Category Archives: NHL

It’s Official: For the NHL, the Jets are a Rousing Success!!!

Posted on February 2, 2012 by Scott Taylor| 1 Comment
8420529e3ab735ca810247d1155004ef getty 135150807 300x205 Its Official: For the NHL, the Jets are a Rousing Success!!!

The fans deserve a salute.

TAMPA — While sitting in the press box between a group of NHL executives on Thursday night, an official-looking list from the National Hockey League was passed around.

It was a list of the NHL’s gate receipts, ticket sales and ticket prices through Jan. 31, 2012. It confirmed everything Jets fans have known since the season opener against Montreal back on Oct. 9.

The Jets are 13th overall in NHL receipts per game even though Winnipeg’s rink is the smallest in the NHL at 15,004. Winnipeg makes $1.24 million per game. According to the NHL, last year in Atlanta, the Thrashers made $331,000 per game.

The Jets also had the seventh most expensive ticket in the NHL in average price at $76.41 per seat.

Montreal is No. in gate receipts at $2.058 million per game ($1.965 per game last year). Toronto is No. 2 at $2.004 million per game ($1.981 million per game last year). Montreal’s average ticket price is $96.44 per seat while Toronto’s is $105.94 per ticket.

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Mark loved the move from Atlanta. Gary? Not so much. Until now, one guesses.

At the bottom of the list — at No. 30 — in game per game gate receipts is Phoenix (no surprise) at $387,364 per game. Last year, the Coyotes averaged a meagre $378,925 per game.

Those Coyotes numbers make it all the more unbelievable that Commissioner Gary Bettman has three buyers in Phoenix who are prepared to keep the team in the Arizona desert.

How come Gary Bettman has the ability to find stupid people with lots of money who are eager to piss it down a toilet? I keep looking for those guys and just can’t find them anywhere.

(Note: To the commenter below — from the Globe and Mail: “True North considered a number of different pricing plans before deciding on the one it unveiled. Tickets will range between $39 and $129.” On the secondary market, ticket prices are obviously high. The original market was $39-$129.”)

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Big Win Tuesday. Now, Will the Jets Make a Move?

Posted on February 2, 2012 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment
138025484 slide 300x248 Big Win Tuesday. Now, Will the Jets Make a Move?

Ondrej Pavelec makes another huge save.

TAMPA — Tuesday night in Philadelphia, the Winnipeg Jets won a huge hockey game.

In fact, when Bryan Little scored the shootout winner, it was more than just a win in the 51st game of a long season. It might have been the most important win of 2012.

For 65 minutes on Tuesday, the Winnipeg Jets went toe-to-toe one more time with the Philadelphia Flyers at the Wells Fargo Centre and for the third time this season the Winnipegs emerged victorious. Chris Thorburn scored his first goal of the year in regulation time (and it was a goal scorer’s goal); Little fired the only goal of the shootout; Blake Wheeler played 23 minutes, had five shots on goal and was an absolute beast; and Ondrej Pavelec made 27 saves as the Jets beat the Flyers for the third consecutive time.

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Blake Wheeler playing like a beast.

“That was a big two points for us,” Jets head coach Claude Noel said after the game. “We were wearing down in the third period, but we found a way to win the game.”

It’s true. A Jets team without Dustin Byfuglien, Alexander Burmistov and Evander Kane did wear down in the third period, but they played well enough defensively to hang in long enough and get the bonus point in a shootout. For the first two periods, however, the Jets actually outplayed the Flyers in Philly and they definitely deserved that extra point.

However, they still can’t score. The Jets have scored only 21 goals in 13-plus (counting overtime) games in 2012, but if they continue to check as well as they did against the Flyers on Tuesday, they’ll win a lot more games than they lose.

So here’s the deal with the trade deadline just three weeks away: as they head into Tampa tonight, the Jets are 23rd overall in goals scored at 2.47 per game. The team’s leading scorer, Blake Wheeler, has nine goals and 33 points. He is 87th in scoring in the NHL. The team’s leading goal scorer, Evander Kane, has 18 and is tied for 29th in the NHL but was in the midst of a 10-game goal scoring drought when he suffered a concussion and was lost indefinitely.

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Evander Kane's return will help.

The Jets have scored 126 goals in 51 games this season. Within the Eastern Conference, only the Islanders (120 in 49) and Sabres (120 in 51) have scored fewer. Of course, while the Jets have 126 total, they scored nine in one game against Philadelphia. The Jets are actually one game away from being the lowest-scoring team in the Eastern Conference. As a group the Jets are also a minus-18.

In the month of January, the Jets went 4-8-1. To date, the Jets are 23-22-6 on the season. Last season, as the Atlanta Thrashers, they were 23-19-9 after 51 games. In 13-plus games (counting two overtimes) this month, the Jets have scored a meagre 21 goals.

Now, to be fair, they played part of the month without Kane, Zach Bogosian and Alex Burmistrov and they played the entire month without their all-star, Dustin Byfuglien. At the start of the season, everyone knew this team was thin, but January has proven that little nugget beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Now it’s February and it starts tonight here in Tampa. It has become quite clear that the Jets need scoring help. This is not a team that takes nights off. It’s work ethic is pretty much beyond reproach. Still, the people who run this team know it can’t score. And it becomes especially weak up front when certain players — like Byfuglien, Kane and Burmistrov — go down with injuries.

So as the 2012 trade deadline looms (Feb. 27), what should Jets GM Kevin Cheveldayoff and his brain trust do? Does he move his veteran grinders and build for the future? Or does he deal prospects and draft picks, try to find a scorer and take a run at the playoffs?

Right now, the Jets could use three things:

1. A scorer, obviously, but that’s not an easy thing to acquire. For example, if Ryan Getzlaff or Bobby Ryan are actually available in Anaheim, who could the Jets trade to get them? Who would interest a team like the Ducks? Making trades are an art AND a science and big ones don’t just happen over a glass of cognac at the all-star break. We are not naive enough to believe these trades are made easily. You have to give to get and the asking price just might be too much.

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Designated Fighter Chris Thorburn.

2. A tough guy. The Jets don’t always open up enough space for the guys who can put the puck in the net. They’re also at a point where they need Chris Thorburn and Mark Stuart to fight for them. Yes, yes, we all want fighting eliminated from hockey, blah, blah, blah, but the fact is, fighting has not been eliminated and the Jets don’t have a guy who can stop a player like Shawn Thornton of the Bruins from running their goalies and pounding the crap out of defensemen they need in the lineup. They also need a guy who can drop the gloves on the road, win a fight without getting hurt, not hurt the team’s skill level by being in the box for five minutes and give the club a pick-me-up.

