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SPORT-SCAN DAILY BRIEFNHL 12/22/2013

Anaheim Ducks730650 Getzlaf's hat trick lifts Ducks to 5-3 win730651 Final: Ducks 5, Islanders 3730652 Ducks stretch winning streak to 8 in win over Islanders

Boston Bruins730653 Rematch goes to Bruins730654 Tuukka Rask’s timely saves secure 4-1 Bruins win730655 Patrice Bergeron refuses to back down from fight730656 David Krejci helps Bruins beat Sabres730657 Game 36: Sabres at Bruins730658 Patrice Bergeron gets little punchy730659 Minus mates, Campbell continues pivotal play730660 Nick aims to stick730661 Bruins get creative in tough win730662 Notebook: Let’s not make game punchless730663 Bruins bounce back with 4-1 win over Sabres730664 David Krejci keys Bruins' 4-1 win over Sabres

Buffalo Sabres730665 Sabres notebook: Omark hopes to make his mark in Buffalo730666 Cap hike may not mean lower ticket costs730667 John Vogl’s Top Line: Three people or groups making an

impact in the hockey world730668 Sabres fail to extend win streak730669 Enroth will start against Bruins; Omark to debut on Sabres'

fourth line730670 News and notes for Sabres at Bruins730671 Amerks lose to Lake Erie Monsters

Calgary Flames730672 Flames close road trip in 4-3 loss to Penguins730673 Calgary Flames' Glencross, Russell injured in loss to

Penguins730674 Sidney Crosby the difference as Pittsburgh Penguins edge

Calgary Flames 4-3

Carolina Hurricanes730675 Gudas scores in OT, Lightning beat Hurricanes 3-2730676 Lightning strikes thrice: Canes lose 2 leads, fall in OT

Chicago Blackhawks730677 Blackhawks depth keeping their lines fresh730678 Patrick Kane emerging as MVP candidate in best season yet730679 Pretty much all systems go for Blackhawks730680 LaBarbera happy to be a Hawk730681 Tracey hands out Christmas gifts to Blackhawks, NHL

Colorado Avalanche730682 Francois Allaire a big part of Avalanche success as goalies

coach730683 Dater: Rinkside seats at NHL games provide glass full of

remarkable action730684 Avalanche goalie Semyon Varlamov "excited" that legal

ordeal is over730685 Los Angeles tops Colorado Avalanche in shootout730686 Postgame Colorado Avalanche vs. Los Angeles Kings:

They’ll take the point, cherish it730687 Adrian Dater’s spotlight on Sharks center Joe Thornton

Columbus Blue Jackets730688 Steve Mason back in top form after trade to Flyers730689 Blue Jackets notebook: Richards shakes up forward lines

Dallas Stars730690 Double whammy: Sergei Gonchar leaves game as Stars

lose in shootout to San Jose Sharks730691 Colton Sceviour proving too good to be taken out of Stars

lineup730692 Cameron Gaunce OK with personal role reversal730693 Stars take early lead on San Jose backup goalie, but Sharks

come back to win in shootout730694 Stars forward Ryan Garbutt the odd-man out after dealing

with lower body pain730695 Vernon Fiddler returns after six-game absence, says he's

one of the lucky ones730696 Jaromir Jagr: Stars rookie Valeri Nichushkin will be the best

in the world one day730697 Morning skate update: Stars coaches could have tough

decision tonight with forwards730698 Sharks rally to beat Stars 3-2 in shootout; Gonchar hurt

Detroit Red Wings730699 Fans should plan ahead to park for NHL Winter Classic730700 Red Wings 5, Maple Leafs 4: Why the Wings won on

Saturday night730701 Detroit 5, Toronto 4 (SO): Red Wings finally solve shootout

problem730702 Detroit Red Wings' Stephen Weiss to have surgery for sports

hernia, out at least through February730703 Game thread: Detroit Red Wings back on road to take on

Toronto Maple Leafs730704 Detroit Red Wings anticipate fun game as Danny DeKeyser

rejoins lineup vs. Toronto Maple Leafs730705 Jimmy Howard aims to play in Winter Classic, plus other

Detroit Red Wings injury updates730706 December 21, 2013 at 11:20 pm730707 Wings' Stephen Weiss to undergo hernia surgery; likely gone

eight weeks730708 Jonas-Gustavsson-12-12-13Toronto's Joffrey Lupul scores a

second-period goal against the Red Wings' Jonas Gust730709 Red Wings battle back after blowing two-goal lead, beat

