 Today's newsletter covers some new things to look for as the NHL season opens Friday (yes, already) in the Czech Republic (yes, really). Plus, the first round of the baseball playoffs wraps up tonight and Canadian swimmer Maggie Mac Neil has no regrets about retiring.
Let's get started. | | | The NHL season begins tomorrow — here's what's new around the league | | | The 2024-25 NHL regular season gets underway Friday when the Buffalo Sabres and New Jersey Devils face off for the first of a pair of games in Prague.
Hockey returns to this side of the Atlantic on Tuesday with an all-U.S. triple header that includes the Stanley Cup champion Florida Panthers and the relocated Utah Hockey Club in separate games. Fans in Canada get their first taste on Wednesday with a trio of all-Canadian matchups.
Last week, we did a quick catchup on what each of the seven Canadian clubs did over the summer. Today, let's zoom out and look at what's new this season around the NHL.
4 Nations Face-Off
After sitting out the 2018 and 2022 Winter Olympics, the NHL jumps back into international "best-on-best" competition with a scaled-down version of the old World Cup of Hockey. The 4 Nations Face-Off features Canada, the United States, Finland and Sweden competing in a weeklong tournament from Feb. 12-20 in Montreal and Boston. Each team has already selected six players and will decide its full 23-man roster over the coming months.
This event replaces the All-Star Game this season and will serve as an appetizer for the NHL's return to the Olympics in 2026 in Italy, where 12 teams will compete for the men's gold. One of the reasons the 4 Nations is much smaller is that Russia remains banned from international play over the invasion of Ukraine. Otherwise, we'd probably be seeing Alex Ovechkin's team along with the Czech Republic and, say, Slovakia, Germany and Switzerland in a larger World Cup-style tournament.
The Utah team
After almost three decades of trying to make hockey bloom in the desert, Gary Bettman finally gave up the ghost in April as the NHL facilitated the sale of the struggling Arizona Coyotes to Utah Jazz owner Ryan Smith, who immediately moved them to Salt Lake City.
It all happened so fast that Smith didn't have time to properly rebrand his franchise. For this season, it will be known simply as the Utah Hockey Club and take the ice in austere uniforms resembling those worn by PWHL players during their own hastily organized inaugural season.
The Coyotes finished 27th overall in 2023-24 and missed the playoffs for the fourth straight time. But Utah hopes to make a run at the post-season with 33-goal scorer Clayton Keller leading the way. Here's more on the UHC, which is already a hot ticket.
A new all-time goals king?
Wayne Gretzky's 894 career regular-season goals once seemed like an unbreakable record. But Alex Ovechkin enters his 20th NHL season just 42 away from overtaking the Great One for the all-time lead.
The 39-year-old Washington Capitals sniper finally showed his age last season, scoring "only" 31 times for his lowest total apart from the pandemic-shortened 2020-21 campaign. But Ovechkin has potted at least 42 goals 13 times in his career (including exactly that number in 2022-23) and he seemed rejuvenated in the back half of last season, scoring 23 goals in his final 36 games.
Macklin Celebrini (and other interesting rookies)
The San Jose Sharks selected the 18-year-old Canadian forward with the first pick in the draft after he scored 32 goals in 38 games as a freshman at Boston University and won the Hobey Baker Award as the NCAA’s player of the year. Celebrini is day-to-day with a lower-body injury suffered during a pre-season game, but the Sharks hope to have him back for their season opener next Thursday.
Other rookies to watch this season include Montreal defenceman Lane Hutson and forwards Matvei Michkov (Philadelphia), Cutter Gauthier (Anaheim) and Logan Stankoven (Dallas), who's still eligible for the Calder Trophy after playing 24 games in the regular season and another 19 in the playoffs.
And don't forget about Connor Bedard. Touted as the best prospect since Connor McDavid, the top pick in the 2023 draft came back from a broken jaw to win the Calder with 61 points in 68 games for Chicago.
Familiar faces in different places
The most jarring sight will be Steven Stamkos in a Nashville uniform. After 16 seasons, two Stanley Cups and more than 600 goals (including playoffs) with Tampa Bay, the longtime Lightning captain signed with the Predators on July 1.
Nashville also poached forward Jonathan Marchessault, an original Golden Knights "misfit" who was MVP of the playoffs when Vegas won the Cup in 2023. The Knights' departures also included centre Chandler Stephenson, who went to Seattle along with defenceman Brandon Montour from the Cup-champion Panthers.
Boston acquired two Vancouver players — centre Elias Lindholm and defenceman Nikita Zadorov — while the Canucks brought Bruins forward Jake DeBrusk the other way.
The two worst Canadian teams in last year's standings made big trades as Montreal acquired talented forward Patrik Laine from Columbus and Ottawa got 2023 Vezina Trophy winner Linus Ullmark from Boston. But Laine suffered a knee injury this week that will keep him out for at least a couple of months.
Meanwhile, Boston goalie Jeremy Swayman could be on the move (or not) as his contract standoff with the Bruins drags on. Team president Cam Neely hinted the other day that Swayman turned down a $64-million offer as he continues his holdout.
For more on the new NHL season, read these predictions by a pair of national reporters who cover the league. | | |  | The Utah Hockey Club is a hot ticket in Salt Lake City after moving there from Arizona. (Jamie Sabau/Getty Images) | | | Quickly… | | | Three of baseball's four opening-round playoff series ended in sweeps.
Detroit's first post-season appearance in a decade will continue after the American League's sixth-seeded team beat No. 3 Houston last night to take their best-of-three matchup in two games. The Tigers, who were eight games below .500 on Aug. 10 but are baseball's hottest team since then, ended the Astros' run of seven consecutive trips to the AL Championship Series.
Elsewhere in the AL, No. 5 Kansas City knocked off No. 4 Baltimore while, in the National League, No. 4 San Diego eliminated No. 5 Atlanta. Third-seeded Milwaukee will host the No. 6 New York Mets for the deciding Game 3 of their series tonight.
The top two seeds in each league come off their bye to start the best-of-five second round on Saturday. In the NL, the top-ranked Los Angeles Dodgers face San Diego while Philadelphia plays the Mets or Brewers. In the AL, the top-seeded New York Yankees face Kansas City while Cleveland takes on Detroit. | | | And finally… | | | Maggie Mac Neil is "at peace" with her decision to retire from swimming at the age of 24. But that didn't make it easy.
The 2021 Olympic 100m butterfly champion confirmed her plans to walk away from the sport last week, ending a career that saw her win three Olympic medals and eight more at the world championships, including a gold in her signature event in 2019. Mac Neil also captured golds at the Commonwealth and Pan Am Games along with three NCAA titles at the University of Michigan and LSU.
The Academic All-American completed her Masters degree while she was still competing and is now preparing for law school. She told CBC Sports' Devin Heroux this week that she has no regrets about leaving one of the Olympics' most demanding sports.
"I'm so at peace with my decision and I think it was just the right time for me," Mac Neil said. "I'm ready to move on and begin this next chapter, whatever that might be."
Still, making it official was a nervy experience.
"I had the message and the [social-media] post in my drafts for a couple of weeks," Mac Neil said. "And as I was ready to hit post, my heart rate was probably the same as it was before I walked out at the Olympic final." Read more here. | | | That's it for today. Talk to you tomorrow. | | | | Not subscribed? Sign up here to get the Buzzer delivered to your inbox. Got an idea, question, comment or other feedback on the newsletter? Drop us a line at thebuzzer@cbc.ca. | | | Share this newsletter | | or subscribe if this was
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