3. Depth. Two injuries and this team can’t recover. The Pittsburgh Penguins have the personnel to stay in the hunt without Sidney Crosby and Kris Letang. The Jets lose Dustin Byfuglien and Zach Bogosian and it’s downhill all the way.

When the team arrived in Winnipeg at the start of the 2011-12 season, Cheveldayoff and company made it clear that the new organization would be patient. They would not do anything rash and would build with youth and draft picks. After all, they have 3-5 years of sold-out buildings and they know their fans will also be patient and wait for them to build a legitimate contender.

Trouble is, they’ve talked all year about making the playoffs. The two aren’t necessarily exclusive, but…

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10 Things on My Mind After a Sunday on the Couch…

Posted on January 23, 2012 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

When you spend an afternoon watching football on television — oh, my gawd, I’ve just spent a month of them — you think about crazy stuff.

Like did CTV finally put the Olympic rings on its logo bug in the corner of the screen? Did it finally occur to them that this is and Olympic year? Or, how in hell can a referee come to the conclusion that Ahmad Bradshaw didn’t fumble with 2:21 to play on his own 20 yard line? I guess, a referee that blew his whistle w-a-a-a-a-y too soon.

Those are the things you think about when a game takes almost 4 1/2 hours to play.

In fact, I wrote down 10 of the things I was thinking about…

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Steven Tyler

1. How can Steven Tyler be a judge on American Idol when he can’t sing a lick? I guess the same way Mike Milbury can pass judgment on the job being done by an actual working NHL general manager after Milbury himself destroyed two franchises — and one, the Islanders, still hasn’t recovered. It has nothing to with his ability to sing. It has everything to do with the fact he passes judgment on other people.

2. Did I miss something? Did Joe Flacco not outplay Tom Brady by about a mile and a half? Damn, Flacco was good yesterday.

3. Was Brady hurt more than anyone would let on and while the Patriots said it was his non-throwing shoulder, when he missed a wide-open Rob Gronkowski by 20 feet, it looked as if he had bigger problems than that.

4. Boy is young Winnipeg Jets star Evander Kane getting beaten up this week. He really must have done something to piss off a city that is so madly in love with its Jets that, when you actually think about it, not one of them could possibly do anything wrong. I’m not sure Kane did anything at all, but suddenly people all over Winnipeg are convinced he did.

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Ahmad Bradshaw

5. Just watched the replay of the Bradshaw fumble again. It was a fumble. Sorry. In fact, that call was so bad it looked like the fix was in. I’m sure the officials can find a way to justify it with the old “quick whistle” excuse but I agree with Niners coach Jim Harbaugh: “It looked like a fumble,” Harbaugh told Comcast SportsNet Bay Area. “Every play that happened in the game except that one was played out to the conclusion of the play.” That call was just horrible. Maybe the officials just believed that after they screwed the Giants twice in Green Bay last week, it was time to make it up. There had to be some reason.

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Dwight Howard

6. Guess the Orlando Magic aren’t thinking about trading Dwight Howard anymore. At 11-4, the Magic are the No. 2 team in the East, a half a game ahead of Miami. Meanwhile, Howard is averaging 20.2 points and 16 rebounds a game. I wouldn’t trade him either.

7. The best thing that happened this week to the rest of MLB’s American League? The Texas Rangers paid $52 million to negotiate with Yu Darvish and then $60 million over six years to sign him. Now they say they’ve pulled out of the Prince Fielder Sweepstakes. If I were the Tigers or the Yankees or the Angels, I’d fear Prince Fielder — especially in a lineup that already boasts Josh Hamilton, Nelson Cruz, Ian Kinzler, Adrian Beltre and Michael Young — a lot more than a Japanese pitcher who just might be the next Diasuke Matsuzaka, or maybe even Hideki Irabu.

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Tiger

8. Flipped over to watch the golf tournament from PGA West on Sunday and dozed off. Can’t wait for Tiger to show up at Pebble Beach on Feb. 6. At least there will be something to watch. Man golf is dull without Woods. Of course, we should be OK this week. The Golf Channel should have plenty of coverage from Abu Dhabi where Tiger opens his 2012 season.

9. Even though he said, “You don’t have to worry about me jumping off a ledge,” I still feel sorry for Baltimore Ravens kicker, Billy Cundiff. Missing a 32-yard field goal at the NFL level (whether it’s to send a game to overtime or was just pooched sometime in the first quarter) has to make you sick to your stomach. Not surprisingly, I got three Facebook messages which essentially read: “The Winnipeg Blue Bombers have announced the signing of kicker Billy Cundiff.”

10. Speaking of the Bombers, many Winnipeg football fans are upset that the Bombers haven’t done anything at all to get better this off-season. Why worry? They didn’t do anything at all last winter and they went to the Grey Cup.

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Our NHL All-Star Break Award Winners

Posted on January 20, 2012 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment
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Alex Ovechkin

It could be argued that Sidney Crosby and Alex Ovechkin are the two most talented players in all of hockey.

But of course, Crosby has been out for almost an entire year with a concussion and Ovechkin, although he’s trying to change his game, hasn’t quite come to grips with his coaches’ demand for a more defensive approach to the sport.

As a result, for different reasons, hockey’s two greatest talents have been missing.

For fans and fantasy players, that’s not great news. For other players, however, it’s an opportunity to step up, score some goals, become leaders and make a name. One man’s disappointment is always another man’s opportunity.

As a result, a whole collection of new, young stars has risen to the top in the National Hockey League this season. Names that might not have been well known a year or two ago are now getting the respect that their coaches, teammates and a whole lot of scouts believed they always deserved or, at least, would earn.

nhlasg2012logo Our NHL All Star Break Award WinnersWe’re now just a week away from the NHL’s Mid-Winter Classic, the All-Star Game in Ottawa. At that game, you will no doubt be introduced to a number of young players who could, one day, take up the mantle that has been left virtually untouched since Crosby’s injury.

You will no doubt also recall some old names that have been stars in this league and are clearly stars once again. The one thing that this year’s all-star game will bring clearly to mind is the names of the players who should be honored at the end of the 2011-12 season.