Maple Leafs in shootout, 5-4730710 Red Wings' Stephen Weiss will have surgery for sports

hernia, should return after Olympic break730711 Live blog: Detroit Red Wings meet Toronto Maple Leafs

tonight in Winter Classic preview730712 Red Wings' Jimmy Howard (MCL) ahead of schedule, aiming

to return before Jan. 1 Winter Classic730713 Jakub Kindl, scratched from Red Wings' lineup tonight, says

he needs to work harder, compete more730714 Red Wings' Stephen Weiss has a sports hernia; club

deciding whether surgery is the next step730715 Detroit Red Wings beat Toronto Maple Leafs in shootout

Edmonton Oilers730716 Oilers sing the Blues730717 Chris Stewart on Alex Ovechkin scoring pace for Blues730718 Edmonton Oilers Taylor Hall tells HNIC’s After Hours he and

teammates just have to fight through current circu730719 Magnus Paajarvi still finding his way with the St. Louis Blues730720 A wonderful step back in time for Ken Hitchcock730721 Ryan Jones knocked out at morning skate; Edmonton Oilers

coach Dallas Eakins makes changes prior to game again730722 Oilers lose sixth in a row730723 Former Oiler Paajarvi returns with Blues to face his former

team

Florida Panthers730724 Growing continuity helping Florida Panthers730725 Panthers making noise with turnaround

Los Angeles Kings730726 Martin Jones, Anze Kopitar lead Kings to 3-2 shootout win730727 Kings goalie Jones ties NHL mark with 8-0 start730728 Backstopped by Martin Jones, Kings beat Avalanche730729 Jones remains perfect, ties Froese’s record730730 Game 37 Preview: Colorado at Los Angeles730731 December 21 postgame quotes: Darryl Sutter730732 December 21 postgame notes\730733 December 21 postgame quotes: Colorado730734 December 21 postgame quotes: Anze Kopitar730735 Game 37: Colorado at Los Angeles

Minnesota Wild730736 Granlund has 'great practice' with Wild, is eager to return730737 Gameday preview: Wild at New York730738 Minnesota Wild: Matt Cooke has changed his game, but he's

still a pest

Montreal Canadiens730739 Desharnais’ OT winner saves Habs from collapse against

Predators730740 Habs almost sing the blues in Nashville730741 About … aw, forget last night. Merry Christmas!

Nashville Predators730742 Predators show ability to fight back despite loss730743 Preds show trust in goalie combo

New Jersey Devils730744 Devils Prevail in Overtime; Jagr Ties Messier in Goals730745 Greene, Devils Rally Past Capitals 5-4 in Overtime730746 Ducks Win 7th Straight, 3-2 Over Devils730747 Devils' Damien Brunner out at least four weeks with knee

injury730748 Devils: Damien Brunner injury won't rush Ryane Clowe

return; Andrei Loktionov ill730749 Andy Greene goal gives Devils 5-4 win over Capitals in

overtime730750 Devils making move up in standings with hot streak730751 Devils, Capitals instant analysis730752 Like in Pittsburgh, Caps fans show no love to Devils' Jaromir

Jagr730753 Devils wary of Alex Ovechkin and Capitals' dangerous power

play730754 Devils find way to win without playing perfect; Head to

Chicago next to face reigning Cup champs730755 “Clutch” Greene comes through for Devils with OT goal,

shakes off Olympic snub; Jagr ties Messier730756 Tedenby back in Devils’ lineup tonight in Washington,

Loktionov (ill) out; Henrique back to center730757 Devils’ Clowe doesn’t expect plan for his return to be

impacted by Brunner’s knee injury730758 Lamoriello: Brunner “out approximately four weeks” with right

knee injury, but doesn’t need surgery730759 Andy Greene scores game-winner for Devils in overtime

victory against Capitals730760 Following big win over NY Rangers, Islanders come back

down to earth in loss to Ducks730761 Devils rally past Capitals in OT

New York Islanders730762 Getzlaf’s hat trick sinks Islanders730763 Point taken as Strome makes scoresheet730764 Islanders blow another two-goal lead to lose to Ducks730765 Islanders have 3 prospects in World Juniors730766 Islanders cautiously defend their star Tavares

New York Rangers730767 Henrik Lundqvist, NY Rangers look for signs of life against

Minnesota Wild730768 Cam Talbot ready for call730769 Point taken as Strome makes scoresheet730770 In sorry matchup, sorriest player is Lundqvist

Ottawa Senators730771 Vermette stuns Senators as Coyotes rally for win730772 Scanlan: Play loose, start winning games730773 Ottawa Senators special teams feelin' the pinch730774 B-day boy Cody Ceci tried to make it four OT winners this

season730775 Ottawa Sens are better off with Robin Lehner then Coyotes'

