NHL Three Stars: Leafs' Marner, Wild's Kaprizov and Rangers' Shesterkin Turn Up the Heat

Despite some solid individual performances in the past week, Mitch Marner, Kirill Kaprizov and Igor Shesterkin shined brighter than the rest, writes Adam Proteau.

Welcome back to THN’s Three Stars of the Week, a regular feature in which we pay homage to three NHLers who dominated most in the past seven days. Here we go:

His Maple Leaf teammate Auston Matthews has taken up much of the spotlight of late, but Marner has been doing more than his part to keep Toronto on its current seven-game win streak. The veteran winger posted a league-best nine assists and 10 points in four games. Marner’s season totals have been bumped up to 49 assists and 72 points in 56 games, and while his salary of $10.9 million per season is nothing to sneer at, the 26-year-old is proving he’s well worth the financial investment the Buds have made in him.

Marner is currently on pace for a 70-assist, 104-point season, numbers that would top his career highs of 69 assists and 99 points in a single season. Like all players, he’s ultimately going to be judged by his success in the Stanley Cup playoffs, but as a day-in, day-out contributor, he’s become one of the NHL’s most consistent threats on offense, and that isn’t likely to change anytime soon.

The Minnesota Wild are desperately trying to get back into the Western Conference playoff picture, and this week, they got a major hand from star winger Kaprizov. The 26-year-old Russian posted a league-best six goals and 12 points in four games, and he’s now back on pace to generate 37 goals and 89 points in 72 games – not as good as his career-high 47-goal, 108-point performance in 2021-22, but still, very productive.

The Wild’s highest-paid player at $9-million per season, Kaprizov needs to be at the top of Minnesota's scoring leaders for the team to have any chance at a playoff berth, but at his age, he’s still got room to grow his game. Minny may wind up missing out on a post-season spot, but it probably won’t be because Kaprizov hasn’t done his share of the work. He’s shown he can be depended on for offense, and without him, the Wild would undoubtedly be completely out of the playoff race.

All NHL goalies work in a tandem, splitting their team’s workload far more evenly than they may have 25 or 30 years ago. But there remain needle-moving netminders who carry a large load, and Shesterkin is one of them. This week, Shesterkin made four appearances, winning all four games to help the Rangers continue their elite play in the Metropolitan Division. The Russian goaltender also posted a stellar 2.03 goals-against average and a .951 save percentage to bump up his season totals to include a 2.70 G.A.A. and .909 SP.

Those totals aren’t as impressive as his totals from last season (.916 SP, 2.48 G.A.A.), but don’t kid yourself – Shesterkin is going to be in the mix to win his second Vezina Trophy as the NHL’s top goalie. He’s had stellar support in the Blueshirts' No. 2 goalie Jonathan Quick, but if the Rangers are going to do any notable damage in the post-season, they’ll need Shesterkin to do much of the heavy lifting.

The good news is that Shesterkin always inspires confidence from his teammates, and he’s quite capable of shouldering the load and dealing with the pressure that comes along with being an elite netminder. Shesterkin can stymie just about every opponent, and at a salary of only $5.66 million per season, he’s one of the best-value stars in the sport.