Brophy on Leafs: Dudley does right
Toronto Maple Leafs director of player personnel Rick Dudley is expected to join the Montreal Canadiens.

Mike Brophy, Sportsnet.ca, May 8 2012


The Montreal Canadiens were a bunch of duds this season, finishing out of the playoffs and dead last in the Eastern Conference.

Now it appears they are going after Duds to help them get back to the dance.

Duds, as in Rick Dudley, who is currently the director of player personnel for the Toronto Maple Leafs.

When Marc Bergevin was named the new general manager of the Habs last week, it was immediately speculated that he would try to hire Dudley away from the Maple Leafs to become his assistant GM. Bergevin and Dudley are close friends having worked together in building the Chicago Blackhawks into a Stanley Cup champion in 2010. Bergevin was the Hawks director of player personnel and although Dudley had departed to become GM of the Atlanta Thrashers by time Chicago hoisted the Cup, his fingerprints were all over the team.

It has been even suggested if Dudley joins the Canadiens, he would pull the strings as the team's GM with the bilingual and comical Bergevin merely being the face of the management team.

Of course the fact that Dudley is currently under contract with the Maple Leafs and the two teams are said to be in discussions trying to work out a deal that will allow him to join the rival organization could be a stumbling block. The Maple Leafs want Dudley to remain with them at least until the 2012 NHL Draft in June concludes. Montreal is slated to select third overall, while Toronto is primed to pick fifth.

It really comes as no surprise that a team would seek out Dudley to be a leader on their management staff. He is, after all, a guy who has been the general manager of four NHL teams (Ottawa Senators, Tampa Bay Lightning, Florida Panthers and Atlanta Thrashers) and has worked as a coach, amateur and pro scout, director of player personnel and as an assistant GM since retiring as a player in 1982.

"Duds is a smart guy," said Maple Leafs assistant GM Claude Loiselle, who also interviewed for the Canadiens GM post. "He is a little unorthodox, but he's a really good scout. Even when he was the GM in Tampa Bay, he would jump in his car and take off to scout players for days on end. He just loves watching games and evaluating players."

Added Maple Leafs director of amateur scouting Dave Morrison: "He's a good man and he loves the game ... absolutely loves the game! He is as enthusiastic about the game of hockey as anybody I have ever met. He gets excited about good players making great plays. It's refreshing. Scouting isn't necessarily the most glamorous job in hockey, but Duds just embraces it."

Loiselle said when he first met Dudley when they worked together in Tampa Bay, he was introduced to a new way of classifying players. All scouts, Loiselle said, have a system, usually numerical, but Dudley's system included ranking players by number and by letter. Forwards are ranked as elite, skilled and bottom six while defenceman are either top four or bottom five, six and seven.

"At first it was difficult to understand, but once you grasped it, you realized how easy it was," Loiselle said. "It's just one more step in defining the players that we scouted."

As a player, Dudley, was as tenacious as they come. The 6-foot, 190-pound left winger scored 75 goals and 174 points with 292 penalty minutes in 309 NHL games with Buffalo and Winnipeg, and 131 goals and 277 points with 516 penalty minutes in 270 WHA games with the Cincinnati Stingers. He was also one of the best -- and toughest -- lacrosse players in the world having played for the Rochester Golden Griffins of the National Lacrosse League.

Yet to meet the soft-spoken Dudley, who is 63, one would never guess that he could be as brash as a player.

"There are guys who weren't tough as players, but as soon as they get behind the bench to coach they act like tough guys," Loiselle said. "And then there are guys who were genuinely tough as players, but when you meet them off the ice, they have completely different personalities. That's Duds."

Don Luce, the director of player development with the Philadelphia Flyers, played on the same line with Dudley on the Buffalo Sabres in the '70s and said his skill was underrated.

"He was definitely a fiery competitor," Luce said. "I don't know if you would call him Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, but he was absolutely a fierce player. He played with so much passion. The funny thing is, he is mostly remembered for being an energy player and a tough guy to play against, but he had a high skill level, too. I remember one game against the Canadiens, he carried the puck from one end to the other, through the entire team, and scored a goal. I think the Canadiens were shocked. They didn't expect that from him. And yet he also played his typical tough game that night."

Luce said Dudley was a great teammate -- always there to help others. It is looking very much like he'll be there to help his pal Bergevin try to revive the NHL's most successful franchise which has fallen on hard times very soon.

A three-in-the-key rule to solve NHL’s shot-blocking bore

ERIC DUHATSCHEK, Globe and Mail, May. 09, 2012


In the mid-1990s, during the NHL’s original dead-puck era, former coach and general manager Pierre Pagé floated a unique idea that may have merit again as scoring shrinks and the game has turned into an exercise in shot-blocking, where the majority of goals are scored on ricochets, deflections or other happenstance.

What’s on display in these playoffs isn’t hockey, it’s pinball.

Seeking a way to enhance offence, Pagé proposed that the NHL introduce a modified version of basketball’s three-in-the-key rule. The rule states that an offensive player shall not remain in the key for more than three seconds. Pagé’s application to hockey would affect both offensive and defensive players, with the primary goal to keep the area in front of the net unclogged.

It’s an idea worth considering, given how established the shot-blocking trend is today. Teams all collapse back toward the goal, with every player instructed to get in front of shots, even if they happen to screen the goaltenders. Under the Pagé plan, hockey could create a zone in front of the goaltender that perhaps only three, or even two, players a team could enter at the same time.

Naturally, purists would hate this innovation because it would mean drawing more lines on the ice, but for the sake of argument, let’s say the NHL designated the area from the goal to the outer edges of the lower faceoff circles as hockey’s key. If you permitted only two defenders to enter that area at a time, you might see some creative plays down low instead of the gridlock we have now. Traffic on the Long Island Expressway at rush hour can’t compare to the way the New York Rangers clog the lanes in front of goaltender Henrik Lundqvist, and the Washington Capitals are just as guilty/adept, making the area in front of Braden Holtby look like the Beltway when a presidential motorcade is passing by.

Maybe you’d see more stick-handling. Maybe you’d see more give-and-goes. It might take some getting used to – defenders stationed outside the zone, waiting for an opportunity to counter. But it might also mean more action off the rush; if a team breaks up a play in the key and gets the puck ahead to one of its forwards, it theoretically should create more open-ice, odd-man opportunities, a part of the old NHL that seems to have been relegated to the Classic TV channels.

The attempt to unclog the area in front of the goalie would break the glassy-eyed sameness of what we have now – a game dominated by netminding and team defence, in which virtually every goal seems to come off a cycle down low and requires that the puck carom to a player in a shooting position, usually off a deflected pass. There is so much more randomness and luck involved in scoring a goal than pure offensive brilliance and it’s not because of a lack of skill. The skilled players just don’t have enough room to demonstrate those talents.

It even raises the larger question, which seems to have gone unasked in these playoffs. Is shot-blocking good for the game? Unquestionably, it takes courage to block shots. Nowadays, players can all rifle the puck, and as good as it is, today’s equipment cannot completely protect against the tiny gaps where the human body is exposed. If the puck hits you just right, it can do some serious damage. One of these days, a puck is going to deflect off a stick, into the face of a player and there will be a tragedy on the ice.

Beyond the safety considerations, there is also the entertainment perspective to consider. Yes, the league is competitive. Yes, there is parity. Any team can win, and all you need to do is examine who’s left in the playoffs to understand that. All five Western Conference teams that finished with 100 or more points in the regular season are on the sidelines. For the right to advance to the Stanley Cup final, we’re left with the Phoenix Coyotes and the Los Angeles Kings, two teams that – based on their respective goalie’s save percentages – are stopping 19 of every 20 shots that actually make it to the net, never mind all the ones blocked along the way.

In this day and age, it isn’t just NHL players who are better than they’ve ever been. Coaches are too. Coaches have devised these winning defensive systems and players are smart, skilled and fit enough to adhere to them with minimal breakdowns. There is no earthly reason why, on a sheet of ice 200 feet by 85 feet, eight of 10 position players should be spending so much time crowded within 30 feet of the same net.

Maybe that’s an idea the NHL’s research and development crew can examine next summer.

Because based on these playoffs, the NHL is moving ever closer to an era where a single goal is all you’re going to see on a given night.

Quenneville uses leverage, plus 30 Thoughts

Elliotte Friedman, CBC Sports, May 9 2012


I'm a big believer in "face time," that talking to someone or seeing a situation in-person is the best way to report. Obviously, that isn't always possible, but it beats phone calls or text messaging - the scourge of a new generation.

Didn't get a lot of face-time with the Chicago Blackhawks this season and I'm not around the team every day like a Chris Kuc, an Adam Jahns or a Tracey Myers. But there were plenty of rumours of behind-the-scenes strife, especially when former Scotty Bowman assistant Barry Smith appeared on-ice to help with the ailing power play.

General manager Stan Bowman agreed to address it two months ago and disagreed with the idea of a rift, pointing out that Smith - the team's director of player development - worked with guys all the time. He added it didn't hurt to "have an extra set of eyes" with a power play that went 0-for-40 in one stretch.

The rumours never went away. Not being there makes it very difficult to recognize what really is going on. Tuesday night, we finally received a window into the situation.

As Joel Quenneville emphatically stated his desire to stay with the Blackhawks, assistant coach Mike Haviland was fired. This came two days after we blathered that Quenneville's good friend, new Canadiens GM Marc Bergevin, may ask for permission to talk to him about the Montreal opening.