Antoine Vermette730776 Ottawa Sens defenceman Marc Methot gets two-goal night

scratched from score sheet730777 Ottawa Sens lose in OT to Phoenix Coyotes

Philadelphia Flyers730778 Blue Jackets top Flyers, 6-3730779 Changing concept of heroes reflected in new statues730780 Lecavalier solid in return, but Flyers falter730781 Flyers Notes: Lecavalier makes surprise return to Flyers730782 Lecavalier returns tonight730783 Flyers reach $1M+ settlement with season ticketholders730784 Flyers' Downie will miss 7-10 days730785 Giroux getting hot -- but enough for Olympic spot?730786 Blue Jackets get revenge on Flyers with comeback win730787 Downie out, Lecavalier in for Flyers vs. Columbus730788 McCaffery: NFL plan for Super Bowl Tuesday a well-played

snow job730789 Despite loss, Lecavalier 'felt good' in return730790 Late breakdown dooms Flyers vs. Jackets730791 Instant Replay: Blue Jackets 6, Flyers 3730792 Holmgren: Downie doesn't have a concussion730793 Lecavalier to make return with Downie injured730794 Mason staying positive despite recent woes730795 Flyers-Blue Jackets: 5 things you need to know730796 Flyers have to shuffle lines again730797 Flyers fade late in loss730798 Flyers' fall to Blue Jackets, 6-3

Phoenix Coyotes730799 Antoine Vermette lifts Phoenix Coyotes past Ottawa

Senators in OT730800 Phoenix Coyotes center Antoine Vermette masters language

of leadership

Pittsburgh Penguins730801 Stats Corner: Penguins rookies earning their keep730802 Ex-Pens winger Asham looking forward to retirement730803 Pens goalie situation intriguing730804 Letang has surgery on infected elbow730805 Crosby leads Penguins to 7th straight win730806 Penguins sign Zatkoff to new 2-year contract730807 Penguins minor league notebook: Wilkes-Barre still fields

pair of NHL veterans730808 On the Penguins: Learning the value of a team730809 Penguins on 7-game win streak with defeat of Flames, 4-3

San Jose Sharks730810 San Jose Sharks beat Dallas Stars in shootout730811 Sharks' Tomas Hertl out a least a month, possibly longer730812 Reluctant shooter Thornton keys win over Stars730813 Instant Replay: Sharks save Stalock, beat Stars 3-2 in SO730814 Stalock set for first career home start730815 In the Crease: Sharks move on without Hertl, host Stars730816 GM Wilson prepared to lose Hertl for a long time730817 Sharks GM Wilson on Hertl: 'More tests to be done'

St Louis Blues730818 Backes returns, but the Blues lose Polak730819 Stewart's hat trick sparks Blues' romp730820 Backes will return to Blues' lineup tonight730821 Polak will miss at least two weeks with ankle injury730823 Gudas, Bolts rally past Carolina in OT

Tampa Bay Lightning730822 Bolts notes: Malone likely to return soon730824 Fennelly: Bolts’ Stamkos still goal-oriented730825 Bolts Beat: NHL players must police themselves730826 Lightning beats Hurricanes in overtime730827 Pyatt returns to Lightning after long layoff730828 Lightning Nuts & Bolts730829 Lightning's fond farewell for Kubina

Toronto Maple Leafs730830 Shoalts: Consistency eludes exasperating Leafs in shootout

loss to Wings730831 Maple Leafs: Bernier in penthouse, Reimer in doghouse

after loss730832 Marlies beat Checkers back-to-back730833 Maple Leafs fall short in Winter Classic preview: DiManno730834 Maple Leafs: Kulemin thrills boys’ team visiting from

Kazakhstan730835 Toronto teams are many things — but boring's not one of

them730836 Maple Leafs: James Reimer looks to start tonight against

Detroit Red Wings730837 NHL: Cherry backs P.K. Subban for Canada on Coach’s

Corner730838 '24/7' airs dramatic second episode just after Alfredsson

buries Leafs730839 Maple Leafs goalie James Reimer pulled after giving up

three goals vs. Red Wings730840 Maple Leafs' top guns held in check vs. Red Wings730841 Maple Leafs forward David Clarkson grew up cheering for

Brendan Shanahan730842 Leafs-Red Wings rivalry will need time730843 Detroit Red Wings take Winter Classic preview in shootout

over Toronto Maple Leafs

Vancouver Canucks730855 Three minutes to show what you’ve got730856 Pay Santo? Or let him prove his worth?730857 Tortorella will try anything to break a tie730858 Gallagher: Tortorella's tactics frustrate at times730859 Willes: Gino Odjick needs to be ready to ask for help, no

matter how tough and determined he is

Washington Capitals730844 One-shot wonders of 2013730845 Five thoughts on the Capitals’ 4-2 win in Carolina730846 Martin Erat still waiting for trade730847 Morning skate: Grubauer again? Neuvirth unhappy730848 Capitals lose lead, fall to Devils in OT

