow raised and a cheeky twinkle in his eyes.

“Not like that,” you scold him, lightly punching his arm. “Or, maybe like that. But first, I made Kalops.”

At the mention of his favorite Swedish food, Elias’ face lights up. A while ago, you asked his mom for her recipe and it’s one of the only Swedish dishes you can make, but you make it well.

“Also,” you continue, as you take his hand and start leading him towards the kitchen, so he can sit at the counter while you cook as he always does, “I called the electrician so the TV is already fixed. I know you could have done it, but I decided I’d much rather use that time to hang out with you. I took Puck to get his shots at the vet and I also used my free afternoon to take your car through the car wash.”

When you reach the kitchen, you twirl around towards Elias and his arms immediately circle around your waist.

“You didn’t have to do all that,” he mutters, taking the opportunity to kiss you once more. “But thank you. I love that you took the time to take care of that for me. And I love you.”

“Look at us,” you tease, lightly tugging at the ends of Elias’ hair. “Speaking each other’s love language like that.”

“Perfect couple,” Elias agrees, and you smile back at him.

Somehow, you and Elias managed to create a language of your own: one that you could speak with nobody else. But luckily, you don’t have to.

Cause he came home to your shared apartment like he always does, and well. That’s the biggest act of service he could do for you.  

[sunnypogue]

during the cup i decided i wanted to be a hockey fan because hyperfixations are fun especailly sports ones and so my friend who played for rutgers has been helping me learn a lot because i have never watched the sport before now. i have self declared as a canucks <3, flyers, and select few islanders players fan (yes i simp for barzy i tried not to at first and now his jersey is in my closet) and as much as i love watching my teams MY QUESTION is what teams do you think are best to watch clips of to try and learn more about the way the game is played and stuff?? like who has the best execution, playing style, ect?? im really trying to go in depth but i am so lost and dont know where to start lol help pls

hi! welcome to the club.

it’s hard to say - you really can’t go wrong with watching most hockey to learn more about the sport!

I think Erik Karlsson is one of the best defensemen to watch for effective zone entries during a power play. Elias Petterson is pretty much elite at everything, so his clips are great too.

Biased, but Auston Matthews has one of the best shots in the game. Watch the Dec 2019 Leafs/Canes game for some insanity.

Kucherov-Stamkos is elite, too, when healthy.

2010-2015 Kane-Toews, Keith-Seabrook + Crawford were pretty untouchable.

Connor McDavid really is as good as people say he is. His speed and puck handling ability is just unreal. Watch him go end to end & score - jaw dropping.

Team Canada and Team North America from respective Olympics and WCOH have some pretty bomb clips on elite hockey.

Hope this helps a little!

[kikiskeysgame]

While last night's game ended in a loss for the Blackhawks, it was a pretty exciting game to watch with both teams active on the ice through three whole periods.

In the first period, J.T. Miller got the Vancouver Canucks on the scoreboard first, but the Blackhawks responded by tying up the game with Connor Murphy scoring his 4th goal of the season (with assists by Dominik Kubalik & Jonathan Toews).

During the second period, things started getting crazy between the Blackhawks and the Canucks. Tanner Pearson broke the tie game and then David Kampf tied the game back up.

Patrick Kane & Jonathan Toews gave the Hawks a four-goal lead, but Quinn Hughes & Elias Petterson were able to tie the game back up again. (There was so much going on during the period, it made my head spin).

In the third period, the Canucks regained the lead with a goal by Bo Horvat, but Patrick Kane scored his second goal of the night to tie the game up again. As the period was winding down, Adam Gaudette broke the tie & Bo Horvat sealed the Canucks' victory with an empty-net goal.

Despite the loss, I liked how very active the Blackhawks were during the game (especially Patrick Kane, Dominik Kubalik & Jonathan Toews), but I am not happy with how they allowed the Canucks to take away their lead goal.

As I mentioned many times before in my past keys to the game, when the Blackhawks have the lead goal, they need to maintain it, not lose it because if they're not careful, the other team could take it away from them (which is exactly what happened last night).

In my opinion, it was a pretty tough game for Robin Lehner; not only did he allow six goals against him, but he sustained a hard shot to the neck from the puck and then one of the Canucks' players awkwardly fell onto his knee. I'm surprised he was able to finish the game in one piece after everything he went through tonight.

Even though the road trip didn't end on a good note, I thought that the Blackhawks played quite well and two points out of three games isn't so bad. Just because the Hawks didn't win, it doesn't mean it's the end of the world. There are things that they did well on the road trip and things that need some improvement.

After Thursday's game, the Blackhawks' next four games will be on home ice, starting on Sunday night against the Winnipeg Jets. I hope that the Hawks can use that two-day break to rest up, re-focus and be ready for their next game.

Until then, go Blackhawks!

[andrewuttaro]

New Look Sabres: GM 66 - EDM - Numbers

Perhaps this game represents the Sabres season; at least from a standings point of view this game last night was what being a Sabres fan has felt like this season. Favorable numbers toward the start followed by an ugly decline that turns the math against you. The simplest stat in hockey is goals. In this game last night Buffalo had more of those up until the dying minutes of the second period. It ended 4-3 Edmonton. I went into this game giving some good thought to the Phil Housley criticism. I thought: You know what, this guy is in his first NHL coaching job and in spite of it being his job, you could say he still is wrapping his head around what he’s got. I was feeling very generous having those thoughts and if the game didn’t kill the good will I was trying to foster for Housley then his postgame comments did. He said his team played 55 minutes of great hockey. The other 5 were bad minutes. That would be a nice piece of analysis with a team that consistently plays well and beats the teams they should. This team does not, and that comment is stupid. The numbers that do not represent time are against those comments. Jack Eichel scored two goals in a loss. Linus Ullmark was hung out to dry as his defense let up the greater number of high danger shots. The Oilers outplayed the Sabres in every statistical category except the powerplay and shots on goal. You had me fooled, Phil! I was sitting happy halfway through this game looking at the next four to five games being winnable! Boy, am I fool! The numbers are clear. After having an 83% chance of making the playoffs at the start of December, the Sabres are now nine points out at the start of March having gone 34 games without back to back wins! The 2014-2015 Tank team that was designed to lose and drove me to watch the Rangers most of that season, that team only got as bad as 31 games in that category. This ain’t it, Phil. I don’t know who I want to replace him in any intelligent way but when he’s back behind the bench for the home opener in October I am will not be a happy camper about it. This game was the microcosm of this season and oh so appropriately that microcosm ends in a loss.

The game starts off with an unlucky shorthanded goal against when Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl teamed up for the latter’s 41st goal of the season. Edmonton maybe wasting Connor McDavid and will likely miss the playoffs this season but there are guys tearing it up there in spite of it all. I hate that Buffalo and Edmonton are still comparable in this way because on the very same powerplay Jack Eichel revives the home crowd with a tight net-front goal to draw the score even again at 1. If there is one big positive for the Sabres in this game it was a full display of Jack Eichel’s leadership. The rest of this first period is a vision of what we thought the Sabres would be in 2019 in 2015. Jack Eichel helping Montour get a great chance. Okposo getting a great chance. Sheary knocking at the door. Jeff Skinner was chopping at that net like a lumberjack because he wants to get Rocket Rickard trophy votes. Casey Mittelstadt broke through Mikko Koskinen with a point-blank blast at 13:19 into the first period. The primary assist on that was Scott Wilson who, only now gets his first NHL point of the season having missed the majority of it with a gruesome ankle injury sustained way back in Training Camp. The fun only continued when Jack Eichel made it 3-1 unassisted in a no-look smacker that earned his team a standing applause as they went to the locker room for the first intermission! The likes of Jeff Skinner, Rasmus Ristolainen and Evan Rodrigues all shined bright with beautiful chances in the second period too. While the pushback came in the second that lead remained into the second half of the middle frame and I began to foolishly let myself hope looking at the schedule. Oh what a fool I am.

Less than four minutes left in the second period the whole Sabres defense was caught puck watching when Zack Kassian got a McDavid assist on a one-timer snipe that made Ullmark look confused. It’s now 3-2 Oilers and the floodgates are opened. A puck squirted out of a battle on the wall to Darnell Nurse who wired it home for the equalizer. Credit where credit is due, Jeff Skinner starts taking shots from Ovi spots to try and get the lead back, but the Oiler kept pushing. Give me an intermission, PLEASE! The horn to end the period did not come soon enough and with a mere five seconds left in the second period Adam Larsson takes a shot on net from way out that trickles in past Ullmark. Evidently Kyle Brodziak tipped it in, and I have not seen Ullmark angrier than after that goal. Some folks I heard wanted a challenge for a kicking motion by Brodziak but gee, I just don’t have the energy to litigate shit like that when the Sabres are this bad. Boos came down and Carter Hutton replaced Ullmark in net for the third. A one goal deficit never looked so demoralizing for a team and the Sabres never looked like they were going to come back. Sure, like many times this season its been encouraging to just see the Sabres have legitimate rushes in on net; hell, Brandon Montour is worth the price just for his ability to pass the puck to the offense if nothing else. In spite of Jeff Skinner not getting the puck across the line behind the Edmonton netminder and Jason Pominville blocking his own tap in (?) the threat of a Sabres equalizer just never seemed real. It ended 4-3 Oil.

