STATE COLLEGE, Pa. — On Jan. 22, two days after the 2024 season had officially ended with Ohio State beating Notre Dame to win the College Football Playoff national championship, Penn State coach James Franklin was in Philadelphia recruiting. His cellphone rang.

It was 5:06 a.m. Ohio State defensive coordinator Jim Knowles was calling about Penn State’s open DC job.

“To be honest with you,” Franklin said, “I didn’t know how serious it was, but it went pretty quickly from that point on.”

Franklin hasn’t claimed many wins over Ohio State, a program that is 12-1 against the Nittany Lions since 2012, but luring Knowles away from Columbus — not to mention a handful of other blue-blooded programs — was a big one.

Knowles, 60, is widely regarded as one of the top defensive coordinators in the country. His defense at Ohio State last year ranked No. 1 in points allowed per game (12.9), yards allowed per game (255), yards allowed per play (4.2) and red zone touchdown percentage (42%). Which is why his move is one of the most stunning of the offseason. The veteran coordinator who had just won a national title at one of the nation’s wealthiest and most storied programs is moving to a rival Big Ten school.

“First thing I thought was, ‘How did we get him?'” Penn State defensive tackle Zane Durant said.

Knowles, in a recent interview in his new office, was candid about why he left Ohio State, and told ESPN it boiled down to the timing of Ohio State’s contract extension offer. He was hoping to get a deal done before the Buckeyes went to the national championship game. Had Ohio State offered him one before they faced Notre Dame, Knowles said he “would not have explored or considered other options.”

“I did not want to put anyone, including myself, in a position to have to deal with it immediately following the national championship game,” he said. “And that’s the way it happened.”

It created a situation, he said, that eventually turned “awkward.”

“Season’s over, everything coming to a head again quickly,” Knowles said. “Ohio State hasn’t come forward with a deal, and it’s like, OK, if I’m going to act on this or at least explore it, I have got to make the call.”

ON JAN. 26, the Ohio State Buckeyes and about 30,000 fans celebrated the first team in the sport’s history to win four straight playoff games, culminating in a championship following the inaugural 12-team College Football Playoff.

What created a stir, though, was who wasn’t in Ohio Stadium.

“I was asked not to go to the parade, and I respect that,” Knowles told ESPN during an April interview in his office at Penn State’s Lasch Football Building. “I’m not trying to be a secretive guy. Here’s this offer, there were a couple others that were every bit as much money, and then there was Ohio State’s offer, which was still great money, but not as much, so then you have to sit with it.”

Penn State offered Knowles a $3.1 million annual salary that would make him the highest-paid defensive coordinator in college football. He’s also from Philadelphia, where he went to St. Joe’s Prep, and grew up a Penn State fan forced to watch the Sunday recap show with George Paterno because he couldn’t find the games on any of the three channels he got at home. Knowles also had known Franklin for years and spoken to him about the job before. Knowles flew to Oklahoma to see his fiancée for a few days and consider his options.

“Maybe I’ll take less because Ohio State’s a great place,” he said, “but then they asked me not to come to the parade. So then you’re like, ‘OK, honestly, the writing is on the wall.’ Now it becomes something. It’s always something on the outside world, but now it’s become something here, too. I hadn’t made any decisions, but you just kind of feel like — I wouldn’t say I’m not wanted here — but you just feel like, OK, now it’s gotten awkward.”

Meanwhile, at the national championship celebration, Ohio State coach Ryan Day was at the podium praising Knowles as “the defensive coordinator of the best defense in the country that was completely dominant in the playoff.”

Day declined comment for this story.

Knowles said a new deal at Ohio State was “really under question” in the days leading up to the national championship game, but nobody ever said his contract wouldn’t be extended. It just hadn’t happened as early as Knowles would have preferred.

“Ohio State didn’t want to do it,” he said. “And so then all of a sudden it becomes a rush at that point because people are trying to make decisions on other jobs. They want to know whether you’re interested or not.”

When asked about Knowles’ contract situation, Ohio State athletic director Ross Bjork declined comment.

Franklin said Penn State was already “pretty far along” in its search to replace former defensive coordinator Tom Allen, who left to take the same job at Clemson. Franklin had been considering a group of candidates that included some NFL assistants, college coordinators and a few head coaches that had been out of work.

And then Knowles entered the mix.