Websites730860 ESPN / Tomas Hertl likely out a month730861 CNN/Sports Illustrated / Blue Jackets’ Marian Gaborik

breaks collarbone against Flyers

Winnipeg Jets730849 Physical play key to beating shifty Canucks730850 No rest for training staff730851 Tonight: Jets @ Canucks730852 Jets not focused on win, but next game730853 Frolik pleasant surprise for Jets730854 Bogosian makes presence felt in return to Jets lineup

SPORT-SCAN, INC. 941-284-4129

730650 Anaheim Ducks

Getzlaf's hat trick lifts Ducks to 5-3 win

By ERIC STEPHENS / ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

Published: Dec. 21, 2013 Updated: 9:48 p.m.

UNIONDALE, N.Y. – Frustrated over a fruitless first two periods and seeing a winning streak put in peril, Ryan Getzlaf vocalized it with his Ducks teammates and saw it wasn’t the best course of action.

The thing to do Saturday night against the New York Islanders was take matters into his own hands.

Getzlaf simply willed the Ducks to a franchise-best eighth straight victory with a third period that will drive him further into the Hart Trophy conversation as he rallied his team to a 5-3 win Saturday night at Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum.

The Ducks (26-7-5) broke their previous mark of seven straight wins, accomplished twice previously before this current string. And their captain made sure it didn’t end, sparking a four-goal third and delivering his second hat trick.

“I got caught a little during the game, being a little negative with the group,” Getzlaf said. “In certain situations, I was getting a little frustrated. It was at the point where I just needed to keep my mouth shut and do my thing and try and help our group in a positive way.”

The Islanders got goals from Thomas Vanek and Frans Nielsen just 57 seconds apart late in the second to grab a 3-1 lead. The Ducks stared at a two-goal deficit for the first time since Nov. 30 at San Jose.

All it did was set the stage for Getzlaf. After scoring on a rebound in the second, the big center went to the net again to put in another rebound past Islanders goalie Evgeni Nabokov just 1:10 into the third.

Mathieu Perreault scored for the second straight night to the tie the score, 3-3. Then Getzlaf won a faceoff in the Islanders’ end. Kyle Palmieri jumped on the puck and blew past defenseman Andrew MacDonald before beating Nabokov with 6:16 left.

Palmieri celebrated his homecoming to New Jersey by beating the Devils with a dramatic overtime goal Friday and then came right back with another winner. Four of his six goals have been decisive in Ducks wins.

“Yeah, I wouldn’t mind if it was more of them,” Palmieri said. “Definitely it was nice to get that one tonight.”

Getzlaf finished the comeback with an empty-net goal to match his hat trick Nov. 8 against Buffalo after going his first eight NHL seasons without one. His four points give him 43 for third in the league behind Pittsburgh’s Sidney Crosby and Chicago’s Patrick Kane.

“He just put it upon himself, that he was going to (carry) this team and everybody rode with him,” Coach Bruce Boudreau said. “He was the catalyst for sure.”

Ducks backup Frederik Andersen made 18 saves to improve to 9-1, becoming the third goalie to win nine of his first 10 games. Frank Brimsek did it for Boston in 1938 and Bob Froese repeated the feat in 1983.

The bigger feat is a winning streak the Ducks hope to stretch to nine when Boudreau coaches his first game in Washington since being fired by the Capitals in 2011 before taking the Ducks job three days later.

Told that it is something the Ducks’ 2006-07 Stanley Cup champion never did, Boudreau quickly retorted, “Well, we haven’t done what the ’06-07 team did either.”

Orange County Register: LOADED: 12.22.2013


Final: Ducks 5, Islanders 3

December 21st, 2013, 6:38 pm ·

posted by ERIC STEPHENS

The Ducks (26-7-5) set a new franchise mark for consecutive victories by scoring four times in the third after trailing, 3-1, after two periods. The club had previously won seven in a row twice this season and also in 1998-99.

One night after beating New Jersey with an overtime goal, Palmieri snapped a 3-3 tie with 6:16 remaining as he beat Islanders defenseman Andrew MacDonald off a faceoff win by Getzlaf and put a shot past goalie Evgeni Nabokov.

Getzlaf wrapped it up by firing the puck into an empty net for his second career hat trick. His first came Nov. 8 at home against Buffalo.

Goals by Thomas Vanek and Frans Nielsen late in the second gave the Islanders a 3-1 lead after Getzlaf got his first of the night at 15:10 of the period.