In order to set you up for the big game in Ottawa, here’s a look at the players who should be honored at the mythical midway point of the campaign. These are our seven major award winners for the opening half.

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Evgeni Malkin

The Hart Trophy, Most Valuable Player: Our winner is Evgeni Malkin of the Pittsburgh Penguins and our runners up are Claude Giroux of the Philadelphia Flyers and Henrik Lundqvist of the New York Rangers. nhl.com gave us a pretty clear outline of what Malkin has done in order to almost single-handedly keep the banged-up Penguins in the heart of the Stanley Cup playoff race:

“Since Crosby exited the lineup on Dec. 5, the Penguins have limped to a 9-9-0 record in his absence. If not for the heroics of Malkin things could be a whole lot worse. In those 18 games without Crosby — and not to mention Kris Letang one of the NHL’s best offensive defenseman who returned to the lineup after a two-month absence on Thursday — Malkin has 15 goals and 15 assists. He has factored in 30 of the Penguins’ 53 goals during that time (56.6 percent) and has been on the ice for a whopping 34 (69.8 percent) goals during that stretch.”

Malkin has also taken over as the NHL’s scoring leader (54 points) and he’s kept the Penguins within the Top 6 in the Eastern Conference.

Our runners-up are Giroux who is more responsible than anyone in that Flyers lineup for keeping Philly in the Top 5 in the East and Lundqvist, because the Rangers have 62 points and are first in the East for only one reason: goaltending. 

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Henrik Lundqvist

The Vezina Trophy, the Best Goaltender: Well, if he’s almost the MVP, Henrik Lundqvist is certainly the best goalie. The runners-up are Jonathan Quick and Jimmy Howard.

Lundqvist has played 34 games and has a 1.93 goals against average to go with his .936 save percentage. He’s 20-10-4 and has saved the first-place Rangers on more than one occasion.

Howard has played 39 games and is 28-10-1 with a 1.98 goals against average and .926 save percentage while Quick is 20-11-9 with a 1.92 GAA and a save percentage of .934. Frankly, if the Rangers aren’t first in the East and Lundqvist doesn’t make so many game-saving stops, I’d look at Quick as the best goalie in the game this year.

Of course, there is also that two-headed monster in Boston. Tuukka Rask is 11-4-1 in 16 games with a 1.61 GAA and a .946 save percentage while Tim Thomas is 19-9-0 in 30 games with a 2.02 GAA and a .936 save percentage. Turn those two guys into one and you have the best goalie in the world.

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Adam Larsson

The Calder Trophy, Rookie of the Year: There are three players I love for this award at the midway point of the year. Edmonton’s Ryan Nugent-Hopkins leads all rookie scorers with 13 goals and 22 assists. Adam Henrique in New Jersey is next with 13 goals and 21 assists. And then there is New Jersey’s Adam Larsson, a big, powerful defenseman who is logging 22-25 minutes a game.

If I had to vote today, Larsson would get my vote. It’s tough enough to learn to become a regular defenseman in the NHL. Larsson, the No. 4 pick overall last spring, has not only learned, he’s instantly become one of the best rearguards on a defensive minded team. In fact, he’s the No. 1 defenseman in the Devils lineup right now.

At 6-foot-3, 210-pounds he has all the tools to play the position but the fact he can skate, hit and clear the front of his own net, makes him, potentially, one of the great players of the future in the NHL today.

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Zdeno Chara

The Norris Trophy, Best Defenseman: We still love Nick Lidstrom and always will, but this year, Zdeno Chara, all-star captain and leader of the Boston Bruins, has been remarkable. He won his first Norris Trophy in 2008-09, and has been the Bruins rock ever since. He is currently on a pace to set career highs in assists, total points, and plus/minus, all while being the most imposing force on defense in the game – anywhere on the planet.

Our runners up are Nick Lidstrom (of course) of the Detroit Red Wings, and Shea Weber of the Nashville Predators for reasons that are obvious.

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David Backes

The Selke Trophy, Best Defensive Player: There is only one choice for the Selke this year and while Ryan Kesler, Pavel Datsyuk, Jonathan Toews and Patrice Bergeron will get a load of support from the media voters, there is only one guy who passes the best defensive forward test at every level.

Centre David Backes of the St. Louis Blues covers the opposition’s best line on every shift. He starts most shifts as the centre in his own end and wins most of his faceoffs – and almost all the important ones. In fact, Blues coach Ken Hitchcock sends Backes out on to the ice 63 per cent of the time when his team has to start with a faceoff in its own end.

Backes also leads his team in scoring with 14 goals and 19 assists, is a plus-13 and is the leader on the power-play AND the penalty-kill. He’s also a leader on a team that is a remarkable 28-12-6 this season. He was snubbed by those selecting the players to attend this year’s all-star game and he’s been snubbed by the media mob that wants to give Toews an award, but won’t give him the Hart Trophy. Still, quite clearly David Backes is the best defensive forward in the game.

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Teemu

The Lady Byng Trophy, Most Gentlemanly Player: I don’t even have a runner-up for the Lady Byng. There is only one player who is even in the mix: Teemu Selanne.

The fact that he plays the game with passion, is the 15th leading scorer at age 41, seldom gets a dirty penalty, is beloved throughout the league and is such a class act at every possible level that there is no greater gentleman in all of hockey, makes this award a no-brainer. In fact, he should get it as a lifetime achievement award for being both a great player and a great human being.

I frankly, don’t care about anyone else. As one of my colleagues, Jonathan Willis, recently wrote: “This award really should go to a guy like Selanne, who has shown over a long career that he’s a superb player and someone who has exhibited exceptional sportsmanship throughout his career.”

Can I get an Amen?

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Paul MacLean

The Jack Adams Trophy, Coach of the Year: Absolutely no doubt about it, Paul MacLean of the Ottawa Senators is the coach of the year. Our runners-up would include Ken Hitchcock of the St. Louis Blues and Mike Babcock of the Detroit Red Wings.

MacLean, the former Winnipeg Jets rightwinger has the Senators in fourth place in the East with a record of 27-16-6. A man who learned his coaching philosophy as a player and as an assistant to the very accomplished Babcock in Detroit, MacLean has taken an Ottawa team that was 32-40-10 (13th in the East) last season and nearly equaled that win mark by the all-star break.

There is no doubt that MacLean’s efforts have taken a team that was expected to miss the playoff this year and turned it into a team that is now three points out of first place in the entire NHL.

