Terry grows into his talent, Power's Calder case, and 5 other NHL items

The Anaheim Ducks fell 5-3 to the Los Angeles Kings on Thursday night. The season-ending loss, Anaheim's 59th in 82 games, secured the highest odds to land the first overall pick in the highly anticipated 2023 draft lottery on May 8.

Buried under the buzz about top prospects Connor Bedard and Adam Fantilli was another productive night from Ducks winger Troy Terry. Terry, who recorded at least one point in 11 of his final 13 games, has silenced any doubters by posting consecutive 60-point seasons while on a terrible team.

"I've followed up last year and proved to myself and everyone that this is the player I am and that it wasn't a one-year thing," Terry, who was picked 148th overall in the 2015 draft, told theScore during All-Star Weekend in February.

Despite missing time due to injury and personal reasons, Terry accumulated 23 goals and 38 assists, including 22 primary helpers, for 61 points in 70 games. He's one of the most dangerous fast-break players on the planet - full stop. Heading into Wednesday's slate of games, Terry ranked third in one-on-one dekes per game, seventh in scoring chances generated off the rush per game, and ninth in zone entries per game, according to Sportlogiq tracking.

The Denver product and 2017 World Junior Championship sensation (remember all of those silky shootout goals?) is an elite dangler. The clip below is a sampling of the kind of one-on-one magic Terry is capable of.

"It's funny," Terry said, "because that's something everyone used to tell me: 'You're not going to be able to do that at the next level.'" Well, he definitely can, and this year, Terry drew 33 penalties - many off one-on-one dekes.

Math was always his best subject in school, which is appropriate. He studied business in college, excelling in accounting, finance, and calculus classes. Now he studies opposing defenders in real time. Terry has said if he weren't a high-end athlete, he'd probably be pursuing a career in engineering.

The 25-year-old has also realized the mental health benefits of engaging in interests outside of hockey and generally unwinding when not at the rink. As a rookie and sophomore, hockey was all he thought about.

"I got sent down to the AHL my first year, and it was like my life was ending," Terry recalled. The physiological and emotional side, he added, is "something not many people talk about, but it's the hardest part of pro sports."

"My emotions and how I was as a person was almost decided by how hockey was going," he said. "I was letting everything affect me. And it's not to say I don't still go through hard times with hockey, but it's a little bit easier now."

Over the mental wall, Terry's three-year deal carrying a $1.45-million cap hit expires this summer. He'll be a restricted free agent with arbitration rights. There were no extension talks with the team during the season.

The lack of communication wasn't due to a lack of interest, however.

"I feel like I've grown up as a man and as a hockey player in Anaheim. A lot of these guys I had in my wedding party," Terry said. "I love being in Anaheim, and I'd love to be there long term."

Power's sneaky-good Calder case

Seattle Kraken forward Matty Beniers will probably win the Calder Trophy. A top-six center on a playoff-bound team, he paces all rookies in points (57) and is tied for the lead in goals (24). That said, Buffalo Sabres defenseman Owen Power, Benier's former NCAA teammate, shouldn't be glossed over.

Power's Calder case is more nuanced. His four goals and 35 points don't tell the whole story. He plays a complicated position and shines in less obvious ways. In fact, Power's top attribute is his ability to process the game quicker and better than others. Only 20, he already dictates the pace of play, and his level of poise with and without the puck is off the charts.

"He's kind of like Adam Fox but 6-foot-6," is how Sabres forward Casey Mittelstadt described Power. That's not only a huge compliment, but also an accurate take. Both are cerebral defensemen with strong three-zone impacts.

Buffalo head coach Don Granato trusts the kid, too. Ahead of the Sabres' final game of the season Friday night, Power ranks first among rookies in average ice time (23:48), and he's rarely skating against third- and fourth-liners. Check out the list of Power's 10 most common forward opponents: Alex Killorn, Nick Paul, Tim Stutzle, Steven Stamkos, David Pastrnak, Brad Marchand, Patrice Bergeron, Alex DeBrincat, Claude Giroux, and Carter Verhaeghe.

Incredibly, Power sits second in the entire league in five-on-five usage (19:43), trailing only Erik Karlsson. In those 1,542 five-on-five minutes, the Sabres have potted 87 goals while surrendering 71 - a cool plus-16 goal differential.

"OP's dominant right now, and he's only 20, so I can't imagine what he'll be like when he has a bit more man strength," Sabres defenseman Kale Clague said. "That's scary to think about."

Already a legitimate top-four blue-liner capable of carrying a partner (for the most part, Henri Jokiharju), Power possesses all the markings of a future superstar.

"What people who don't watch us super closely don't realize is that we have (Rasmus Dahlin), and Ras takes the first-unit power-play minutes. And rightfully so," Mittelstadt said. "But there's maybe five other teams in the league where OP wouldn't be running their power play. He's a rookie, and he plays 24 minutes a night, anyway. It's been pretty impressive, pretty crazy."