The Ducks were suddenly presented with their first two-goal deficit since Nov. 30 on the road at San Jose. They managed to rally against the Sharks on that night, tying the game in the third before losing in a shootout.

Getzlaf simply wouldn't allow the Ducks to go meekly into the night. His second score off a rebound in front just 70 seconds into the third pulled them within one and fired up his team.

Mathieu Perreault then tied it with 9:28 remaining as he also scored for the second straight evening. Corey Perry had three assists while Ducks backup goalie Frederik Andersen made 18 saves to improve to 9-1 as a rookie.



Ducks stretch winning streak to 8 in win over Islanders

By ALLAN KREDA

Posted: 12/21/13, 10:03 PM PST | Updated: 12 secs ago

UNIONDALE, N.Y. — Riding a long winning streak, the powerful Anaheim Ducks had no fear trailing by two goals heading into the third period against the fragile New York Islanders.

Ryan Getzlaf scored three goals and the Ducks rallied for their team-record eighth straight victory, beating the Islanders 5-3 Saturday night.

“We talked after the second of just continuing to play our game,” Ducks coach Bruce Boudreau said. “We were very calm about it and knew if we got one quickly, we’d have a great chance.”

Down 3-1, the Ducks scored four times in the third period. The Islanders played a spirited first two periods, taking their lead on two goals by Thomas Vanek and another by Frans Nielsen.

But Getzlaf scored his second of the game at 1:10 of the final period and Mathieu Perreault tied it at 10:32.

Kyle Palmieri, a native of Montvale, N.J., who scored the overtime winner Friday night against the New Jersey Devils, found himself in front of Evengi Nabokov with a clear shot at 13:44. The 22-year-old forward, who also scored the winning goal when the Ducks beat the Rangers 2-1 at Madison Square Garden on Nov. 4, knocked in his sixth goal of the season.

“Those goals feel really, really good,” Palmieri said. “We find ways to win and tonight was another example of our patience and skill.”

Getzlaf completed his hat trick with an empty-net goal. The Ducks won in their first visit to Long Island since a 3-2 loss on Dec. 16, 2010.

“We didn’t move the puck the way we should have in the third period,” Islanders coach Jack Capuano said. “You can’t play the way we played in the third period against a big Stanley Cup-caliber team like this. It won’t work.”

Vanek finally had the type of game the Islanders envisioned when they acquired him from Buffalo for popular left wing Matt Moulson on Oct. 27.

The Austrian right wing opened the scoring at 11:27 of the first, putting a rebound past backup goaltender Frederik Andersen, who made 18 saves to improve to 9-1.

After Getzlaf tied the game at 15:10 of the second, Vanek gave the Islanders again with a perfectly placed shot as he sped down the right side, beating Andersen to his stick side at 17:55.

The goal was Vanek’s ninth since joining the Islanders and his third in two nights. Nielsen made it 3-1 for the Islanders 57 seconds later.

“It came down to execution,” Capuano said. “We were icing the puck too much and not making plays when we had to in the third period.”

Anaheim forward Teemu Selanne was a healthy scratch. The 43-year-old Selanne usually doesn’t play the second half of back-to-back games. Selanne played Friday night as the Ducks upended the Devils 3-2 in overtime.

NOTES: This was the 10th time in 36 games this season the Islanders have lost a third-period lead. ... The Ducks will complete their final Eastern trip of the season at Washington on Monday. ... Forward Dustin Penner and defenseman Hampus Lindholm were healthy scratches for the Ducks, as were Islanders forwards Colin McDonald and Peter Regin, plus defenseman Aaron Ness. ... Anaheim also continued to be without goaltender Viktor Fasth (lower body) and defensemen Luca Sbisa (hand) and Sheldon Souray (wrist). ... The Islanders have been without defenseman Lubomir Visnovsky (concussion) since has injured Oct. 19.

LA Daily News: LOADED: 12.22.2013

730653 Boston Bruins

Rematch goes to Bruins

By Amalie Benjamin

December 22, 2013

With many of their best penalty killers already out of the lineup, and two of their best in the penalty box in Patrice Bergeron and Gregory Campbell, the Bruins’ remaining players were tasked with keeping hold of a one-goal lead.

Not that, in coach Claude Julien’s opinion, the situation was warranted.

Julien was critical of the referees after Saturday night’s game, taking issue with penalties called on both sides. One of the most crucial a cross-checking penalty on Bergeron that, coupled with Campbell’s double minor for high-sticking 12 seconds later, led to a 5 on 3 for the Sabres midway through the second period.