"I had an assessment that there is some dysfunction to our coaching staff and we need a change," Quenneville said on a conference call, adding that Stan Bowman agreed. "It was not an easy decision. It was tough on Mike. I'm respectful for the job that he did. It's not the blame game here."

He later added, "I take ownership for what happened this year."

The word "dysfunction" is an eyebrow-raiser, because you so rarely hear coaches use it in relation to their staff. But, it is the exact word that's been used from the outside to describe what's been going on in Chicago.

Now, this is where it gets dicey. Not going to take sides because I'm not there every day, but here's an idea of what's been said:

Over the past few years, the Blackhawks moved from one of the NHL's worst-run organizations to one of its model franchises. The focus changed from floundering like a beached fish to actually winning a Stanley Cup - which it did in 2010.

Under president John McDonough, Stan Bowman and Scotty Bowman, the team was unafraid to make bold but cutthroat decisions. Dale Tallon, who began the resurgence, was fired under controversial circumstances. Quenneville replaced Denis Savard just four games into the 2008-09 season.

The Blackhawks knew they were going to Salary Cap Jail in 2010. But, understanding they had a rare chance with a great team to end a 50-year Stanley Cup drought, they went for it - a decision no one can argue.

The cap crunch meant painful choices. Gone are Andrew Ladd, Troy Brouwer, Dustin Byfuglien and Brian Campbell, among others. Since they left? Consecutive first-round defeats.

McDonough made it clear the organization wanted to win "Cups" (as opposed to just one "Cup") and this was not acceptable. Never mind the fact it's hard to win and that, for 49 years, Chicago wasn't real close very often.

More was demanded. And, when it didn't happen, the pressure increased and different factions emerged. There were accusations of "spying."

Disagreements, too. Apparently, according to sources, there is a belief one involved where Patrick Kane should play - wing or centre. Another involved John Scott. (Scott was traded to the Rangers at the deadline, after internal debate about his spot on the team.) Power-play philosophy clearly was an issue. And there was something else.

Don't know what happened between Quenneville, his good friend/assistant Mike Kitchen and Haviland. Don't know who is right or who is wrong or who stood where on what issues. But, the decision to remove Haviland - a coaching finalist in Winnipeg last season - and the explanation for it is proof that people did not trust each other.

Players notice stuff like this. It affects your team.

Quenneville had a lot of leverage. If he walked or was fired, he'd be unemployed for as long as it takes Don Draper to charm a bored housewife. And, there was no guarantee they'd find a better replacement.

He wanted to pick his own assistants and got his wish. Haviland becomes a scapegoat, because there couldn't be just one person disagreeing with everybody else. But next season is a huge one for the Hawks. If they don't push farther into the playoffs, bigger changes are coming.

Got to make Quenneville happy, because he's your best bench choice for that success.

30 THOUGHTS

1. Expect Bergevin to interview a wide range of French-speaking candidates (Marc Crawford, Bob Hartley, Patrick Roy, Michel Therrien, etc.) but don't be surprised if he looks at a couple of unexpected names as either assistants or AHL coaching possibilities. Among them: Gatineau coach Benoit Groulx (especially if Roy is the guy) and Colorado assistant Sylvain Lefebvre.

2. In the last week, Bergevin's received a lot of credit for his scouting acumen. Best find? Probably Andrew Shaw, who wasn't selected until his third year of draft eligibility. Bergevin convinced the Blackhawks to take him in the fifth round last June.

3. A few hockey people are surprised the coaching market's been "so quiet." Montreal and Calgary are vacant, Edmonton and Columbus are in a holding pattern, Vancouver wants to extend Alain Vigneault and Washington awaits Dale Hunter's decision. Some of it is because candidates are still coaching, some of it is because teams hoped Vigneault, Quenneville or Todd McLellan would be free. (If San Jose lets McLellan go, he'd be snapped up in a second.) But it could also be because teams don't want to risk paying two salaries with the possibility of a lockout.

4. One bit of coaching gossip is that Bryan Marchment could join the San Jose staff. He is currently a scout.

5. Agreed with Brendan Shanahan's decision to suspend Claude Giroux, but something about the video was off. At the 1:05 mark, he points out Giroux is "legally finished" by Mark Fayne but certainly creates the impression the Flyers forward is angry there was no call on that contact. (Giroux was actually upset Martin Brodeur wasn't penalized for illegally playing the puck.) Shanahan's trying to protect his referees, but that's misleading.

6. Not that he needed to, but Zach Parise increased his UFA attractiveness with a ferocious forechecking performance against Philly. He constantly forced Flyers to turn towards the boards, where New Jersey dominated the entire series. For a great example, look at his goal that puts the Devils up 3-2 in Game 3.

7. The Flyers downplayed their lack of hatred for New Jersey as a factor, but you've got to believe it is a pretty big reason for the defeat. Philly so badly wanted Pittsburgh -- and deserve great credit for having that attitude -- but succeeding in the playoffs is all about adapting to four different opponents and challenges. If you're not as emotionally invested in the Devils as you are in the Penguins, you've got to find another way.

8. From stat superstar Stan Nieradka: Who is the only player acquired on Trade Deadline day still active in the postseason? (Answer at bottom.)

9. Barry Trotz repaid David Poile for 14 years of loyalty by playing Alexander Radulov and Andrei Kostitsyn in Game 5. Can't imagine there is any way Trotz wanted to do it. After the Game 4 loss, he understood the bigger picture: don't embarrass your GM. Especially when he's been great to you.

10. One storyline got a little out of control last week. It's ridiculous to say that you can't win with Russians, just as it's ridiculous to say that people were "piling on" them. The fact is this: more than any other "hockey nationality," you have to do your research -- because Russian players have a legitimate financial option others don't. A lot of them want to play in the NHL and compete hard for the Cup. Some don't. If you're wrong, you could get burned by a player who is willing to flout the rules because he sees no consequence.

11. The best thing the Predators could do right now is take a deep breath and say, "We're not making any decisions over the next couple of weeks." Never make important choices when you're emotional. Then, they've got to sit down with Ryan Suter and ask for an honest appraisal of his future. If he won't sign (or give you enough assurance), it's time to let teams talk to him in advance of July 1. Get what you can.

12. Shea Weber? One more year until he becomes UFA. God knows what the next CBA will look like, but will there be any push from the league to raise the age/experience level for free agency? That could affect Weber, Jordan Staal, Carey Price and Cory Schneider, among others.

13. This is the series where Phoenix will miss Raffi Torres. Energized and in control, he could have made a difference against the physically dominant Kings.

14. The better the Kings do, the worse it is for Columbus. The Blue Jackets have an option on the Kings' first-round pick, but a conference final berth means it can't be any higher than 27th. The Jackets will likely wait for 2013.

15. Colorado didn't create a market for Chris Stewart before trading him to St. Louis, and teams were disappointed they didn't get a chance at a strong, right-shooting scorer. Not long after the deal, I asked a member of the organization about letting him go. All he said was, "We have our reasons." That was it. No further explanation, no shot at his character. Just that.

16. Thought of that conversation when Stewart was a healthy scratch for the second time in the playoffs, Game 2 against Los Angeles. As the Blues packed up, he told NHL.com's Lou Korac, "This is probably the biggest summer of my career." Yes, it is, if he wants to prove the Avalanche wrong.

17. On Mike Green's Game 4 power-play winner, Alex Ovechkin was down low with the extra man, not on the point. (Dale Hunter does that late in games to be a little safer defensively.) One thought is that this was a reason for the goal, because Henrik Lundqvist couldn't find Ovechkin in the regular spot. Glenn Healy disagreed.

18. The next day (Sunday), the Rangers reminded players about their "rules" of shot blocking. As one explained it, Lundqvist (and the coaches), ask that if you're going to block, you have to stop everything low. That is your responsibility. Green's shot got through the otherwise excellent Ryan McDonagh for the score.There are not supposed to be any holes along (or slightly above) the ice.

19. Lundqvist gave brief insight into his film work with coach Benoit Allaire. They'll break down all of the opposing team's scoring chances, among other things. How many clips is that, he was asked? "About 20." That's a lot by today's standards, as most coaches don't believe players have the attention span for more than four or five. "Goalies are smarter," Lundqvist said.

20. One more on him: when Ottawa smothered the Rangers late in the third period of Game 7, Kelly Hrudey wondered how badly Lundqvist's legs were burning. Standing in goal, adjusting your stance, it wears you down. The Ranger said it isn't so bad for him, because he's so upright. And, other goalies do agree his style economizes movement.

21. A little insight into the McDonagh trade: Right around the 2009 draft, it's believed the Canadiens struck out for the second time on Vincent Lecavalier. (There was disagreement in Tampa about whether or not it really made sense to deal him.) Glen Sather saw an opening and let Montreal know Scott Gomez was available. He pointed out, correctly, that there wasn't much out there and the Canadiens could not go without trying to fill the No. 1 centre position. They were in a weak spot and Sather exploited it.

22. When Sather realized he had a shot at making the deal, he went to Director of player personnel Gordie Clark and asked, "Who should we get?" Both Clark and assistant GM Jeff Gorton had McDonagh No. 1. The Rangers really liked him going back to the NHL combine of his draft year and always kept an eye on him. (He was taken before New York selected the late Alexei Cherepanov.) Who was No. 2 if Montreal said no? "It never got that far," Clark said.