“But then, Ohio State’s trying to keep him,” Franklin said. “We’re involved. Oklahoma needs a defensive coordinator. Notre Dame needs a defensive coordinator. I think what people don’t realize a lot of times — even for these head coaching positions — there’s not as many obvious candidates out there that people think. It’s a smaller list than people realize. So now you’ve got four or five football powers all fighting over one guy at the end of the cycle.”

Franklin called his boss, athletic director Pat Kraft, and told him the price to hire Knowles.

“In years past, we wouldn’t have been able to do that,” Franklin said.

The difference?

“Pat and the president,” he said. “Not lip service to say we’re trying to win at the highest level.”

Knowles said the 2024 season at Ohio State was the toughest environment he had ever been a part of — there was “finger-pointing” at the defense after the 32-31 Oct. 12 loss at Oregon, and it was grueling piecing the team back together after its fourth straight loss to rival Michigan in November — but that’s not why he left.

“I don’t think it did,” Knowles said, referring to the pressure of coaching at Ohio State and if that affected his decision. “I mean, if I’m honest with myself, I don’t think it did. You become accustomed to it. It didn’t keep me up nights or anything like that. I’m up nights trying to get it right. But I did that when I coached at Cornell or Western Michigan. I was the same way. You grind over those details for the players because you don’t ever want to put them in a bad position or not have coached them something. You just become accustomed to the environment.”

When Knowles was first hired at Ohio State, he said former friends and teammates who were in the Columbus area tried to warn him “this is an incredibly difficult and highly scrutinized place to coach,” he said. “Fans are tough.

“I kind of blew it off,” Knowles said. “I’m like, ‘I grew up in Philly. I’ve been around Eagles fans. We threw snowballs at Santa Claus.’ But yeah, when you’re in, it’s really tough.”

“It’s real,” he said. “Anybody who works there will — if they’re being honest — will tell you that it’s real. It’s almost like a badge of honor there. It’s like, ‘Oh yeah, well this is Ohio State. This is what you have to expect. This is just the way it is here.’ If you give up a touchdown but you win 63-7, somebody somewhere is going to have something to say about it.”

FRANKLIN SAID HE planned to take one full day this spring to watch the Nittany Lions’ past two games against Ohio State and go through Knowles’ scouting reports in detail. In 2023, Penn State lost 20-12 to Ohio State in Columbus after Knowles’ defense held the Nittany Lions to one touchdown. Last year, Penn State lost 20-13 to Ohio State, dropping Franklin’s record to 1-10 against the Buckeyes.

“We’ll as a staff dig into that deeply and spend a day grinding through it and hearing the tough feedback and asking tough questions,” Franklin said. “That’ll be really valuable.”

As Ohio State’s defensive coordinator, Knowles studied Penn State quarterback Drew Allar probably as much as anyone, and he has already shared his scouting report. Allar called it “eye-opening.”

The report included what Ohio State thought of Allar athletically, how he went through his progressions, and the tendencies he showed on film. Much of it was what his own Penn State coaches had already told him, but hearing it from a former opponent drilled it in.

“Knowing that other opponents saw it on film means it’s true, I have to get better in those areas,” Allar said. “And there were a couple unique things, like deep balls in general — I put a lot of air on balls down the field and I thought that was kind of unique. I never really heard that before and I thought that was a good perspective shift for me. There’s time to let the receivers run under the ball, but there’s times when you have to put it on them right away.”

Franklin said the players — and the staff — need “thick enough skin” to hear the feedback and “not be sensitive.” He’s looking for Knowles to educate the team on who Ohio State was concerned about when it played Penn State — and who the Buckeyes weren’t concerned about. What things did the Nittany Lions do well? Did they have any tendencies or indicators that were giving away pass or run plays?

In addition to sharing Ohio State’s perspective, Franklin said he asked Knowles to do an “honest evaluation” of the Nittany Lions’ offense following spring football practices — and he asked the same of offensive coordinator Andy Kotelnicki to provide a report on what he saw from Knowles’ defense.

“There’s some sensitivity to how you deliver that message because you’re peers and you’re working together,” Franklin said. “Whereas when he was the defensive coordinator at Ohio State, there was no sensitivity to it. This is how we see it — black and white. We’re not worried about anybody’s feelings. So to get that report, yeah, I think is powerful.”

Knowles downplayed any notion that his insider tips might make the difference in winning at Ohio State on Nov. 1.

