My bullishness of Wyatt Johnston as a hockey player is well known in these parts. The 20 year old has the makings of a future stud in both regular hockey and for fantasy. Right now, he’s been given the best opportunity early in his career, and he’s taking full advantage of it. Johnston was bumped onto the first line with Dallas’ two best forwards, Robertson and Hintz, and Johnston has been excellent since the change. Robertson totaled three assists, four shots and two PIM in the 5-4 win over the Red Wings on Tuesday. Johnston has seven points in his last five games while averaging over three shots per game. The new change is enough to put Johnston on the fringe, and with Dallas closing the week with Anaheim and Washington, I would definitely be targeting Johnston for the bottom of my roster. Let’s take a look at what else happened on Tuesday night:
Nikita Kucherov – Hat trick and an assist with five shots. Kucherov already has 80 points. Only McDavid and Crosby have done it faster this millennium. Just an absurd perfomance.
Brayden Point – Goal and an assist. He won’t get back to last season’s 51 goals, but Point is still having a very good season.
Anthony Cirelli – Two assists with a shot and two PIM. It’s been a nice stretch for Cirelli, but I’m still not in a rush to stream him.
Brandon Hagel – Goal and an assist with three shots and two PIM. Hagel is on the fringe, but I lean elite streamer while he’s on the second line and power play unit.
Cam Atkinson – Goal and an assist with four shots and two PIM. After a dreadful start to the season, Atkinson has a point in six straight games. The minutes are through the roof as well. He’s bumping back up to an elite streamer in the short term.
Morgan Frost – Two assists with two shots. Frost has also been much better lately, but he’s more in the middling streamer range.
Joonas Korpisalo – 24 saves on 25 shots in the 4-1 win over Montreal. This season has been a disaster for Korpisalo. He’s been the worst player in fantasy besides Samsonov. Easy pass.
Roope Hintz – Two goals and an assist with four shots. Hintz is sitting exactly at a point per game and seems to be getting a boost right now with Johnston on his wing.
Thomas Harley – Two assists with a shot. While Heiskanen is out, Harley is worth owning everywhere.
Dylan Larkin – Goal and an assist, as did Alex DeBrincat. Nine game point streak for Larkin, while DeBrincat has been ice cold before this game. Even with that, his overall numbers are quite good.
Lucas Raymond – Two assists with two shots. Raymond is a middling streamer. His stats are fine, but nothing blows you out of the water and he’s getting killed at even strength.
Alex Pietrangelo – Two assists with two shots. Pietrangelo has fallen off quite a bit this season. That said, he’s had horrible shooting luck, and it’s still enough to be a bottom end hold. I’ve been low on Pietrangelo for years, but I expected more with Theodore missing extended time.
Ivan Barbashev – Goal and an assist with four shots and two PIM. Middling streamer at best.
Nic Roy – Goal and an assist with two shots. Roy is up to a solid streamer while Eichel is out.
Anthony Mantha – Two goals on four shots. It feels like forever ago that Mantha was turning into a fantasy stud. Now, he’s only a bottom end streamer.
Marcus Johansson – Two goals on three shots. There’s deep league value here, but he’s never a guy I’m targeting for streaming.
Marcus Foligno – Goal and an assist with two shots. Foligno is fine as a hits streamer, but he’s doing very little else.
Joel Eriksson Ek – Goal and an assist with two shots. JEEK continues to dominate. The Wild’s struggles are keeping him from getting his due.
Stuart Skinner – 27 saves on 28 shots in the 4-1 win over the Blue Jackets. Skinner was so bad to start the year, and now he’s been arguably the best goalie in fantasy besides Hellebuyck over the last two months. What a time.
Evander Kane – Goal and an assist with three shots. Kane is starting to look a bit better offensively while he’s been on the second line. I’ve been stubbornly holding regardless.
Warren Foegele – Goal and an assist with two shots and two PIM. Foegele has also been quite good on the second line lately. He’s in solid streamer territory.
Nick Leddy – Three assists. Leddy’s fantasy relevant days are behind him.
Brandon Saad – Two goals on five shots. Saad occasionally has blow up games like this, but overall, there’s not a lot here.
Colton Parayko – Two assists with two shots. Parayko has been very good lately for the Blues, more in real life than fantasy. He’s great in blocks leagues. Without blocks, he’s probably a step behind the fringe, but it’s looking up.
Yegor Sharangovich – Goal and an assist. I did not see a season like this coming for Sharangovich. I thought he would be fine in their bottom six, and all of a sudden he’s on the first line and power play unit, which he earned by his play. He’s on the fringe depending on format.
Jordan Greenway – Goal and an assist with three shots. He’s dreadful offensively, but Granato likes him solely because he coached him as an amateur, so maybe he’ll be force fed a bunch of minutes to be fantasy relevant.
Jakob Silfverberg – Two goals on three shots. He’s beyond washed, but don’t worry, the Sabres will let him match his goals from the previous 45 games in one night!
Cam Fowler – Two assists with three shots and two PIM. He’s getting all the minutes he can handle, but I’m not that interested in Fowler because of how bad the team is.
Olen Zellweger – Assist with two shots and three blocks in his NHL debut. Zellweger was a big reason why Anaheim felt comfortable trading Drysdale. There’s a lot of offensive upside here, but I don’t see much from Zellweger for this season. Welcome to the Razzball Database!
Adam Fox – Goal and an assist with three shots. Fox is starting to shoot the puck more again to get him back into the bottom end #1 range for defensemen.
Jan Rutta – Two assists with a shot and two PIM. And there’s your annual Rutta update!
Three Point Challenge: We will do Thursday’s games per usual. You can’t select Kucherov, MacKinnon, Nylander, Panarin, Pastrnak, Miller, McDavid, Pettersson, Reinhart, or Rantanen. I’ll go with Marchand against the Senators.
That’s all for now guys. I’ll be back on Friday recapping the action from the next two nights. As always, feel free to leave any comments, give any suggestions, or make any comments below. Thanks for reading, take care!