23. Clark explained how the Rangers (and presumably every other team) keep an updated list of about four/five players from all other organizations they'd target in a deal. "We're not talking about guys like [Steven] Stamkos," he said. "Everybody wants him. It's about prospects or lesser-known players. You watch everyone else's like you watch your own." That way, when Sather needs an answer, he gets one quickly.

24. Clark added the Rangers liked McDonagh for the same reason they noticed Chris Kreider and Dylan McIlrath at their comebines. "Physically, it was like men amongst boys," he said. "You have to be careful to make certain they have the hockey sense to play the way they need to, but they really stood out."

25. Totally forgot that Tom Renney helped run the Rangers' draft from 2001-05. He found some good ones -- none better than current captain Ryan Callahan. Renney apparently credits Don Maloney and Jamie McDonald for that pick, and McDonald's influence is interesting. He took a ton of grief for selecting Mike Richards fourth overall in the OHL draft and saw Callahan in the same mold. "Oozed character and drive," was part of the report on Callahan.

26. Jay Beagle lost 10 pounds in the triple overtime Game 3. He said he was doing shots of olive oil and avocado oil the next day to replace some of the "good fat." Keith Aucoin joked he lost just four pounds "because I only weigh 170."

27. Dale Hunter indicated Beagle would play Game 6 despite missing the morning skate. (He blocked a shot on Monday.) Beagle could barely walk from the ice to the dressing room. Sometimes skating is easier than stepping, but you could see he was really in pain.

28. Really couldn't find a ton of info on Roman Cervenka, the free-agent centre the Flames signed out of the KHL. Even though his salary is reported as $3.775 million US, three-quarters of that is bonuses. (His base is $925,000.) Calgary would be more than happy to pay all of that, because it means he has a great season. It caught people by surprise, because there wasn't a ton of interest. Maybe the Flames know something others don't.

29. Mattias Ohlund wants to play again. You can be certain he'll try everything he can to get back, although the knee problems are severe. While Brian Rafalski and close friend Markus Naslund walked away from one year of salary, Ohlund has four years and $12 million remaining.

30. Trivia answer? John Scott. (Credit to NHL.com's Dave Lozo, who guessed it in three seconds.) The only other players still alive acquired in the week before the deadline are Jeff Carter, Antoine Vermette and Marek Zidlicky.

Flyers GM on Bryzgalov: ‘It's not Comedy Central'

VOORHEES, N.J.— Dan Gelston, The Associated Press, May. 10, 2012


Ilya Bryzgalov had plenty of time this season to babble on about bears, the universe, the woods, and other arcane bits of knowledge.

He kept quiet on Thursday.

Staying out of the locker room on the day Philadelphia packed up and headed home might be the first sign the Flyers' quirky goalie learned a lesson that he's paid $51 million to win games and not play the room like a late night talk show host.

“His job is to stop pucks and help us win games,” Flyers general manager Paul Holmgren said. “It's not Comedy Central.”

The man known around these parts as “Bryz,” still has eight more years left to figure it all out.

Bryzgalov never quite warmed to hockey-mad Philadelphia and even his own teammates were often left wondering what the Russian was really all about. He had trouble adjusting to the increased scrutiny from media and fans, and even a new style of play in front of him. Bryzgalov had a sensational March with three straight shutouts, and he set a Flyers record with a shutout streak of 249 minutes, 43 seconds. His success just failed to carry over into May.

Holmgren said he expected more out of Bryzgalov next season.

“Did he play as good as I expected this year,” Holmgren asked. “I'd probably say, no.”

In the post-season, Bryzgalov had a 3.46 goals-against average.

“He is a funny guy to talk to, I don't think there's any question about that,” the GM said. “He's got some interesting concepts of life and how to walk down the road of life.”

Forward Jaromir Jagr compared Bryzgalov's struggles in his first season to baseball player Albert Pujols having trouble going from St. Louis to Anaheim. Bryzgalov's dry wit made him a hit on HBO's behind-the-scenes show “24/7” leading into the Winter Classic.

“Maybe the HBO thing didn't help much,” Jagr said. “He's not shy of the cameras, that's for sure.”

Bryzgalov was the lone Flyer who declined to talk to the media on Thursday.

The ones who did talk, though, echoed the same sentiment: A season that ended in the second round with a five-game loss to the New Jersey Devils was a major underachievement for a team that finished with 103 points and dominated Pittsburgh in Round 1.

“We had a decent year,” Holmgren said.

In Philadelphia, that's not good enough. And as they move ahead, the Flyers now enter an off-season loaded with questions about the return of key veterans.

Jagr, who won a pair of Stanley Cups with Pittsburgh, proclaimed this season his most enjoyable in the NHL. Yet he stopped short of saying he wanted to return to the Flyers. Jagr credited his agent, Petr Svoboda, a fomer Flyers defenceman, with steering him back to the NHL after three seasons in Russia. He's again putting the pressure on Svoboda to find him a new home.

“I want to play in the NHL. I want to play somewhere,” he said. “Hopefully I'm going to find some team where I can play. I still love the game and I think I'm going to be better than I was this year.”

All-Star forward Scott Hartnell said he thought Jagr would be arrogant and cocky. What he found was a player who was one of the hardest workers on the team and a true mentor to a roster stocked with under-25 players.

Holmgren was noncommittal

“I'd like to have him back” Holmgren said. “But we'll see.”

Defenceman Chris Pronger sat out most of the regular season and playoffs because of severe post-concussion syndrome. He has been sidelined since Nov. 19 and his teammates said they hadn't talked to him in weeks.

“You always kind of felt that missing part of the dressing room,” Hartnell said.

Holmgren had no update on Pronger's condition, though he remained optimistic the captain could return next season.

“I believe he's going to play, but I don't know,” Holmgren said. “I don't have anything to back that up.”

Blossoming superstar forward Claude Giroux said he could serve next season as captain, if needed.

“If the time is right, yeah, I think so,” Giroux said.

He could be the latest in a long line of Flyers captains that includes Mike Richards. He and another former Flyer — Jeff Carter — will both play in the Western Conference finals for the Los Angeles Kings next week, while the Flyers make vacation plans.

“We missed Ritchie and Carts,” Hartnell said. “That's a lot of points not in our lineup.”

Holmgren pointed to Jagr as the kind of player he wanted youngsters like Giroux to learn from. Even when prodded about the deals, he refused to say a more harmonious locker room this season came simply because they traded Richards and Carter last summer.

“What you're asking is, were those guys problems? I don't think that's the case,” Holmgren said. “I think those guys were good, young players and we decided we needed to make changes.”

Holmgren and several other Flyers said they were rooting for the Kings to win the Cup. But with a shaky labour future in the NHL, the question remains: Could that Cup be the last one hoisted after a full season?

With the NHL's Collective Bargaining Agreement set to expire Sept. 15, the prospect of another tough round of negotiations means next season may not start on time. Forward Danny Briere said a harmonious relationship between the two sides left him hopeful a new deal could be struck without any game interruption.

“I just have a feeling there's more respect for both sides,” Briere said. “That's what gives me the confidence something will be worked out.”

That's a concern for another day. Instead, the Flyers spent this one lamenting their missed opportunity in a wide-open playoff race to win their first championship since 1975.

“We're here to win championships,” coach Peter Laviolette said. “So, when it comes to that, there's disappointment.”

Other year-ends notes from the Philadelphia locker room:

— Holmgren expected the salary cap to be set at about $69 million.

— Holmgren gave oft-injured forward James van Riemsdyk a “huge incomplete” for this season: “There was something wrong with him all the time.”

— Holmgren wants to re-sign unrestricted free-agent defenceman Matt Carle. “I don't see any reason why we can't work out a deal.”

— Holmgren talked with Kimmo Timonen and said the veteran defenceman wants to return for the final year of his contract.

Dale Hunter making believers out of Capitals

Bruce Arthur, National Post, May 10, 2012


Dale Hunter’s great lantern face tends towards one expression, more or less; he seems to squint without squinting, his mouth a hard line, his pale blue eyes partly lidded. The whole thing seems made of granite when he is behind the bench, though the mouth moves.

He wears the same expression with reporters, where the coach of the Washington Capitals deflects questions the way his team now blocks shots. But if you ask him enough questions, the mask breaks into a smile — not quite uneasy, but not quite not. For instance: What was the difference between coaching the junior London Knights and the NHL’s Capitals, who will play Game 7 of the second round against the New York Rangers Saturday night? The transition can’t have been easy, can it?

“Nothing’s easy that’s worthwhile,” says Hunter, before breaking into a spasm of laughter. “It’s the game of hockey. Don’t overanalyze that, it’s hockey.”

He keeps answers and hockey simple, as best he can, chopping along with short strides. He is no more revealing than the man on the other bench in Game 7, John Tortorella, though Tortorella’s public face is more likely to be awash in rage. In steering the Washington Capitals to Game 7 as a seventh seed, Hunter has also done about as much to promote hockey as a thicket, rather than a pond. In this series — and in Washington’s previous one — hockey is being dragged to Earth with goaltenders, defensive discipline and blocked shots, all married with a fierce desire. And Hunter, a tower of emotion as a player, watches it all with that face carved out the side of a mountain.

