Carolina Hurricanes prospect Alex Nedeljkovic accomplished the rare feat Friday night for the ECHL's Florida Everblades, providing his club with an insurance marker late in the third period.
From the 2016 world juniors, to the '16 world championship, to the draft, to the World Cup, and, finally to the NHL. Matthews and Laine. Laine and Matthews.
Player
Tournament/League
GP
Goals
Points
Laine
World juniors
7
7
13
Matthews
World juniors
7
7
11
Laine
Worlds
10
7
12
Matthews
Worlds
10
6
9
Laine
Finnish Elite League
46
17
33
Matthews
Swiss League
36
24
46
Laine
World Cup
3
0
0
Matthews
World Cup
3
2
3
Laine
NHL
38
19
30
Matthews
NHL
35
18
30
Rather remarkable, right? That the two head into the new year separated by only a goal in the best hockey league on the planet is fitting.
Matthews and Laine, one-two, changing the fortunes of the Toronto Maple Leafs and Winnipeg Jets. Countless headlines. And they're only getting started. It's difficult not to wonder what they'll do in 2017 for an encore.
What was available to be won in 2016, Crosby did. The Stanley Cup. The Conn Smythe Trophy. The World Cup. The calendar Art Ross (he goes into action on New Year's Eve with 100 points in 75 regular-season games).
Never a dull moment in Montreal. And no one should want it any other way.
It's been a rollercoaster 2016 for the Canadiens and their supporters, but you can probably break the year down into three parts: The collapse, the trade, the rise.
Everyone learned a valuable lesson in 2016: The Canadiens are only as good as a healthy Carey Price. Without him, their 2015-16 campaign went off the rails.
On June 29, Montreal played an integral role in what will go down as one of the most important days in modern NHL history, trading P.K. Subban to Nashville for Predators captain Shea Weber in a monumental one-for-one deal.
So far, so good. Price is healthy, has won 18 of 26 starts, and owns a .931 save percentage. Weber's third on the team with nine goals, eight of them on the power play, and he's outproducing Subban.
Most importantly, Montreal's in first place in the Atlantic Division, and will be there on Jan. 1.
Enjoy the ride in 2017.
Blue Jackets rising
The Blue Jackets have been making headlines since January.
Six days into the year, Columbus traded Ryan Johansen, its franchise center, to the Predators for Seth Jones in a blockbuster nobody saw coming. The club went 34-33-8 with John Tortorella behind the bench; good things appeared in store moving forward.
Then the stars aligned for the Blue Jackets at the draft lottery, as Columbus ended up with the rights to the third overall selection. The team went into the lottery looking at pick No. 6, which they had 33.2 percent odds to land. They only had a 9.7 percent chance at No. 3, which they eventually used to draft Pierre-Luc Dubois.
On Dec. 31, Columbus is the best team in the NHL. Say it out loud if you don't believe it. The Blue Jackets have the NHL's best goal differential (plus-48) and are riding a monumental 14-game winning streak.
Most surprising of all, perhaps, is that Tortorella has mellowed. And that's saying something, considering Columbus has points in 29 of 34 games, winning 25 of them.
McDavid's Oilers
Connor McDavid, the savior, is living up to the billing.
Here are the point-per-game averages of the top 10 scorers in calendar 2016:
Rank
Player
PPG
1
Crosby
1.33
2
McDavid
1.13
3
Patrick Kane
1.07
4
Artemi Panarin
1.03
5
Joe Thornton
0.99
6
Vladimir Tarasenko
0.95
7
Brent Burns
0.94
8
Erik Karlsson
0.91
T9
Phil Kessel
0.90
T9
Joe Pavelski
0.90
When you're second only to Crosby on that list, at 19 years old, you're special. And McDavid is more than that; he's already the Oilers.
Edmonton hasn't made the playoffs since 2006, when it lost the Stanley Cup Final to the Carolina Hurricanes in seven games. On Jan. 1, 2017, the Oilers will be in playoff position.
New captain, new building, new beginning. The lost decade is over.
Honorable mention: The Florida Panthers, and Jaromir Jagr. From the club's success on the ice, to the upheaval in its front office, and to Jagr's incredible accomplishments at 44, it was a banner year.
After his cursed opening two months of the season, in which he scored twice with 63 shots and counted three goals in his first 30 games, Filip Forsberg is rather predictably now scoring in bunches.
