Las Vegan Jason Zucker comes back with best season of NHL career

The hometown kid did good.

Actually, more than good. Jason Zucker, the 25-year-old left wing who is Las Vegas’ only NHL player, compiled his best numbers in six seasons with the Minnesota Wild.

Zucker finished with 22 goals, 25 assists and 47 points in 79 games. He was a plus-34, which tied him for first in the NHL with teammate Ryan Suter in plus-minus.

But Zucker wishes he still was playing. The Wild were eliminated 4-1 by the St. Louis Blues in the first round of the playoffs.

“Right now, it’s hard to look at it that way,” Zucker said of enjoying his personal accomplishments. “It’s very disappointing to not still be playing. We played hard. We just didn’t get it done.”

The season was pivotal for Zucker. He signed a two-year, $4 million deal after a disappointing 2015-16 season during which he scored 13 goals and had 23 points.

Zucker worked hard in the offseason on his strength, conditioning and overall game. He came to training camp with a positive attitude, ready to do whatever first-year coach Bruce Boudreau asked.

“I had a fresh start with the new coach,” Zucker said. “Bruce let me earn my way. He put me with two great linemates (Mikko Koivu and Mikael Granlund) for most of the season, and we really clicked.”

Zucker also married Twin Cities sports broadcaster Carly Aplin last summer and said being a family man helped with his bounce-back season.

“It was nice to come home and have our own house and feel like a home,” he said. “It’s a very underestimated part of an athlete’s life.”

Zucker also wanted to show he could play both ends of the rink. And he’s proud of his plus-minus stat.

“I needed to prove I could play a two-way game,” he said. “It wasn’t in my M.O. But I felt if I could do it, it would help me stick around.”

He also was fifth in the NHL in minor penalties drawn over 60 minutes this season. Zucker averaged 1.69 penalties drawn. Washington’s Tom Wilson was first at 1.87.

“I think my skating had a lot to do with it,” he said. “I tried to use my speed whenever I could, and if you’re a defenseman, you have to make a decision to either let me go by you or try and stop me by holding or hooking or tripping.”

Zucker plans to be back in Las Vegas in June, but whether he is back for good remains to be seen. The Wild have not indicated whether he will be one of their 11 protected players in the June 21 NHL Expansion Draft as the Golden Knights put together their inaugural roster.

“I have zero control over it,” he said. “And I prefer it that way. I try not to think about it. Wherever the cards fall, they fall.”

Expansion Draft reveal

The NHL is determined to milk as much drama out of its announcement of the Golden Knights’ 30 selections on June 21.

According to Yahoo Sports, the plan is to have four segments devoted to the expansion draft reveal during the Awards Show at T-Mobile Arena.

“We started thinking that these two events could be combined, and be at a much larger venue than we’ve ever done for the awards show,” NHL executive vice president Steve Mayer told Yahoo. “It felt right. It felt like we could pull this off. We felt like one could help the other.”

Empty seats in Ottawa 

In the aftermath of the Ottawa Senators’ 2-1 win over the New York Rangers on Thursday in Game 1 of their best-of-seven second-round series, the news was about empty seats at the Canadian Tire Centre.

Almost 2,000 seats were vacant, creating a stir in Canada’s capital after Game 1 drew 16,744. In a poll in the Ottawa Sun, almost half who voted said the tickets were too expensive.

The players said it’s their job to perform regardless of attendance.

“It is what it is,” Senators captain Erik Karlsson said. “That’s something that we as players can’t control. We go out there every day to do the best that we can for this team and this city.”

Steve Carp’s weekly NHL notebook appears Sundays. Contact him at scarp@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2913. Follow @stevecarprj on Twitter.