“I don’t know about that,” he said. “There’s so much more to do to get ready.”

At the very least, Kotelnicki said Knowles has everyone’s attention because “he’s been there.”

“This is what we have to do,” Kotelnicki said. “Why? Because if we don’t, it’s going to cost you a game. And so yeah, you hope that his perspective in that area is the difference — or is part of the difference.”

PENN STATE OPENS the season with four straight home games — none bigger than Sept. 27 against Oregon, the first indicator of how seriously to take the Nittany Lions in the Big Ten and CFP races. Oregon was the only team able to score more than 17 points on Knowles’ Ohio State defense last fall.

Knowles said he never personally received any death threats following the loss to Michigan — as Day’s family did — and it was more difficult to go to work following the loss at Oregon because he felt “like I had let a lot of people down because defensively, we struggled.”

It was a different story in the CFP quarterfinal at the Rose Bowl, when Ohio State trounced the Ducks 41-21 on New Year’s Day.

Without quarterback Dillon Gabriel, and ranking No. 109th in the country in returning production (43%) according to ESPN’s Bill Connelly, Oregon looks vastly different than it did a year ago. Knowles, though, is still running the same defense at Penn State and again has NFL talent to execute it.

“They’ve consistently been very good,” Knowles said of the Nittany Lions’ defense. “I’m able to blend more concepts than just throw everything out and start over. I’ve been real mindful of that process. If I can create things that are similar to what they’ve done here, that’s what I’ve done — tried to err on the side of similar terminology. When you come into a defense that’s been pretty good, there’s a culture here. And I feel like coach Franklin has built that.

“You definitely see a real defensive mentality in the whole thing,” he said. “And so I thought, well, maybe I can be of service. You get to my age, and you’re like, ‘Where can I help the most? How can I add value?’ and just be a part of something that’s bigger than myself. When you’re in this business, sometimes you see situations where people get a hard time for winning 10, 11 games here. Maybe I can help.”

Franklin has won 80.2% of his games (97-24) against opponents not named Ohio State, Michigan and Oregon. He’s 4-18 against that trio. The Nittany Lions avoid Michigan for a second straight season but travel to Ohio State on Nov. 1 — where they haven’t won in six straight tries.

“Every year, it’s one or two games,” senior defensive end Dani Dennis-Sutton said. “Everybody knows the biggest teams. If we get over that hump as far as beating the big teams, then I think we’ll be where we want to be. For the past however many years, Penn State has always had a dominant defense — hard-nosed, blue-collar defense — but the last part is just coming up big in those big-time games and big-time moments.”

Dennis-Sutton is facing the lofty expectations of helping replace the production from former defensive end Abdul Carter, who was drafted by the New York Giants. Dennis-Sutton had 13 tackles for loss last year and 8.5 sacks playing opposite Carter.

To better understand Knowles’ defense, the Nittany Lions watched film of Ohio State’s defense. Senior defensive tackle Zane Durant said they watched a lot of the national title game against Notre Dame, and the win against Tennessee, plus some regular-season games to study “basic concepts early in the season.”

“It’s unique,” Durant said. “I’m learning a lot of stuff through coach Knowles. He’s a pro-style type of defense. I feel like this is beneficial for me, for my future and things like that and learning the game a lot more. He’s breaking it down in the details and depth, why we’re doing things, and kind of just giving us a bigger picture to why we do it, so it can help you retain the information more.”

Knowles is Penn State’s third defensive coordinator in as many seasons, but Knowles said he wouldn’t have joined a program he didn’t believe could contend for a national title. Unlike defenses he has been hired to resurrect in the past (see: Oklahoma State), Penn State’s defense isn’t broken.

“We’ve played them three years and the games have always been close,” Knowles said. “You see the investment financially. I noticed, like we had at Ohio State last year, you see guys coming back that could have moved on. I think that’s a very telling example of the health of the program.”

Dennis-Sutton is one of them.

He said Knowles’ defense has “so many different intricacies” in one play and it hasn’t been easy to learn.

“But once you learn it, you’re like, ‘Oh, OK, I see why he was the No. 1 defense,'” Dennis-Sutton said. “Because he has an answer for everything.”

The question will be if he has one for Ohio State.

The Stanley Cup playoffs can teach us something, whether it’s in success or in failure.

Sometimes these lessons stick. Sometimes they’re lost in time. Sometimes, by the end of the postseason, there are new lessons to learn.