I legitimately had a moment last night where I sat down to write this reaction and for the first time this season doing that I just couldn’t. My wife and I were having a good night and I just said no for my own mental health. With 16 games left in this season the Sabres need to go 14-2 to legitimately have a chance to make the playoffs. Pardon my French: What the Fuck? I had to talk myself out of buying a Skinner jersey that probably wouldn’t fit me at this time in December we were all so into this team. They were gold at that point, the best team we’d seen since before the Harbor Center was built! Now I would rather watch MLS Review videos and blog about a soccer team that isn’t even playing this calendar year than watch this team take on clubs they should be beating by multiple goals! WHAT THE FUCK! So, let’s turn away from the frustrating team stats for the far less frustrating individual stats.  Jeff Skinner sits at 36 goals 9 back of goal leader Alex Ovechkin. He probably doesn’t have the most goals by the end of this season but if he can get north of 40 and push near 50 in these last several games its going to do a lot for how we feel going into next season when he’s inevitable signs. He should get some MVP votes. Jack Eichel sits at 25 goals. He needs to reach 30. I say that because this season has been such an encouraging step forward for him that hitting the 30-goal mark needs to happen as a bookmark if nothing else. Casey Mittelstadt just hit 10 goals and sits at 21 points with his 11 assists. He’s probably not quite the Calder Trophy contender we thought he could be but that’s ok because he’ll be a great C2 real soon. His fellow rookie Rasmus Dahlin on the other hand should get the majority of the Calder Trophy votes in my bias opinion. Dahlin has more points than all but one rookie forward has. The lone guy ahead of him in that category, Elias Petterson, has cooled off a fair bit from the first part of the season in which he was destroying worlds with his goals. What Dahlin has done puts him in an elite company among rookie D-Men in this league already and that’s more special than anything Petterson has done. Rasmus Dahlin for Calder!

I hate pushing hard for individual awards because it feels so dirty against not making the playoffs. Then again, I still feel cheated that Artemi Panarin came in out of nowhere and stole it from Jack Eichel in 2016. Those however are the things I’ll cheer for to avoid the crushing gloom of what a missed opportunity season this has become. That and I eagerly await exit interviews to see how Jason Botterill and Phil Housley envision next season. There is an outside chance that changes Botts’ opinion of Housley prompting a coaching change, but the more likely and interesting outcome is the two of them hammering out a plan of Playoffs or bust. Their comments have grown a little bit conflicting in these late phases of the season in spite of that vote of confidence a couple weeks back. All this and the Amerks will go on a run. How many times have I mentioned that? Not enough, one more time: the Rochester Americans are going to probably win the division and make a deep playoff run. Like, comment and share this blog with your friends. The end of this Sabres season, for how disappointing the lack of a playoff berth will be, will be very interesting in terms of Front Office Palace intrigue. There will be a new Will for the playoffs in 2020 at that point and how this organization fixes to get there will be fun to watch. For now, we eagerly anticipate Jeff boy. Come on, Skin man, sign on the line!

Thanks for reading.

P.S. Columbus is my favorite non-Sabres Eastern Conference team to watch going into these last 15 games. They pushed all the chips in on a run this post-season and its not even for sure they make the playoffs right now.

[highbuttonsports]

Oilers Start the Season 3-0

.OCT 13; EDM 4, VAN 3

The NHL welcomed fans back into Canadian arenas at full capacity for the first time in 561 days on Wednesday night. It felt like arenas in Canada were once again filled with life after what seemed like an eternity of lifeless emptiness, blue tarps, sponsored ads, and fake crowd noise.

But the noise in Rogers Place was very real on Wednesday night as the Oilers faced the Canucks in game one.

The crowd roared in a collective sea of orange, starving for hockey as two of the brightest shining stars in the sport, Connor McDavid and Elias Petterson lined up for the opening faceoff.

Both teams played fast and loose, and Jesse Puljujarvi was soon able to find open space in front of the Canucks net, giving the Oilers a 1-0 lead going into the first intermission.

The Oilers would go on to capture a 2-0 lead after a power-play goal by Zach Hyman late in the second period, but would later surrender the lead in the third period after goals by Oliver Ekman-Larsson and Quinn Hughes to force overtime and a shootout.

Kyle Turris clutched the shootout with a quick shot through the five-hole of Thatcher Demko, giving the Oilers their first win of the regular season.

Takeaways from game 1

The Oilers played well overall, although they were outshot 38-34, they were able to capitalize on the power-play and generate offense with effective zone entries and net front traffic.

Zach Hyman was easily one of the most noticeable players on the ice with a goal on the Oilers' deadly first power-play unit. He was most noticeable not only for doing what he was most known for in Toronto, digging pucks out of corners and fighting for space around the net, but also for leading the rush.

Head Coach Dave Tippet has been thoroughly impressed with Hyman’s performance so far; “He delivers. He’s one of those guys you send him over the boards you know what you’re gonna get.”

Although fans found it questionable putting Zach Hyman on the second line rather than having him on McDavids wing, the second line of Hyman-Nugent-Hopkins-Yammamoto was dominant against Vancouver, combining for 10 shots-on-goal, 3 hits and 3 blocks at even strength.

“That line was excellent. As a five on five group they were great... They work. They have skill, they use their skill with work, and when you do that you can find some success”

Coach Tippet also commented on the 7 penalties taken by the Oilers this game.

“We’ll look at a few things, there’s some things we can clean up… With all the penalties we took, we took some guys out of the game. That fourth line’s been pretty good for us… they didn't get a lot of minutes because the timing of the penalties seemed to disrupt the rhythm of it.”

Although Tippet was obviously dissatisfied with the amount of penalties taken, he also seemed quite optimistic about the direction the Oilers are headed after their first win of the season.

“It's one game, well take the points and there's stuff we can do a lot better and there’s stuff we can build on.”

OCT 16; EDM 5, CGY 2

The long-time rivals did not disappoint in the highly anticipated first battle of Alberta of the season. It was a riveting game, featuring 8 goals, 22 penalty minutes, and multiple cases of post-whistle scrums in front of either net.

Mike Smith played an amazing game stopping 45 of 47 shots for Edmonton.

Once again the Oilers had a great night offensively, but struggled to stay out of the penalty box. Kailer Yammamoto in particular took two minor penalties against the Flames, one of which resulted in a goal.

“We’re using him as a penalty killer so he shouldn't be taking penalties.” Said Dave Tippet postgame regarding Yammamoto.”He has to play the same aggressive style, but he can't be taking a lot of minors.”

Tippet has repeated his concerns about the amount of penalties taken by the Oilers so far this season, as they have committed 13 minor penalties in their first two games.

“There’s some that didn't have to be taken...you have to recognize you can't take penalties like that. The penalties are a byproduct of some of things we’re doing… it's too many, I’d like to take less for sure.”

Takeaways from Game 2

Things were mostly positive from an Oilers perspective in this game. Puljujarvi has remained consistent, with 4 points in just two games, Connor McDavid had a hat trick, and Leon Draisaitl recorded three assists.

From an offensive standpoint the Oilers are on fire, but the contrast to that would be the defense. The Oilers gave up 47 shots and took 7 minor penalties against the flames. Something the team clearly has to work on moving forward.

The offense has been terrific, the goaltending from Mike Smith has been more than solid through 2 games, but the defense seems to be giving up a lot of high-danger scoring chances, and the penalty kill has been getting a major workout.

OCT 19; EDM 6, ANA 5

The Edmonton Oilers defeated the Anaheim Ducks to secure the top spot in the Pacific division in a thrilling, high scoring contest.

The Oilers gave up a bad goal on an odd man rush within the first 6 minutes from Kevin Shattenkirk, but Zack Kassian answered for the Oilers less than 4 minutes later, and Connor McDavid was able to quickly follow that up with a magnificent end-to-end dash that would result in a goal, giving the Oilers a two-one lead before the Ducks were able to tie it once again at 2.

Leon Draisitl however, continued his Duck hunt, ripping a beautiful one-timer past Alex Stalock on the power-play with 31 seconds to go in the period, giving the Oilers a 3-2 lead heading into the first intermission.

After surrendering two unanswered goals in the second, the Oilers came roaring back to retake the lead in the third period, eventually finishing off the Ducks 6-5.

Of course winning any game by a score of 6-5 is a great way to show your offensive firepower, but the Oilers top two defensive pairings had by far their worst game of the season. The Keith- Ceci pairing was a -2 and did a horrendous job at pressuring the rush on both goals.

However, the third pairing of Keokkoek-Bouchard was excellent. Bouchard logged 19 minutes of ice time and blocked seven shots while also scoring a goal and an assist to finish the night with a +2 rating.

He was also able to get the attention of his head coach who had this to say regarding Bouchard postgame.

“He’s a solid player, a smart player, reads situations well, usually executes pretty well. Calm with the puck and engaged in the physical battles. The biggest part of his maturity in his game is he’s not running anybody over. He's just using his body well and using his body position to box people out, to hold pucks and things like that. He’s a good player.”

Lastly, Dave Tippet will be pleased to know that the Oilers only took two minor penalties this game, something he has worked at reducing since the first game of the season.

TAKEAWAYS FROM GAME 3.

With this win over the Ducks, The Oilers have gone 3-0 to start the season and have taken the top spot in the Pacific division. Their star players are contributing as expected, with Connor McDavid currently sitting at 4 goals and 4 assists for 8 points in just three games, putting him on pace for an unbeleviable 218 point season which would surpass Wayne Gretzky’s single season points record of 215 in ‘85-86 should he remain consistent.