“Well, you know, as a coach, as a player it’s kind of different,” Hunter says. “You’re on the ice, you’re in the heat of the battle. As a coach you’ve got to be watching more, and studying the game more. As a player you can get heated up, because you can use your emotions on the ice to be a better player on the ice. But as a coach you have to watch, and make sure you have your wits about you.”

Was an adjustment necessary when he started coaching? “Yeah, you have to talk to yourself, I think.”

It is all a little odd. When Bruce Boudreau was fired and Hunter elevated in late November, the team itself did not know what to think. “When I found out it was Dale Hunter I kind of took a breath and thought, ‘This is going to be real serious’,” centre Brooks Laich says. Hunter’s methods in 52 games produced a 92-point pace, which was coincidentally the pace at which the Capitals played over the entire season.

He reduced the ice time of the team’s stars, created less puck possession for his team, and produced more time in Washington’s defensive end. He has carved out increased roles for of a posse of grinding pros like Jay Beagle, Joel Ward, Jason Chimera, Troy Brouwer, Mike Knuble, and especially in Game 6 in Washington, Matt Hendricks. Hendricks, a guy who bounced around for years, is a perfect Capital, just now.

“’Cause he’s a — I don’t know if I can say it — he’s a prick on the ice,” Laich says of Hendricks. “You don’t want to play against a guy like that. You have to go through a lot to get the best of Matt Hendricks. He’s gonna compete, and he’s gonna do everything in his power to not let you do it.”

The Capitals have seen 12 of their 13 playoff games decided by one goal, which means the margin for error is narrow, and the entire apparatus seems based at least in part on luck and jeopardy. Yahoo’s Greg Wyshynski called Hunter an accidental genius, which seems about right — it seems like a cocktail of magical thinking, luck, strategy, and belief. Hunter was prepared for this, in some ways; the former Washington star installed a satellite dish on the Knights bus so he could watch Capitals games, and he has been talking to GM George McPhee regularly for years.

But Hunter imported the same system he used in London, and when asked about the difference between there and here, he says, “They’re both … bottom line, they want to win. It’s just [the players are] older, and they’re the best in the world. [In junior] they’re younger, they make more mistakes; up here they make less. There are more scoring chances in junior because you’re teaching them to play the right way.”

Hunter does not come across as sophisticated in his coaching, yet his players say they believe, to a man. The Capitals have not lost back-to-back games in these playoffs. Ovechkin’s ice time has plummeted, and Mike Green’s role was reverted, and neither one has complained. Defenceman Karl Alzner says “we have that thick skin.” Chimera says, “It’s a working man’s game.” Laich says, “I just think he’s done a great job finding the balance and still allowing our skill players to be creative but within the confines of the system and obviously giving our defensive players the assignments and minutes to do what they do.”

Of course, all of this would mean nothing if not for a 22-year-old goaltender with 34 career starts whose playoff save percentage is .935, which is the highest he has ever achieved at any serious level of hockey. We don’t yet know if it is a coincidence that the goaltender in question, Braden Holtby, who became a father for the first time on Thursday, gave his newborn son Hunter as a middle name.

Regardless, the coach beetles along with short, choppy strides, matching lines, staying calm, carrying on, and whether he is an accidental genius or simply a lucky devil, his team believes. Alex Ovechkin blocked three shots in Game 6, at least two of them intentionally, and scored a goal by being moved to a new spot on the power play. Alex Semin, long derided for vacillating effort, fought like hell to set up the winning goal.

One more game to play, and Washington will go further than it did as the league’s best team, further than any Capitals team since 1998. Back then there was a 37-year-old veteran at the end of his career hanging around, playing a role on a top-10 defensive team, chipping in, a bit of a prick on the ice, sacrificing for the team. He seemed to squint, and had pale blue eyes.

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Alex Ovechkin’s evolving superstar status

Ken Campbell, The Hockey News, 2012-05-11


When Steve Yzerman reached the crossroad of his career, he had the option of going one of two ways. He could either continue as a one-way offensive dynamo or he could reinvent himself as a two-way player.

Had he taken the first option, there’s a good chance Yzerman would have never won a single Stanley Cup. Either he would have been dealt from the Detroit Red Wings or he wouldn’t have been able to provide them with the type of play they needed for him to lead them to three championships. Because he chose the latter, not only was he an integral part of three championship teams, but he also cemented his Hall of Fame credentials and his status as one of the greatest leaders and players of all-time.

So it’s rather curious, isn’t it, that now that Alex Ovechkin is being asked to do some of the same things and he’s complying, his career is going down the sinkhole before his 27th birthday? The same things for which Yzerman was lionized Ovechkin is being fed to the lions. This wouldn’t have anything to do with a bias against Russians would it? Didn’t think so.

It must be more a function of the fact that at just more than $9.5 million, Ovechkin carries the highest salary cap hit in the league. But the reality is there are a lot of players in the top snack bracket who aren’t exactly earning their money these days.

Let’s take a look at the top 10 salary cap hits among forwards. Most hockey observers concede that Ovechkin has endured two consecutive miserable, underachieving seasons. But of the players in that group, only Steven Stamkos has more goals and more points than Ovechkin in that time period. Or put another way, would you rather face the prospect of another nine years with Ovechkin’s $9.5 million cap hit or another six years with Vincent Lecavalier at $7.7 million? (Lecavalier’s contract actually runs for another eight years, but the last two years are for salaries of $1.5 million and $1 million, meaning there’s a very good chance he will retire by then.)

Ovechkin has averaged 35 goals and 75 points over the past two seasons, which is by anyone’s standards an enormous downgrade from his salad days. Will we ever see a 60-goal season from Ovechkin again? Probably not. Will we see 50? Debatable.

But under Dale Hunter in these playoffs, Ovechkin has done everything he has been asked. He isn’t exactly a shot-blocking demon, but he’s putting his body in the way of shots. He’s playing both ends of the ice. He isn’t cheating by darting up the ice out of the defensive zone before his team even has control of the puck. And hey, if you’re going to let the game get dragged down by not enforcing the standards and by rewarding defensive play, what’s a guy to do? Ovechkin would have been exposed if he played the way he has in the past.

And we shouldn’t forget that through all of this he’s still leading the Capitals in scoring in the playoffs with five goals and nine points. It would be one thing if Ovechkin were lagging behind his teammates, but has anyone noticed that Nicklas Backstrom has only eight points through 12 games? In these playoffs, Ovechkin is far more a product of his environment than he is the author of his demise.

We can only imagine what GM George McPhee makes of all this. After all, he built the Capitals to be the most exciting team in the new NHL and basically got nowhere in the process. Ovechkin was the crown jewel, the constant go-to guy and the one around whom the entire offensive game plan revolved. That didn’t work out so well.

Now the Capitals are far more turgid, defense-minded and typical of a team that has more success in the playoffs. Ovechkin’s ice time is way down, as is his production and his impact on the game, and the Capitals are one win away from making it the furthest they ever have with Ovechkin in their lineup.

The key for Hunter, if he decides to stay on as the Capitals coach beyond this year, is to convince Ovechkin and some of the other Caps there are rewards in playing this way for the 82 games of the regular season. It’s one thing to have players buy into a system for two months with the Stanley Cup as a tangible and reachable goal. It’s quite another to make them realize the rewards of playing that way on a Tuesday night in the middle of January.

So far, though, Ovechkin has been buying what Hunter has been selling. More importantly, he hasn’t made any of this about himself. Lesser players, lots of them, would have been far more vocal in their complaints by now. And in return, Ovechkin is being written off as an impact player.

It’s not Ovechkin’s fault he’s doing what’s best for his team. He’s an extremely proud man, he’s driven and, contrary to the belief of some people, he cares deeply about winning. He’s also still one of the most dynamic physical talents in the NHL.

That’s not a player I’m ready to write off. Not by a long shot.

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Change of identity has been key for Caps

Terry Koshan,Toronto Sun, May 10, 2012


ARLINGTON, VA. - Brooks Laich sat up and took notice last July when Washington Capitals general manager George McPhee went on bit of a spending spree.

McPhee, who had acquired Troy Brouwer from Chicago in a trade at the NHL draft, soon added veterans Joel Ward, Jeff Halpern, Roman Hamrlik and Tomas Vokoun.

Great, thought Laich, a leader on a team that counts Alex Ovechkin as its captain. A solid group, in his mind, was improved.

But it wasn't until the end of November, when Dale Hunter took over as coach after Bruce Boudreau was fired, that the true re-shaping of the Capitals began to come into sharp focus.

"It has been interesting to see our team evolve with the change in identity, change of mentality," Laich said. "We have learned that preventing a (scoring) chance is more important than trying to create one.

"It is a game of mistakes, and you need to be solid defensively. Don't give them anything and think that sooner or later the other team might break down and give us a chance, and we have opportunistic scorers.

"That's a different mentality than what we had in here before."

Of course, the Capitals will carry that mentality into Game 7 of their Eastern Conference semifinal Saturday night against the New York Rangers. The winner of that game will clash with the New Jersey Devils in the conference final, starting Monday night. The loser will pick up the mental pieces and begin to prepare for a summer of what-ifs.

Neither club practised Thursday, and the Rangers players had the day off completely. Hunter said he would have a better idea on Friday whether there would be any chance forward Jay Beagle could return from a lower-body injury, one that caused him to be replaced in the lineup by Halpern in Game 6.

No one knows yet what Hunter will do if the Caps lose, whether he will pack up and head back to the London Knights (as some suspect) or decide that coaching in the NHL is something he wants to do for the foreseeable future.