Hedman teaching son the ropes

I love outside-the-box angles, and I especially loved how former Washington Capitals beat writer Samantha Pell turned a curiosity into a fun piece titled, "For children of NHL players, grasping hockey as a job is a lot to process."

The 2019 story's angle: NHLers have a public-facing, travel-heavy job that might not seem like work at all to kids. So, at what age does an NHLer's kid start to truly understand what dad does for a living and what the gig entails?

Pell's story in mind, I recently asked Victor Hedman if Rio, his two-and-a-half-year-old son, has grasped that his father is a professional hockey player.

"I don't know if 'professional' is the right word," Hedman said with a laugh.

"He definitely knows I'm a hockey player," the Tampa Bay Lightning defenseman added. "I put my suit on, and he knows right away that daddy is going to play hockey. He'll go to the ice for warmup sometimes. That helps.

"He's really into it, in general, which is a lot of fun. He wants to be good right away when he's on skates, so he's not as patient as you would like. It will take time, and we'll see if he wants to do that moving forward. But he just loves it."

Rio "has no clue" what the NHL is, that it's the best league in the world, or that his dad is under pressure to perform, Hedman said. It makes sense, and it's also a bit funny.

Rio, proud brother of a newborn sister, has started to wrap his head around the concept of a road trip. If Lightning highlights are on the morning after a game, does that help instruct Rio on dad's whereabouts and overall celebrity?

"A little bit. But he's not that into hockey on TV," Hedman said, pausing a beat to deliver the punch line. "He'd rather watch his own stuff - cartoons."

Bruins' feats trump McDavid's

We were blessed with two all-time performances in the regular season.

Edmonton Oilers captain Connor McDavid essentially lapped the field with 153 points, 64 of them goals, while the Boston Bruins set an NHL record for wins (65) and points (135) on the back of an absurd plus-128 goal differential.

Until a few weeks ago, there seemed to be a debate brewing around which performance was more impressive. But the record-breaking set the Bruins apart - especially given how low expectations had been set back in the fall.

"Going into the season, people weren't saying, 'Oh, this team could break the record for most wins and most points.' I think they did all of that by surprise," TNT analyst Keith Yandle said, referring to Boston bringing in a new coach, icing top-six centers over 35, and starting the year with injuries to key players.

"I had them out of the playoffs. I thought they were old and moldy and washed up," added TNT colleague Paul Bissonnette, another former NHL player, during a conference call with reporters earlier this week.

The hockey world has become so accustomed to McDavid raising the bar - this year, posting the 15th-most points in a season ever while leading a historically good power play - that his exploits almost fly under the radar.

As host Liam McHugh noted, "It's unbelievably impressive how unimpressed we are with what McDavid does. We just kind of expect to be wowed."

Parting shots

Ron Hextall: The writing was on the wall for Hextall's tenure with the Pittsburgh Penguins. After a poor offseason, the goalie-turned-general-manager botched the trade deadline (none of his acquisitions - Mikael Granlund, Dmitry Kulikov, and Nick Bonino - worked out), wasting one of the final years of the Sidney Crosby-Evgeni Malkin-Kris Letang era. There's no guarantee Crosby and Malkin, who played all 82 games in the same season for the first time, remain healthy in 2023-24, when they'll be 36 and 37, respectively, or in 2024-25, the final year of Crosby's contract. Whoever is hired to replace Hextall, who was fired on Friday morning alongside president of hockey operations Brian Burke, must act decisively to squeeze every last ounce out of the Big Three. A full-scale rebuild is coming in a few seasons. In the meantime, the Penguins need to get after it with an aggressive retool.

Mullett Arena: In possibly the least shocking development of the season, the Arizona Coyotes finished last in NHL attendance. According to Hockey Reference, it's Arizona at 4,600 fans per game, then the 31st-place San Jose Sharks at 13,912 - a canyon-sized gap. That a franchise in a major pro sports league competed in a tiny rink built for a college program will always be embarrassing for the NHL. Yet the Coyotes made hay at Mullett Arena, where they'll be for at least two more seasons, earning the league's 19th-best home record (21-15-5). For context, they were last on the road (7-25-9).

Offensive boom: Goals, goals, goals. As of Friday morning, with just two of 1,312 games left on the schedule, there were a whopping 11 100-point scorers, the most in one season since 1995-96. The NHL also boasted five 50-goal scorers, the most since 2005-06 (Tage Thompson, who's at 47, can make it six). Meanwhile, the average game featured 6.36 goals, the highest rate since 1993-94, and the average power-play percentage rose to 21.32, the highest since 1985-86. And, to no surprise given the booming offensive stats, the average save percentage was down to .904, the lowest since 2005-06.

Takes, Thoughts, and Trends is theScore's biweekly hockey grab bag.

John Matisz is theScore's senior NHL writer. Follow John on Twitter (@MatiszJohn) or contact him via email (john.matisz@thescore.com).