Although they sit atop the Pacific division and are currently locked in a 5-way tie with the Panthers, Wild, Sabres, and Penguins for first place in the league, Dave Tippet has said repeatedly, there are a lot of things that still need to be cleaned up in order for them to remain consistent throughout the regular season and into the playoffs.

While it is trending in the right direction, the amount of penalties being taken needs to be reduced. The Oilers have taken 15 minor penalties over their first three games and have already surrendered 2 power-play goals against.

Say what you will about playing a physical game, but the more ice-time the penalty killing unit gets, the less ice time the star players are given.

Can the Oilers keep the streak alive? Will they soon sit alone atop the NHL? Can coach Tippet reduce his teams penalty minutes? Will Connor McDavid challenge for another scoring title, and possibly even the all-time single season points record?

Come back next week for all the Oilers news and updates.

-Dave

[himbeaux-on-ice]

saw a clip yesterday where an Avs player trying to block a shot from Elias Petterson got hit in the back of the head with the puck (honest accident, he slipped as he was kneeling to block), and went down on his hands and knees and stayed down but the refs let the play keep going bc I dunno, they don’t have eyes or whatever. but even though play was still going and he could easily have taken a new chance to score, Petterson immediately like stopped next to the Avs player and started pointing and trying to get the ref’s attention and continued to hover by him and keep looking at the guy and trying to keep play away from him for the entire rest of the time until play finally stopped. it would have been completely legal for Petterson to just stay game-focused and keep playing until the whistle, but this kid who is one of his team’s best shots just absolutely stopped keying in to the game and fully focused on worrying about an injured opponent instead. and as I watched this clip I like felt him go from “Canucks player Elia Petterson” to “Petey” within my mind right then and there

[graphersdelight-blog]

Kole Lind

Autographed Upper Deck CHL hockey card signed via TTM by Kole Lind of the Team Orr

Kole Lind not only a former top CHL prospect, he’s one of the top prospects in the Vancouver Canucks’ organization.  With Elias Petterson jumping straight into the NHL and Adam Gaudette waiting in the wings, Kole Lind still might have a couple years of pro hockey before he gets his shot at the big leagues.  With…

[goarticletec-blog]

Laine's hat trick lifts Jets past Canucks

New Post has been published on https://www.articletec.com/laines-hat-trick-lifts-jets-past-canucks/

Laine's hat trick lifts Jets past Canucks

Patrik Laine’s hat trick lead the Winnipeg Jets to a 6-3 win over the Vancouver Canucks on Monday.

The Finnish right winger put the puck into an empty net with less than two minutes to go seal the game.

Bryan Little, Mark Scheifele, Kyle Connor also scored for Winnipeg (12-5-2).

Elias Pettersson, Tyler Motte and Nikolay Goldobin put up goals for Vancouver (10-11-2).

Watch Pettersson score his rookie-leading 12th goal 

Vancouver centre Elias Pettersson ties the game 1-1 during the 1st period. 0:27

Connor Hellebuyck stopped 22-of-25 shots for the Jets and Jacob Markstrom made 43 saves for the Canucks.

The Jets’ 49 shots on goal were the most Vancouver has allowed in a single game all season and extends the Canucks’ losing streak to six games.

Winnipeg opened the scoring just over a minute in after Markstrom tried to clear the puck along the boards. Little collected the puck at the point and hammered it in as the Vancouver goalie slid back into his net.

The Canucks responded with a power-play goal after Dustin Byfuglien was called for slashing.

Goldobin got a behind-the-back pass off to defenceman Ben Hutton, who sliced the puck to Pettersson. The Canucks rookie fired a rocket past Hellebuyck, tying the game.

Petterson now has 19 goals in his first 17 NHL games.

Markstrom faced a barrage of 23 shots in the opening period, including a hard wrister from Nikolaj Ehlers that went off his blocker.

The rebound popped out to the side and Scheifele poked it in to make it 2-1 for the Jets.

Winnipeg added another first-period goal when Connor popped in a top-shelf shot on the power play.

The left-winger is riding a five-game point streak where he’s notched four goals and three assists.

Laine takes advantage

Midway through the second period, Pettersson and Hutton collided while trying to clear the puck from in front of the Vancouver net.

Laine took advantage of the opportunity, collecting the puck and getting off a quick wristshot that sailed past Markstrom to make it 4-1 for the Jets.

Motte clawed one back for the Canucks, scoring his second goal of the year on a short-handed breakaway.

It was Goldobin who brought Vancouver within one. The right-winger slid the puck across the crease, forcing Hellebuyck to sprawl, then tucked it into the net behind the netminder’s skate.

Laine registered two goals in the third frame for the sixth three-goal game of his career.

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[thrashermaxey]

Wild West: Pettersson Returns, O’Reilly on Fire, and James Neal

Welcome to another week of the Wild West column. During the last week we have had goalie injuries, superstars returning, and some incredible goals from human highlight reel Connor McDavid. Let’s assume you know all of that and jump right in to some players.

  Potential Streaming Pickups:

No teams in the west play four times during the upcoming week, which is usually a benefit when streaming a player. Obviously the idea being that if you are looking to add a guy that might produce at a lower point per game pace than the ones you drafted, getting that extra game can certainly help make up for it. This week then, by necessity we are featuring some high risk/high reward candidates.

  Over in Winnipeg Bryan Little has been showing some strong shooting with 17 shots over his last fives games, though it has not translated into goals or assists. He has been suiting up with Kyle Connor and Mathieu Perreault, which is certainly a downgrade from Patrik Laine, but his high shot counts and time with the second power play unit could provide a mid-week boost with two games back to back on Thursday-Friday.

  Elias Petterson’s first few weeks were the stuff of, “I-want-the-guy-who-is-playing-with-Pettersson” good. Enter Nikolay Goldobin. With Pettersson injured Goldobin’s production when to zero in a hurry, but good news, Petterson is back. Also on their line on Saturday? Brock Boeser. There is definitely some points-by-osmosis potential here with three games early in the week.

  Last week’s recommendation:

So that great recommendation of Zach Parise from the first week didn’t translate as well to the second week. Kailer Yamamoto tore up the league with zero goals, one assist, one power play point, and three shots in four games (though this is written while his last game is still on progress). Dominik Kahun was slightly more brilliant with zero goals, two assists, one power play point, and five shots in four games.

  Line Combos:

  Don’t look now but something in St. Louis agrees with Ryan O’Reilly. There was a shake up in lines and it seems to be doing wonders for his scoring. Who would have thought that it would take moving Vladimir Tarasenko off his line to make it happen? The line doing the damage is O’Reilly, David Perron, and Zach Sanford. O’Reilly leads the pack with 10 points in his last five games, while Perron has seven in five, and Sanford five in three. Likely the points will slow, but it has allowed the killer trio from 2017-18 Tarasenko, Brayden Schenn, and Jaden Schwartz to be reunited, which will hopefully pay some dividends for the Blues.

  Drop or Not:

  James Neal: If you grabbed the Dobber Guide this fall you already know that I recommended Elias Lindholm over James Neal in Calgary. So far that is looking good, though there is a lot of season left to play. Neal has two goals, one assists and 26 shots over his 11 games so far, and only one point in his last seven.

  At 31 I was worried about him going into the season. Well, not really worried as I wasn’t planning on drafting him. His time on ice and shot generation numbers have been slipping for several years and he is now down to almost 15 minutes of ice time and under 2.5 shots per game for the first time in his career. On the plus side he is still getting some power play time, but unfortunately that power play time has not been helping him as he still has a no power play points on the season.

  The long and the short of it is I don’t own, nor am I planning on owning Neal in pretty much any format. He likely will improve on the 22 point pace he is currently on, so if a 40ish point, 15-20 goal player is valuable in your league sure hang tight, otherwise feel free to cut bait. 

  Thanks for reading.

  from All About Sports https://dobberhockey.com/hockey-home/the-wild-west/wild-west-pettersson-returns-oreilly-on-fire-and-james-neal/

[usatrendingsports]

Canada dominates Denmark to lock up prime group seed at World Juniors

Brett Howden celebrates his objective that gave Canada a 2-Zero lead over Denmark. Getty Photographs

Canada can have a prime seed when the medal spherical of the World Junior Championship kicks off subsequent week in Buffalo.

The Canadians locked up the highest spot of their Group A desk on Saturday evening due to a dominant Eight-Zero victory over Denmark. With that prime spot comes favorable seeding (and a possible first-round matchup with Switzerland) when the playoff spherical kicks off on Tuesday.

The bounce-back win comes simply in the future after Canada’s gorgeous shootout loss to the USA open air at New Period Subject. Regardless of the disappointing loss, the Canadians knew they have been nonetheless within the Group A driver’s seat with a cupcake matchup in opposition to the Danes to shut out the preliminary spherical. All they wanted to do was take of enterprise on Saturday, and deal with enterprise they did. 

As anticipated, it wasn’t a lot of a contest, as Canada managed many of the recreation and outshot Denmark 44-18 within the victory. Seven goal-scorers carried the load whereas Carter Hart made his second straight begin in internet, recording his first clear sheet of the event. 

Canada finishes the preliminary spherical Three-Zero-1 and can get to catch their breath and relaxation up drained legs for just a few days till the playoff spherical begins. The remainder of the preliminary spherical will shut out on Sunday.

Which NHL prospects got here up large on Saturday?

Vancouver Canucks prospect Elias Pettersson had a three-point day — together with one hell of a highlight-reel objective — in opposition to Switzerland on Saturday afternoon. The 19-year-old has nice velocity, arms and creativity with the puck on his stick, which is an enormous cause he went fifth general within the 2017 draft. Petterson confirmed off that agility and elusiveness when he utterly froze a Swiss defender on a rush, then tucked the puck previous the netminder for the excellent objective.

