Only two games last weekend, so not a lot of change in the standings.

Standings, December 18

Going into the mid-season break it’s very tight from second to fifth place, and then we have a series of clusters: 6th and 7th, 8th and 9th, 10th through 12th, 13th through 15th, 16th through 18th... everyone can at least hope to rise to the top of their little cluster, and perhaps to break away from their peloton and make it to the next group. This in fact happened for this week’s highest scorer, Frankel My Dear, I Don’t Give A Damn, who didn’t change their ranking but moved from top of the 15th through 18th cluster to the bottom of the 13th through 15th cluster. Still all to play for! Well, not all.

What happened last weekend?

Hurst But No Mercy: Ohio State needed overtime to beat Mercyhurst 2-1. Then Ohio State didn’t need overtime to beat Mercyhurst 9-2. Tatum Skaggs (OSU, $31.4, 15.5 SP, 4.3 WP, 2 picks), yes, the Tatum Skaggs who I recommended everyone sell three weeks ago, scored 4.3 fantasy points. Charly Dahlquist (OSU, $24.3, 16.3 SP, 5.3 WP, 0 picks), yes, the Charly Dahlquist who absolutely nobody has picked, was lead scorer of the week with 5.3 fantasy points. More popular picks Emma Maltais (OSU, $48.5, 29.5 SP, 3.1 WP, 14 picks) and Jincy Dunne (OSU, $40, 21.4 SP, 2.8 WP, 14 picks) came in at fifth and seventh respectively in weekend points. All three Mercyhurst goalies played in the Sunday demolition, and the one who had the best save % on the day was actually Kennedy Blair (Mercyhurst, $18.4, 5.15 SP, 1.95 WP, 1 pick), who was the first one yanked.

What’s happening in the second half of the season?

More hockey! I hope to have time to write more trade tips articles but in case I don’t, one thing to look at is the number of games each team has remaining. You can see that in column AF of the Comp Schedule tab. Most teams are on 14-16, but there are some outliers. In particular, BU has 18 and Harvard has 17; on the low end, Robert Morris has 10, Ohio State has 11 and Mercyhurst has 12. This obviously limits what Robert Morris, Ohio State and Mercyhurst skaters can score on the one hand, and on the other makes those of us who already bought Jesse Compher (BU, $45.9, 32.7 SP, 0 WP, 7 picks) look very smart indeed.

On the first weekend back, the weekend of Dec. 29, we have a limited slate of games (with KRACH probabilities indicating the probability that the first team listed wins, calculated as explained in week 8):

• Boston University v Penn State x2: 0.791
• Connecticut v Dartmouth: 0.769
• Princeton v Merrimack x2: 0.697
• St. Cloud State v Lindenwood x2: 0.695/

Princeton v Merrimack will be a fascinating test of how depth teams in Hockey East and the ECAC match up — I say “depth”, even though Princeton are at the top of the ECAC standings and on a twelve-game undefeated streak, because Princeton haven’t shown the fireworks of a Clarkson or Colgate or Cornell (except for their one real marquee win, 6-0 against Colgate back in mid-November). This first weekend will help show if I’m underrating them.

The following weekend, the first of 2019, includes the mouthwatering Clarkson / Northeastern matchups in Belfast. On that weekend everyone’s playing except Merrimack, OSU, Robert Morris, St. Lawrence and Wisconsin, so plan your trades with that in mind. Speaking of which...

Trade reminder for the holidays

By 11:59 pm Eastern on Thursday December 27, please get me up to four trades, i.e. up to four buys and up to four sells (and an equal number of both). This doesn’t have to be four individually permissible trades so long as the end team is still valid:

• You have non-negative money in the bank
• You have no more than three players from any team
• You have three goalies and twelve skaters/

Current costs (which you can sell at and buy at) are on column K of the Cost tab. Points per game to date are on columns R to V of the Points Stats tab.

I’ll also be keeping track of points scored in the second half, though obviously whole-season points are going to be the main win criterion that we pay attention to. Still, this will give those of us who regret some of our earlier decisions something to look forward to.

I hope to have some posts over the break, highlighting the best performers, tipping players who may be good in the second half, and talking about how well first half performance has historically predicted second half performance. But I may end up being out caroling or something instead. In which case, happy holidays everyone and see you when the games start again!