Babcock has Detroit in first overall with 63 points and what makes him great is his ability to handle some huge egos and make the gifted Red Wings play as a team. Meanwhile, Hitchcock replaced Davis Payne early in the season and in a very short time coaxed the Blues into fourth in the West.

By the way, I have no problem with those people who promote the efforts of Alain Vigneault in Vancouver, Barry Trotz in Nashville and John Tortorella with the Rangers. They’ve all done great work.

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The 10 Most Surprising Players of 2011-12

Posted on January 14, 2012 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment
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Sid the Kid

Sidney Crosby is still out of the Pittsburgh Penguins lineup, nursing a concussion that has essentially kept him away from the NHL for an entire calendar year.

Sean Avery didn’t impress New York Rangers head coach John Tortorella in training camp so Tortorella decided to waive him through the league. Rangers fans screamed for Avery’s return and Tortorella gave hockey’s bad boy a second chance. Torotorella was correct in the first place. Avery came back, was dreadful and was waived through the league again.

Martin Brodeur was, for most of the 2000s, the best goalie in all of hockey. A Team Canada fixture and a stalwart in the net of the always-contending New Jersey Devils, Brodeur has started to show his age in recent years and this season, it looks as if the train has stopped at the station for the final time. Brodeur is now 35th in the NHL in goals against average (2.98) and 42nd in save percentage (.891). At 12-10-1 in 26 games, he’s just not the same goaltender.

These are just a few of the surprises that have been foisted upon National Hockey League fans and fantasy players in the first half of the 2011-12 season. But there have been more – many more!

While the fates of Crosby, Avery and Brodeur and might soon be decided, there is a whole slew of players who have surprised the experts this season – both in good and bad ways.

Here is a quick look at the 10 Most Surprising Players in the NHL this season. And, remember, they are not always surprising for the right reasons:

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Teemu

1. Teemu Selanne, Anaheim Ducks: While some players have long retired at the age of 41, the Finnish Flash is like fine wine. He improves with age. After 18 seasons in the NHL, Selanne is now 14th in scoring with 15 goals and 28 assists. He picked up two goals last weekend and then two assists on Tuesday night and a goal and an assist on Friday night. He’s well ahead of legitimate, young NHL scoring stars such as the Kings’ Anze Kopitar, the Islanders John Tavares, Chicago’s Patrick Kane, Washington’s Alex Ovechkin and Nicklas Backstrom New Jersey’s Ilya Kovalchuk. No wonder Anaheim GM Bob Murray, a guy who says he’s ready to break up the Ducks and start over, called Selanne “an untouchable” this past week.

2. Jason Spezza, Ottawa Senators: OK, so from the day he entered the NHL, everyone had high hopes for Spezza. But for years he’s been a victim of his own potential. Playing for some marginal coaches on some horrendous lines, Spezza put up with a lot of baloney in Ottawa. He never reached that gigantic potential he was said to have but you can bet there was no coach ready to take responsibility for Spezza’s failures. Then along comes Paul MacLean and everything changes. Last year, Spezza had 21 goals and 36 assists. It was a decent season, but not as spectacular as his big year in 2007-08 when he had 34 goals and 58 assists. This year, however, the 28-year-old from Toronto who was the second overall pick in 2001, has a chance to record his best season as a pro. After 45 games, he has 18 goals and 28 assists and is seventh overall in NHL scoring. The arrival of MacLean, who put him on a line with Daniel Alfredsson and let him do what he does best, has made Spezza a star again – and a starter in the All-Star game.

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Claude Giroux

3. Claude Giroux, Philadelphia Flyers: In 2006, Giroux was the No. 1 draft pick of the Philadelphia Flyers, 22nd overall. This guy had enjoyed two straight 100-point-plus seasons with the Gatineau Olympiques of the Quebec League, had wonderful speed, great moves and soft hands and yet it took 21 selections before the Flyers could grab him because so many teams thought, that at 5-foot-11, 170 pounds, he was just a little undersized. Still, the Flyers were prepared to wait for him to reach his potential and it appears that the potential has been reached. Last year, Giroux had 25 goals and 51 assists. This year, he has 18 goals and 31 assists, is tied for second in scoring in the NHL and has missed four games with a head injury. Right now, 23-year-old Claude Giroux might be the best young player in the NHL.

4. Jason Pominville, Buffalo Sabres: Last year, Pominville had 22 goals and 30 assists in 73 games. It wasn’t his best season in the NHL and it even appeared as if his play was tailing off. The concussion he suffered early last season might have been a reason for his declining numbers — he had 80 points in 2007-08 and then 66 in 2008-09, 62 in 2009-10 and 52 last year. This year, however, with the captain’s C on his jersey, Pominville has suddenly awakened. After 43 games (he has played in every Sabres game this season), the former second-round draft pick (55th overall in 2001) has 15 goals and 29 assists and is 10th in scoring in the NHL. Most NHL followers expected Pominville to be a good player for the Sabres. No one expected him to be in the Top 10 in scoring, let alone a participant in the all-star game.

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Colton Orr vs. Arron Asham

5. Colton Orr, Toronto Maple Leafs: On Jan. 5 of this year, Orr was waived through the league and sent to the Toronto Marlies of the AHL. While in Winnipeg two weeks ago, just before he was waived, Orr said to me,” The game is changing again. They don’t need guys like me like they used to.” Orr is an “enforcer.” Some might say, a “goon.” And yet, he was an integral part of the Leafs plans until head coach Ron Wilson decided he didn’t need a fighter who had only played five games. Leafs GM Brian Burke said sending Orr to the Marlies was one of the most difficult things he’s ever done. Even Burke knows that Orr’s demotion was an admission that fighting is being used on a very limited basis in the game these days.

6. Alex Ovechkin, Washington Capitals: Perhaps the most skilled player in the NHL, Ovechkin has 18 goals and 16 assists in 42 games this season and is 46th in league scoring. This is a 26-year-old hockey player – make that superstar – who had 32 goals and 53 assists last year, but 109 points in 2009-10 and 110 points in 2008-09. Something is either wrong with Ovechkin or wrong with the game when a player with this much skill is held to only 34 points in 42 games at the age of 26. Of course, most observers will tell you he’s being held back by his own coaches, coaches who are more interested in stopping the other team from scoring than scoring goals themselves.