“It’s one of those nights where I really was disappointed in a lot of the calls,” Julien said after the Bruins took the 4-1 win over Buffalo. “I know they got a bad one at the end there on [Steve] Ott, but when I look back on it, it was a tough night.

“I was frustrated, to be honest, with some of the calls. You had a young referee in there tonight. He wants obviously to make the calls that he thinks need to be made, but there was a lot of them that put us in some tough spots there. It’s one of those games where, sometimes, you’ve got to beat more than the other team.”

They did, though, just two nights after Buffalo — the team with the fewest points (21) in the NHL — beat them at the First Niagara Center.

This time, the Bruins prevailed, improving their home hot streak to 12-0-2, thanks in large part to surviving five penalties, including two 5-on-3 chances for the Sabres.

In the first instance, the Bruins used the combination of Zdeno Chara, Johnny Boychuk, and Torey Krug for part of the time — with Krug swapped out for Ryan Spooner on a key faceoff — to help survive. As Julien said, “You kind of ad lib once in a while and be creative, and that’s what we tried to do.”

Milan Lucic, whose first goal in nine games helped the Bruins to a 3-1 lead at 5:18 of the third period, thought the penalty kill was key.

“Seeing other guys come in and step up and kill that off was huge and brought momentum back on our side and kind of lifted us to victory after that,” he said.

The second instance of 5-on-3 came after penalties to Jordan Caron and Boychuk, which would have given the Sabres a two-man advantage for 1:13. Instead, it ended after 30 seconds with a slashing call on Ott that the Sabre hotly contested.

The Bruins were already missing much of their penalty kill muscle, with Chris Kelly (56:36 of shorthanded time this season), Daniel Paille (46:43), Adam McQuaid (32:24), Loui Eriksson (26:06), and Dougie Hamilton (20:11) all out of the lineup with injuries.

And, still, the Bruins have continued their excellent record on the penalty kill, their 82.7 percent mark ranking among the league leaders.

“The good thing about that is we have had a lot of guys on this team that have been able to do that,” Campbell said before the game. “The system’s been in place for a while now, so to be honest with you, most of the team is in the penalty-kill meeting, and so most of us know what to do and there’s a number of guys that are capable of doing that.

“Penalty kill has a lot to do with sacrifice and playing within the system and it’s really become a big part of the game these days,” Campbell said.

“Killing penalties is, although it’s not very glamorous, it’s a huge part of the game. I consider it an honor to be in that position, to fill that role, and I think a lot of other players do, too.”

Though the Bruins started slowly Saturday night, they took the lead at 9:39 of the first with Reilly Smith’s power-play goal on a nice feed from Carl Soderberg.

But with just 66 seconds to go in the first, Buffalo’s Zemgus Girgensons put one between Tuukka Rask and the post, tying the score.

The Bruins got the lead back at 1:47 of the second period on David Krejci’s seventh of the season, after Jarome Iginla had skated up ice starting from behind the Bruins’ blue line, the play aided by the net drive from Lucic.

Lucic added his late goal, and Smith added his second of the game with 22 seconds left on an empty net.

“You need effort and you also have to capitalize on your scoring chances,” Krejci said. “So we didn’t have the complete game [on Thursday], but I felt like we had an OK game. In this league, OK isn’t good enough.”

Fortunately for the Bruins, they were better than OK on Saturday — especially their depleted penalty kill unit.

“We were getting pretty thin with killers,” Bergeron said. “But we’re a team that everybody can do the job when they step on the ice. We have a system that we believe in, and they did a great job.”

Boston Globe LOADED: 12.22.2013


Tuukka Rask’s timely saves secure 4-1 Bruins win

By Fluto Shinzawa

December 22, 2013

The sight was not one that any goalie finds appealing.

The puck, once safely tucked onto the stick of a teammate, had floated onto the blade of an unmarked Matt Ellis. It was early in the third period. The Bruins were up by only one goal.

It was time for Tuukka Rask to go to work.

“I just tried to square up,” Rask said. “I saw it was on his backhand. He shot it blocker side. I couldn’t really clear that rebound because I had to move from side to side.”

Rask moved from left to right and got his right pad on Ellis’s backhand shot. But Rask wasn’t out of danger. Linus Omark was sniffing for the rebound.

Had Omark slipped the puck past Rask, the surging Sabres would have tied the game. Instead, Rask stayed with the puck, extended his right pad once more, and kept Omark’s shot from finding the back of the net.

Three minutes later, Milan Lucic gave the Bruins a 3-1 lead. With those two saves, Rask had done his job. Even though the goalie shouldn’t have been asked to make those stops.

Brad Marchand had control of the puck in the defensive zone. Marchand could have gone up the left-side wall and out of the zone. Instead, Marchand tried to clear the zone through the middle of the ice. Ellis read the play to intercept the pass.

