The Utah Hockey Club is scorching hot. They have won six of their last eight games and three of their last four since returning from the 4 Nations Face-Off break. Utah now sits just two points behind the Vancouver Canucks for the second Western Conference wildcard playoff spot. With the team seemingly peaking at the right time, let’s check in on some news and what Utah has seen over the last week.
Clayton Keller Voted NHL Player of the Week
Following Clayton Keller’s five-point night against the Minnesota Wild, the NHL announced him as the NHL’s Player of the Week for February 22 to 27. Over this stretch, Keller had nine points and seven assists, leading the NHL throughout the week.
When asked about Keller’s performance recently, Utah head coach Andre Tourigny said Keller is playing the best hockey of his career, which is backed by Keller being on pace for 95.8 points this season, which is well above his career-high 86 points he set in 2022-23. However, it has not just been the point production that’s been impressive. Tourigny added that “He plays solid defensively. He’s really competitive, he gets inside, he’s good on the forecheck,” and that “His game is the most complete it’s been,” (via Cole Bagley).
Keller is the second Utah player to be voted the NHL’s Player of the Week this season. The first was Dylan Guenther in the first week of the NHL season, leading the league with five goals. The only other Utah player to receive Player of the Week votes this season was Barrett Hayton, who was voted the third star of the week in the final week of January. All three of these players are scorching hot right now, and if they can maintain their level of play, Utah has a good chance of getting into the playoff bracket.
Sean Durzi Scores First Goal for Utah
Sean Durzi returned to Utah’s lineup for the first time in 52 games in Utah’s first game back from the 4 Nations Face-Off against the Los Angeles Kings. Durzi wasted no time finding the stat sheet in his first game back with an assist. Then, in his fourth game since getting back in the lineup, he found the back of the net on a seeing-eye shot from the point.
Durzi’s impact hasn’t just been on the stat sheet. He impacts the game in so many ways. As Keller said before Durzi’s return from injury, “He’s such an underrated player. So smart. Really good with the puck…If you’re playing up front, you want him to be out there on the ice because he’s going to find you.” This same sentiment was echoed by Michael Kesselring, who said, “He’s really underrated, I feel like, in our league. He’s a very good D-man…He blocks shots. He’s kind of a warrior out there…we all know what he can do with the puck,” (via Cole Bagley).
In the eight games with Durzi on the ice this season, Utah is controlling 57.40% of the shot attempts, 61.16% of the shots on goal, 61.75% of the expected goals, 60.68% of the scoring chances and 69.09% of the high-danger chances at 5-on-5. In addition to his massive impact at 5-on-5, Utah’s power-play percentage is 36.4% with Durzi in the lineup, compared to 22.1% in the 52 games Durzi missed. It also must be noted that Utah is 6-1-0 in the seven full games Durzi has played and has outscored opponents 29-19 over that stretch (via Cory Wilkins).
Karel Vejmelka Taking the Starter’s Role
If you go by the games played, Karel Vejmelka looks like he has been Utah’s starting goalie for most of the season. However, this doesn’t capture that Connor Ingram got the net in 12 of Utah’s first 15 games. Given his poor first three seasons in the NHL, Vejmelka was stuck in a backup role, as he should have been. However, he finally earned his first back-to-back starts of the season after holding the Carolina Hurricanes to just one goal while making 49 saves in a game back in mid-November.
At the time, I speculated that this was the first shift in Utah, where Utah was leaning toward Vejmelka as more of a starter or tandem goalie with Ingram. But following Vejmelka’s first set of back-to-back starts, Ingram left Utah’s next game with an injury, which forced Vejmelka into the starting role.
Related: Utah’s Hot Goaltending Could Make Connor Ingram Expendable
Vejmelka went on to start 19 of Utah’s next 23 games. He was phenomenal in Ingram’s absence and probably deserved to be the starting goalie. However, once Ingram returned, Tourigny gave Ingram the chance he deserved to get his starting job back. However, Ingram continued to struggle, and now it is safe to say Vejmelka has assumed the starting role on this team, given he has started five of Utah’s last six games in net and has saved 8.33 goals above expected compared to Ingram, who has allowed 11.11 goals to be scored above expectation. Utah’s most significant concern coming into the season was goaltending, but Vejmelka’s performance quickly turned Utah’s goaltending from a problem area to a considerable strength.
Stats via Natural Stat Trick