It appears like Pettersson has had a jaw-dropping spotlight in each one in all Sweden’s prelim video games, however that is actually his finest to this point. 

Boston Bruins prospect Joona Koppanen (fifth-round choice in 2016) had a strong day for Finland and earned Participant of the Sport honors following their victory over Slovakia. This was one in all his higher sequences; he did an ideal job pressuring on the forecheck to win possession, then organising in entrance of the web to get on the scorebaord.

Calgary Flames prospect Adam Ruzicka got here up large on Saturday as effectively…sadly, it was for the opposing workforce. The Slovakian heart received a draw cleanly within the third interval and by chance despatched it straight into his personal internet. That personal objective doubled Finland’s lead and was a reasonably demoralizing blow for the Slovaks. 

Cale Makar of Canada had a second consecutive recreation with an influence play objective, and it got here on this good sequence in opposition to Denmark. Makar, a Colorado Avalanche prospect, confirmed nice composure through the use of a flip go to the purpose to flee strain within the nook, then acquired the following go and located the again of the web with an ideal shot. Makar’s capability to maneuver the puck, execute good performs and create offensive possibilities is an enormous cause why he went fourth general to the Avs in 2017. 

4 gamers from Staff Canada acquired their first objective of the event on Saturday evening — Robert Thomas (St. Louis Blues), Michael McLeod (New Jersey Devils), Alex Formenton (Ottawa Senators) and Brett Howden (Tampa Bay Lightning). Howden had two objectives and earned Participant of the Sport honors for Canada of their victory. 

What else occurred within the preliminary spherical?

Czech Republic held off Belarus for a 6-5 win

Sweden acquired 4 straight objectives within the third interval and beat Switzerland, 7-2

Finland acquired 5 objectives from 5 totally different gamers to beat Slovakia, 5-2

What occurs subsequent within the World Juniors?

Although Canada has formally locked up the highest seed in Group A, the USA nonetheless has an enormous matchup in opposition to Finland on Sunday. The winner of that recreation will safe the second-place seed in Group A’s desk. Russia and Czech Republic will likely be even be combating for seeding in Group B on Sunday. The second-place seeds will find yourself going through the opposing group’s third-place seeds.

The 2018 World Juniors preliminary spherical concludes on Dec. 31 to set the stage for relegation in January, which precedes the medal spherical playoffs. This is a whole rundown of the ultimate prelim video games on Sunday.

Sunday, Dec. 31

Czech Republic vs. Switzerland, 12 p.m. (NHL Community, TSN 1/Three)

Finland vs. United States, four p.m. (NHL Community, TSN 1/Three)

Denmark vs. Slovakia, 6 p.m. (TSN2)

Sweden vs. Russia, Eight p.m. (NHL Community, TSN 1/Three)

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from Usa Trending Sports – NFL | NCAA | NBA | MLB | NASCAR | UFC | WWE http://ift.tt/2DDRxe5

[puckinghell]

Why (Won’t You Love Me) | Elias Pettersson

Summary: Time and time again, Elias watches you get your heart broken by guys who aren’t worth your effort, and he just can’t help but wonder why you can’t love him instead.  Words: 3,5k Note: Based on the 5sos song with the same name. 

--

There’s a glow on the pavement, fresh from the rain. Dark clouds are still packed together in the sky when they arrive at the plane, but the rain is mere drizzle now, and Elias doesn’t bother with an umbrella as he hauls his bag over his shoulder.

Brock, of course, has the hood of his jumper pulled tight around his face, and he looks absolutely miserable. Normally Elias would tease him – probably something about his hair – but today he’s not in the mood.

He’s pretty miserable himself.

“Petey, hey.” Brock runs to catch up to him, as they approach the plane. Elias should’ve known Brock would notice: his best friend always seems to know when he shouldn’t be alone. “What’s up, dude?”

Elias huffs out an indignant sound that’s not resembling any English words, and not really any Swedish ones, either. He pulls his eyebrows together in a frown and makes a frustration motion with his hand.

“Y/N…” he says, your name falling off his lips a little rough. “She’s having guy trouble.”

“Ah,” Brock says, like he understands. He probably does.

It’s not the first time Elias is in a mood because of your ‘guy trouble’.

Now it’s not really fair to you, he knows that. You’re not actually aware of the fact that you’re hurting him, by talking about other guys, so he can’t hold it against you.

It’s just…

“Why won’t she love me?” he finally says, as they stand in front of the stairs to the plane, waiting for the others to go in first.

There’s no use pretending, not with Brock. Brock knows him better than anyone and he knows how far gone for you Elias is, how much it hurts that you don’t feel the same way. 

Brock shrugs. “She loves you,” he says, but he doesn’t sound quite so sure.

“Not like that.” Elias can’t help sounding a little mopey, and Brock slaps his hard across the back to show his support, in the way that bros do, sometimes.

“Sorry, man,” he says, and he sounds genuinely remorseful.

Elias met you right after he arrived in Vancouver, and he knows it’s cliché to say, but he immediately knew that you were it for him. You made him laugh with some snarky remark at a rude customer in the coffee shop, and that was it. He was sold.

It’s not become anything but friendship, though. And sure, it’s a friendship Elias holds dear to his heart, but he’s not afraid to admit he’s always wanted it to be more. It’s just, he’s never been able to find the words to tell you that.

In the beginning, he blamed his lack of English, but now he knows it’s just you.

You render him speechless. When you look at him with bright eyes, when you say his name. And whenever he thinks about telling you, and thinks about the look of pity on your face and how you would say “Elias…” like you’re the bearer of bad news, he feels like his throat has swollen to the point where talking is impossible.

So he says nothing. But he hates himself for it, every time you sit on his couch and tell him about your failed dating endeavours.  

He sits down and takes his phone, to put it on airplane mode. Brock is humming under his breath next to him, and it’s distracting enough that he nearly misses the text notification.

Nearly, but not quite.

Sorry for crying on your shoulder again the text reads.

Elias thinks back to last night, when you’d showed up at his apartment, nearly in tears because the guy you’d gone on a few dates with had cancelled your date and said he’d rather be friends.

“When they say that, they never actually wanna be friends, Petey,” you’d sighed, your bottom lip trembling.

And he’d pulled you inside, parked you on the couch and made you tea, and then you’d watched MasterChef together, your body curled into his, until you weren’t so sad anymore.

He always tried everything to stop you from being sad, and he usually succeeded, too. Taking care of you is one of the things he’s best at, in his opinion. 

“I guess finding a decent guy to love around here is just too much to ask,” you’d said, after at least an hour of comfortable silence. “Well, at least I’ve got you, right?”

And Elias had to bite his lip so hard he can still feel where it’s sore, only to stop himself from asking:

Why won’t you love me, instead?

He stares at your text now. Behind it, his background is still visible: a picture of him and you, that he likes to look at when the road is a little too lonely.

“You gotta turn it off, Pete,” Brock says, and that’s when Elias notices the plane is already about to take off.

He quickly texts back “No worries” and switches his phone to airplane mode. The glass of the little round window is cold against his cheek when he leans against it.

It’s gonna be a long road trip.

--

The bar isn’t busy, but there’s a constant hum of chatter around you, and you try to use that to quiet your mind.

It doesn’t really work.

You’re a few drinks in, and there’s tears burning behind your eyes.

Normally, you would’ve called Elias. But now you don’t feel like you should, anymore.

Elias has been different, since he got back from what felt like the longest road trip in history. He’s been dodging your calls, not texting as much, and you have only seen him once since he got back a week ago, which is not normal for you two.

If you knew why he’s been avoiding you, you could fix it.

But you have no idea.

“Excuse me, can I borrow this chair?” a voice asks. A girl has her hand on the empty chair opposite you, and she smiles at you when you look up.

You open your mouth: something inside of you says no, but you know that’s ridiculous. This is a table for one, tonight.

“Sure.”

It’s not like that guy is gonna show up three hours after he was supposed to.

It’s not your supposed-to-be-date, that you’re thinking about though. Maybe you should be sad about him, because he just stood you up, but instead you’re thinking back to the last time you saw Elias, when he’d just come back. They had won two out of three road games, so he’d been in a good mood, and when you went to his house for pizza and Netflix he’d been chatty and filled with laughter all evening.

His good mood dimmed, when you mentioned you had a date planned.

“Do you know this guy?” he’d asked, and there was a hint of judgement in his voice that instantly got you defensive.

“No, my friend set us up,” you said. “But it’s not like I have a choice, Elias. Time is slipping away from me, and I can’t just sit here and wait for the love of my life to show up while everyone is getting married. It’s no fun being lonely.”

“No,” Elias had said, a strange look on his face. “It’s not fun.”

You would’ve asked him what he meant by that – surely he wasn’t lonely, being Elias Pettersson in Vancouver – but there was something about him that stopped you.

For the first time since you met him, it felt like there was a wall up between you, and it felt like for every stone the wall was made off there was a matching stone in the pit of your stomach.

It felt like you did something wrong, but you can’t put your finger on what. You hadn’t lied to him, although it hadn’t quite been the full truth either. You can’t tell him the full truth, because the full truth is too pathetic.

The full truth, of course, being that when your other best friend Liza got engaged, you realized that everyone had someone, except for you. You just had Elias, and that has always been enough: until you sat there staring at the giant diamond on Liza’s finger and realized that Elias was never going to feel that way about you.