“Totally unnecessary turnovers, I thought,” Rask said of his team’s carelessness early in the third. “They got a couple chances and kind of took the momentum after that. We couldn’t really get anything going until that goal. That’s something we have to clear going ahead. The third period should be our best period. Today it definitely wasn’t.”

Saturday marked Rask’s 28th appearance. Rask stopped 34 of 35 shots. With the 4-1 win, Rask is now 18-8-2 with a 1.87 goals-against average and a .936 save percentage. Though 36 games, Rask has been the team’s best and most important player.

The only goal Rask gave up was one he usually stops. Late in the first period, Rask got his blocker on a close-range Matt Moulson shot. Rask tried to squeeze up against the post to keep a follow-up attempt from going in. But Rask didn’t seal up the post tightly enough. Zemgus Girgensons slipped the puck over Rask’s blocker from a sharp angle to tie the game at 1-1 at 18:54 of the first.

Rask made up for that goal by making the two timely stops in the third. It’s what he’s paid to do. It’s what the Bruins require of their ace.

Two nights ago, they didn’t get that timely save. Drew Stafford broke a 2-2 tie when he stuffed a wraparound goal through Chad Johnson. The Bruins never recovered.

Rask’s double-barreled stops put an end to Buffalo’s best surge. Rask also stood tall in two other challenging situations: a pair of two-man advantages for the Sabres.

In the second, Patrice Bergeron and Gregory Campbell were called for penalties within 12 seconds. Rask and his penalty killers — at one point, the coaching staff tabbed Zdeno Chara, Johnny Boychuk, and Torey Krug for a shorthanded shift — kept the net clear.

In the third, Jordan Caron and Johnny Boychuk went off in a 47-second stretch. Again, Rask kept a Buffalo rally from happening.

Like any goalie, Rask has submitted his duds. Rask gave up four goals in the Bruins’ 6-2 loss to Vancouver on Dec. 14. Rask was in net for all six goals in the Bruins’ 6-1 implosion against Detroit the day before Thanksgiving.

Those have been exceptions rather than the rule. From when the ice broke on the lockout, Rask has been one of the league’s most consistent goalies.

Rask’s bosses don’t fret when he’s in goal. For a coach, it’s one less thing to worry about. Perhaps the most important thing.

Not every high-end goalie can say he’s experiencing the same thing. Henrik Lundqvist was a Vezina Trophy finalist last season. This year, Lundqvist is 10-15-2 with a 2.77 GAA and a .905 save percentage. Lundqvist, who agreed to a seven-year, $59.5 million extension earlier this month, is making his employers sweat with the fear of more mediocrity to come.

Lundqvist isn’t alone. Sergei Bobrovsky, last year’s Vezina winner, was nothing special before his groin injury. Neither was Jonathan Quick, also out with an injured groin. Before hurting his knee, Jimmy Howard had lost his starting job to Jonas Gustavsson. Craig Anderson, just about immortal last year (12-9-2, 1.69 GAA, .941 save percentage), has forgotten how to stop the puck. Pekka Rinne, once considered Rask’s primary competitor for Olympic puckstopping duty, remains sidelined because of a hip infection.

It’s one thing to be a very good goalie. It’s another to be very good and consistent. Rask is both.

“It takes a lot of focus and a lot of energy to do that,” Rask said. “You can’t do it by yourself either. You need your team to help you out too. As a team, I don’t think we’ve played consistently great all the time. But we haven’t been bad. That helps a goalie a lot. You might have a game or two where you really have to be on top of your game. But then after that, it’s OK that you’re playing at your level. You don’t have to win those games by yourself. Us as goalies here, we’ve had that luxury this year.”



Patrice Bergeron refuses to back down from fight

By Amalie Benjamin

December 22, 2013

The tale of the tape did not look good for Patrice Bergeron: The 6-foot-2-inch, 194-pound Bergeron vs. Buffalo’s 6-8, 227-pound Tyler Myers.

Not to mention that Bergeron had never had a regular-season fighting major in his career.

The bout, which occurred at 14:07 of the second period Saturday, was precipitated by a last-straw crosscheck to the face that Bergeron didn’t exactly appreciate.

“It’s just, I guess, one of those things that it was in the heat of the moment,” Bergeron said. “And we were kind of both going at each other — crosschecking each other — and we just decided to obviously drop the gloves.”

Bergeron was trying to get to the front of the Sabres’ net. Myers was trying to prevent that.

For Bergeron, fighting could be dangerous with his history of concussions. But the center said that wasn’t what occurred to him as he was standing up for himself.