For Hunter, the transition to coaching NHL players after being responsible for the hockey well-being of teenagers wasn't done with the snap of his fingers.

"Nothing is easy," Hunter said. "(If it was) it would not be worthwhile. (NHL players) are older and they are the best in the world. (Junior players) are younger and make more mistakes. There are more scoring chances in junior because you are teaching them how to play the right way. Up here, there are less mistakes."

You expect the grit guys, the Laichs, the Jason Chimeras, the Brouwers, the Matt Hendricks, to get in line with Hunter's way of thinking. But there was Alexander Semin dumping the puck into the Rangers' end in Game 6, when, Laich figured, he might have tried to dangle in the past. There was Ovechkin blocking three shots, the most of any Caps forward in what was the team's biggest game of the season.

But let's not kid ourselves. No team is perfect, but when the Capitals do have breakdowns and make mistakes, 22-year-old goaltender Braden Holtby (who became a father on Thursday when his fiance gave birth to a boy, named Benjamin Hunter Holtby) has calmly turned away just about every Rangers shot when a save has been needed most.

Laich said he "absolutely" wants Hunter to return next season, but then caught himself and reminded reporters that he was thinking only of Game 7.

But he recalled the day he learned it was Hunter who would be taking over from Boudreau.

"I took a breath, and it was like, 'This is going to be really serious,'" Laich said. "I can't speak enough (about Hunter). He has been great. It's almost like having another veteran in the locker room. He has been through these battles."

Bryzgalov: My season unfit for an enemy

Luke Fox, Sportsnet.ca, May 11, 2012


"What I lived through this season I wouldn't wish to an enemy," Philadelphia Flyers goaltender Ilya Bryzgalov told Russian newspaper Sovetsky Sport this week. "I understand the fans. They paid their money and want the show, but many forget we're not robots but living people."

Bryzgalov spoke with the Russian daily on Tuesday, after the favoured Flyers lost the fifth and final game of their Eastern Conference semifinal series 3-1 to the New Jersey Devils.

The enigmatic goalie’s quotes were released on Thursday, the same day that Flyers general manager Paul Holmgren delivered his season-end press conference.

"His job is to stop pucks and help us win games," Holmgren said. "It's not Comedy Central."

Bryzgalov was acquired from the Phoenix Coyotes in the off-season to remedy Philadelphia’s instability between the pipes. He has eight more years on a nine-year contract that pays him $51 million.

"Did he play as good as I expected this year?" Holmgren asked. "I'd probably say no."

Bryzgalov posted a 3.46 goals-against average and a .887 save percentage in 11 playoff games, the worst numbers of any netminder who reached the second round. His record was 5-6.

Bryzgalov, a great quote since his quirky personality was revealed on HBO’s 24/7: Road to the Winter Classic, was the only Flyer who declined to speak to the media on Thursday.

"We have an excellent team," Bryzgalov says in the Sovetsky Sport piece. "All the guys are good, the management is great. But there is a lot of negativity surrounding the team. You did everything you could on the ice, you go to the locker room and someone yells some nonsense at your back. They're ready to eat you alive. It's unpleasant, because we are all people.

"You should understand that I am not speaking out against the fans. Philadelphia has great fans. They are the majority. They are always with the team in difficult times."

Bryzgalov had his share of difficult times in 2011-12. In October, he allowed five goals on 15 shots against the Winnipeg Jets before being pulled and told the postgame scrum that he was “lost in the woods.” And although “Bryz” was the breakout star of 24/7, he did not get the start in the Winter Classic.

Bryzgalov did, however, enjoy a phenomenal stretch towards the end of the regular season during which he set a franchise record for the longest shutout streak.

"Everyone is talking about me …'Philadelphia won, but Bryz made a mistake again.' … Guys, who doesn't make mistakes? People are so concentrated on the negative that they only see the bad in me. But I think that you need to be kinder to each other,” the 31-year-old said.

"I gained invaluable experience. It is difficult to describe with words. It is a psychology, a new view on life."

The NHL injuries nobody told you about

Sean McIndoe, National Post, May 15, 2012


It’s the time of year when hockey fans see something they’re not used to on NHL injury reports: honesty.

By now fans have become used to teams being as vague as possible when it comes to health issues. Many injuries to key players are never acknowledged at all, and those that are mentioned are cryptically referred to as upper or lower body injuries and nothing more.

But that all changes once a team has been eliminated. There’s no point in keeping up the charade once the season is over, so teams finally let the public know what sort of medical challenges the players were dealing with. Sometimes the news confirms fans’ suspicions, and sometimes we’re all caught completely off-guard.

Here are some of the hidden injuries that teams have recently revealed after being eliminated from Stanley Cup contention.

Ryan Suter, Predators His teammates say he was obviously dealing with some sort of major injury that will require him to meet with a specialist in Detroit, since he spent the past few months constantly whispering into his cellphone about some sort of appointment there at 12:01 on July 1.

David Backes, Blues Along with several teammates, he suffered abdominal injuries from laughing at that moronic advance scout who kept insisting that the best way to score on Jonathan Quick was to take slapshots from centre ice.

Ed Jovanovski, Panthers Keeps saying that he thinks this year’s first-round loss will help the Panthers when they’re back in the playoffs next year, which has led to facial trauma from all the people who keep pinching his cheeks and telling him he’s being just adorable.

Ryan Kesler, Canucks Will be out for six months after surgery to repair an injured labrum. The injury has confounded local experts, in the sense that they haven’t been able to figure out how to blame it on Roberto Luongo.

Sidney Crosby, Penguins Was not only hurt but also has terrible cellphone reception since every time you ask him what his injury is he yells, “Uh, you’re breaking up on me” and hangs up, according to the people who put together Canada’s roster for the world championship.

Brad Marchand, Bruins Was battling through an upper-body injury that team doctors described as unusual, since it’s rare to see so many knee-cap-shaped bruises on somebody’s shoulder like that.

Erik Karlsson, Senators Looked pretty darn tired towards the end and should probably just take half of next season off, according to this petition from other NHL blueliners who’d like to have a chance at winning the scoring title for defencemen.

Claude Giroux, Flyers Some time between the first and second rounds, apparently had whatever that type of injury that turns you from the consensus best player in the world to an overrated bum that everyone hates.

Nicklas Listrom, Red Wings Has been spotted walking around with this weird growth on his back that looks kind of like Mike Babcock crying and screaming, “Please don’t retire!”

Patrick Marleau, Sharks Embarrassed team doctors recently admitted that it turns out that they didn’t need to list him on every injury report after all, since technically “eyebrows that make you look super-surprised in every photo” aren’t actually considered an upper body injury.

Alexander Ovechkin, Capitals He told everyone he has been dealing with a severely broken heart ever since he heard that coach Dale Hunter won’t return next year although, come to think of it, considering all the Champagne and balloons, there’s a chance he may have been being sarcastic.

Patrick Kane, Blackhawks Obviously suffered some sort of serious injury to his knees or legs, since every story about him on gossip blogs these days ends with all his friends having to carry him.

Flood of late donations buoys Guinness Record hockey marathon:
Buzzer finally ends play after non-stop 246-hour match in Chestermere Arena

Bryce Forbes, Calgary Herald, May 16, 2012


CHESTERMERE, AB — They played 246 straight hours of hockey — but it took the final buzzer to finally slow them down.

Two hours earlier, they had already set a Guinness World Record for the longest hockey game.

Yet as the last seconds finally ticked away at the Oilympics Hockey Marathon, they still wanted to give a show to the cheering fans at the jam-packed Chestermere Arena.

“These guys are nuts, these guys are absolutely nuts,” said team captain and organizer Alex Halat.

“These guys did not stop for 10-and-a-half days. There was no off switch in them, whether it was one in the morning or one in the afternoon.

“They were going 100 miles an hour and they were going for the win.”

Unfortunately for Halat, his Team Hope was on the wrong end of a 4,178-3,845 score, as the teams combined for a record 8,023 goals.

The final score didn’t matter, though.

It was all about the $1.4 million and counting that will go to the Alberta Children’s Hospital Foundation.

Hopes were bleak around the arena heading into the final 48 hours. They had only raised $822,000 going into play on Tuesday morning.

But donations soon flooded in from all over the world — around $200,000 on Tuesday and at least $400,000 on the last day.

Halat was confident they had broken the $1.5-million goal, with donations still being accepted online for those interested in topping up the total.

“I’m so happy for all the kids here that we did something awesome — we really did,” said a beaming Lyall Marshall, holding six-year-old daughter Diamond Marshall. “It means a lot for everyone that got those needed funds in.”

Those funds will be going toward cancer research and equipment in the hospital’s pediatric intensive care unit.

“It’s absolutely critical to the hospital,” said Kathy Greenwood, ACHF’s vice-president of development.

“The difference that it makes to the kids and the families at the hospital to have state-of-the-art equipment especially in our pediatric intensive care unit means that the treatment is quicker, it’s faster, it’s better, it’s less invasive.”

At the closing ceremonies, Dave Shillington was given a golden stick for his record 524 goals and Halat was awarded a mini-Stanley Cup for all the work he did.

Country music superstar Paul Brandt serenaded the crowd with I Was There, the song he wrote for the 2012 World Junior Hockey Championship in Calgary.

