The Tampa Bay Lightning don’t have many high-end prospects in their system, but one of them keeps adding big goals to his resume. Over the weekend, Michigan State needed just one goal to advance to the Big 10 Championship games as they beat Notre Dame, 1-0. Guess who scored that goal? Isaac Howard.
It was Howard’s 24th goal of the season as the Hobey Baker Finalist continues his career-best season with the Spartans. More importantly, when the spotlight is the brightest, Howard has been at his best. Case in point, the 2024 U20 World Juniors where he put up 7 goals in 7 games, including the game-winner in Team USA’s 6-2 gold medal winning game.
The second-ranked Top 25 Under 25 prospect also had helpers in the semi-final and final games of the Big 10 championship last season when the Spartans won the title. Some players just know how to show up when it counts and Howard is developing into that type of player. Can he carry that over into professional hockey? We could find out pretty soon as he is likely to turn pro after Michigan State’s season is over.
It could be a few more weeks as the Spartans will be a top seed in the NCAA Frozen Four tournament regardless of the outcome of the game against Ohio State on March 22nd.
Lightning News
Could Steven Stamkos return to the Lightning? [Raw Charge]
The bigger question would be, does Stamkos want to come back? Maybe towards the end of the contract (which, to be fair, is what Encina points out in this article), but we think it would be less likely than Ryan McDonagh or Yanni Gourde coming back.
Crunch’s big weekend [Syracuse Crunch]
After a season-long struggle to put the puck in the net, the Crunch’s offense exploded over the weekend as they beat the Springfield Thunderbirds twice this weekend. On Friday it was a 9-4 thrashing. They followed that up on Saturday with an 8-3 win. The wins propelled Syracuse into fourth place in the North Division with 14 games to go in the regular season.
A look at some of Oliver Bjorkstrand’s rookie cards [Hockey Bay Cards]
Looking to invest in the new guy? Here are a couple of cards to look at.
Hockey News
Top NCAA Free Agents [Daily FaceOff]
We chatted about Luke Haymes a couple of weeks ago, but here are some more names that should be signing pro contracts pretty soon.
How Jake O’Brien became one of the top 2025 draft prospects [The Athletic]
Let’s keep chatting about the prospects shall we? Unless things change drastically over the next few months, O’Brien won’t be around when the Lightning have a pick, but it’s still a nice story.
PWHL games sets U.S. attendance mark for women’s hockey [ESPN]
The Minnesota Frost and New York Sirens met for a routine hockey game at Little Caesars Arena in Detroit. Oh yeah, 14,288 fans joined them in the building, setting a record for a PWHL game played in the United Stats.
Utah Hockey Club players get free eggs from teammate [Sports Illustrated]
Mikhail Sergachev has found a way around the high cost of eggs these days. The man raises his own chickens. With the birds producing more eggs than he can eat, Sergy has been sharing them with his teammates.
