The Bell Center is one of the noisiest buildings in the NHL. Opponents love to play there because it gets absolutely electric. So far this season, however, it seems the Montreal Canadiens do not like to play there. When you compare the team’s record on the road and at home, you realize that Martin St-Louis’ men are much better when they are the visiting side.

The Habs are 7-8-1 at home, while they are 8-3-2 on the road. In other words, they’ve won 62% of their games when playing away from the Bell Centre and just 44% of their tilts in Montreal. Worst still, on the road they’ve allowed 40 goals and scored 42, giving them a plus-2 differential, but at home they have allowed 63 goals (the most in the league) and scored only 49, for a minus-14 differential.

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Those numbers are troubling. Playing at home is meant to give you an advantage, not just because of how electric the building is, but also because you control the matchups with the last change. Is St-Louis struggling to find the right matchups? Or are the players struggling with the man-to-man defensive system? It seems to be a bit of both, but if it’s the defensive system, how can they apply it on the road but not at home?

There is no better proof of the team’s inability to play the system than Nikita Kutcherov’s goal in Tuesday evening’s game. Ivan Demidov, Joe Veleno, Jared Davidson, and Mike Matheson are all standing in a perfect line in front of Jakub Dobes. At the same time, Maxwell Crozier feeds the puck to the Lightning sniper, who is all alone on the wing, as if Tampa was on the man-advantage, but they weren’t. He unleashed a cannon of a shot and, of course, found the back of the net.

Nikita Kucherov gives Tampa a 3-0 lead in the 1st period. pic.twitter.com/HDvA8kRQI4

— TSN (@TSN_Sports) December 10, 2025

St-Louis said last night that what worries him the most is his team’s tendency to give up goals early in periods, and he’s right to be concerned about that, but the man-to-man defensive system should also be right up there on his list of concerns.

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Toronto Maple Leafs defenseman Dakota Mermis is going on injured reserve, retroactive to Dec. 8, the day he took a knee from Tampa Bay Lightning forward Gage Goncalves.

The Maple Leafs have placed D Dakota Mermis (lower body) on injured reserve retroactive to December 8.

D Henry Thrun has been recalled from the Toronto Marlies (AHL).

— Leafs PR (@LeafsPR) December 10, 2025

The play happened three minutes into the third period of Toronto's 2-0 win over the Lightning. Goncalves went to throw a hit on Mermis in the corner and clipped the defenseman's knee instead of the body.

A scrum ensued at center ice, with Dakota Joshua fighting Max Crozier and Bobby McMann high-sticking Oliver Bjorkstrand, which resulted in a one-game suspension. While this was going on, Mermis was getting assistance to the Maple Leafs' dressing room.

The 31-year-old defender, who has played 11 games with Toronto this season, will be out for one week after being placed on IR. The earliest he can return is Dec. 15, and the Maple Leafs host the Chicago Blackhawks on Dec. 16.

In a corresponding move, the Maple Leafs have recalled Henry Thrun from the Toronto Marlies. Thrun has three goals and nine points through 19 AHL games this season.

The Maple Leafs acquired Thrun from the San Jose Sharks in the summer for veteran forward Ryan Reaves. A fourth-round (101st overall) pick in the 2019 NHL Draft, Thrun has appeared in 119 games, scoring five goals and 20 assists.

Thrun was on the ice for practice on Wednesday morning as the Maple Leafs prepared for a matchup against the Sharks on Thursday. Not on the ice for the skate was Morgan Rielly, who the Maple Leafs said would miss practice due to illness.

#Leafs lines at practice Dec. 10/25

Knies-Matthews-Domi
Cowan-Tavares-Robertson
Joshua-Roy-Nylander
Lorentz-Laughton-Jarnkrok
Extra: McMann (suspended), Maccelli

Myers*-OEL
McCabe-Stecher
Benoit-Thrun
Extra, Tanev(🛑), Rifai(🛑)
*Myers placeholding for Rielly(illness)

Hildeby… pic.twitter.com/CF2GXS3q1X

— David Alter (@dalter) December 10, 2025

It appears that Thrun, who's on the third pairing with Simon Benoit in practice, could make his Maple Leafs debut vs. his former club on Thursday night.

Joseph Woll was on the ice before practice, six days after leaving last Thursday's game against the Carolina Hurricanes with a lower-body injury. It's the first time we've seen the goaltender on the ice since then. He's not eligible to return to game action until Dec. 11.

More to come...

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ST. PAUL, Minn - This happened last year when Edmonton Oilers star forward Connor McDavid chicken winged Marcus Johansson in the head and didn't receive even a penalty for it. Johansson was out for weeks with a concussion after that.

With no discipline from the league on McDavid.

On Monday in Seattle, Kraken defenseman hit Mats Zuccarello up high. Zuccarello was pulled from the game and did not return. He is now out.

Dunn received a fighting minor on the play after Danila Yurov came in to the defense of Zuccarello. The rest of the game, Wild players tried to get Dunn to drop the gloves but he didn't give in.

On Tuesday the NHL said nothing about the hit and Dunn did not receive and discipline from it other than the roughing minor on Yurov.

Dunn hit on Zuccarello pic.twitter.com/5jPq7soJdy

— Spoked Z (@SpokedZ) December 9, 2025

This did happen earlier this year. Wild forward Tyler Pitlick hit Carolina Hurricanes defenseman Jalen Chatfield in the head. Chatfield missed some time and Pitlick did not get any discipline from the league.

The only difference was Pitlick was ejected from that game for the hit. Dunn didn't even get a penalty for the hit on Zuccarello who is likely going to be out for some time. The Wild still don't know yet how long.

We should get an update from Wild head coach John Hynes after morning skate on Thursday about Zuccarello's status. But it is safe to say he probably won't play against the Dallas Stars on Thursday.

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ST. LOUIS -- The St. Louis Blues announced on Wednesday that forward Dillon Dube will join Springfield of the American Hockey League on a professional tryout. 

Dube will report to Springfield upon receiving his work visa.

Dube was one of five former members of Canada’s 2018 World Junior hockey team that was charged with sexual assault stemming from an alleged incident that occurred in 2018 in London, Ont. along with Carter Hart, who has recently joined the Vegas Golden Knights, Alex Formenton, Michael McLeod and Cal Foote. They were acquitted of the charges in July.

The Blues released the following statement regarding the signing:

#stlblues statement regarding signing Dillon Dube to an AHL PTO ... pic.twitter.com/do2IaWySGg

— Lou Korac (@lkorac10) December 10, 2025

The Blues have been hit with a rash of injuries to their forward corps, including Jordan Kyrou (lower-body), Jimmy Snuggerud (wrist), Alexey Toropchenko (leg burns), Nathan Walker (upper body) and Nick Bjugstad (upper body) left the second period of a 5-2 loss to the Boston Bruins on Tuesday and have called up Aleksanteri Kaskimaki, Matt Luff and Hugh McGing in the past week-plus and are lacking bodies/depth in both organizations at the position.

The 27-year-old Dube most recently played for Minsk Dynamo in the KHL and recorded 11 points (four goals, seven assists) in 42 regular-season games during the 2024-25 season. 

The Golden, British Columbia native was originally drafted by the Calgary Flames in the second round of the 2016 NHL Entry Draft and spent his entire six-year career with the Flames and had 127 points (57 goals, 70 assists) in 325 regular-season games, including back to back 18-goal seasons in 2021-22 and 2022-23.