If the return of the NHL has felt like it's slipping under the radar a bit—not for you, of course; you've studied Lauren's preview like it's the Dead Sea Scrolls—blame it on the season's soft launch. Is it truly an Opening Day if there are five separate opening days depending on the team? Some clubs won't play their first meaningful hockey until Friday, a full week after the lads were getting after it in Prague. It doesn't help that many of the games so far, including those Czechia games and Tuesday night's tripleheader, have involved teams that still sound a little fake to me: the "Utah Hockey Club," the "Seattle Kraken," the "Buffalo Sabres."
But it is real, regular-season action, and I come bearing video to prove it. The Utah Hockey Fellas are, of course, the old Arizona Coyotes in everything but name. (It's all the same players, but the history and intellectual property belong to the league, after Alex Meruelo renounced them upon not being able to get a new barn. Those now purely theoretical Coyotes also possess the history of the original Winnipeg Jets, not to be confused with the current Winnipeg Jets, who own the history of the Atlanta Thrashers. Aren't sports fun?) So this is not an expansion roster—despite the temporary lack of a name, and the tenancy in a building that after a hasty first round of renovations only holds about 11,000 for hockey—and won't be dogshit, or at least no more dogshit than the Coyotes were. This is a real, big-boy hockey team, and Salt Lake City fans, who turned out in strong numbers to buy season tickets, were ready to welcome them. In their first game, hosting the Blackhawks (who are dogshit), Dylan Guenther made sure the fans didn't have to wait longer than five minutes.
I'm officially designating Guenther as one of my Western Conference Guys To Pay Moderate Attention To. The 21-year-old right wing, picked ninth overall in 2021, got his first real call-up last January as an injury replacement but immediately showed enough pop that he wouldn't be sent back down. In 45 games to close the season, he put up 18 goals and 17 assists. He's got a dangerous shot and likes lining up from long-distance—there's more than a little Stamkos in his hockey DNA. Playing on a line centered by Logan Cooley, who assisted on both of Guenther's goals (including an empty-netter) in a 5-2 win, he's going to get a ton of good looks, and I can't imagine him turning many of them down. Utah feels pretty confident about this guy already, signing him last month to an eight-year, $57 million extension.
While trying not to get too excited about a win over Chicago, UHC might be ... pretty good? Or at least certainly not terrible. The forward group, headed by Guenther, Cooley, Lawson Crouse, and team captain Clayton Keller, is young and talented and can trade goals with anyone. Their defense, improved by the addition of Mikhail Sergachev, might be serviceable. Goal is a bit of a question mark still. But in a Central Division where nothing is a sure thing besides Colorado and Dallas, they could very easily be in that second-tier pack scrapping for a playoff spot.
And they've got a good, hearty goal horn. Things are looking up on the lake.