For the players who were adored like rock stars to the fans for more than 10 days — signing autographs and posing for photos — they’ll now head back to the real world of families, jobs and honey-do lists.

They have plenty of injuries to heal, from blisters and skate bite all the way up to separated shoulders, broken ankles and concussions.

“I miss my family and I want to go home, but I don’t think we will ever forget what we are doing today,” said former Canadian Football League player Frank Pimiskern.

The players will need the rest.

Halat is already planning on doing it again — only bigger.

“It’s hard to believe we finished this,” Scott Logan said.

“It feels both like we just finished yesterday and at the same time it feels like we went for weeks and weeks.”

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Top goal scorers:

Dave Shillington — 524

Chris Robertson — 442

Casey Coutts — 397

Allen Bekolay — 379

Chris Wilkins — 323

(All five beat the previous record of 313 goals)

Loss to Slovakia not the end of the world for Canadian hockey

Adam Proteau, The Hockey News, 2012-05-17


Team Canada’s skate blades were barely dry after the team’s 4-3 quarterfinal loss to Slovakia at the 2012 IIHF World Championship when the handwringing at home began in earnest. Shocked Twitter users threw out words like “embarrassing” and “pathetic.” Soon enough, we’ll be hearing plaintive wails for Hockey Canada to be examined extensively with Luminol and by Jack Klugman and David Caruso.

For me, it’s entirely predictable and more than a little tired. Whenever Canada fails to win a tournament – be it the World Junior Championship, Olympics or any international showdown – a number of Canadians get weak in the knees and drown in dread that their homeland will soon be on the same level as Lesotho and the Solomon Islands when it comes to producing hockey talent.

Nothing could be further from the truth. And a quick scan of the circumstances of Canada’s World Championship defeat by Slovakia should comfort all reasonable Canucks in that regard.

For starters, you’re talking about a tournament that does not include the best talent each country has to offer. Everyone knows the Stanley Cup playoffs siphon off skilled players from virtually all countries – and many of the NHLers who do become available after their teams are eliminated often choose (as is their right) to return home and convalesce following a long, gruelling season. Moreover, the players who do decide to represent their country usually are worn down and go up against European national teams that have far more practice and preparation time. It is only natural to assume that will have an effect on Canada’s chances.

But even if Canada had all hands on deck and lost, does that mean there’s something troublingly wrong with the manner in which it develops players? Not to me. It’s the height of arrogance to assume each major international showdown will end with another Canadian coronation and the rest of the planet admitting that America’s neighbor to the north will forever be better at hockey than any other nation.

For a country that prides itself on being polite and kind to a fault, such arrogance comes off even worse than it would if it came from a consistent chest-beater. In many ways, it reminds me of the cowardly “Beggar King” Viserys from the popular Game Of Thrones books/TV series, whose expectancy for glory was best encapsulated in the quote, “You cannot touch me. I am the dragon! I want my crown!”

That’s what I hear when I hear Canadians bemoaning their place in the hockey world at any particular point in time. Is it not enough that 53.7 percent of all NHLers in 2011-12 hail from Canada? Do we not understand that, long ago, all other hockey countries learned how to play “the Canadian way” and have their own collection of talent that can overcome adversity and show courage in its own right? Are we really that myopic that we can’t comprehend how boring it would get – and how awful it would be for the long-term growth of the sport – if Canada’s challengers never failed to wither by the wayside?

Anyone who tries convincing you there’s just something in the water that separates Canadian players from all the rest is exhibiting a sad need to be comforted by nationalism. The reality is there is no inherent advantage to the random circumstance of being born within particular boundaries. Just as we see in the NHL, the hockey world at large is creeping closer to parity with every generation. And no re-examination or re-jigging of Hockey Canada will change that.

Ultimately, Canada is not the dragon and doesn’t get the crown simply because it’s accustomed to wearing one. By earning it – and by respecting other hockey nations that earn their victories, the way Slovakia did in the quarterfinal – we’ll come away looking far more gracious than some nervous northerners will in the coming days.

Shelf life of NHL coaches is getting shorter

Michael Traikos, National Post, May 17, 2012


“Every coach has a shelf life. That day comes for every coach. It’s like if you have a friend who lives near the airport, he invites you over for a cookout, you say to him, ‘How can you stand the noise?’ And he says, ‘What noise?’ You get used to it. At some point the players tune out the coach.” — Maple Leafs GM Brian Burke, on firing coach Ron Wilson

There was a time when the shelf life seemed longer, when coaches were developed alongside their draft picks and literally grew old standing behind the same bench. Jack Adams coached 20 straight years in Detroit while surviving two name changes to the team and a world war. Al Arbour coached in his 40s, 50s, 60s and even a game in his 70s with the New York Islanders.

Now, coaches are lucky if they reach their one-year anniversary.

Scott Arniel, Bruce Boudreau, Randy Carlyle, Jacques Martin, Paul Maurice, Terry Murray, Davis Payne, Ron Wilson all lost their jobs during this season, although two of those coaches were hired by other teams. Thirteen of the league’s 30 teams have undergone a coaching change in the last 12 months, a number that will rise with vacancies behind the benches in Calgary, Montreal, Washington and possibly Edmonton.

Based on what we have seen in these playoffs, there might be a reason for that.

In a league where it is becoming increasingly more difficult to trade players, teams are finding it is easier — and sometimes more effective — to trade coaches. Of the eight teams that reached the second round, three had replaced their coach mid-season. A fourth, New Jersey Devils, hired Peter DeBoer last summer.

Two of those coaches — DeBoer and Los Angeles’s Darryl Sutter — have their teams in the conference finals, where they are looking to continue a trend that has continued since the lockout. In 2009-10, Joel Quenneville steered Chicago to a Stanley Cup after replacing Denis Savard earlier that season. Dan Bylsma did the same thing with Pittsburgh in 2008-09. And Peter Laviolette went to the final twice, winning in his first full season with Carolina in 2005-06 and losing after becoming a mid-season replacement for Philadelphia in 2009-10.

There might not be an answer for all of this. A coaching career might simply be like opening up a shaken can of pop. Eventually, it fizzles.

Boudreau averaged more than 50 wins a year in his first three full seasons with Washington. He lasted 22 games this season. Jacques Martin took Montreal to the conference final in his first season, won 44 games his second, and was gone 32 games into his third.

As hard as it is to imagine, the same fate could await Sutter and St. Louis’ Ken Hitchcock before long. Both coaches improved their teams’ success rate dramatically after stepping behind the bench — the eighth-seeded Kings have a 2-0 lead against the Coyotes in the Western Conference final, while the Blues went 43-15-11 and won a playoff round for the first time in 10 years — but they also have reputations as demanding, defensive-minded coaches.

In coaching parlance, that often equals a short shelf life.

Sutter’s previous stop was in Calgary, where he took the Flames to the Stanley Cup final in his first full season. He stepped down after an opening-round loss the year after. Hitchcock, meanwhile, has lasted fewer than four years in his previous two coaching jobs.

There are still teams that do it the old-fashioned way. Barry Trotz has been Nashville’s only coach since the team entered the league in 1998; Lindy Ruff has been behind Buffalo’s bench for the past 15 years; Detroit’s Mike Babcock is entering his eighth year; Vancouver’s Alain Vigneault his seventh.

But every other team has made at least one coaching change — or five if you are the Devils — in the last five years.

So what does this mean? Well, if you are DeBoer, maybe it is better to rent than buy a house in New Jersey. And if you one of the many coaches out of work or currently moonlighting as a TV analyst, keep your voice ready.

Renney out, Sutter in?
Brent front-runner for Oilers gig

WES GILBERTSON, QMI Agency, May 18 2012


CALGARY - Darryl Sutter is just six wins away from sipping from the Stanley Cup.

Hard to believe, but the news for Calgary Flames fans could get even worse.

Just over a month after clearing out of his office at the Saddledome, Brent Sutter is suddenly the front-runner to become the next head coach of the provincial rival Edmonton Oilers, who officially axed Tom Renney Thursday after weeks of speculation.

While the Battle of Alberta hasn't had the same punch — or as many punch-ups — over the past decade or so, Flames fans are already dreading the idea of the up-and-coming squad from the opposite end of the QEII Highway emerging as a playoff team and eventually a Stanley Cup contender.

Making matters worse, a former Flames skipper will likely be along for the ride.

When his younger brother Brent became unemployed in mid-April, current Los Angeles Kings coach Darryl Sutter told reporters “I think (Brent) is a top coach in the National Hockey League, and it may be very well he'll be coaching somewhere else soon, too.”

The smart money says that somewhere else will be Edmonton.

It's certainly not a far-fetched idea, especially when you consider what Sutter's been up to for the past three weeks.

Just days after Sutter and Flames GM Jay Feaster mutually agreed to go separate directions, the 49-year-old accepted an invite from Kevin Lowe to become head coach of Canada's entry at the world hockey championships.

In case you didn't know, Lowe just so happens to be the president of the Oilers.

This isn't exactly six degrees of separation we're talking about. Lowe and Sutter have been hanging out together in Helsinki.

Team Canada made a hasty exit after Thursday's quarterfinal loss to Slovakia, but Sutter has had plenty of time to impress his could-be boss.

It makes sense for both sides.

Sutter, who missed the playoffs in three consecutive seasons at the Saddledome, has a reputation for being an effective teacher of young players. The Oilers have a hat-trick of rising star forwards — Jordan Eberle, Taylor Hall and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins — and the first-overall pick in the 2012 NHL Entry Draft.