Here are eight hard lessons from the 2025 Stanley Cup playoffs through Monday night’s action.

The Leafs are Cup-worthy

Yes, I mean the Stanley Cup. Why do you ask?

Oh right, because it’s the Toronto Maple Leafs. They haven’t played for the Cup since winning it for the final time in 1967, a drought of 56 seasons. They haven’t made the conference finals since 2002. There’s a reason the Stanley Cup is safe inside the Hockey Hall of Fame: There’s no chance of anyone in Toronto ever lifting it.

Every Maple Leafs postseason team drags a half-century of dashed expectations and self-inflicted despair like an anchor. Their most arduous opponent continues to be themselves, when they allow seeds of doubt to blossom into a funeral arrangement for their Stanley Cup aspirations.

So what do we make of a Toronto team that doesn’t allow those seeds to take root? Because this one hasn’t. This one has five wins in seven games over two rounds. This one has members of the Core Five — the Core Four of Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner, William Nylander and John Tavares, plus Matthew Knies, as ESPN’s P.K. Subban christened them — making clutch plays in big spots. More than anything, this one has the psychological stylings of Craig Berube, and now has proof of concept.

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William Nylander scores 33 seconds into game for Toronto

William Nylander scores less than a minute into Game 1 to give the Leafs an immediate lead over the Panthers.

When the St. Louis Blues won the Stanley Cup with Berube as coach in 2019, they might have been one of the mentally toughest teams to even hoist it. From being last in the NHL on Jan. 2 to the way they moved past calamity and controversies on the way to the championship, the Blues simply moved on in every sense of the phrase.

As assistant coach Larry Robinson put it in 2019: “We’ve been counted out at times all year in certain situations, and every time we were counted out, we came back. We had calls go against us in this series and other series. Most teams might have panicked and did something stupid. But they showed a lot of will and a lot of heart.”

When Berube was hired by Toronto, part of the pitch was that he could bring that stoic postseason focus to a franchise that only knew panic and “doing something stupid.” The theory was tested in the first round and the center held: The old Leafs would have panicked after losing Game 5 at home, dropped Game 6 in Ottawa and then lost back in Toronto for maximum fan anguish. Instead, they won Game 6 convincingly, and the Battle of Ontario was over.

In Game 1 of the second round against Florida, they jumped to a 2-0 lead and then a 4-1 lead, saw Anthony Stolarz leave with an upper-body injury and watched the Panthers rally … only to hold them off for the win.

Maybe this version is built differently. Maybe the harsh education of playoff failures has taught the Core Five how to win. Maybe they have the right coach to reinforce those lessons and block out the noise when adversity hits.

Maybe the Toronto Maple Leafs are Cup-worthy.

Or maybe I will regret this declaration by Game 6 of this series against Florida.

Maybe the playoffs are just high-scoring from now on?

When you think of a Game 7 in the Stanley Cup playoffs, what score do you imagine? Something tightly played with few scoring chances? Where the goalies are the true last lines of defense in a 2-1 nail-biter, in a game in which power plays will be handed out only for an obvious procedural faux pas (puck over the glass, too many men on the ice) or attempted murder?

Yet Game 7 between the Dallas Stars and Colorado Avalanche was a 4-2 game. And Game 7 between the Jets and Blues was a 4-3 game, despite advancing to two overtimes.

That’s part of a larger playoff trend. Through 47 first-round games, there were 307 goals scored for a 6.53 goals-per-game average. If that average held over the next three rounds, the 2024-25 postseason would be the highest scoring playoff since the 1992-93 season (6.84 goals per game).

If the average goals per game finished above six, that would mark three of the past four postseasons in which the mark was achieved. Again, you’d have to go back to 1992-95 to find a similar multiyear trend. In fact, the NHL went 26 seasons between playoffs that had an average goals per game of six or more goals (1995-2022).

Scoring has been up significantly in the NHL over the past eight seasons. Even with two seasons of year-over-year decline in goals per game — we’ve gone from 6.36 goals per game in 2022-23 down to 6.08 in this regular season — the NHL has been over six goals per game in six of the past seven seasons, with a small dip for the 868-game COVID season in 2020-21 (5.87).

One recent factor: Power plays continue to cook with bacon grease. The conversion rate this season was 21.6%, the ninth best all time and the highest since 1985-86 (22.2%). The NHL has had a leaguewide power-play success rate of better than 20% in six of the past eight seasons.