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Erik Karlsson

7. Erik Karlsson, Ottawa Senators: Make no mistake, most hockey experts that Karlsson would be a good one when he arrived from Sweden as Ottawa’s first round pick (15th overall) in 2008. But like so many young defensemen, it’s taken him a few seasons to adapt to the speed and grit of the NHL. But this year, Karlsson has adapted. Last year, he had 13 goals and 45 points in 75 games and was a dreadful minus-30. This year, he already has six goals and 43 points and is a plus-eight on an Ottawa team that moved into fifth in the Eastern Conference after a 3-0 shut out of the New York Rangers on Thursday night. He’s a starter in the all-star game and when you’re the 15th leading scorer in the NHL and tops among defenseman, no one can argue.

8. Dwayne Roloson, Tampa Bay Lightning: Certainly, people thought Dwayne Roloson was just about done. But after the way he played last season at age 41 – 18-12-4 with a 2.56 goals against average and a .912 save percentage – many people, including Lightning GM Steve Yzerman, believed Roloson had something left in the tank. But this season has been a nightmare for the 16-year NHL veteran. He is 72nd in goals against with a 3.68 mark and 71st in save percentage at .880. The reflexes had just disappeared. At 6-10-2 in 23 appearances this season, Roloson does not even resemble an NHL-level goaltender. Yzerman gambled and kept Roloson one season too long.

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Jordan Eberle

9. Jordan Eberle, Edmonton Oilers: It’s his second full season in the NHL and this former first round draft pick (22nd overall in 2008) has matched his scoring output from last year. Last season, Eberle had 18 goals and 43 points. This year, after 41 games, Eberle has 17 goals and 43 points and he’s helped make Ryan Nugent-Hopkins the early favorite for rookie of the year (on a line with Nugent-Hopkins and young Taylor Hall, they are known as the “Diaper Snipers.”). Eberle is tied for 10th in NHL scoring. Not one rightwinger in the Western Conference has more points than he does and the rightwingers on the all-star team from the West are a pretty nice group — Jarome Iginla, Patrick Kane, Marian Hossa and Corey Perry. Right now, Eberle has a sprained knee and probably won’t play until after the all-star game, but when he does come back, he’ll no doubt take a run at a 70-point season.

10. Ondrej Pavelec, Winnipeg Jets: At 24, he’s still a young NHL goalie, but Pavelec doesn’t appear, on the surface at least, to be a very good one. He’s 40th in the NHL among ALL goaltenders in save percentage with a .910 mark and 50th in goals against with a mark of 2.92. But he’s a fan-favorite in Winnipeg and a guy who has single-handedly won a half dozen of the 15 victories on his record (he’s an average 15-15-5 on the season). What makes Pavelec so surprising is his ability to play at home in the tiny MTS Centre in front of Winnipeg’s loud, proud fans but on the road, he’s a wonky goalie. Pavelec has a 3.50 goals against average and a .896 save percentage away from home, both well below average. At home, however, he has a 2.32 goals against average and a .925 save percentage. If he could play on the road as well as he does at home, he’d be one of the best goaltenders in the NHL. As it is, he’s in the bottom third of the league. Go figure.

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The 10 Biggest Stories of the Opening Half

Posted on January 9, 2012 by Scott Taylor| 1 Comment

sport 257 The 10 Biggest Stories of the Opening HalfIt’s halftime. Most of the National Hockey League’s 30 teams have played 41 of 82 games and for some of the teams, it’s been quite a ride. For a load of others, of course, it’s been a nightmare.

The Anaheim Ducks were fourth in the West last spring with 99 points. At the midway mark of 2011-12, the Ducks have only 11 wins and 28 points. Last year, the Atlanta Thrashers were in the midst of a downward spiral, set to miss the playoffs for the fourth consecutive season. This year, the Thrashers are now the Winnipeg Jets and after a win in their 41st game of the season on Saturday night, they sit in ninth place in the East, just a point below the post-season line.

Still, there was a lot more to the first half of this season’s NHL campaign than just the woes of the Ducks and the euphoria in Winnipeg. In fact, finding the 10 most important issues of the first half was so easy, we had to exclude a few for the first time in four seasons of making this list.

So without further adieu, here’s our First Half Top 10 NHL Issues for 2011-12:

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Teemu

10. The Collapse of the Anaheim Ducks: Last season, with 99 points, the Ducks made the playoffs easily. With stars such as Teemu Selanne, Saku Koivu, Corey Perry, Ryan Getzlaf, Bobby Ryan and Cam Fowler, the Ducks were expected to challenge for the Stanley Cup. Uh, oh. The Ducks have 12 wins in their first 40 games and general manager Bob Murray told the Los Angeles Times last week that he’s just about ready to blow it up. Murray said Selanne and Koivu were “untouchable,” but everybody else was available. This is a very good team with very good players but something is wrong. Murray fired head coach Randy Carlyle and replaced him with Bruce Boudreau and nothing changed. One suspects that the Ducks will be a completely different team by the trade deadline. Oh yeah, and Teemu won’t be an untouchable by the Feb. 27 trade deadline. He’d look great in a Jets uniform.

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Claude Giroux

9. The Emergence of Claude Giroux: In 2006, Claude Giroux was the No. 1 draft pick of the Philadelphia Flyers, 22nd overall. This guy had enjoyed two straight 100-point-plus seasons with the Gatineau Olympiques of the Quebec League, had wonderful speed, great moves and soft hands and yet it took 21 selections before the Flyers could grab him because so many teams thought that at 5-foot-11, 170 pounds, he was a tad undersized. Before Giroux was taken, Florida took Michael Frolik, Tampa selected Riku Helenius, Anaheim took Mark Mitera and Montreal took David Fischer. Huh? Giroux was playing at the Habs doorstep and that organization didn’t even notice. Last year, Giroux had 25 goals and 51 assists. This year, at the midway point, he has 18 goals and 30 assists, is second in scoring in the NHL and has missed four games with a head injury. Right now, 23-year-old Claude Giroux might be the best young player in the NHL.

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Scott Arniel - gone.

8. Coach Firings: It started when the St. Louis Blues fired Davis Payne on Nov. 5 and replaced him with Ken Hitchcock. Now, nearly one-sixth of the entire league has fired its coach. Washington fired Bruce Boudreau and replaced him with Dale Hunter; Carolina fired Paul Maurice and replaced him with Kirk Muller; Anaheim fired Randy Carlyle and replaced him with Bruce Boudreau; Los Angeles fired Terry Murray and replaced him with Darryl Sutter; Montreal fired Jacques Martin and replaced him with Randy Cunneyworth and on Monday, the Columbus Blue Jackets fired Scott Arniel and replaced him with Todd Richards. St. Louis, Washington and L.A. have benefited from the changes. Not so much for Anaheim, Carolina and Montreal. We’ll wait on Columbus, but that’s an American Hockey League team. I wouldn’t expect a change in fortunes.