He’s your best friend, and although you’d want him to be everything, if he was interested in more, he would’ve done something by now. And so you decided you had to stop waiting for someone who would never love you like that, and find someone who would. 

You haven’t found that person, yet, and you haven’t gotten over Elias either. 

You look at your phone now. It’s 2am, and you probably shouldn’t call him, but…

But it’s Elias. He’s your best friend and you know he cares for you, even if he is mad about something.

You just got stood up, and it’s late, and you’ve had a bit too much to drink, and you don’t really want to have to walk yourself home…

“You can always call me if you need anything,” Elias said all the time. “Even in the middle of the night.”

So you call him.

There’s no answer. There’s no answer the next time, or the next, either. 

You throw some money on the table. It’s time to take yourself home: after all, you’ve always been able to take care of yourself. There’s no reason for this burning feeling behind your eyes. 

He’s just a friend.

The next morning, there’s two texts waiting for you when you wake up.

3 missed calls? Everything OK?

Sorry I missed them. Have to go to practice now, talk later.

There’s no smileys, no familiar XO’s that Elias has been using since Brock forced him to watch Gossip Girl, no love you at the end.

So that’s how you know something is really wrong.

--

Creating some distance between you is harder than Elias had thought.

“She hates me,” he grumbles. It’s probably not the right time to do this, in the middle of practice, but he’s been distracted and since this is all Brock’s fault, he figures he should just say that.

“She doesn’t,” Brock says. “Also, how is this my fault?”

Elias leans on his stick. They’re both waiting until it’s their turn to do the drill. Jake skates past, shoots on Marky. Scores.

“You said I needed some distance. You said to put my phone on airplane mode every now and then. Last night she called me three times and I didn’t answer, and now she hates me.”

Brock rolls his eyes, ever so slightly: but enough for Elias to see, and he glares at his best friend.

He feels a little vindicated when Brock flushes red and shuffles a little away from Elias.

“Look, bud, I said that because you’ve been miserable.” Brock’s face is gentle. “But since this is clearly not working, have you thought about just talking to her?”

He has thought about that. A lot.

“Absolutely not,” Elias says. “She’s not interested in me, she’s made that clear by dating half of Vancouver.”

Brock laughs. “I didn’t know Vancouver had 6 people living in it.”

“Shut up.” But there’s no heat behind it, and Brock shuffles closer again.

“Petey.” He sounds remorseful. “You haven’t scored even once today. And Marky’s not even trying. You need to fix this.”

At that moment, his name gets called, so Elias shoves Brock aside and skates up to the puck, taking it with him towards the goal.

He shoots wide.

Fuck. Maybe he does have to do something about this.

Elias may have decided he needs to talk to you, but he sure as hell doesn’t have to do it right now. He’s allowed to go home and get changed first, because he’s not going to confess his love and get his heart broken while wearing a Canucks tracksuit.

Unfortunately, it ends up not really being his choice, because when he walks into the hallway of his apartment you’re sitting on the floor, leaning against his front door.

Elias stops dead at the end of the hallway.

You’re doing something on your phone, not noticing him right away. You look tired, and your hair is a mess, and it squeezes something in Elias’ heart.

You look… kinda like shit, and whereas Elias knows he probably doesn’t look much better himself, it’s worse when it’s you.

Suddenly, guilt washes over him like a tidal wave. You needed him last night, and he wasn’t there for you. It was 2 am when you called him: you could’ve been anywhere, anything could’ve happened, you could’ve gotten hurt.

Suddenly he’s walking, faster and faster, until he reaches you.

You look up, and when you see him, there’s a small smile curling at the edge of your lips. But you don’t look happy, and Elias’ worry only intensifies.

“Hey,” he says, reaching out his hand. You let him help you pull you to your feet, but then you drop his hand right away.

It stings.

“Can I come in?” you ask. Your voice is small and you’re fretting with the edge of your shirt.

“Of course.” Elias opens the door, lets you walk in first. Normally, you would kick off your shoes at the door and throw yourself on his couch, or immediately dive head first into his fridge. You don’t do that now, and it’s wrong: everything feels wrong, and Elias hates it.

If he could make it go back to the way it was, he would do anything for it to stay that way. He would ignore his feelings, he would push them away. He would answer the phone.

He wouldn’t hurt you like this.

“Are you okay?” he blurts out. He regrets it instantly, because your face falls even more.

He should’ve eased into it. He should’ve let you say what you came to say, first.

“I’m so sorry for not answering the phone,” he continues, helplessly, because you’re not saying anything and the silence is too much for him to take. “I put my phone on airplane mode and I shouldn’t have done that, you needed me and I should’ve been there for you and…”

“Elias.” Your voice is soft, but stern. Your hand reaches out, fingers curling around his wrist. “Calm down. I’m fine, nothing happened last night.”

Something heavy dissolves in the pit of Elias’ stomach, and for the first time that day, he feels like he can breathe.

“I’m just…” you pause, sigh. Then you stand a little taller, something determined settling over your features. “I just want to know what I did wrong.”

“Huh?” Elias can imagine he must be staring at you pretty blankly, but he truly just doesn’t get it. “What you did wrong?”

You roll your eyes. “Don’t play dumb. I know you’re mad at me. So tell me what I did wrong, so I can fix it.”

Elias can feel it: the energy shifting in the room. There’s something harsh in your eyes, and he knows you came here looking for resolve as much as you came here looking for a fight.

Fighting, he figures, is a way to feel things, too. But he’s not about to let you do that to yourself, especially when it’s his fault. 

“Y/N,” he says, softly, and then he shakes his wrist out of your grip and takes your hand in his, instead. Your hand is cold, skin soft, and he immediately decides he wants to hold your hand for the rest of his life. “Come sit with me.”

You let him lead you to the couch, and sit down next to him, body turned away from his.

Once again, you’re sitting on his couch, on the verge of tears. But it’s different, this time. You’re not crying over guys that aren’t worth your time, you’re crying over him, over Elias, and he has to fix this one even more than he did all the other times.

“You didn’t do anything wrong,” Elias starts. This time, you don’t fight him on it. “It’s me, actually. I think I did something wrong.”

You look up. There’s a hint of fear in your eyes when you ask: “What?”

Elias sighs. It’s hard, to get out the words, even harder than he was worried about. He doesn’t know what to say, how to say it, or how to make you understand.

“I made a mistake,” he says, carefully. “I thought I needed some time away from you, but that wasn’t right.”

“Away from me?” The look of hurt on your face doesn’t pass by Elias. “Why?”

“Why?” Elias repeats. “Because it’s too hard sometimes. It’s too hard to hear you talking about all these guys you’re dating, and how they always hurt or disappoint you.”

Your eyes are fixed on the floor. “I don’t mean to be a bother,” you mutter.

“You’re not, that’s not what I meant.” Elias takes another breath. There’s something about the way you’re sitting here, shoulders hunched, arms wrapped around yourself, that gives him the courage to say: “You talk about them, but you always come back to me.”

You look up at him, eyes swimming with questions.

“Whatever guy you’re with, no matter how lonely you say you are, how many dates you go on; you always end up coming back here, to hang out on my couch. Why?”

“I mean,” you start, then stop yourself.

Are you really gonna tell him?

You think back to months ago, when Liza had asked you to picture your perfect guy.

“I can’t set you up if I don’t know what you want,” she’d said. “So, close your eyes, and picture yourself happy, in the future. You’ve got a house, and a dog, and a job. You’ve got a partner. What do you picture when you think of the partner?”

Elias. 

You hadn’t said it, you’d said something about blond hair and kind eyes and someone who always makes you laugh, but you’re not dumb enough to deny that it was Elias that you were describing to her. That you pictured, when you closed your eyes, an alternate reality in which Elias was yours and you were his.

But you clearly can’t say that to Elias, because he’s not interested in you like this, and you don’t want to ruin this friendship. Not when it means the most to you. 

You’d give anything to be able to hold onto Elias, and have him hold onto you. 

So you say nothing, just stare at Elias’ hand, which has come to rest on your thigh. His fingers are long, slender, and you miss the feeling of them tangled with your own. You wonder if you could get away with grabbing his hand, every now and then, just as friends. 

“Y/N,” Elias repeats, and this time he sounds a little desperate. “You’re always saying you’re lonely, and you want someone to love you, and you need a decent guy, and I don’t know what you’re waiting for but…”

I’m waiting for you, you think.  

“But I’m right here.” Elias sits up a little straighter. There’s determination in his eyes, a quiet conviction that he usually reserves for hockey. “I’m right here, and I’m a decent guy, and I love you, so why won’t you love me?”

Time freezes.

You’re pretty sure if Elias had a clock you could look at, you’d find the hands of the clock not moving. If you looked outside, the cars would be stationary, the birds would be frozen in the air.

But Elias isn’t frozen. He’s somehow closer than he was before, and he’s moving closer, still.

“Stop me,” he whispers. “Stop me if you don’t want…” He doesn’t finish his sentence.

Doesn’t have to, really.

Because there’s a million things running through your mind, things like because I’m scared and he loves me and we’ve wasted so much time but at the end of the day they all lead to one single conclusion.

It’s him. It’s always been him.

So you launch forward, crash your lips against his in a feverish desperation to finally, finally make it right. He moves back from the force of it, but then his arms are wrapped around you and he’s pulling you closer, into his lap.

He slows down the kiss, softens it. The way he kisses you has your toes curling in your shoes, your heart beating in your throat, because he kisses you like no one has ever really kissed you before.