The Nashville Predators star scored in a third straight game - and recorded his fifth goal in six contests - in Friday's 4-0 triumph over the St. Louis Blues, bumping his season total to seven.
He's still only on pace to achieve about half the production of his 33-goal campaign from a season ago - but still, he's firing at about half the total success rate he had with 247 shots last season.
Though it's unlikely that Forsberg will be able to maintain linear totals, there's no reason to believe he won't be one of the more productive scorers in the NHL down the stretch.
"Jaro wasn't sharp at all," Capuano told Newday's Arthur Staple following the loss. "He gave up some soft goals and we had to battle back."
Halak allowed four goals on just 24 shots before being relieved by backup Jean-Francois Berube.
No doubt Halak has struggled this season, finding just six wins in 21 games, while posting a career-worst GAA and his lowest save percentage since 2012-13, a season he spent with the St. Louis Blues.
In fact, New York has a winning record when it has called on fellow goalie Thomas Greiss, but it's not as if the club would be running away in the standings if not for Halak. As it stands, the Islanders own the second-worst record in the East, claiming a 14-15-6 record through 35 games.
Goalie
GP
Record
GAA
SV%
Thomas Greiss
14
8-5-0
2.48
.922
Jaroslav Halak
21
6-8-5
3.23
.904
J.F. Berube
4
0-2-1
3.27
.901
Several Islanders have underwhelmed more than one-third of the way through the season. Captain John Tavares leads the team with 25 points, but at 0.71 points per game, he is at his worst production of his career, save for his rookie campaign. Tavares is also just one of two Islanders to reach double-digit goals, with Anders Lee leading the way with 13.
Don't forget the World Cup
But it'd be shortsighted to think Halak's game is no longer there. That wasn't the case at the World Cup, where the Slovak-born netminder represented Team Europe and was arguably the MVP of the mish-mash team.
Through that six-game performance, Halak posted a 2.15 GAA and a .941 save percentage en route to Team Europe advancing to the best-of-three final versus the heavily-favored Canadians. There, Halak held his own against the world's best, and despite the two losses, allowed just five goals on 72 shots, good for a .931 rating in the final round.
The challenge is Halak's contract. He's owed $4.5 million against the salary cap for the remainder of this season and through 2016-17. As of Friday, just eight teams can absorb that payment.
One of those clubs is the Edmonton Oilers, who just happen to need a goaltending upgrade behind starter Cam Talbot.
Don't claim, but trade
It'd be a tough sell for Edmonton to claim Halak outright, given his underwhelming play and inflated salary. But what about sending back an ugly contract of their own, perhaps veteran defenseman Mark Fayne?
Fayne, 29, is off to Bakersfield, home of the Oilers' AHL club, after an injury-riddled season has limited him to just four games. On the hook for the same term as Halak, Fayne is owed slightly less, coming in at a $3.63 million AAV this year and next. Such a swap would save the Islanders just shy of $1 million on the cap each season.
For the Oilers, it allows them to upgrade their No. 2 man behind Talbot, that being Jonas Gustavsson.
Sitting second in the Pacific, Edmonton is on pace to end a 10-year drought by qualifying for the postseason for the first time since 2006. A big reason for that has been the play of Talbot, who has been regularly called on by Oilers coach Todd McLellan.
In fact, Talbot has started all but four games this season. Gustavsson, however, seems to have lost the confidence of his club after his abysmal play - allowing 13 goals - in his minimal starts thus far.
That means Talbot is on pace to appear in 73 games this season. In other words, all but nine games. No other goalie has played as many games as Talbot this season, nor is any other netminder on pace to make more ice appearances.
In the end, the Oilers could make the playoffs for the first time in a decade, only to show up to the dance with an exhausted goalie.
Thankfully, Halak offers postseason experience of his own. Despite his struggles this season, Halak has proven to be a clutch goaltender when called upon. Not only was that evident with Team Europe, but no hockey fan can forget Halak's playoff performance with the Montreal Canadiens in 2010, when he nearly single-handedly stole rounds over the first place Washington Capitals followed by Sidney Crosby and the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Make the money work and Edmonton would provide Talbot with a much-needed rest, while also bulking up their crease for a long-awaited playoff run. Halak's acquisition would be a no-lose for the Oilers.