The conversion rate in the first round of the playoffs was 24.9%. That’s up from 20.6% for the entirety of last year’s postseason. Again, this is a multiyear trend: After having only one Stanley Cup postseason with a power play conversion rate above 20% in a 36-season span (1983-2020), the NHL has had a conversion rate higher than 20% in five straight postseasons.

The notion that the playoffs are a completely different sport than the regular season is hard to shake. But the numbers so far indicate that the regular-season goals bonanza has, for the time being, bled over to the postseason.

All future mic-drop performances by a player against his former team will be judged against what Rantanen did to eliminate the Avalanche in the first round.

He had 11 points in the last three games of the series, two of them victories for his Stars. Martin Necas, his frugal replacement in Colorado via a trade with Carolina, had four points in that span and none in Game 7.

Rantanen is the first player in NHL history — regular season or playoffs — to record four-point periods in back-to-back games. He’s the first player with 10 or more points in Games 5-7 in a series. He’s the first player to record a hat trick in the third period of a Game 7 and the first player to record a hat trick against his former team in a Game 7.

He’s in playoff beast mode. He’s a postseason MVP for Dallas. And he’s the kind of player that, quite frankly, the Avalanche could have used in this series.

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Mikko magic! Rantanen nets hat trick in 3rd period

Mikko Rantanen leads the Stars to a comeback win in Game 7 over his former team with a hat trick in the third period.

Whether Rantanen’s agent priced him out of Colorado or the Avalanche simply made a “tough business decision” for more cap flexibility with the hope of replacing him in aggregate, it was Colorado’s decision to trade Rantanen before free agency. If they don’t ship him to Carolina, then he’s on Nathan MacKinnon‘s wing in this series. Granted, some of the other moves Colorado made to better its roster at the trade deadline don’t happen either, but Rantanen would still be in Colorado and wouldn’t have been in Dallas — and that changes everything.

The Hurricanes hopped on Rantanen when he became available in the hopes of signing him long term — which didn’t happen — but also because of his reputation as a playoff stalwart. He had 101 points in 81 career playoff games entering this postseason. That included 25 points in 20 games when the Avalanche won the Stanley Cup in 2022.

Give Carolina credit: The Hurricanes identified and acquired two clutch playoff scorers over the past two seasons that live up to the hype in Rantanen and Jake Guentzel, who was easily the best thing about the Tampa Bay Lightning in their first-round loss to Florida. It’s just that the Hurricanes couldn’t hang on to either, and in Rantanen’s case didn’t even get to see him suit up in the playoffs.

The Hockey Gods gave us Mikko Rantanen against his former teammates in Colorado in the opening round, a player getting his “revenge” on a team that moved on from him. Will they give us Mikko Rantanen against his former teammates in Carolina in the final round, with a team getting its “revenge” on a team that moved on from them?

You never know with those Hockey Gods. They’re cheeky like that.

The key to rallying in Game 7 is missing your second-leading scorer and top defenseman

Admittedly, it’s a small sample size.

But the Stars rallied from a two-goal deficit in the third period of Game 7 to eventually eliminate the Avalanche without injured Jason Robertson (80 points) and Miro Heiskanen (25:10 per game in ice time), who both sat out the series.

Then the Winnipeg Jets rallied from a two-goal deficit in the third period of Game 7 to eventually eliminate the St. Louis Blues without injured Mark Scheifele (87 points), who sat out Games 6 and 7, and Josh Morrissey (24:23 per game in ice time), who played only four shifts in the first period of Game 7 before leaving because of a shoulder injury.

Clearly, not having two of your most important players in the most critical game of the season portends good things.

OK, I understand the counterargument: Perhaps with both of those players in the lineup, there might not have been the need for a Game 7. This is a bit like the “Pete DeBoer is 9-0 in Game 7s” lesson, one that ignores that he’s also 7-15 in Game 6s and 5-7 with a chance to clinch in Game 6. It’s results over process.

But I’d counter that counter with a little Ewing Theory. That was the philosophy popularized by former ESPN Page 2 pundit Bill Simmons that the teams on which Basketball Hall of Famer Patrick Ewing played — Georgetown University and the New York Knicks — would “inexplicably play better when Ewing was either injured or missing extended stretches because of foul trouble.”

