Utah's 1st game, Crosby's 600th goal among best moments of 1st half of season

The halfway point of the 2024-25 regular season arrives Thursday and there has already been a full season's worth of highlights, magical moments and unforgettable goals.

Which moments have been the biggest and best during the first three months of the season?

That's the question we posed to a panel of NHL.com staffers.

Here, in chronological order, are the answers.

NHL comes to Utah

Lauri Markkanen skated onto the ice at Delta Center on Oct. 8 almost as if he were a player for the Utah Hockey Club instead of the NBA's Utah Jazz. The 7-footer from Finland wore a No. 23 Utah hockey jersey and carried the puck to center ice for Ryan and Ashley Smith, the owners of each team. "How we doin', Utah?" Ryan Smith asked the sellout crowd, drawing cheers. "Thank you for being here. Thank you for packing the barn tonight. Let's make this the loudest place to play in the NHL. Let's go." Ashley Smith dropped the puck between Utah captain Clayton Keller and Chicago Blackhawks captain Nick Foligno for the ceremonial face-off, and the NHL's newest team opened its inaugural season with a 5-2 win. "This is history," Keller said. "It's only going to happen once, so you just try to soak it all in." -- Nicholas J. Cotsonika, columnist

Celebrini's debut with Sharks

From the four laps he took with fellow rookie center Will Smith before the rest of the San Jose Sharks took the ice, to the two points (one goal, one assist) he had in the game, it was a memorable night for 18-year-old Macklin Celebrini when he made his NHL debut Oct. 10. The No. 1 pick in the 2024 NHL Draft, Celebrini thought his first NHL goal was actually teammate William Eklund's until Eklund corrected him -- "I was like, 'Nice goal,' and he was like, 'I didn't score; you did,'" Celebrini said. The game, a 5-4 overtime loss to the St. Louis Blues, didn't turn out the way the Sharks had hoped but Celebrini's debut was a great sign of what the teen could do for the Sharks in the years to come. -- Tracey Myers, staff writer

Blue Jackets honor Gaudreau in home opener

No one wanted this moment at Nationwide Arena in Columbus on Oct. 15. No one wanted to see the Columbus Blue Jackets start the game without a left wing. Everyone wanted to see No. 13 Johnny Gaudreau in that spot. But it obviously couldn't be that way. Gaudreau and his brother, Matthew, were killed while riding bicycles near their home in Salem County, New Jersey, on Aug. 29. Six and a half weeks later, the Blue Jackets were getting ready to play their home opener against the Florida Panthers. To honor Gaudreau, the Blue Jackets put out a starting lineup that did not include a left wing. Sean Monahan, Gaudreau's longtime teammate in Calgary who came to Columbus this season to play with him, took the face-off. He won it across to Panthers forward Sam Bennett, another former Calgary teammate. Bennett settled the puck where Gaudreau should have been. They stood in silence for 13 seconds, a nod to Gaudreau's jersey number. The teams then changed lines. The game resumed with 19:47 remaining on the clock. It was sad, emotional, heartbreaking, but there was a perfection to that moment. It was the perfect way to honor Gaudreau; on the ice, with teammates and friends, family in the stands, fans watching. Unforgettable. -- Dan Rosen, senior writer

Panthers visit West Point before going Global

It's been a whirlwind of a season for the Florida Panthers, who opened 2024-25 by raising the Stanley Cup banner. But the highlight for me this first half was being at the U.S Military Academy in West Point, New York, when the Panthers visited the alma mater of their owner, Vincent Viola. On a crisp fall day on Oct. 25, the players, coaches, PR staff and management teams toured the historic campus, raised the Cup in front of all the cadets in the mess hall, and then posed for pictures with the gorgeous Hudson Valley behind them. It was a chance for the entire organization to see why Viola holds his military background so near and dear to his heart. And how did they follow up that trip? By going to Finland as part of the NHL Global Series and winning back-to-back games against the Dallas Stars. In what could be a long, and sometimes tedious regular season, the trips to West Point and Finland were magical times. -- Bill Price, Editor-in-Chief

Stamkos returns to Tampa

Steven Stamkos tried not to well up. Deep down inside, he realized it was an impossible ask. As such, he was overcome with emotion as he looked around Amalie Arena during the standing ovation in his honor that seemed to go on for an eternity. It was Oct. 28, and the veteran forward was playing in Tampa for the first time since he signed with the Nashville Predators as a free agent July 1. During the first TV timeout of the game, he watched a tribute video in his honor. It was a condensed digest of his 16-season legacy with the Tampa Bay Lightning, from being selected with the No. 1 pick at the 2008 NHL Draft to scoring his 500th NHL goal to hoisting the Stanley Cup twice. He'd been the face of the franchise for so long, and now this was the chance for appreciative fans to say thank you. He acknowledged them by skating a couple of laps while waving. Until it became too much. "It was pretty emotional," said Stamkos, who had two assists in the game. "I didn't know how I was going to react. I could feel some tears coming, so I decided to get back to the bench." A moment that both he and Lightning supporters will cherish for a long time. -- Mike Zeisberger, staff writer