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Adam Larsson

7. The Game’s Great Teenagers: On Jan. 31, Tyler Seguin turns 20. Until then he is one of the league’s many outstanding teenaged stars. Seguin has 37 points in 37 games this season and is a plus-32, that’s the best in the entire NHL. Meanwhile, 19-year-old Jeff Skinner (down with a concussion), 18-year-old Ryan Nugent-Hopkins (35 points in 38 games) of the Oilers, 19-year-old Adam Larsson (24 minutes a game as a defenseman) of the Devils, 19-year-old Gabriel Landeskog (plus-10 on a minus team) of the Avalanche and 19-year-old Sean Couturier of the Flyers, are all playing regularly – and well – in the best league in the world.

6. Realignment: The league voted 26-4 to realign the league in 2012-13 from a two-conference, six-division operation in which 16 teams made it to the playoffs, to a four-conference league, separated by time zones. It was brilliant, but it didn’t even get off the ground.

5. The Rejection of Realignment: This was a bigger deal than realignment itself. In an effort to fire a salvo at the owners, the players rejected the league’s new realignment. NHLPA executive director Donald Fehr said it had something to do with travel and fairness (since when did the Agents Association give a crap about fairness?). Seems the players couldn’t get a clear feel about the travel issues, days off, etc. etc and they didn’t like the fact that there were seven teams in two conferences and eight teams in two others and the players thought it would be harder to make the playoffs in the West. Most people involved with the NHL believed that this was simply Fehr’s first shot at the owners in what everyone believes will be a long, ugly battle for a new collective bargaining agreement (the old one expires on Sept. 15, 2012). In fact, many people are convinced there will not be a hockey season in 2012-13.

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Randy Cunneyworth, not the bad guy.

4. The Mess in Montreal: Here is the biggest problem facing the Montreal Canadiens: They don’t win enough games. At the midway point of the season, the Habs are 16-18-7 and in 12th place in the NHL’s Eastern Conference. However, many Quebeckers are not angry at the fact the Habs are a lousy team, but they’re incensed by the less-important fact (at least to a rational individual) that the Canadiens fired Jacques Martin and replaced him with Randy Cunneyworth, a coach from Etobicoke, Ont., who does not speak French. On Saturday night, Quebec Nationalists protested that the Canadiens, “aren’t French enough.”  What really pissed them off was the fact they found out the language of the locker room is English and that the team is made up of eight players from English Canada, five Americans, 10 Europeans (none from France) and only two Quebecois. In a roundabout way, the protesters have a right to be upset. How good and French would Montreal be today if they’d drafted PA Parenteau in 2001; Patrice Bergeron in 2003; Marc-Edouard Vlasic and Marc-Andre Gragnani in 2005; Claude Giroux, Brad Marchand and Mathieu Perrault in 2006; and hadn’t traded away Maxim Lapierre, Guillaume Latendresse and their first-round pick in 2008? Of course, have you noticed that after Giroux and maybe Vincent Lecavalier, there aren’t that many great French-Canadian players anymore? Maybe the problem in Quebec is at the minor hockey level, not the NHL level.

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Opening Night in Winnipeg

3. The Return of the Winnipeg Jets: It was one of the biggest stories in Canadian sport in 2011. On May 31, Mark Chipman and David Thompson announced that they had acquired the Atlanta Thrashers of the NHL and they were going to move the team to Winnipeg. They sold out the season tickets at the MTS Centre – for five years! – in just 17 minutes. Since then they have won 19 of their first 41 games (19-16-5) and remain a legitimate playoff threat. After 16 years without an NHL team, Winnipeg had its beloveds back again and Canada had a seventh franchise. The crowd at MTS Centre is so loud, enthusiastic, fun and intelligent that it has become an international story unto itself. Happy days are here again.

2. Concussions and The Shanahan Justice: This season, Brendan Shanahan took over from Colin Campbell as the NHL’s director of discipline and it’s clear he’s been told to do everything possible to lower the number of concussions being suffered by NHL players. The concussion “epidemic,” is indeed and epidemic, but there is one big problem: Many of the concussions suffered by the game’s top players came as a result of (a) contact with teammates, (b) inadvertent contact based on the speed and size of the players and (c) injuries that were a result of hard plastic equipment that is a dangerous weapon when it’s placed on large, fast hockey players. So far this season, Shanahan has suspended 30 players while another 14 players have been fined. Trouble is, in the big picture, none of this is making a dent in the problem.

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Will We See Him Again?

1. The Loss of Sidney Crosby: So far this year Chris Pronger (who signed a seven-year contract with Philadelphia in 2009) has been lost for the season with a concussion, young superstars Claude Giroux and Jeff Skinner missed time with concussions or concussion-like symptoms and even Ottawa forward Milan Michalek (20 goals already) has missed games due to head trauma. However, the loss of Sidney Crosby — the game’s best player – since last January because of a concussion is what makes this epidemic so tragic. When the face of the game is also the face of the game’s biggest problem, the NHL has trouble.

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Are We Closing in on Another Nuclear Winter?

Posted on January 7, 2012 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment
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Gary Bettman

When Donald Fehr took over as the executive director of the National Hockey League Players Association, he offered an olive branch to commissioner Gary Bettman.

In a far-reaching interview in early 2011, Fehr said he wasn’t taking over the position to create any problems or have a fight with anyone. He was there to do what’s best for his members. Sounded good, but anyone who knew Fehr, knew that he was jerking Bettman’s chain.

Friday night, Fehr yanked Bettman’s chain again.

A realignment plan that was approved 26-4 by the teams and got the thumbs up from the more than two dozen players with whom I spoke, was not approved by Fehr and the NHL Players’ (Agents?) Association.

That brought a long response from the league, but here was the money line: “It is unfortunate that the NHLPA has unreasonably refused to approved a plan that an overwhelming majority of our clubs voted to support and that has received such widespread support from our fans and other members of the hockey community, including players.”

I particularly like the use of the word, “unreasonably.”

