We are through the first round of 2025 playoff games. Home fans in all four cities were sent home happy as the higher seeds prevailed in each quarterfinal game, and the semifinal matchups are set. The defending champion Buffalo Bandits will take on the unbeaten-in-seven Vancouver Warriors, and the Halifax Thunderbirds, fresh off their first-ever playoff win, will meet the Saskatchewan Rush, fresh off their first playoff win in six years. These series are going to be amazing.
Category Archives: San Diego Seals
Why your team will/won’t win the 2025 NLL Championship
For all you fans of NLL teams that are not in the playoffs, or maybe those of you who want to bet some bucks on the NLL playoffs, here is a handy reference guide for why each playoff team may or may not win the Championship.
2025 NLL Week 21
That will do it for the 2025 regular season. Seems like just a few weeks ago we were getting ready to start the season and now it’s already over. But of course, the playoffs are an entirely different beast, and even though there are no more than thirteen games left before the long off-season, those games will be the most meaningful ones played all season. There was an awful lot of Awesome this past week, so let’s get into it.
2025 NLL Week 18
We’re a little closer to knowing the playoff picture but incredibly, the only thing that was decided this past weekend was that the Rush have clinched a home playoff game. Buffalo and Saskatchewan are now tied for first, with Buffalo holding the tiebreaker, but there are still six other teams (COL, GEO, HFX, ROC, SD, VAN) that could still finish first overall. Four more (ALB, CAL, OTT, TOR) could finish as high as third, and the Wings could finish as high as sixth. Alternatively, any of those teams except Buffalo and Saskatchewan could finish tenth or lower. For example, with only three weeks left in the regular season, the Rock could finish 3rd or 14th.
Just like last year, the playoff race could come down to the very last weekend, or even the very last game, of the season. Once again, unified standings FTW.
2025 NLL Week 16
Another busy weekend in the NLL with seven games. Blowouts were the name of the game this weekend, as four of the seven games featured a team that led by at least nine goals and three of them led by eleven. To balance things out, we had a one-goal game and a two-goal game, but most of the games were decided well before the fourth quarter even started.
I have more Not Awesomes than Awesomes this week, which is unusual, but even the Not Awesomes aren’t really that bad.
Trade frenzy on deadline day
Trade deadline day in the NLL was pretty uneventful and boring… until it wasn’t. And then it really really wasn’t. First, former MVP and Goaltender of the Year Christian Del Bianco was sent to the Vancouver Warriors for defender Brayden Laity and some pretty high draft picks. Del Bianco had been holding out this entire season, asking for a trade closer to his home in Vancouver, and since Calgary is the closest team to Vancouver that isn’t Vancouver, there was really nowhere else for him to go.
There were a few other deals made that day as well which I’ll touch on too.
Trades: Rose, de Snoo, Corbeil, Cattoni, Simpson, Jackson
We saw a few significant trades this past week, notably two huge ones involving the Toronto Rock as well as another significant one involving the Wings and Desert Dogs. Then on Saturday, the Seals and FireWolves made a deal. The Toronto trades look like they’ve given up on the season and have begun the rebuild, but it may not be as bad as that. The Wings have massively improved their defense, the Seals and Rock get picks for the future, and the Desert Dogs and FireWolves both get some more firepower up front.
2025 NLL Week 11
It was Week of the Rookies in the NLL. One of the most anticipated rookies this year made his debut on the weekend, another highly anticipated rookie (and a teammate of the first one) scored one of the best goals of the year, and yet another rookie had his second strong offensive outing in a row. I guess some non-rookies did good things too.
2025 NLL Week 8
What a wild weekend! We had lacrosse being discussed on the most popular podcast in the world, every team played a game and a couple played two, a sellout in the desert, close games, comebacks, a blowout that turned into less of a blowout, the last winless team winning, and the second NLL broadcast in a language other than English.
2025 NLL Week 7
An incredible week of games starting with one of the best rivalries in the game, despite the results in recent years (Buffalo has won 11 of the past 12 matchups with the Rock since 2022). As I mention below, every game was a comeback to some extent but some were significant comebacks. Halifax/Rochester was as close as a game can be, to the point where we still don’t really know who won it.
NLL Chatter 