The 2025-26 NHL regular season continues to chug along with six Pacific Division teams in a rally for playoff positioning. Calgary and Vancouver may be down and out, but all bets are off when it comes to Seattle, Edmonton, Anaheim, LA, San Jose and Vegas. Currently the Pacific holds five of eight playoff tickets, including the Oilers and Sharks occupying both Western Conference Wildcard slots.
Will the Division hold strong and keep the Central from seizing an extra ticket or two? Time will tell. Today we put together one holiday gift for each Pacific Division team that may help them on their path forward.
Edmonton Oilers
Stan Bowman and the Edmonton Oilers made a pivot on the back end on Friday morning, making two trades that may shore up their position in net as well as fill a hole that they created on defence by shipping Brett Kulak.
Trade #1
To Pittsburgh:
G Stuart Skinner
D Brett Kulak
2029 second round draft pick
To Edmonton:
G Tristan Jarry
F Samuel Poulin
Trade #2
To Nashville:
2027 third round draft pick
To Edmonton
D Spencer Statsney
One can debate the value of both deals, but one thing is certain; Bowman is taking a major risk by handing the net to Tristan Jarry.
Is the Surrey, BC native a solid goaltender by NHL standards? He is a great goaltender. The only issue is that he is that he can be a terrible goaltender. Whether it’s s surprise stinker or an extended stretch of poor play, Tristan Jarry can be either the best goaltender in the NHL or one of the worst.
Could he catch fire and carry the Oilers through a playoff series?
Possibly, but he hasn’t shown that yet. The 30 year old has been given the reins for just one series in the three times the Penguins have made the playoffs with him on the roster and he lost to the New York Islanders in six, posting an .888 save percentage. A running joke among Isles faithful is that Jarry earned MVP of the series, for, well, playing poorly.
Overall, Jarry is 2-6-0 in the playoffs with a .891 save percentage. A stark contrast from .909 across 307 career regular season games.
For the Oilers, they get Dr. Jekyll’s special potion, with the hopes that they can keep one side of the netminder put safely away come spring.
The Gift: Dr. Jekyll’s Special Potion
Seattle Kraken
With a 12-10-6 record, the Kraken continue to spin their wheels just outside of the playoff bubble.
The lack of progression from some of their younger stars is the main culprit. Matty Beniers is in his fourth full season with the big team and isn’t playing like the two-way force that he was projected to be. Ryker Evans is still stuck at the bottom of the depth chart below Brandon Montour and Adam Larsson. 2022 fourth overall pick Shane Wright is evolving into the middle six center that he’s been developed to be with pedestrian offensive totals to match; 12 points in 28 games. 2019 second overall pick Kappo Kakko’s season is a wash with injury issues limiting him to 12 games and just three points.
Things didn’t always look this bad. 11-5-5 on Nov. 22, the Kraken were third in the Pacific and carried a playoff-worthy .643 points percentage.
If we could wave a wand that made every younger player start to realize their potential, we would give that. Unfortunately, we’re aiming for realism. The Kraken are three points out and have lost three shootouts. Columbus sits in second-last in the Eastern Conference, so they may be able to help them out.
The Gift: Kirill Marchenko, 5-for-5 shootout ace.
Vancouver Canucks
Things aren’t great in Canucks territory.
Sitting in last place with 25 points in 31 games, the season is effectively over.
Jim Rutherford and management are talking sell off.
Keifer Sherwood is on a 34 goal pace with 13 markers and the ask is rumoured to be a decent prospect and a first round pick. Lukas Riechel’s representation are looking for a crash landing out of the province.
The brightest story from this season might just be the mid-season emergence of Aatu Raty, who has five points in five December games.
Then there is Quinn Hughes.
Similar to the Calgary Flames in 2022, an American superstar appears to on the express line out of a Canadian market and has one year left on his contract after this season for management to salvage what they can.
The return is expected to be astronomical, as it should for one of the best puck managers in the sport.
Aside from an unlikely swap for Cale Makar, there is no replacing that level of elite skating and puck distribution, but the Canucks are reportedly asking for a younger centre to fill a void they they created by trading away both Bo Horvat and JT Miller.
The Gift: Ruby slippers to click. The team is in last place before Hughes has even been shipped. Good god. This sure doesn’t seem like Kansas.