He kisses you like he loves you.

When you pull away, gasping for air, Elias’ eyes are soft when they lock with yours.

“Yeah?” he asks, and it’s hesitant, careful, like he’s still waiting for you to close the metaphorical door in his face, to take his heart and break it in two.

“I thought it wasn’t possible,” you admit. “I thought you would never want this.”

“Always,” Elias mumbles, and he leans a bit closer, presses a kiss against your jaw. “I’ve always wanted this.”

Always. He’s always wanted this and you were both too dumb to see it, both too dumb to connect the dots. You can’t believe you lost so much time, and you can’t believe it took so long.

Why did it take so long?

“Why didn’t I…” you start, but Elias cuts you off, kissing you once more. Gentle and short, this time, but still just as loving.

“It doesn’t matter,” he says. “What matters is that I love you.”

“I love you, too,” you say, and you bury your face in the crook of his neck, allow yourself to press your lips to his collarbone.

Maybe the why, or the how, or the when, doesn’t really matter in the end. Maybe it’s about the happy ever after.

And you think you found that, now.

[andrewuttaro]

New Look Sabres: GM 62 - TOR - For Nathan

There is something deeply satisfying about the Sabres getting a guy rumored to be connected to the Leafs, particularly the day before you play them. It also feels like a trade like this with Anaheim has been in the making forever… like since before Jason Botterill. I’ve read speculation on a big trade for a Ducks defenseman since Eichel’s rookie year. There is no way all those talks built up to this right? Whole new GM yatta yatta yatta. At the very least this move shows Jason Botterill is up to stuff, we have something that is entirely his to point at now beyond the Skinner trade. This move proves JB isn’t asleep at the wheel which was a developing criticism that now gets tabled for at least four months. Getting a cost-controlled young defenseman with some term of Brandon Montour’s stature upgrades the D-core immediately and although past comments lead you to think otherwise it means JB is giving these guys another tool to make the playoffs. That goal has become pretty distant but it’s possible and a two-way puck moving defenseman can’t possibly hurt. That is a vote of confidence in the room. Use it, boys. In Botts We Trust! Early returns on this trade are good and can only get better when he plays against the Flyers tomorrow night. And yes, I will get to Nathan Beaulieu because his departure is somewhat serendipitous. The deadline is done and now it’s the final push for the playoffs no matter who you ask. There is no playoff trash talk I have relished as much as this: We know what the word is in Toronto. A first round exit would be unacceptable: the only thing to truly make this season a failed one for the Maple Leafs. I think I speak for every man; woman and child in Buffalo when I say the Sabres relish the opportunity of serving you a piping hot failed season for dinner in April! It’s only a fighter’s chance but oh that chance alone is worth going to war. Give me Ristolainen and Kadri fucking murdering each other game after game. Give me Eichel and Matthews yucking it up off the ice before putting on the great American gun show on the ice. Give me hordes of the Southern Ontario middle class flooding across the Peace Bridge in their Leafs uniforms only to be sworn at in Tim Hortons! This series is the sleeping giant of the NHL and a playoff series would be the kind of war NORAD worried about in the 80s! The Blue and Gold versus the Blue and White! Let’s do this! Sabres in 7!

There is a former Sabre, former as of about 3:42 this afternoon, who once said: “I have hated them my whole life.” That former Sabre was Nathan Beaulieu and those were the words he shared with the press last season after getting into a wicked scrap with then-Leaf Matt Martin. Yes, he was talking about these Toronto Maple Leafs. He hated them as a Habs fan in his childhood and for a year and a half our boy Nate, lived them as a Buffalo Sabre. I’m not eulogizing a guy who wasn’t good enough to consistently make the bottom defensive pairing but him being dealt the same day as a game against the Leafs felt right. It felt like this game was to be for Nathan! I doubt anyone on the ice was thinking that but nonetheless: FOR NATHAN! The first period of this game, like Sabres first periods often are, was an encouraging display of what this team can do when it plays its game. Buffalo played the kind of defense we can hope gets better with Brandon Montour: frustration. For the entire first frame the Sabres fought a neutral zone battle with the Leafs. The Leafs are good when their goal scorers are given space to be creative. The first period saw very little space for creativity as Dahlin, Bogo, McCabe and Ristolainen broke up passes and stopped the majority of scoring chances before they got into Carter Hutton’s business. Fredrick Anderson on the Leafs end was great as well staying on his game as the Sabres got the most of the period’s shots. He was until very late in the period that is. You could see John Tavares’ frustration when he got called for tripping sending the Sabres to the powerplay. Jack Eichel got the puck alone in the slot and one timed it past a heavily screened Anderson with 53 seconds left in the first. It was a great start for the visitors and you got the feeling we could see the kind of wins we’ve come to expect when the Sabres visit Ontario’s Capital. Then the wheels came off… or someone’s did.

Over the course of 2:04 early in the second period the Leafs scored three goals! Tavares, Matthews and the guy they call goat. All of the sudden it was 3-1 and you could totally see why. The puck watching of the Sabres when they’re NOT doing their thing. When they don’t fight for the puck on the wall and when they don’t breakup passes this team looks gross. We see this periodically roughly ever fifth game and I’ve gotten really tired of it. Against the Leafs its about the worst thing you can do not just because we all hate the Leafs, because, once again, Toronto lives and dies on their offense and when you let that offense breathe, they take up all the air in the room. I will say the goal song is great. I wish it wasn’t the LEAFS goal song but here we are. Good job on that one, Toronto. Now, instead of JT going to the box, it was Carter Hutton getting pulled and flipping shit on the bench. It was Robin Lehner last season and Carter Hutton this season. The Leafs piss off our goalies and I’m sure its not just us. The hard part for Hutton is that he was really beginning to look better and although we may have the patience to keep giving him starts we have a very unforgiving coach behind the bench so Ullmark coming in for the rest of this game may signal Ullmark returning to the level of starts he was getting not too long ago. The middle frame got worse before it got better and old pal Tyler Ennis, a fourth liner on their roster, scored a breakaway goal that may give you flashbacks to the golden era of… 2011? Ok, whatever. There was hope before the next intermission and a couple of compounding penalties gave Buffalo a 5-on-3 opportunity. I openly laughed in my unfaithful pompousness that they could capitalize on the powerplay but lo, it was our bridge beauty Sam Reinhart who took a Skinner pass in front and snuck it past Anderson. It would be 4-2 Leafs going into the third. Sam Reinhart gave us faith.

Jack Eichel gave us hot flashes. A minute had not passed in the third period and he enters the zone riding the circle around the Leafs defenders before roofing it 4-3 Sabres! Eichel was coming in on Anderson like a train locomotive. Anderson dodged Captain Jack, but Jeff Skinner did not and ate ice well Eichel looped back on the celly. The comeback was in motion now and while the shots on goal don’t show it the Sabres were pushing hard for the equalizer. With the Leafs fourth line scoring two of their goals in the second I was really pulling for one of those hard-working fourth line goals from Zemgus Girgensons or Johan Larsson but as close as they got there was no Sabres goal to come. There was one point in this final period when the puck was in play well above the ice and was coming down right over Rasmus Dahlin. Dahlin, who mind you is closing the gap with Elias Petterson in some metric I am too lazy and upset to look up right now, looked like an absolute competitor in this game. He saw the puck coming down and gave it a header to try to maintain possession. He may have the same first name as Ristolainen, but he is really the opposite, at least in possession and defensive zone play. Dahlin’s great play made the final goal of the game all the more heartbreaking when he couldn’t hold the puck in the zone on the Sabres late powerplay. Kasperi Kapanen took advantage of the opportunity and scored the breakaway goal to notch the final score line at 5-3 Leafs. A shorthanded goal with less than three minutes left in a one goal game deflates you like a Patriots Superbowl and this one ended in disappointing fashion. We’ll have to wait for those back-to-back wins we’ve been dying for. One Leafs fan I had an exchange with earlier in the day on twitter came back with that nifty timing after the final horn sounded to tell me the overall series is 18-16 Leafs since 2012. Thanks for that one, bud. My last thought on the Leafs in this will be that all my negative experiences with fans of the blue and white happen online. Literally every Leafs fan I’ve met in person is the sweetest shit ever. Just positive vibes going up the QEW from me after this game but that may not be true again on Saturday when we meet again.

Apologies, this is my longest New Look Sabres yet and I’m not done yet. That said, if you’ve read this far you probably enjoy this so please: like, share and leave a comment. Even if you’re a Leafs fan leave me comment. This blog is a lot more fun when it’s a conversation not a treatise. Some people pointed out with annoyance that Marco Scandella, fresh off the IR, got the third pairing start over Casey Nelson. I understand the frustration; hell, former Leaf Matt Hunwick was the other guy on that pairing! However, we should probably accept who we got for a Coach right now. Barring a shocking locker room cleanout and exit interviews day in April (and yes, start getting used to that probably coming in April) Phil Housley is likely the Coach into next season. The GM made a public vote of confidence in him and this is the bed we’re sleeping in. The Trade Deadline is past. This is the bed we’re sleeping in. Did we miss Scott Wilson? He’s back! This team with all it’s faults and late game collapses is what we got now. In the outside chance they make the playoffs: this is the team that will go. This is the team now… well except for our new friend and first Sabre in #62 Brandon Montour. With the Trade Deadline in the past it forces us to smell our stank and deal with the roster that is; but the other side of that coin is its fun to talk about what a great time that was!

