SLC Puck!

The Utah Mammoth lost 3-1 to Minnesota, but this wasn’t just about one bad night. Austin’s main takeaway is that the penalties absolutely buried Utah — 29 penalty minutes, seven Wild power plays, and two Minnesota power-play goals — while Utah’s own power play went 0-for-4.

But the bigger issue is what this game exposed: Utah keeps shuffling lines instead of letting real top-six chemistry build. Austin argues the Keller-Schmaltz and Cooley-Guenther duos are obvious, and now the Mammoth need to stop scrambling and commit to the right complementary piece.

Subscribe and listen here: full episode

Austin brought in Adrian Denny for a very specific conversation: the Mammoth goaltending panic, the trade that never happened, and whether fans should actually be freaking out after the Seattle loss.

Adrian’s big argument is that Utah’s front office isn’t operating on impulse. Bill Armstrong is checking on everything, Utah can be in every rumor because it’s a destination and has assets, but that doesn’t mean the team should blow up its cap flexibility because people got spooked by a bad three-game save percentage stretch.

Subscribe for more SLC Puck, and listen to the full episode here.

Utah lost 5-3 in Seattle, and Austin’s whole point is that this team keeps making life harder than it has to be because it isn’t getting the best goaltending on the ice. Seattle got a .917 night from Philipp Grubauer, while Karel Vejmelka stopped 18 of 22 for an .818 save percentage, and that keeps fitting a bad trend.

Over Utah’s last three games, Austin says the Mammoth goalies have posted a combined .774 save percentage while opposing goalies are at .892. That’s why the Connor Hellebuyck conversation suddenly feels a lot less theoretical and a lot more urgent.

Subscribe for more SLC Puck and listen to the full episode.

Utah split the Edmonton set, which should feel pretty good on paper: a 4-2 win in Edmonton, then a 6-2 faceplant in Salt Lake City. But the real point of the episode is simpler than the scorelines: this team looks good enough to matter, and the goaltending still looks like the thing that could drag it back to earth.

Austin also gives Kailer Yamamoto his flowers after a goal, 3 assists, and instant-impact minutes since Michael Carcone went week-to-week, while asking the uncomfortable Karel Vejmelka question out loud. The power play is still humming at 35.3%, the 5-on-5 process looks strong, and Utah might be better than its raw goals say. But if the crease stays shaky, that’s the conversation.

Subscribe and listen for the full Edmonton fallout and the big goalie debate.

The Utah Mammoth are officially the top net-rated team in the NHL, which is both hilarious and very real. Austin digs into what’s driving it: a 5-2-0 start, 27 goals scored, a plus-8 goal differential, and a win over Toronto where Utah survived despite going 0-for-4 on the power play and watching Dylan Guenther live in the penalty box.

Then it turns into the real test: two straight against Edmonton. Connor McDavid has 17 points in 6 games, Evan Bouchard somehow has 14 points from the blue line, and the Oilers are averaging 4.8 goals per game. If Utah wants to keep this net-rating throne, the path is simple and terrifying: stay out of the box.

Subscribe and listen for the full breakdown.

The main thing from this episode: Utah coming home with 6 of 10 points on a five-game trip is good, but the bigger issue is Logan Cooley still not having a goal through six games. Austin’s case is pretty direct — Cooley himself admitted he hasn’t been enough of a shooting threat, and the Buffalo 2-on-1 was the clearest example yet.

Utah’s power play is humming at 10-for-25 and the overall process at 5-on-5 actually looks strong, but Cooley’s even-strength mindset has to change. He’s been a really useful distributor on the power play, yet if he wants to be in that top young-star tier, he has to start taking the shot when it’s there and burying chances like that one against Buffalo.

Subscribe for more SLC Puck and listen to the full episode for the full road-trip recap and the Cooley breakdown.

Utah got drilled 6-1 in Boston, and the ugly part is how many different ways it went wrong at once. The power play came in running at 61.5% and went 0-for-7, while Boston went 3-for-4 and David Pastrnak basically turned the game into a personal project.

The weird part is Utah still outshot Boston 37-22 and generated 4.5 expected goals to Boston’s 2.33, which tells you this was part regression-to-the-mean, part Jeremy Swayman brick wall, and part a brutal night in net for Sebastian Cossa and Karel Vejmelka. Clayton Keller’s version is still the right one: flush the toilet and get ready for Buffalo.

Subscribe for more SLC Puck, and listen to the full episode for the full Boston autopsy.

Utah beat New Jersey 5-3, but this one felt bigger than two road points. The Mammoth went 2-for-4 on the power play, got Clayton Keller’s first of the season 1:57 into the game, and saw Nick Schmaltz stay absurdly hot with a goal and two assists.

But the real story was the attitude. Utah out-hit the Devils 24-10, survived a late 6-on-4 after MacKenzie Weegar’s third penalty, and Jack McBain turned Brenden Dillon’s forehead into modern art. This team doesn’t just want to beat you anymore. It wants you to remember it.

Subscribe and listen for the full late-night postgame spiral.

This one is a free SLC Puck Plus preview, and it is absolutely not for children. Austin digs into the NHL’s bizarre “Hot for Hockey” campaign, the hockey-smut boom around stuff like Heated Rivalry and Off Campus, and why the league’s 60-to-90 second romance-audio idea got yanked almost immediately.

The core take: the NHL didn’t fail because the campaign was too strange. It failed because it tried to wink at the bit instead of fully committing, then backtracked when players clearly hated seeing Connor McDavid, Jack Eichel, Trevor Zegras, Sebastian Aho and even Gritty dragged into it.

Subscribe for more SLC Puck Plus chaos and listen now.

Three games is absolutely enough time to overreact, so let’s do it responsibly: the Utah Mammoth look better than last year. Even after the 4-2 loss at Madison Square Garden, this team is controlling play, piling up shots, and turning the power play into an actual weapon instead of a tax audit.

Austin gets into the 93-55 shot differential through three games, the absurd 6-for-9 power play, the perfect 9-for-9 penalty kill, and the moment the whole team jumped in after Dylan Guenther got shoved dangerously from behind by Will Cuylle. Also: why Karel Vejmelka might be doing a little too much.

Subscribe for more SLC Puck and listen to the full episode.