Now, Ewing Theory doesn’t apply to every situation. Witness the New Jersey Devils meekly exiting the postseason in five games against Carolina without injured Jack Hughes. But it’s not just about success or failure in a star player’s absence. It’s also an education about how individual players react in their absence. Witness Nico Hischier, who had two goals in his first 17 regular-season games and then had four goals in five playoff games without Jack Hughes (and Luke Hughes, for four games) against Carolina.

Without Heiskanen, who played the most minutes against Nathan MacKinnon‘s line back in January, the Stars relied on Cody Ceci and Esa Lindell to slow him in Game 7. MacKinnon had a goal, but that was it. Without Robertson, Mikko Rantanen stepped up with 11 points in the last three games of their series.

Without Scheifele, captain Adam Lowry skated more than 14 minutes with Kyle Connor and Alex Iafallo on the top line in Game 7, and they had a plus-21 advantage in shot attempts and combined for the double-overtime winner. Cole Perfetti scored three goals with Scheifele out, including two in Game 7.

“Him scoring in St. Louis was big. Then he gets two big ones tonight,” coach Scott Arniel said of Perfetti. “That’s the evolution you want. For a guy that doesn’t have much experience this time of year, I like his response in a heavy, heavy series.”

Without Morrissey, Winnipeg rolled with five defensemen. Neal Pionk and Dylan Samberg played more than 44 minutes each, and Haydn Fleury had the game of his life with 33:02 in ice time.

“What a yeoman’s effort by a defense. They had a different partner every shift. It was guys stepping up. That’s what we needed,” Arniel said.

Of course, getting their second-leading scorer and top defenseman back are really what they need. Maybe in Round 2 …

The fourth time actually isn’t the charm

There were reasons to expect that the Los Angeles Kings could eliminate the Edmonton Oilers in the first round, despite failing to do so for three straight postseasons.

The Oilers were wildly inconsistent defensively this season in front of the goaltending battery of “hopes” and “prayers,” and were missing key defenseman Mattias Ekholm. Edmonton’s hockey demigods Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl had both sat out games near the end of the regular season because of injury.

The Kings themselves seemed primed to shut them down, with the best regular-season goals-against average (2.48) and goaltender (Vezina Trophy finalist Darcy Kuemper) that they’ve brought to the table with the Oilers sitting across from them. The margin between these teams had been razor thin: Since 2023, 10 of the 12 playoff meetings were decided by a one-goal margin or saw the game-winning goal scored in the third period.

But the reason so many people believed the Kings would defeat Edmonton — and 16 of the 26 ESPN pundits did! — is because the fourth time had to be the charm. How could virtually the same teams play in four straight postseasons and have one team win every time?

Well, history tells us that’s how these things go, actually. Since 1968 (a.k.a. the “expansion era”), there has been only one other stretch in which the same two teams faced each other in the opening round for four straight seasons: Montreal faced Boston from 1984 to 1987 — and won every time.

But hey, fourth time’s the charm! Ask the Buffalo Bills, who played the Kansas City Chiefs four times in five postseasons and … lost every time. Now imagine that instead of one Patrick Mahomes there are two of him, and that’s what the Kings faced against the Oilers in perennial MVP candidates Draisaitl and McDavid.

It doesn’t help when, after a promising start with two wins at home, the Kings embarked on a series of self-owns punctuated by the worst coaching performance in the first round by Jim Hiller. His coach’s challenge in Game 3 handed the win to Edmonton, giving the Oilers a power play for delay of game after tying it 4-4. His decisions to sit on leads, his refusal to utilize his depth players … it was a defeatist approach against a team that preys on weakness.

But hey, given the current playoff format, there’s always next year. This time with a new general manager, as this latest playoff dud cost Rob Blake his job in L.A.

Super Mega Lines rule

The key to winning the Stanley Cup is to have contributions from throughout the lineup. Depth can be the decider between hoisting the chalice or getting crushed under the weight of playoff pressure.

All that said: It absolutely rocks when teams decide to load up with three ridiculously talented players to form a Super Mega Line.

The Vegas Golden Knights have one with Jack Eichel, Mark Stone and William Karlsson. Coach Bruce Cassidy deployed them after winger Pavel Dorofeyev missed Game 6 with an injury, sending out his trio of defensive aces to handle Kirill Kaprizov‘s line, and watched them slow down and outscore the Wild’s best offensive unit in the elimination game.