The Trade deadline, hell the build up to it, can really mess with you. You know the endless updating twitter and the rampant speculation from all sectors. On Sunday night I bit on rumors linking Ristolainen to Callahan in Tampa and spent about 90 minutes trying to do the money gymnastics to make that work. The Montour trade put an end to all that in the same way it has reinvigorated all the Ristolainen talk. We all wanted to say that all these abrasive stats nerds were full of shit but we’re smarter than that. We told ourselves: Risto is just poorly utilized! Those arguments muddied the waters enough to cling to our abrasive Finnish sandpaper in back. Rasmus Dahlin changed that conversation and now Brandon Montour changes it again making it even harder to say Risto is bad because he’s been given too much in the way of minutes and workload. As a second pairing guy consistently, he shouldn’t be as statistically poor as he has been but the addition of Dahlin didn’t change that and if the addition of Montour doesn’t change that either we better prepare for a Risto trade by July 1st this summer. I’m not saying it needs to happen but it’s looking that way. That’s not the happiest outcome obviously, we’re all dying to see him in a playoff series but its probably what Botterill does: the last easily movable guy on this team who can actually get some decent assets in return. I feel bad about saying this too, I named my car after our first Rasmus, but if Botts can sell high on him it probably won’t be a move we’ll regret. Don’t factor out a playoff berth yet but focus your angriest passions elsewhere from now on. Get behind these Amerks! This AAF Football League is something! The Bachelor looks like it had a wild episode tonight. Cushion the blow but don’t hop off the roller-coaster just yet. There are still some fun hills and loops left even if its likely it doesn’t end in another, way cooler roller-coaster afterward. They’re back at it with the hot new face tomorrow night in Philadelphia: Let’s Go Buffalo!

Thanks for reading.

P.S. My wife told me to calm down shortly before the final goal so naturally I was mad. I have proceeded to call her Kasperi for the rest of the night. Steve, should she be happy about that?  

[thrashermaxey]

Wild West: Pettersson Injury, Avs Power Play, and Clayton Keller

  So I am sure everyone as heard/seen the update that Elias Pettersson is out. It was recently confirmed a concussion with 7-10 days the minimum missed time. If you didn’t know, well, sorry to be the bearer of bad news. I did just want to take a moment and second what I have seen some others writing. If you take a look at the actual hit from Michael Matheson it initially doesn’t really look terrible. Petterson is pinned against the boards, slightly from behind, but not enough to seem to do much damage. It’s the second half doesn’t look great, where the much smaller Petterson is slammed to the ice. It looks even worse when you see that a couple of seconds prior Matheson is made to look foolish by the slick hands of Petterson. In that context it looks like a vindictive attempt to injure or at they very least to put the young flashy forward ‘in his place’. It is that action that has riled up Canucks Army, and really has no place in the sport.

  That done, on to the fantasy advice.

  Potential Pickups:

  This week I am eyeing a player with a nice four game schedule over the next seven days.

  Zach Parise was left for dead in a lot of fantasy drafts. He has responded with five points in four games with 12 shots on goal.  He has been playing with Mikko Koivu and Mikael Granlund, and on the second power play unit. The linemates might not be inspiring much fantasy confidence so far this year, but the shots are coming and with four opportunities to cash in this week, he could be worth an audition on your fantasy team.

  Line Combos:

 I won’t be covering all the lines in the Western Conference here so make sure to keep an eye over at the Frozen Tool Line Combos section.

  This week I wanted to take a quick look over at Colorado, specifically their power play. There are a couple of things to note here. First of all one of the power play lines has scored ten points, while the second line has managed only two. The two groups are listed below.

  COMPHER,J.T. – KERFOOT,ALEXANDER – SODERBERG,CARL (WILSON,COLIN)

  JOST,TYSON – LANDESKOG,GABRIEL – MACKINNON,NATHAN – RANTANEN,MIKKO

  In case the way this was written didn’t give away the game, the unit with MacKinnon and Landeskog has two points. The unit with Kerfoot and Compher has 10 (Colin Wilson was on the ice for most of those, but missed out on a couple). 

  Surprised? I was. The Avs are off to a decent start and power play one hasn’t clicked yet. If you own any of them look forward to those percentages to kick back in.

  Thing two to note here is that Tyson Jost has a coveted spot on that first power play unit. He hasn’t cashed in yet, but he might be worth a flyer at some point if that unit catches fire.

  Drop or Not:

  Clayton Keller

  Managers and analysts came into the year with high expectations for Arizona and for Keller in particular. Out of the gate those expectations are not looking good. Arizona was shut out in their first two games and Keller has been decidedly human managing only one assist in four games.

  To put the cart before the horse so to speak, hold if you own him or buy low if you can.

  Keller has been playing almost 20 minutes a game on average (up from 2017-18), spending three and a half minutes a game on the power play (again up from 2017-18), is averaging three shots a game, and got a point on the only goal that was scored when he was on the ice. In short, he is doing all the things you want a player to be doing, the puck just hasn’t been going in. It will. Buy, buy, buy.

    Thanks for reading.

  from All About Sports https://dobberhockey.com/hockey-home/the-wild-west/wild-west-pettersson-injury-avs-power-play-and-clayton-keller/

[thrashermaxey]

Wild West Summer Series 2018: Vancouver

  So big news out of Ottawa. I took a look at my notes from the San Jose  Column. Timing didn’t work out great on the release of that one, but isn’t that just the way it goes. Erik Karlsson certainly changes the outlook for the power play in San Jose. Evander Kane and Tomas Hertl, who I was reasonably positive about could stand to lose out on power play time depending how Karlsson is deployed. Both could get a small bump if they get to overlap on even strength though. Dobber has updated his projections so go buy the Guide. Show Cam some love too and keep up with the Eastern Edge Series.

  The idea for these columns to compare end of 2017-18 Fantasy Hockey Geek rankings for individual players with an expected ranking based on their average draft positions from the start of the year. This process does not necessarily identify who was the most important player to each team but gives us not only an idea of who was a steal/bust on draft day, but where each player was valued going into this season. I will also be adding some thoughts on whether or not that is the new normal for the player in question and if we should be adjusting our draft positions. For a deeper dive on each team plus full projections make sure to get your copy of Dobber’s Fantasy Guide, out now!

  And now for the technical details. We will be using the Fantasy Hockey Geek tool to get a ranking that combines all of a player’s stats for the searched categories. Like for the previous series, the ranks are based on a 12 team, head-to-head league, using the categories of goals, assists, power play points, shots, hits and blocks for forwards/defensemen and wins, saves, save percentage and goals against average for goalies. Player eligibility for this series is based on Yahoo, and draft ranks are based on average draft positions compiled from Yahoo, ESPN and CBS by FantasyPros.

  Vancouver

  Recap:

Vancouver finished 2017-18 7th in the Pacific with 73 points. They had a significant problem with goal scoring, which is likely not going to be helped along by the retirement of Henrik and Daniel Sedin. For 2018-19 Vancouver is certainly relying on the progression of their young guns to make up the difference.

  Undervalued:

  Alex Edler:

  Alex Edler provided exceptional value in the 2017-18 season. He was drafted 260th overall, but finished the season as the 47th most valuable player, and 16th most valuable defensemen. The defensemen around him had an average draft position of 177th.

  Ivan Provorov

PHI

D

41

John Klingberg

DAL

D

45

Alexander Edler

VAN

D

47

Matt Dumba

MIN

D

55

Tyson Barrie

COL

D

58

  Expectations were clearly not high for Edler, and it is not exactly surprising. Managers were not all that excited about the offense that Vancouver had to offer in 2017-18 and Edler himself has only two seasons of his 11 seasons where he managed more than 40 points.

  Games Played

Goals

Assists

Points

Points/ Game

Shots

Sht%

Hits

PPlay Points

Blocks

70

6

28

34

0.49

172

3.5

157

15

203

  While his 34 points doesn’t scream ‘great season’, 2017-18 saw Edler post his best assist, power play point numbers, and point pace since 2011-12, his best hit and block numbers of his career, and his best shot pace since 2013-14. Edler provided incredible value for leagues that count hits and blocks, and he was even able to score at a decent pace.

  What is a little less clear is exactly what changed. His point pace was the highest of his career, but his personal shooting percentage was a touch low if anything. The team’s 5-on-5 shooting percentage was almost exactly in line with previous years, and while his IPP was a little high, it wasn’t high enough to account for the change. The biggest change (and the cause of the point increase) was his career high power play totals. Unfortunately that career high did not come with an increase in time on ice on the power play, or with a new role, as he was the lone defenseman on the first power play in multiple recent seasons. The biggest difference between 2016-17 and 2017-18 was the effectiveness of the power play. In 2016-17 Vancouver managed 32 goals for a 14.1% success rate. In 2017-18 they scored 53 goals for a 21.26% success rate.

  The career highs in hits and blocks are also another big question mark as Edler’s average time on ice, and short handed time on ice (usual culprits for changes in these types of stats) were almost exactly the same in 2017-18 as his recent career numbers. To further highlight the change, his average hit per game numbers from 2015-2017 was 1.6, in 2017-18 it was 2.2 per game. For blocks, he was averaging 2.04 per game over that time period, but in 2017-18 it was 2.9. Those are large changes for with no additional time on ice. My tenuous theory is that Vancouver was a more porous defensive team in 2017-18 (as illustrated by higher corsi, fenwick, and shot against numbers, more defensive zone starts, and higher teamwide hits – by almost 300 – and blocks) and so more of Edler’s responsibilities (outside of power play time) were defensive.

