Shots With Cotts: A Look Around the NHL With Yours Truly

Welcome to Shots With Cotts, the best way to improve your hockey fan Corsi. I’ll be your host, Cotts, and catch you up with a few stories from around the NHL each week. For those thinking, what is a Cotts??… It’s a college nickname many of my friends know me by, and I don’t know how it came to be either, but it stuck. The single syllable nature of the moniker, quite frankly, offers superior catchy rhyming potential to Austin, so let’s roll with it! On to the stories!

Hard to believe, the NHL season is already two weeks old. The seasons grow up so fast these days. Your division leaders are the Montreal Canadiens and New York Islanders out east, and the Nasvhille Predators and Anaheim Ducks in the west. The Buffalo Sabres are already in peak form to land a prime ticket for the Connor McDavid sweepstakes, and the Colorado Avalanche have a bevy of issues of their own to figure out.

John Tavares leading the league in scoring

One of the surprises of the early NHL season, is the New York Islanders. The Isles are sporting a 5-2-0 record, and are tied for the league lead with 25 goals through their first 7 games. The Isles are led by their captain, superstar John Tavares. Tavares is currently the NHL points leader, with 11.

Check out this filthy little shootout goal by number 91.

This is the final season the Islanders will be playing on Long Island, so it is cool to see them playing well. They will relocate to Brooklyn next season, and join the NBA’s Nets in the Barclays Center. The scoreboard positioning in the arena is sure to be frustrating for those with OCD.

PK Subban is a thrilling player

Subban showed off his exorbitant costume at a Habs Halloween bash recently. The MJ inspired thriller getup sure is frightening… but those in attendance probably weren’t as scared as

and

were in their nightmares of this PK Subban goal. Not the finest moment for the guys in burgundy and white.

You may not like Corey Perry, but your fantasy hockey team should

A pair for Perry… of hat tricks that is. Perry has not one, but two hat tricks on the season already… although I’m sure most of you already picked up on that. Hey, how about a pair of explanations. Maybe one reader learned what a pair is today…

To put that into context, the last hat trick scored by an Avalanche player was Matt Duchene on November 4, 2011. The Avs haven’t had more than a pair of hat tricks as a team since the 2007-08 season. The last guy in an Avs sweater to score two hat tricks in the same season? Milan Hejduk, in 2006-07.

Pretty impressive stuff for the antagonist of the Ducks. Looking through his highlights, he does a lot of damage from right between the circles with a wicked shot, but he also is dangerous on the rush, as evidenced by this play.

Gotta do what it takes to avoid a penalty

Zach Kassian, of the Vancouver Canucks, realized his team had too many men on the ice. He made a cheeky play to jump into the St. Louis Blues bench, and managed to avoid the penalty. A quick examination of the rulebook states:

During the play, the player retiring from the ice must do so at the players’ bench and not through any other exit leading from the rink. This is not a legal player change and therefore when a violation occurs, a bench minor penalty shall be imposed.

I guess technically Kassian did find a players’ bench, even if it wasn’t his own, and the refs missed the call. Funny stuff in St. Louis, and it was all good for the Canucks, as they won 4-1.

This is how the hockey gods drew it up… errr the wookie gods. I’m not sure.

Brent Burns has something going on for him with this look. Don’t know what… but something.

Well, hope you enjoyed your tour of the NHL. Make sure and swing by next week, so you can impress your hockey friends with your hockey knowledge! #ShotsWithCotts boys and girls. Tell your dog.