“Everyone stepped up at different parts of the series and found ways to contribute,” Eichel said. “That’s how you win this time of year.”

In limited minutes, the Golden Knights trio had a 67.7% expected goals percentage.

Stone and Eichel started to come alive late in the Minnesota series, with points in each of the last three games, all Vegas wins. Maybe Cassidy keeps them with Karlsson to take on either Connor McDavid or Leon Draisaitl. Maybe they’ll have to take on both Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl. The Oilers are no stranger to Super Mega Lines themselves.

Regular-season awards darlings do not portend playoff success

When I’m talking about regular-season awards, I’m not talking about the Presidents’ Trophy, which as we all know is actually cursed. Only eight teams that finished first overall in the NHL since 1986 have gone on to win the Stanley Cup. The last time that happened was Chicago in 2013. Since then, and since the NHL moved to a wild-card playoff format, no team that finished first overall has even played in the Stanley Cup Final, let alone won it, with two teams having lost in the opening round.

Ticktock, Winnipeg.

No, I’m talking about NHL individual awards. Take Cale Makar, the odds-on favorite to win the Norris Trophy this season for the second time in his career. The player who 71.7% of his peers said was the best overall defenseman in the NHL and earned a Ted Lindsay nomination.

Where was that guy in the first round?

The scoresheet said Makar had five points in seven games. Three of those points came in the Avs’ 7-4 Game 6 victory at home. He also had assists in the first two games of the series. But he went scoreless in four games against Dallas, including a meek Game 7 performance in which he was a minus-1, took a third-period tripping penalty and had only one shot on goal.

Dallas did something similar last postseason, as Makar went scoreless in three of their six games and had one assist and two shots in Colorado’s Game 6 loss.

“I’ve got to be a lot better,” Makar said before Game 6. “I think there’s been glimpses where I’ve been pretty good. There’s a lot of things I can do a lot better.”

Something was going on with Makar in that series.

Something’s been going on with Connor Hellebuyck for three series.

Look, he was solid in the third period and the two overtimes in Game 7 against St. Louis, balancing out two iffy goals he gave up earlier in the game. But there’s not a Game 7 without Connor Hellebuyck.

That’s not meant to be a compliment. If he’s anything better than a shooter tutor in any of those three games in St. Louis, then the Jets don’t need Game 7 to move on. But he wasn’t. He was terrible. He was pulled three times, and ended with a .758 save percentage and a 7.24 goals-against average on the road. In the past 40 years of Stanley Cup playoff hockey, that’s the worst save percentage by any goalie on the road, with a minimum of three road games and 50 shots faced.

Over the past three postseasons, Hellebuyck is 1-7 with an .838 save percentage and a 5.19 goals-against average on the road.

Look, I’m happy for Hellebuyck. This was a nightmare round for him, and now he gets a chance at reputation mending against Dallas, along with a chance to reestablish his claim on the Team USA Olympic crease by outdueling Jake Oettinger, who is very much ready to claim it himself.

But along with that, his Game 7 sigh-of-relief win means that we won’t have to suffer through the supreme awkwardness of a goalie who helped cost his team a first-round playoff series for the third season winning the NHL’s award for best goaltender for the second year in a row — and potentially also being named its most valuable player.

The Capitals’ front office is just showing off now

Look at the top 10 scorers for the Washington Capitals after the first round against the Montreal Canadiens.

That’s where the list of homegrown Caps ends.

Dylan Strome (nine points) was a castoff from the Chicago Blackhawks. Anthony Beauvillier, who had five points, is on his sixth team in three seasons, having been acquired from the Pittsburgh Penguins at the deadline. Brandon Duhaime was a free-agent signing and given a career high of 13:21 in average ice time.

Jakob Chychrun and Pierre-Luc Dubois were “buy-low” trade acquisitions last offseason, with Dubois’ appeal at nearly toxic levels due to his contract and his crashing out in Los Angeles. Andrew Mangiapane was another trade addition. Trevor van Riemsdyk was a free-agent pickup in 2020 who blossomed in Washington.

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Caps score empty-net goal, celebrate series win vs. Canadiens

Brandon Duhaime scores an empty-net goal for the Capitals that secures their Game 5 win over the Canadiens.

I’ve written before about Washington’s stunning retool around Ovechkin, the deftness of the front office and the way the organization develops and enhances talent. It’s been on display so far in the playoffs. Frankly, it’s underappreciated.

