Greatest Moments of NHL Season … So Far: first round, matchup 17

The 2019-20 NHL season had many incredible moments before it paused on March 12 due to concerns surrounding the coronarvirus, and now fans can decide which one was the best.

The Greatest Moments of the NHL season … So Far have been placed into a 64-field bracket, and fans will vote on one matchup per day, ultimately deciding the greatest moment up until this point.

Fans can vote on Twitter and Instagram each day from noon until 10 a.m. ET the next day. Each day, the winner of that matchup will be revealed, and a new set of moments will go head-to-head.

Though fans will have the ultimate say, two NHL.com staffers will weigh in on the matchup each day to give his or her opinion on which one should advance to the next round.

In the matchup on Wednesday, Bryan Little's overtime goal against the Calgary Flames in the Heritage Classic defeated the All-Star Skills.

The matchup Thursday pits Boston Bruins forward David Pastrnak's four-goal game against the Anaheim Ducks on Oct. 14 against Columbus Blue Jackets goalie Elvis Merzlikins' three shutouts in four games from Jan. 11-18.

Tom Gulitti, staff writer

I'm a big fan of Merzlikins and the emotion he plays with, but I'll take Pastrnak scoring an NHL career-high four goals in a 4-2 win against Anaheim. That was the sign of a lot of exciting things to come from Pastrnak, who has four hat tricks this season and is tied with Washington Capitals forward Alex Ovechkin for the NHL lead with 48 goals. He got the Bruins started with a power-play goal 4:18 into the first period. He made it 2-0 by finishing a 2-on-1 rush with Brad Marchand at 11:38 of the second and 3-1 by scoring from the left hash marks at 2:20 of the third. Pastrnak wasn't satisfied with getting his fifth NHL hat trick though, so he scored a fourth goal, on the power play, at 4:34 to make it 4-1, bringing a few more hats from the TD Garden crowd.

John Kreiser, managing editor

Pastrnak is one of the elite scorers in the NHL (and generates a lot of chuckles in his cold brew commercials). But he's a known entity. Merzlikins, on the other hand, came out of nowhere as a 25-year-old NHL rookie from Latvia whose goaltending got the Blue Jackets back into the Stanley Cup Playoff race after Joonas Korpisalo went down with a knee injury Dec. 29. Merzlikins had already helped the Blue Jackets sweep their three-game swing through California when he went into T-Mobile Arena and made 27 saves in a 3-0 victory against the Vegas Golden Knights on Jan. 11. Three nights later, the Blue Jackets were back home and shut out Pastrnak and the Bruins 3-0, with Merzlikins making 34 saves. After a 3-2 home win against the Carolina Hurricanes on Jan. 16, Merzlikins put on a show against the New Jersey Devils two nights later, making 21 saves in the first period and 41 for the game in a 5-0 victory. Three shutouts in four games, two of them against teams that were in first place when the season was paused March 12, are a tremendous accomplishment for any goalie, let alone one who had never played an NHL game before this season.