  So for this all to be sustainable we are banking on Vancouver to maintain an above average power play without the Sedins, while at the same time spending enough time in their own zone to allow Edler to keep up his peripheral stats. It feels like something has to give here. A full season from Bo Horvat, Brock Boeser and new arrival Elias Pettersson certainly can give some optimism on the power play. Few other changes though do leave open the possibility that defense will be an issue again in 2018-19, which means that Edler may be relied on in a similar way in 2017-18. My conservative pick is to knock off a few power play points, and maybe regress the peripherals just a touch. So maybe he won’t be the 16th most valuable defenseman, but he should still be much more valuable than his 260th overall draft pick from 2017-18.

  Overvalued:

  Sam Gagner:

So it might not be fair to say that expectations were high for Sam Gagner going into 2017-18 as he was drafted 160th overall. He was fresh of a 50 point season with Columbus propped up by his 18 points as a power play specialist. It is safe to say his season with Vancouver was not a reprise of that success. He ended up as the 383rd most valuable player in the league, and no one around him was drafted at all in most leagues.

  Adrian Kempe

LAK

C/LW

370

Brian Boyle

NJD

C/LW

382

Sam Gagner

VAN

C/RW

383

J.T. Compher

COL

C/LW

393

Tommy Wingels

BOS

C/RW

396

  Gagner saw decreases across in goals, assists, power play points, and shots in 2017-18. He did see increases in hits and blocks (likely due to some of the same issues as Edler above)

  Games Played

Goals

Assists

Points

Points/ Game

Shots

Sht%

Hits

PPlay Points

Blocks

74

10

21

31

0.42

164

6.1

54

11

28

  In positive news, Gagner saw an increase in average time on ice, he was able to maintain his shot rate from Columbus and still saw a decent amount of time on the first power play with the Sedins.

  So what for 2018-19? So if everything to were repeat 2017-18 and his low shooting percentage regress to his average he would add three goals. That certainly doesn’t increase his value much. Since the Sedins won’t be in the picture we can speculate that Gagner might get more ice time, and could round out the top power play with Horvat, Boeser, Petterson and Edler. Does that translate to a higher point pace? I am not anticipating much beyond a half point per game (which incidentally is pretty much what his pace would be if his goals rebound).

  The moral of this story is that Gagner is valuable if a half point per game player with a slightly higher percentage of his points on the power play is valuable. His value seems to be closer to his end of season rank than his draft position.

  Sven Baertschi:

  Sven Baertschi was grabbed in leagues as a late round flyer with hopes of upside. That did not exactly materialize in 2017-18. There were weeks where he was worth owning, but certainly did not provide teams value enough to roster him all season in standard sized leagues.

  Connor Brown

TOR

RW

530

Zack Kassian

EDM

RW

532

Sven Baertschi

VAN

LW

535

Drew Stafford

NJD

LW/RW

537

Matt Hendricks

WPG

LW

541

  Baertschi was the 535rd most valuable player and the 154th most valuable winger.

  Games Played

Goals

Assists

Points

Points/ Game

Shots

Sht%

Hits

PPlay Points

Blocks

53

14

15

29

0.55

82

17.1

19

9

29

  Baertschi actually had the highest point pace of his career, which incidentally has reached six seasons now (we won’t count the five games of 2011-12). He is 25 so still seems to have some room to grow, but at some point we have to start thinking that maybe the upside just won’t be there.

  First the bad news. Baertschi’s most productive season (2017-18) really wasn't that much more productive than his other seasons. He only played 53 games, still has not broken the two shot per game barrier, and had a sky high shooting percentage. His PDO, and 5-on-5 shooting percentage while he was on the ice were also high.

  The good news? There is room for improvement. His time on ice still isn’t high (just over 15.5 minutes a game), and his power play time is low. The Sedin’s have retired and he may be relied on for more in 2018-19. He spent some time with Horvat and Boesor and did have some success (though not consistently). If he gets that spot again (potentially unlikely with Petterson joining the team) and/or sees an increase in power play time there is a chance he sees an uptick in productivity.

  Based on his history, and some his underlying numbers it seems like he will need that increased time on ice just to avoid negative regression. So yes, he has a potential opportunity here, but even a modest improvement puts him maybe in Sam Gagner territory, which for most leagues is undraftable. He is definitely on my wait and see list for 2018-19. 

  Thanks for reading.

  Next week: Las Vegas

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  from All About Sports https://dobberhockey.com/hockey-home/the-wild-west/wild-west-summer-series-2018-vancouver/

[thrashermaxey]

The Wild West: World Junior Performances

WJCs and the West

  By Kevin Wickersham

  Following the late-game, underdog heroics of two Western Conference prospects, Tyler Steenbergen (Arizona) and Conor Timmins (Colorado) to bring the WJC title back to Canada, another World Junior Championships is in the books. This one was accompanied by some unsightly organizational warts and blemishes in Buffalo that hopefully history doesn’t focus on rather than the inspired play of gold-winning Canada, runners-up Sweden, and a ton of impressive individual performances. Several other Western Conference prospects showed well, likely improving their status in scouts’ and the public’s opinion including:

  Jordan Kyrou (Canada) – St. Louis

Registering the most points of any Western Conference prospect or Team Canada skater (3 G, 7 A) the Sarnia Sting star left wing showcased his elite hands, fast and shifty skating prowess, puck handling mastery, and ability to exert relentless pressure upon opponents. In particular, his early-tourney stunner against Slovakia in a 6-0 drubbing drew attention to Kyrou’s deceptive, slippery game around the net. He’ll now head back to Sarnia, where he’s the league’s third-leading scorer in spite of not playing for the OHL West’s second-place Sting in nearly a month.

  Sam Steel (Canada) – Anaheim

Kyrou’s pivot, last year’s WHL scoring champ and Regina Pats’ captain Steel continued to prove he’s a heady and offensively-creative talent who uses his impressive speed and playmaking skills masterfully. A possible Olympic squad member for the Pyeongchang games, Steel produced well on the big stage (4 G, 5 A). His work in Canada’s semi-final contest against the Czech Republic was stellar, including a rifle-shot, power play one-timer after a brisk feed from LA Kings’ draftee Kale Clague to get his squad’s scoring rolling in their 7-2 rout.

  Klim Kostin (Russia) – St. Louis

There’s another reason why the Blues should be pleased about the WJC – 18-year-old power forward Kostin and his dangerous presence near the net led Team Russia with eight points (5 G, 3 A) in five contests, including two goals in their preliminary 5-2 win against Belarus. His totals are even more impressive when you consider that final round participants Canada, Sweden, USA, and the Czech Republic, featuring nearly all of the tournament’s top scorers, each played two more games than Russia. Having spent much of his draft year injured, Kostin went lower in the 2017 Entry Draft (last selection in the first round) than his physical, effectively intimidating talent warranted. Currently the second youngest AHL player, Kostin will continue post-tournament to cut his professional teeth with the San Antonio Rampage, thus far tallying two goals and nine assists with an impressive 47 PIM in 27 contests.

  Cale Makar (Canada) – Colorado

Makar, the fourth overall NHL Entry Draft selection last summer continued to highlight his smooth skating, smarts, deft puck-moving, and playmaking abilities with a three-goal, five-assist effort, tying for tourney points leader among blueliners. The oft-maligned Avalanche defense saw much promise in Team Canada’s rearguard corps with Timmins and Makar’s strong showings, particularly on the offensive end where Makar excelled despite limited minutes. While his opening goal in the outdoor tilt vs. the USA will likely garner the most video replays, Makar’s goal and two assists as Canada shellacked the Swiss 8-2 in their quarterfinals contest was his most productive performance, capping off the former Alberta Junior Hockey League star’s three-game goal streak.

  Elias Pettersson (Sweden) – Vancouver

Pettersson’s six goals and an assist tied fellow Swedes Lias Andersson and Alex Nylander for the squad’s scoring lead. His high water mark may have been two third-period goals and an earlier assist in a 7-2 drubbing of Switzerland. While the first involved some puck luck, as an attempted pass to Lias Andersson deflected into the net off a Swiss defenseman, Petterson’s second was a mind-blower in which he charged in from the blue line, faked one defender out of his skates, sliced east-to-west between another defender and the goalie and, diving though the crease he horizontally forced the puck in the net. Petterson’s having a great year overall, scoring at the second highest clip ever for a Swedish Hockey League player younger than 20, as his 11 goals and 26 assists in 24 Vaxjo contests put him at 1.34 points-per-game pace. His 37-point total is also currently good for third-most overall this SHL campaign.

  Eeli Tolvanen (Finland) – Nashville

Impressing mainly as a distributor in the WJCs, Tolvanen had a productive trip back to North America from Jokerit where his 17 goals, 15 assists and 32 points leads the KHL club in each category. A prolific goal scorer known as shifty and quick on skates with a blistering, accurate shot, he instead dished helpers to Jets’ uber-prospect Kristian Vesalainen, future Blackhawk blueliner Henri Jokiharju, and three to his former USHL teammate and Oilers’ draftee Aapeli Rasanen .Despite 12 shots on goal against Denmark and nine versus the Czech Republic, Tolvanen’s lone goal came on the power play during Finland’s dramatic New Year’s Eve comeback effort versus the USA in an eventual 5-4 loss.

    Follow me on Twitter @KWcrosscheck

from All About Sports http://www.dobberhockey.com/hockey-home/the-wild-west/the-wild-west-world-junior-performances/