Calgary Flames
While sitting in last place certainly felt assuring for fans, it’s surely also enjoyable to laugh at Canucks fans, whose team is about to hit a very familiar iceberg and somehow also found their way below Calgary in the standings.
The most enjoyable factor for Flames fans at this point of the season? Some well overdue silence from management after raking themselves over the coals not once, but twice, in November.
Management may not allowed to use the word “rebuild” but they can certainly rebuild without admitting it.
We can’t speak for everyone, but listening to the brain trust publicly bluffing their fan base in order to get what is likely an extra second round pick for Rasmus Andersson at the trade deadline isn’t fun. The actual on-ice product pretty good given Calgary’s 12-16-4 record. The team should keep it to that. At least for a while.
The Gift: Continued silence as they “drastically reconfigure.”
Anaheim Ducks
Things are good for the Ducks. Seven years of rebuilding and they’re finally surprising as first-half contenders.
A 19-11-1 record has them in second place in the Pacific. Beckett Senecke’s 26 points (10g, 16a) in 31 games has the 19 year old in first place in the rookie scoring race. Three of their top four producers are 21 or younger in Sennecke, Cutter Gauthier (34 points) and Leo Carlsson (39 points).
It’s not easy to find gifts for success stories. They’ve been given a Hall of Fame coach and a fresh start already.
With that said, not everyone is loving this season on the Anaheim Ducks. A victim of several healthy scratches due to a wealth of depth, it may be time to do something for 21-year-old defenceman Pavel Mintyukov.
The Gift: Pavel Mintyukov gets mercifully traded to a team with a vacant top four spot on the blue line.
San Jose Sharks
It’s hard to complain for San Jose fans.
Six more points than they had in the same amount of games last year on this date. The group is starting to climb out of a brutal rebuild. For a team with the most losses (263) since the beginning of the 2019-20 season, sitting above .500 is peachy.
With that said, there is much hockey to be played. Younger teams tend to lose momentum as the season goes on. We may see a regression after a 15-14-3 start.
En lieu of some contrived method of maintaining momentum, lets place a nice present under the tree.
The Gift: An extension for stay-at-home defenceman Mario Ferraro, who keeps the peace for the youngsters.
Los Angeles Kings
36 points in 30 games has the LA Kings humming at a comfortable .600 points percentage. They’re on a bit of a slide, going 4-2-4 in their last ten, but they have enough breathing room and games in hand to stay sweat-free for the time being.
Anze Kopitar continues his farewell tour after it went public that 2025-26 would be his final NHL season.
Corey Perry has cooled down after a red-hot debut as a King. Quentin Byfield continues his progression towards a number one center role. The rebuild has been organic and there is still a bit of gas left from the vets of old.
Old Guard Production
Drew Doughty: two goals, eight assists, 10 points
Anze Kopitar: six goals, ten assists, 16 points
Corey Perry: seven goals, seven assist, 14 points
The only standing issue is that this group has lost to the Edmonton Oilers in the first round for four consecutive post-seasons—and there is no assurance that they have figured out a way to get past them this year.
What might help them finally get past Edmonton?
The Gift: Winger Jonathan Marchessault from the Nashville Predators, who has eight points in six career playoff games against the Oilers.
Vegas Golden Knights
Another year, another contention season for the Golden Knights, who sit atop the Pacific Division with a 15-6-9 record and 39 points in 30 games.
Mitch Marner chose Vegas and has fit like a glove. Jack Eichel is 10th in scoring across the league with 40 points. Tomas Hertl projects for 34 goals and 60 points and is on a semi-retained cap hit of $6,750,000 until July 1, 2030.
Hey, remember that time they missed the playoffs? That must have been so awful. Poor Golden Knights fans.
One thing the team could use is the NHL pulling their players from the 2026 Winter Olympics. Jack Eichel, Mitch Marner, Tomas Hertl, Shea Theodore and Mark Stone project to make their respective teams and head coach Bruce Cassidy will serve as an assistant coach to Jon Cooper.
We’re sure that the Golden Knights as an organization, would love to see their core players compete in the medal rounds, but we’re also sure that a choice few are hoping for the rink conditions to be deemed unsafe so Vegas has a better shot at a deep playoff run.
The Gift: An Olympic Ice Saboteur
Stats courtesy of the National Hockey League and Cap Wages.
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