Sutter would like to stay close to home. Rexall Place isn't far for him.

Sutter has time. The Oilers, as of Thursday afternoon, have an opening.

There's been so much smoke, Oilers GM Steve Tambellini was asked about Sutter by name during Thursday's press conference to address Renney's dismissal.

“As far as guys that are candidates, there's going to be a lot of speculation,” Tambellini told reporters in Edmonton. “I know there's been a lot of talk around the world championships and Brent. He's a good coach — there's no doubt about that — but let us go through the process and get the right guy.”

For Feaster, the head coaching search continues. Although there's a growing sentiment that Abbotsford Heat bench boss Troy Ward is the leading candidate, the Flames GM has insisted it's still early, using the analogy he's in the first inning of a baseball game.

Up the road in Edmonton, it might be a home-run.

And Flames fans might not like the outcome.

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Sutter right man for Oilers

TERRY JONES, QMI Agency, May 18 2012


HELSINKI - Brent Sutter lost in the quarterfinals at the world hockey championships Thursday afternoon.

Nine hours later – at 1 a.m. in Helsinki – you have to figure he became the next head coach of the Edmonton Oilers.

Tom Renney’s contract, it was announced, was not going to be renewed.

What was never said was that Renney’s not going to be coming back because he didn’t do what he was asked to do in his term with the team. Renney isn’t coming back because he wasn’t viewed as a dynamic coach capable of the inspirational and motivational leadership to take the Edmonton Oilers to the future.

Brent Sutter was here for the past three weeks allegedly auditioning for the job as the next Oilers head coach. While he failed to get Team Canada to the medal round, Sutter illustrated those qualities in dealing with Jordan Eberle, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Devan Dubnyk and the other young members of the team throughout the tournament.

In watching Sutter closely throughout the tournament I found a man motivated to prove his worth after his departure from the Calgary Flames, somebody who has a real fire in his belly to succeed and somebody who would bring an extra edge to that rivalry.

Brent Sutter is the right man to replace Renney as head coach of the Oilers.

Tambellini was in Helsinki for the round robin and had Oilers’ president of hockey operations and his boss Kevin Lowe on the inside as GM of Team Canada. If this was an audition for the job, despite the loss to Slovakia Thursday, you’d have to say he had a successful audition.

The bottom line is that Renney might have been the perfect coach to take the Oilers through the last two years, with the tremendous patience he showed in the development of Edmonton’s young stars.

“Tom is a thorough guy, a good man, a good coach and did a good job for us,” Tambellini told the press conference in Edmonton after meeting with Renney on his return from Finland.

So then why isn’t he going to be coming back?

All Tambellini had to do is say what the next coach has to bring to the job and that in management’s opinion Renney isn’t that guy.

I think in time Edmonton will look back and believe Renney was the right man for the job these past two years, that he did a wonderful job with Eberle, Taylor Hall, Nugent-Hopkins and others in their training wheels seasons as NHLers.

But he was not the right man to take this team forward. That was the decision. And I believe Tambellini and Lowe had come to that conclusion before Lowe and the Hockey Canada brain trust offered the Team Canada job to Sutter the morning before he went in and by mutual agreement with Flames’ GM Jay Feaster concluded his own term as coach in Calgary.

Why Tambellini couldn’t just spit that out and show some dynamic leadership himself is a condemnation of him in his own role.

“We’re going into a phase with a different level of compete,” was Tambellini’s way of putting it.

The whole handling of Renney’s departure didn’t look good on Tambellini nor did it when came to letting Pat Quinn go well after the season.

It smacked of the brutal public relations which has been a constant throughout Tambellini’s time as general manager.

To wait more than a month after the season to make up his mind and then do the dirty deed with a 5 p.m. press conference the day Canada lost at the world hockey championship on the eve of the Edmonton Oil Kings opening game at the Memorial Cup was not unlike the political strategy of releasing unpopular news late Friday afternoon to minimize play during the news cycle.

With the next hire, it will be four coaches who have worked under Tambellini.

Technically Craig MacTavish resigned, Pat Quinn was removed and Renney wasn’t renewed. But no coach has lasted more than Renney’s two years in Tambellini’s time.

Tambelini hired Quinn and Renney as a tandem, explaining that he had worked with them both in the past and knew exactly what they would bring to the organization.

The next one better be the guy to take the Oilers into the playoffs and then deep into the playoffs or he’ll be Tambellini’s last one.

Of all the coaches available, it’s hard to see a more qualified coach to hire than Brent Sutter.

Spector on Oilers: Tambellini on thin ice

Mark Spector, National Post, May 17, 2012


EDMONTON - This day wasn't about the deposed head coach Tom Renney. Nor was it about Brent Sutter, farm club coach Todd Nelson, or whomever succeeds Renney as Steve Tambellini's third coaching hire in four seasons at the helm of this Edmonton Oilers organization.

This day, and every remaining day until Tambellini's promised "next phase" comes to fruition, is about the general manager himself. A GM who has run out of mistakes. A GM who had better get this hire right. Period.

"We need to be better," was a theme that Tambellini ran with Thursday, in announcing that Renney, a good man and fine coach, would not be asked back after his contract expires June 30.

Included in that "we" is Tambellini and Oilers president of hockey operations Kevin Lowe, the two men whose acquisitions and stewardship of this organization have guided it to three consecutive No. 1 overall draft picks.

To a place where Renney -- a solid, veteran teacher and coach -- did not have a prayer of keeping this job, if winning was to be the criteria for success.

"I'm not going to dissect Tom as a coach. He's a good man, a good coach," said Tambellini (Renney has chosen not to speak, for now). "We're just trying … to get better. We need to get better as an organization. Better as a management staff. Better as a coaching staff. Better as players.

"We expect better performances from … Ales Hemsky on a more consistent basis. We expect better goaltending ... from Devan (Dubnyk) and Nick (Khabibulin). There are a lot of areas where, in order for us to be better, the people who are here right now need to be a lot better."

That group of the here and now no longer includes Renney, who succeeded Pat Quinn, Tambellini's first coaching hire, which was a disaster. It does however include people like:

o Khabibulin, the ageing goaltender who still has the final year remaining on a regrettable four-year, $15-million deal. Tambellini signed Khabibulin as a No. 1, to starter's money, after his days as a starter had passed.

o Shawn Horcoff, whose six-year, $33-million deal ranks with Scott Gomez' as one of the worst in the entire NHL. He is a third-line centre at best now, and on the decline. Yet, three years remain on a deal inked by then-GM Lowe.

o Last year's free agent pick-ups Eric Belanger and Ben Eager, each signed by Tambellini to three-year contracts. Belanger produced a career-low 16 points in 2011-12, while Eager added 13 points and was entirely ineffective in fulfilling his mandate of protecting players like Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Jordan Eberle and Taylor Hall.

o A minor league defence corps was bolstered by free agent signing Cam Barker. He did not have an assist among his two points in 25 games, and was injured for most of the year.

"We went through a difficult phase here, through this rebuild," Tambellini admits. "We've seen a lot of people put in a lot of positions where … you saw mistakes at times. But the transition through that rebuild we believe, soon here, will take us into a new phase for our hockey club.

"We need to get to a different level of compete. A different level of competing for playoff spots," the GM declared. "Expectations will increase … as we enter this next phase of development … where we are competing for playoff spots. We've risen … in some specific (statistical) areas. Now, we have to move ourselves up in the standings."

Give Tambellini some credit for putting himself on the line Thursday, stating that his Oilers are primed to take that next step. That journey, however, will require the hiring of the right coach, the acquisition of a couple of effective free agents, and the consummation of a trade or two -- perhaps involving Edmonton's third consecutive No. 1 draft pick.

If this rebuild is going anywhere, those are the vital areas where the Oilers have to "be better."

They all fall to Tambellini, who lost a layer of Teflon on Thursday.

Change in roster philosophy the key to Rangers, Kings success

Ken Campbell, The Hockey News, 2012-05-18


In a playoff season where almost nothing seems to make any sense, count on the New York Rangers and Los Angeles Kings to turn everything upside down.

When you think of the Rangers and Kings, you think glamour, Broadway and Showtime. You think star power. But what you’re getting are two teams in the biggest NHL markets that are a triumph of the collective. The Rangers are certainly more than a sum of their parts and the Kings are quickly becoming a Stanley Cup favorite on the strength of having every single player on the roster making a significant contribution.

But most of all, you have two teams that, after years of taking the path of least resistance, finally learned you must build from within to have any sort of sustained success and sometimes that can be a long and painful process.

Who would have thought of the four teams remaining in the Stanley Cup tournament, the Kings and Rangers would have the most homegrown players on their rosters, while the New Jersey Devils would be third and the Phoenix Coyotes fourth?

You’d think the Coyotes wouldn’t be able to afford to do anything but build from within, but they had just five players on their roster for Game 3 of the Western Conference final who had been drafted and developed by the organization – defenseman Keith Yandle and Oliver Ekman-Larsson and forwards Shane Doan, Mikkel Boedker and Michael Stone.

The Kings, by contrast, had 11 players they had either drafted or signed as undrafted free agents in their lineup – goalies Jonathan Quick and Jonathan Bernier, defensemen Drew Doughty, Slava Voynov and Alec Martinez and forwards Anze Kopitar, Dustin Brown, Kyle Clifford, Trevor Lewis, Jordan Nolan and Dwight King.

