Happy New Year! Welcome to 2025 of our news from around the world of hockey and around the league. It’s going to be a great year for hockey with lots of stories, trades, highlights, drama and the good old’ hockey game. But as we watch there is some news from around the league and world of hockey.
- The Dallas Stars have been fined $100,000 for violating the CBA by holding a practice on December 26, 2024, which was in violation of Article 16.5(b). This came after head coach Peter DeBoer shared some details about the practice ahead of the team’s game against the Minnesota Wild. This is something that the league wants to crack down on given that is important given that the players fought for in their CBA agreement.
- The NHL held its yearly outdoor Winter classic game where the Chicago Blackhawks hosted the St. Louis Blues at Wrigley Field, where St. Louis edged the Blackhawks 6 to 2. During the game, Cam Fowler, who recently got traded from Anaheim, became the first defenseman to score twice outdoors, for his 1,000th game in the league. St. Louis is 18-17-4 and is 5th in the Central as they battle it out this season for a playoff spot.
- Auston Matthews of the Toronto Maple Leafs will reportedly miss another game with injury, the same one that kept him out earlier in the season and he travelled to Germany for. Matthews indicated that he re-aggravated the injury in a game against Buffalo when he contributed a power-play goal in a 6-3 victory but it seems like he will be dealing with this for the foreseeable future. This will be a big impact for one of their top guys as Toronto tries to battle for top of the Atlantic.
- Speaking of captains, Jonathan Toews, 36 recently has been in the news with his recent interviews, and has indicated he would like to get back into the game. Toews is one of the best two-way centers and believes he still can contribute. There will definitely be some interest as Toews tries to make a return to the game. We would love to see him back on the ice.
- The New York Rangers have placed Igor Shesterkin on injured reserve with an upper body injury and so the team will rely on both Jonathan Quick and Louis Domingue who has been called up from the Hartford Wolf Pack. The team is struggling this year and this is another blow to the team after some recent trades and losing their last 4 games. We hope the team can turn it around, but there may also be more changes coming to the Rangers in the coming year. It was also reported that New York Rangers defenseman Zac Jones has been upset with being a frequent healthy scratch and not having an opportunity to play. The team will have to figure something out as they face the Boston Bruins tonight.
- The Montreal Canadiens’ Lane Hutson has been named NHL’s rookie of the month for December 2024 after a 13-point month where the young player had 2 goals and 11 assists. Montreal are 17-17-3 and have won 3 of their last games against tough opponents (Vegas, Tampa Bay & Florida) showing that they aren’t going away. This is a fun to team to watch and they have some great talents like Hutson, along with Suzuki, Caufield (who recently reached 100 goals) and Laine, who has become an excellent PowerPlay specialist.
- Finally, Sidney Crosby has surpassed the legend Mario Lemieux for most assists in the Penguins franchise history, recording his 1,034th career assist. Crosby, who is already a legend in his own right, now sits at 12th in NHL history for assists. Only three other players (Wayne Gretzky, Ray Bourque, and Steve Yzerman) have more assists with a single team. This is an impressive feature and we continue to see why Sid the Kid is an elite hockey player.
- As always, there is a lot more news so make sure to tune in for our aired Season 6, Episode 17 of Two Guys & Hockey Talk next Wednesday. We dive into some of these great topics, and so much more.
Thoughts? Questions? Suggestions? Then remember to tune in each week to get all the latest news in the world of hockey. For more hockey news, different takes or if you want to chat about anything hockey give me a follow @hockey_two on TWITTER and give us a follow on YouTube, or at https://twoguysandhockeytalk.com/.
- Pawel ‘The Cat’