Fantastic night in Finland

The Finnish people are proud of their hockey heritage. There is great pride in that such a small country produces so many elite players, including several NHL stars. That was on full display on Nov. 1 when the Dallas Stars and Florida Panthers played each other in the first of two games at the Global Series in Tampere, Finland. There were seven Finnish-born players on the ice for the opening faceoff, three for the Dallas Stars and four for the Florida Panthers. Among them was Aleksander Barkov, the Florida captain, who grew up in this city and played for the local club Tappara. As soon as the Finnish national anthem started, the crowd started singing. It was deafening, it was powerful, it was patriotic. It was, simply perfect and it never stopped. Throughout the game, a 6-4 victory for the Panthers, the cheering never stopped. When it was over, Barkov was the First Star with a goal and three assists. It was a perfect night of NHL hockey in a hockey-proud city. -- Shawn P. Roarke, senior director of editorial

McDavid gets 1,000 points

Connor McDavid does not get overly excited reaching an offensive milestone. The Edmonton Oilers captain is mowing them down at an impressive pace. Yet, becoming the fourth-fastest player in NHL history to reach 1,000 points was special to McDavid, as was the manner he reached the mark. He scored converting a pass from Leon Draisaitl on a 2-on-1 rush against the Nashville Predators on Nov. 14. The goal tied the game 1-1, which Edmonton would go on to win 3-2 in overtime. The entire Oilers bench was given special permission to empty for the occasion, and McDavid was mobbed by his teammates for accomplishing the feat in his 659th game. Only Wayne Gretzky (424 games), Mario Lemieux (513), and Mike Bossy (656) did it faster. The excitement in Rogers Place that night was reminiscent of a Stanley Cup Playoff game as fans were witness to history. McDavid capped off the night setting up Darnell Nurse for the overtime winner. After the game, his teammates presented him with a massive cake and wore commemorative T-shirts designed for the occasion. It turned out to be a memorable night for McDavid, his father Brian who was in attendance, and Oilers fans. -- Derek Van Diest, staff writer

Sid scores 600

It's been a joy to watch Sidney Crosby through the years, the way he has been all that we hoped he would be at the start. It's been a joy to see him win the Stanley Cup and to move up the all-time lists, to make good on the talent that has been there all along. And now at 37, in his 20th season in the NHL, it's worth it to savor the moments that Crosby has left. In that vein, my top moment was Crosby's 600th goal, which came in a suboptimal situation, a 6-1 loss to Utah Hockey Club on Nov. 23. Yet, its historical significance can't be denied. Crosby became the 21st player to score 600 and second active (Alex Ovechkin, 868). The goal, at 3:11 of the second period on Nov. 23, came on the power play and resulted in a long ovation, as his parents watched from the stands. I'm looking forward to Crosby continuing to move up the lists as he heads toward 700, but for now, I'll take that 600th goal as a highlight of the first half of the season. -- Amalie Benjamin, senior writer

Hats off for Hischier

The wait was worth it for New Jersey Devils captain Nico Hischier when he scored the first hat trick of his NHL career in a 5-2 win against the Nashville Predators on home ice on Nov. 25. The 26-year-old center, who is in his eighth NHL season, started his natural hat trick when he skated around Marc Del Gaizo and above the crease for a wrist shot through the five-hole of Juuse Saros to give the Devils a 2-1 lead at 3:52 of the second period. He made it 3-1 with a power-play goal at 10:01 on a snap shot from the right circle, and pushed it to 4-1 at 16:57 with a wrist shot on a breakaway. "Eight years and first hat trick ... you'd think he has five or six of them," Devils forward Erik Haula said. Hischier became the fourth Devils player to score a natural hat trick in the past 15 years, joining Jack Hughes (Nov. 26, 2022), Brian Boyle (Nov. 5, 2018) and Michael Cammalleri (Nov. 6, 2016). -- Mike G. Morreale, senior draft writer

Historic outing at Winter Classic

A trade from the Anaheim Ducks to the St. Louis Blues on Dec. 14 set up Cam Fowler to become the first player to play in his 1,000th NHL game outdoors when the Blues took on the Chicago Blackhawks in the Discover NHL Winter Classic at Wrigley Field on Dec. 31. The 33-year-old shined, scoring two goals in a 6-2 victory. Fowler opened the scoring with a power-play goal 1:40 into the game and then increased the Blues' lead to 5-1 by scoring on a wrist shot from the left point at 17:51 of the second period. He was the first Blues player to score a goal in his 1,000th game and second defenseman in NHL history to score twice in his 1,000th game. Fowler was also the first defenseman to score two goals in an NHL outdoor game. -- Tom Gulitti, staff writer

Wiesblatt honors mom in NHL debut

A player's NHL debut is special moment, but few are as touching as Nashville Predators forward Ozzy Wiesblatt's first, a 3-0 win at the Vancouver Canucks on Jan. 3. Recalled from Milwaukee of the American Hockey League, the 22-year-old introduced himself in a Predators pre-game social media post in American Sign Language (ASL), a tribute to his mother Kim White, who is deaf. "I learned sign language from my mom -- my first language, you could say -- all my brothers know it and my little sister," he said. "I'm very excited to be here." So was White, a single mother who worked multiple jobs to help put four sons through elite level hockey. Clad in a Predators home jersey, she exulted when Wiesblatt tossed her a puck during warmups. It was a hard-earned dream come true for mother and son. -- William Douglas, staff writer