Bettman, who can become quite prickly when someone does or says something he doesn’t like (see: Ron MacLean), was obviously pissed. This was his realignment. He, and pretty much everyone else, knew it made sense, andyet  his new best friend, Don Fehr, threw it right back in his face.

Are We Closing in on Another Nuclear Winter?

Donald Fehr

However, keep this mind. Fehr isn’t an idiot. He knows that the realignment agreement made sense. He knew that vast majority of his members have stated publicly that they liked it. This is a man who just wants a preliminary bout.

As we know, the current collective bargaining agreement expires on Sept. 15. Initial discussions on a new CBA are set for the all-star break. Don Fehr has just told Gary Bettman that the negotiations are going to be no cakewalk. As the executive director of the Major League Baseball Players Association, Fehr made it clear that he had no patience for salary caps and he will not allow his members to give up the 57 per cent of revenues they have already collectively bargained (the owners want what the NBA owners got, abut 50 per cent). Hockey fans should brace for a long, ugly ordeal.

There is a war looming. On Friday night, Donald Fehr fired the first shot.

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Another Day With the Circus

Posted on January 2, 2012 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment
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Chris Johnson Should Be in the NFL Playoffs

New Year’s Day was disappointing. There were no real upsets in the NFL wars. Sure, Kansas City going into Denver and beating the Broncos 7-3 was a bit of an upset, but considering all the holes in the Broncos offense, it wasn’t a big surprise.

In the end, the finish to the NFL season created the usual stupid playoff matchups. Explain to me the logic behind the ridiculous fact that 12-4 Pittsburgh has to go on the road to play at 8-8 Denver in the first round of the post-season this coming weekend. That’s bloody senseless. Sure, Denver won a Division, but there are BCS teams that could have won the AFC West. The only surprise in the AFC West is that San Diego coach Norv Turner wasn’t fired on Monday.

Of course, it was a surprise that Norv Turner wasn’t fired seven weeks ago.

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Tim Tebow Should Not Be in the NFL Playoffs

When 9-7 teams are eliminated (Tennessee) and 8-8 teams (Denver) get in, you have a problem with your playoff structure. It’s time the NFL went to at least eight teams in the post-season. Or else the league should have a cross-over team. Denver has no business being in the playoffs. And they have no business being in the playoffs even if they upset Pittsburgh this week. The Broncos, a sorry team,  are in the playoffs only because the rest of their division is putrid and their presence is a post-season blight on the NFL’s good name.

OK, that rant is done. Now, to relax. At least, on the day after New Year’s, we were treated to some very good sporting events.

Loved the Wisconsin-Oregon Rose Bowl, won 45-38 by Oregon in what the critics are calling Nike’s victory over adidas.

It seems the teams themselves were perfectly matched. The difference in the game was the uniforms. adidas had developed special uniforms for Wisconsin while Nike had developed what it called, “the greatest technological advancement in uniform design in sports history.” (I love the fact that Nike doesn’t get all hyperbolic about itself).

In the end, Oregon won because they had cooler helmets. At least, that’s my guess.

I also enjoyed the Michigan State-Georgia Outback Bowl in Tampa. Considering the way the Buccaneers played in 2011, it was the best football game Tampa fans saw all year. Michigan State won 33-30 in triple overtime. Nice.

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Rangers Score to Win the Winter Classic

The one thing that wasn’t so nice on Jan. 2 was the Winter Classic, the NHL’s outdoor game in Philly. The hockey was decent and it’s always fun to watch one outdoor NHL game a year, but the officiating made the NHL look like professional wrestling.

I had a Sport Select ticket with the Flyers on it, but by the end of the game, I was cheering for the Rangers. That’s because, by the end of the game, referees Ian Walsh and Dennis LaRue were doing everything they possibly could to get Philly the tying goal. Why didn’t one of them just throw the puck in the net and say Scottie Hartnell shot it?

Ryan Callahan’s holding the stick penalty was one of the most mind-boggling calls in hockey history while the penalty shot call on Ryan McDonagh was weak (Covering the puck in the crease? Well, maybe, at absolute worst). In the end, Henrik Lundqvist beat the officials by himself and I didn’t even mind tearing up my Pro Line ticket.

Then, to top off a very interesting day, word arrived on my Twitter that the Calgary Stampeders and Hamilton Tiger-Cats were about to swap quarterbacks.

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Henry Burris Now No. 1 in Hamilton

You knew it was coming, didn’t you? You knew there was no way the Hamilton Tiger-Cats were going back into battle with Kevin Glenn as their No. 1 quarterback next season. And you also knew that Lyle Bauer, the president in Calgary, was NOT going to pay Henry Burris a bonus on Feb. 1, if he could help it. After all, he pulled the same trick with Kevin Glenn in 2009 when he released Glenn before he had to pay him a few thousand bones.

Anyway, we learned late in the day that there was a deal in place to send Glenn to Calgary as the backup to Drew Tate — along with offensive lineman Mark Dewit — while Burris would head to the Ticats to be the new No. 1 in Hamilton.

It was a huge trade, but absolutely no surprise.

It was quite a day. Throw in all the NFL firings and it was a lot more fun than NFL Sunday.

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Helpless

Posted on December 27, 2011 by Scott Taylor| 1 Comment
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Sidney Crosby

It could have been called “Black Tuesday.”

On Tuesday, Dec. 20, two New York Islanders, goalie Al Montoya and forward David Ullstrom, were taken from the ice with suspected concussions. In Ottawa, Jesse Winchester left the game with head trauma. In Pittsburgh, the home of Sidney Crosby and his fragile cranium, Chicago’s Marcus Kruger left the game with a concussion after a vicious hit from Deryk Engelland.

One night, three games, four concussions.

If there was one story that has consumed the National Hockey League this season, it is the concussion story. Yes, the return of the Jets was wonderful and the death of three players in the off-season was tragic, but the one story that wouldn’t fade away –primarily because of the injury suffered by Sidney Crosby – was the concussion story.

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Shea Weber in happier times

And, not surprisingly, it became as big an issue as ever at the end of 2011. Especially after John-Michael Liles went down on Dec. 22 and Shea Weber suffered a concussion on Dec. 23.

Sadly, there is very little that can be done about it.

Now, naturally, the NHL was concerned the night Montoya, Ullstrom, Winchester and Kruger went down. Already, some of its biggest stars were on the sidelines nursing head injuries – Crosby, Jeff Skinner, Chris Pronger — so of course the league was worried.

