I shudder
to think what the Knights may do with a top-five offense that added Mitch
Marner, a perennial 100-point threat with excellent playmaking and defensive
ability that you can play in any situation.
It does
make a lot of logical sense to play Marner and Jack Eichel, a worthy MVP
candidate last season, on separate lines given their ability to drive play
themselves. However, that doesn’t seem to be the case, at least early in the
season, with the Knights toying with the idea of stacking their top line. It’s
not something they’ve ever had the luxury to do; while they’ve gone after some
big names, an Eichel-Marner combo would be the best they ever had, and arguably
a top-five duo in the league.
That Marner
cost them nothing but cap space should push the Knights offense to an even
higher level. To date, only one team in the cap era, the 2021-22 Panthers with Jonathan
Huberdeau (115 points), Aleksander Barkov (88 points) and Sam Reinhart (82),
has ever averaged more than four goals per game. Can the Knights do this? On
paper, I think it’s totally possible. THN Yearbook & Fantasy Guide projects
Eichel and Marner to combine for 199 points this season.
It won’t cost
the Knights a balanced lineup, either, considering Tomas Hertl and William
Karlsson are as good as you can get with your No. 2 and 3 centers. Mark Stone
is still a fantastic Selke-level winger when healthy, and Pavel Dorofeyev (35
goals in 82 games), Ivan Barbashev (21 even-strength goals) and Brett Howden
(22 even-strength goals) can provide scoring from the other lines. The Knights
can throw out three scoring lines on a nightly basis no matter how they
configure their players.
There are
no shortage of quality fantasy options here with Eichel and Marner both worth
first-round picks in standard 12- or 14-team leagues, and then having a minimum
of three others – Dorofeyev, Hertl, Theodore – worth rostering even in the
shallowest of leagues.
Where the
Knights will certainly feel a hit, however, is the absence of Alex Pietrangelo
due to injury. There’s no replacing a player of his caliber and it puts a lot of
emphasis on their current top trio, Shea Theodore, Brayden McNabb and Noah
Hanifin, to pick up the slack. Zach Whitecloud joins the top four, but the jury’s
still out on a defensemen entering his age-29 season who has never averaged
more than 18 minutes per game. Jeremy Lauzon, who will likely anchor their third
pairing, is worth noting due to his significant potential for hits, who played
himself into banger league relevance after leading the league with 386 hits in
2023-24.
Goaltending
is somewhat dicey if only because the Knights have zero depth behind Adin Hill.
At one point they had a parade of capable backups, but Akira Schmid played in
just five games last season and through four seasons has started just 36 games.
Hill is coming off the first season in which he appeared in at least 50 games, and
his play held up a lot better than I thought, but there’s little margin for error.
At least with Ilya Samsonov last season, he brought plenty of experience and
still had stretches where he was very reliable, including a perfect 4-0-0 in December
last season with a .948 SP and 1.25 GAA.
Prediction:
Even with
some question marks regarding their depth on defense and in net, the Knights win
their third division banner in four seasons with an outstanding offense. Even
with a new team, Marner acclimates himself well with the Knights in the Western
Conference, where he can live with relative anonymity compared to being the
hometown franchise savior in Toronto.
A looming
free agency for Eichel has very little cause for concern given how well he’s
fit on the Knights. With plenty of deals expiring this season and the next – Karlsson,
Stone, Reilly Smith, Brandon Saad, Jeremy Lauzon among them – the Knights have the
cap space and plenty of proof they can be a contender for season to come,
making it easy to convince Eichel to stay.
As the
Central Division teams beat each other into oblivion with the divisional
playoff format, the Knights will have a clear path to the conference final and
beyond. Their main rival remains the Oilers, who don’t offer as much depth as the
Knights and have even bigger questions in goal.
All
stats courtesy of naturalstattrick.com, moneypuck.com, hockeyviz.com, allthreezones.com,
hockey-reference.com, eliteprospects.com unless otherwise noted.
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