The Capitals are significant underdogs against Carolina. These two teams are way more evenly matched than the odds suggest, with Washington having a significant advantage in having home ice.

“We just know the ins and outs of a lot of their systems because we play the same thing,” Capitals coach Spencer Carbery said. “It just becomes two teams [deciding] who can do it better and who can do it more consistently for a long period of time.”

Continue to underestimate the Capitals at your own peril, Eastern Conference. They’ve got depth, chemistry, goaltending and, if all else fails, the greatest goal scorer in NHL history on the power play.

NEW YORK — Devin Williams‘ nightmare season continued Monday night with another poor outing in the New York Yankees‘ 4-3 loss to the San Diego Padres at a rainy Yankee Stadium.

The right-hander entered in the eighth inning with the Yankees leading 3-0. He exited with two outs — both on strikeouts — and the bases loaded after yielding a hit and two walks, leaving Luke Weaver, who recently replaced him as the club’s closer, to clean the mess. But Weaver surrendered a pair of two-run hits to squander the lead as the Yankees fell to 19-16.

Williams was charged with three runs, increasing his ERA to 10.03 in 14 games this season. He departed to another smattering of boos from a scant crowd that stuck around to brave the elements and watch his first appearance at home since being demoted from the closer role.

But unlike his previous disappointing outings, Williams is confident the appearance was an outlier and attributed his performance to his inability to adjust to the sloppy conditions in the rain.

“Both walks were obviously not what you’re trying to do, but I was kind of battling myself there with the landing spot,” Williams said. “Tough to control the fastball today.”

Williams said his trouble with the landing spot affected his fastball’s release point. The right-hander threw seven of his 12 fastballs for balls, mostly yanking them to his glove side.

He appeared sharp when he struck out Martin Maldonado on four pitches to begin his outing. He also struck out Fernando Tatis Jr. on a changeup with runners on first and second base before Tatis was ejected for expressing his discontent with the strike zone.

But Williams walked Tyler Wade on six pitches, spraying four around the strike zone; yielded a single to Brandon Lockridge on an 0-2 fastball; and surrendered a four-pitch free pass — all fastballs — to Luis Arraez to load the bases and end his night.

Weaver then gave up a two-run double to Manny Machado and a two-run single to Xander Bogaerts to lose the lead. The fourth run was charged to Weaver — the first earned run he has given up this season. The right-hander has an 0.59 ERA over 15⅓ innings this season.

“I feel good, I feel confident on the mound,” Williams said. “I felt like I was in a good spot. It’s one of those nights where you’re not only battling the hitter, I was battling the mound. But we’re all given the same set of circumstances and I couldn’t pull through tonight.”

The 30-year-old Williams was a slow starter in his six-plus seasons with the Milwaukee Brewers, but he never struggled nearly to this extent.

Williams posted a 1.83 ERA in his time in Milwaukee, winning 2020 NL Rookie of the Year and making two All-Star teams behind his elite screwball-like changeup known as The Airbender. He gave up 13 earned runs in 80⅓ innings across 83 appearances as the Brewers’ closer over the past two seasons. He already has matched that earned run total in only 11⅔ innings with the Yankees.

“The biggest thing, again, is just command and being ahead and not putting guys on,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “Stuff’s there. Stuff’s fine and I do believe he’ll get on a roll and be lights out and dominant. But the command part of it, where the walks or getting behind in certain situations, have hurt him a little bit.”

Boos from the home crowd have accompanied the struggles. Williams heard them when he struggled on Opening Day. And he heard them again as he gave up three runs to the Toronto Blue Jays without recording an out on April 25 — his last appearance as the Yankees’ closer, at least for the time being.

On Monday, Carlos Rodon, who sparkled over 6⅔ scoreless innings, voiced his support to Williams after his appearance. Two years ago, Rodon was the recipient of boos during his dreadful, injury-plagued first season in the Bronx. He understands the pressure. He wants his teammate to just stay the course.

“I’ve been through it,” Rodon said. “I know what that feels like. It’s not easy. But we acquired him for a reason. He’s such a great pitcher. Just needs to build that confidence and he needs to know what kind of pitcher he is. He’s so good. He’s tremendous. We got him for a reason and it’s an unbelievable changeup. Just go out there and pitch with some swagger.”