Trouble was, there was absolutely nothing the NHL could have done. Engelland was suspended for his hit on Kruger, but Montoya was blasted by Winnipeg’s Evander Kane, who was pushed into the goalie, so it wasn’t Kane’s fault. Kane didn’t even have a discussion with the NHL’s vice-president of discipline, Brendan Shanahan.

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Brendan Shanahan: A Man With an Impossible Job

Fact is, in the vast majority of major head trauma incidents this season, there was absolutely nothing the NHL could have done. Milan Michalek ran into his own teammate. Claude Giroux ran into his own teammate. The list goes on.

Tim Wharnsby, who writes for CBCsports.ca has kept count of this season’s concussions and resulting suspensions. According to Wharnsby, the NHL has lost 457 man-games due to head injuries while players have been suspended a total of 77 games for alleged illegal hits.

And still, players are suffering concussions at an alarming rate.

Here are the problems:

1. The equipment. The players don’t wear padding anymore, they wear body armour. Their equipment is a weapon, or a series of weapons.

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The End of Marc Savard's Career

2. The athletes are too big and too fast. Fifty years ago, players averaged 5-foot-10, 175 pounds. Today, it’s 6-foot-2, 220-pounds. The ice surface is no bigger than t was then. Accidents will happen and the presence of these very big men will make those accidents more devastating.

3. The skates. Today’s hockey skates are a technological masterpiece. They are lighter, the blades are sharper and as a result, these giant players skate faster than ever. When the players run into each other, somebody gets hurt.

4. No red line. Players are flying through the neutral zone at a pace that has never been more frightening. If a player gets hit in the neutral zone now, there is always a chance a stretcher will be required.

5. The ice surface. With larger, faster players, the 200-foot X 85-foot enclosure might be too small. But there is one problem. If you watch a hockey game today, most of the fierce play occurs in a space from 10-feet to 30-feet in front of the net, between the circles. Even if there was a larger ice surface, it’s unlikely players would use the extra space.

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Will he get up this time?

The NHL can continue to pass new rules designed to avoid the inevitable. It can fine and suspend players and pay a full-time disciplinarian to try and “clean-up” the game. But I’m afraid none of it will work.

It’s the nature of the game – a fast, brutal dangerous game. And as long as large, tough, fearless, fast-skating, highly-paid entertainers are asked to do what’s necessary to play in the NHL, there will be serious head injuries.

And there is nothing – nothing – that the league can do about it.

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For the Jets, It’s Time to Run the Month.

Posted on December 23, 2011 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment
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Goalie Ondrej Pavelec

The Winnipeg Jets began the homestand on Nov. 29. They had 13 of 15 games at home and they needed to grab at least 20 of 26 possible points.

It was a simple assignment, but it come without a certain degree of difficulty.

This team needed to make some noise. After all, come January, the Jets will play 12 of 16 away from MTS Centre and if they don’t make some hay in December, they could end up a long way from the playoffs come the middle of February. In fact, from Jan. 4 until Feb. 14, the Jets play 15 of 21 on the road. It’s win now and then try to keep the ship together.

So far, so good. The Jets have played 10 games this month and the team is 7-2-1 (7-3-1 since Nov. 29), 7-1-1 at home. The only loss at MTS Centre was that 1-0 mystery against Washington.

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Captain Andrew Ladd

Otherwise, the Jets have played tremendously and now they have a chance to guarantee 20 points this month. They already have 15 of a possible 18 in December and tonight they get the Sidney-Crosby-less Pittsburgh Penguins at home.

So how did the Jets go from 9-11-4 to 16-13-5 so quickly? Five reasons:

1. Ondrej Pavelec: The Jets goaltender has had three tremendous games and two pretty good ones during the stretch. In a 3-2 shootout loss to the Islanders, Pavelec stole the point. Other than the ugly 7-1 loss in Detroit, which was nothing more than a blip on the screen, Pavelec has made the Jets a better team. It was Brian Burke who said, “We call it the Stanley Cup playoffs because we can’t call it goalie.” You could paraphrase that and say. “We call it the Winnipeg Jets 2011-12 season because we can’t call it goalie.” The Jets have moved from 12th to ninth because their goaltender has stolen at least three games and at least seven points.

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Evander Kans scores one of his 15

2. All hands on deck. The Jets leading scorer, Evander Kane, has 15 goals and 10 assists and is 54th in scoring in the NHL. However, it doesn’t matter. Regardless of the game, it seems that somebody always steps up. If it’s not Bryan Little, it’s Andrew Ladd or it’s Blake Wheeler. The Jets have a potential superstar in Kane, but he’s not there yet. Right now this team is scoring by committee and for the time being, at least, it’s working.

3. The Jets survived the loss of Tobias Enstrom. When he was injured, Enstrom was playing 25-32 minutes a game. He was not only a workhorse, he was the steadiest influence on the team. When he went down, the Jets were a 12th place team. When he came back they were 11th, but had gained three points on the teams in the Top 8. It could have been a lot worse and with him back, the Jets have a full compliment of NHL-level defensemen.

4. Claude Noel. He is a journalist’s dream, an eccentric, insightful, talkative head coach who is NOT afraid to say what’s on his mind. His post-game stream-of-conscious news conferences are becoming the highlight of every game. He has

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Claude Noel

made, what appear to be some strange moves at times, but it’s impossible to criticize any of them. The Jets started the season as a 12th place team heading directly toward 12th place. Today they are a ninth place team on the verge of getting into a position to make the playoffs — provided they survive January. Noel has had a great deal to do with that.

5. The crowd at MTS Centre. No wonder these Jets don’t play as well on the road. The home crowd in Winnipeg is a phenomenon. The 15,004 who show up inside the tiny boutique arena in downtown Winnipeg (and make no mistake, every seat is taken) start screaming before the game and don’t stop until their beloved Jets salute from centre ice after the final buzzer. Long-time Alberta journalist Bruce Penton compared it to a British soccer crowd. “They don’t get tired,” he said. “It’s just relentless.” And despite that lousy little excuse after a 5-1 season–opening loss to the Montreal Canadiens, the Jets have warmed to the crowd. They love it. They live for it. If there can actually be a “seventh man” he/she lives in Winnipeg.

These Jets are by no means a playoff-bound team. But so far, they have grabbed a hold of this December homestand and skated with it. A win over the Penguins on Friday night and they could be locked into a playoff spot with two more home games next week.

Then, in January, we’ll really get to see what they have in the tank.

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