And every one of them, with the exception of Doughty and Kopitar, has spent significant time developing in the American League. Brown, for example, came to the NHL as an 18-year-old the year before the lockout and scored one goal in 31 games. Then in 2004-05, he spent the lockout season in the AHL, became a far more confident player and came back to the Kings as a much better prepared NHL player.

The Rangers, meanwhile, haven’t stopped chasing high-profile free agents such as Brad Richards and Marian Gaborik, but it was only when GM Glen Sather came to the realization that model couldn’t work exclusively the Rangers began to make serious strides on the ice. As a result, they had nine homegrown players on their roster for Game 2 of the Eastern Conference final – goalie Henrik Lundqvist, defensemen Michael Del Zotto, Dan Girardi and Marc Staal and forwards Ryan Callahan, Derek Stepan, Chris Kreider, Artem Anisimov and Carl Hagelin. And that doesn’t even include Ryan McDonagh, a player who was drafted by the Montreal Canadiens, but never played a game in the organization before the Rangers stole him in the Scott Gomez trade.

The Devils are still building through the draft, but theirs is a team that is no longer constructed exclusively on talent from within. They also had nine players in their lineup who had originally been drafted or signed as undrafted free agents and developed by the team – goalie Martin Brodeur, defenseman Mark Fayne and forwards Zach Parise, Travis Zajac, Adam Henrique, Patrik Elias, Petr Sykora, David Clarkson and Stephen Gionta. That doesn’t include defenseman Adam Larsson, the Devils first-round pick last summer who has also played sporadically in these playoffs.

The Devils with Ilya Kovalchuk, the Rangers with Richards and Gaborik and the Kings with Mike Richards and Jeff Carter have not shied away from acquiring big-time talents either through trades or free agent signings. In fact, the reason why the Kings were able to get both Richards and Carter was because they had young players they had originally drafted in the fold and were in a position to give up some of the future in order to get help in the present.

That’s the way it’s supposed to be done in the NHL. And now with teams such as the Rangers and Kings unable to spend their into and out of big-money mistakes, the importance of building from within has never been more relevant.

The Kings and Rangers seem to have finally grasped that concept. And it’s a major reason why one of them might end up winning the Stanley Cup.

Blocking shots dangerous — for growth of hockey

ERIC FRANCIS, QMI Agency, May 21 2012

CALGARY - For the sake of the game, let’s hope this shot blocking craze is just a fad.

Otherwise, kids will have yet another reason to quit hockey.

Not only is it painful to watch on TV, but absolutely nobody alive likes the prospect of stepping in front of a hard rubber disc travelling faster than most cars on the Deerfoot.

When you are paid millions of dollars to play the game and a Stanley Cup is within sight, it’s understandable to see guys making such sacrifices.

However, when you are just a kid playing the game at any level, the last thing you want to do is block shots with regularity.

Any minor hockey coaches out there who think incessant shot-blocking is the new trend need to know eight of the top-11 shot-blocking teams in the NHL missed the playoffs this season.

In other words, just because the New York Rangers have survived this long based largely on the fact they’re responsible for more blocks than Lego doesn’t mean it can be relied on as a tactic.

The focus for kids needs to be skill development and not something as painful, dangerous and unnecessary as throwing your body in front of slap-shots and risking even more injury than the game already threatens.

Let the goalies make the saves — that’s why they have that bulky equipment designed especially for such a task.

Otherwise, enrollment and viewership in our great sport will continue to decline in this country.

Now for more notes, quotes and anecdotes from a sports world wondering how Los Angeles Kings GM Dean Lombardi could ever have spent even five minutes considering the possible trade of eventual Conn Smythe Trophy winner Dustin Brown.

AROUND THE HORN

Word is one of the big reasons the Calgary Flames have been taking their time to start their coaching search is the prospect of snapping up San Jose Sharks head coach Todd McLellan if he were to be let go by GM Doug Wilson. Because he wasn’t, the Flames start the real search with Bob Hartley, Troy Ward and Mike Sullivan as the frontrunners. The McLellan move would have been interesting as it was another hot-shot Sharks coach — Darryl Sutter — who the Flames likely saved their franchise with back in 2002 ... Shockingly, the question is not if anyone can beat the Kings but if the eventual Eastern Conference champ can even win a game off them — they are that solid in every possible aspect these days … While defenceman Drew Doughty gets most of the credit for a Kings blueline that has been beyond stellar this spring, two lesser lights deserve more credit than they’ve been given. Rookie Slava Voynov and slick sophomore Alec Martinez have quietly established themselves as regular NHLers. And while both have played prominent roles with the man-advantage and in 5-on-5 situations, their emergence gave Kings management confidence they could trade Jack Johnson to land Jeff Carter and further bolster their top two forward units.

PARTING GIFTS

This astute observation from TSN’s Dan O’Toole: “A bubble hockey game has a better buzzer than MSG.” … Yes, as stated here for three months now, Brent Sutter is still the obvious hire for the Edmonton Oilers. Would have been an easier sell had he returned home from Europe with a gold medal, but he’s still the perfect fit for the job — and vice-versa ... Believe it or not, before Thursday’s game, the Kings had not trailed since the opening period of Game 1 vs. the St. Louis Blues and have won nine straight road playoff games dating back to last year … Wondering if the saddest part of the Coyotes’ inevitable demise for viewers is the fact the series likely won’t return to Glendale — home of the red-headed smokeshow sitting behind Dave Tippett. You know exactly who I’m talking about.

Russia cruises to world championship gold with 6-2 win over Slovakia

HELSINKI, Finland— Chris Johnston, The Canadian Press, May 20, 2012


What a performance. What a team.

Russia steamrolled its way to gold at the IIHF World Hockey Championship on Sunday with an impressive 6-2 victory over Slovakia, completing a perfect run through a tournament where it was barely even threatened.

The level of dominance was reminiscent of the days when the Soviet Union was known as the “Red Machine.” Consider the stats: Russia won 10 games over 16 days by a total score of 44-14.

“I was surprised that they played with a team effort,” said Slovak forward Tomas Kopecky. “Usually the Russians are more about individual skills. They were dumping pucks and they were playing with more of a team effort.

“That’s why they won.”

Ultimately, both teams walked away from an emotional evening at Hartwall Arena feeling like winners. Russian coach Zinetula Bilyaletdinov dedicated the victory to the players killed in the Lokomotiv Yaroslavl plane crash while Kopecky and Slovak captain Zdeno Chara each paid tribute to one of them — wearing a Pavol Demitra sweater backwards while accepting their silver medals.

They had a miraculous run here while playing in honour of Demitra’s memory.

“We played the whole tournament very hard and there’s no regrets,” said Chara. “That’s all you can ask for from your team.”

It’s clear the balance of power in international hockey has shifted. The Russian players were inspired in their first world championship under Bilyaletdinov and celebrated on the ice by throwing their coach up and down in the air.

Like every other opponent, the Slovaks simply had no answer for a star-studded Russian roster that seems to be peaking ahead of the 2014 Olympic tournament, which will be played on home ice in Sochi.

“It’s a great feeling,” said Russian forward Nikolai Kulemin. “This was a special team.”

On Sunday, Alex Semin led the way offensively for Russia with two goals and an assist while Alexander Perezhogin, Alexei Tereshenko, Pavel Datsyuk and Evgeni Malkin also scored.

Zdeno Chara scored twice for Slovakia.

The heavy underdogs briefly enjoyed some momentum after the big defenceman beat Semyon Varlamov with a booming slapshot a little over one minute into the game. They couldn’t have drawn up a better start.

“It was early in the game and we knew it wasn’t going to be enough,” said Chara. “It was nice to get a lead, but Russia started to push really hard.”

As a result, it soon became clear that Russia would not be stopped. It almost appeared as though there were more red sweaters on the ice than white ones with the amount of puck possession they enjoyed.

Semin tied the game midway through the first period after linemate Alex Ovechkin blew past a defender and then the team really put the pedal down. Perezhogin, Tereshenko and Semin scored nine minutes apart in the second period, making the final 20 minutes little more than an extended celebration for the many Russians who packed Hartwall Arena.

“We just tried to play hard,” said Kulemin. “Just the right play — short shifts and hard tempo.”

Added Kopecky: “They have four lines with unbelievable skill.”

It’s the third time in five years Russia has won gold at this tournament and clearly sets them up as the favourite heading into Sochi. They seemed to score at will throughout this world championship while playing a more defensive style under Bilyaletdinov.

They only allowed six goals at even strength throughout the tournament.

Malkin put an exclamation point on Russia’s victory with a breathtaking goal in the dying minutes. Not only did that secure the tournament scoring title for him with 19 points, it was soon followed by Malkin being named the world championship MVP.

The Russians celebrated their victory with fervour and most players ran through the interview area without stopping. They wanted to get the party started in their dressing room.

“This was my Stanley Cup this year,” said Datsyuk.

Notes: The world championship all-star team: Malkin, Chara, forwards Patrick Thoresen (Norway) and Henrik Zetterberg (Sweden), defenceman Ilya Nikulin (Russia) and goalie Jan Laco (Slovakia) ... The Czech Republic took the bronze medal with a 3-2 win over Finland ... Russia has come away from the tournament with a medal six of the last eight years ... Slovakia’s last world championship medal was a bronze in 2003 ... Announced attendance was 13,242.