“You don’t think about that when you’re on the ice and you’re fired up when you’re not happy with what just happened,” said Bergeron, who also had an assist in the Bruins’ 4-1 victory. “I kind of realized pretty quickly that he’s pretty tall. It was tough, he had a pretty good reach. But I mean, you don’t think about it.”

Bergeron, who had seven penalty minutes in the game and has 13 in his last three games, got respect from his teammates on his willingness to stand up against Myers. He has actually had two previous fights in the NHL, both of them coming in the playoffs. Bergeron fought Pittsburgh’s Evgeni Malkin in the 2013 postseason and tangled with Montreal’s Josh Gorges in 2009.

“He plays hard,” teammate Milan Lucic said. “It’s the nature of the game. Sometimes it’s going to happen and it was good to see him get in there and have a spirited bout. It’s never easy no matter [what] — when the guy’s almost got you by half a foot.”

When Tuukka Rask was asked about Bergeron’s readiness to do anything for his team, he said, “Yeah, he’s one of those guys, you know, tough Irishman.”

Missing mates

The Merlot line — Daniel Paille, Gregory Campbell, and Shawn Thornton — has had remarkable stability, three seasons of playing together every day. But of late, without both Thornton (suspended) and Paille (concussion symptoms), Campbell has been the only one of the trio left on the ice.

“Oh, it’s devastating,” Campbell said, seemingly only half-joking. “I’m lost out there.”

“It’s definitely a luxury in today’s game to be able to play with the same two guys for as long as I have, or as long as we have. Change is to be expected. We’ve been very fortunate that we’ve all been healthy. We’ve all been in the lineup, so it’s nice to create a bond with those two.

“They’re really good players and I miss playing with them, to be honest with you. We know each other’s tendencies. We know our role and we know what’s expected of us.”

Campbell has been skating with Jordan Caron and Nick Johnson in recent games, and doing his best to bring the same energy that he did with his former linemates.

But, ultimately, Campbell said, he has a job to do.

“Our role doesn’t change, whether it’s me and Danny and Thorty or whoever it is on that line,” Campbell said. “It’s an energy line that has to be a responsible line that can bring something every night.”

Welcome home

David Warsofsky, from Marblehead and Boston University, who made his NHL debut Thursday in Buffalo, played in his first regular-season game at TD Garden.

“I’ve always been coming to games, I kind of know what the crowd is like, but it was a little different being on the ice,” Warsofsky said.

The defenseman played 13:01 and had 1:18 on the power play against the Sabres.

Getting closer

Adam McQuaid was deemed not quite ready to return for Saturday. Coach Claude Julien said the defenseman, who is out with a lower-body injury, skated Saturday and is “feeling much better.” Julien said that it was a possibility that he would play in Nashville on Monday . . . Dougie Hamilton started skating for the first time since his injury, taking to the ice on Saturday morning. Hamilton, who suffered his lower-body injury two weeks ago, is supposed to be out 2-4 weeks . . . Paille skated again Saturday and is expected to skate with the team Sunday.



David Krejci helps Bruins beat Sabres

AP / December 21, 2013

BOSTON (AP) — The Boston Bruins keep rolling at home.

David Krejci snapped a tie and set up Milan Lucic’s goal as the Bruins earned a split of a two-game set with a 4-1 victory Saturday night.

Reilly Smith had a power-play and an empty-netter for Boston, which won its seventh straight at home. The Bruins haven’t lost at home in regulation since late October, going 12-0-2 in their last 14 games.

‘‘That’s what you’re trying to do every year,’’ Lucic said about Boston’s run at TD Garden. ‘‘You want to make your building a tough one to play in.’’

It’s Boston’s best run at home since winning 14 straight from Oct. 25, 2008-Jan. 1, 2009.

‘‘Every season we start talking about it, creating the atmosphere and getting the fans in it when we play against teams at home,’’ Boston goalie Tuukka Rask said. ‘‘You’re always disappointed when you lose at home.’’

Zemgus Girgensons scored for the Sabres, who beat the Bruins 4-2 in Buffalo on Thursday night. The Sabres, who haven’t won three straight this season, had a two-game winning streak broken.

Bruins coach Claude Julien said the team’s overall play is growing with each win in its own rink.

‘‘I think the more times you win, the more confidence you get,’’ he said. ‘‘We talked about it before the season, wanting our building to be a tough building to come in to.’’

Rask, who was rested Thursday, made 34 saves, including a pair of key stops early in the third period.

Buffalo backup Jhonas Enroth stopped 35 shots and dropped to 1-7-3.

Sabres interim coach Ted Nolan felt like it’s even tougher for his team to win on the road when its not getting production from all if its lines.

‘‘It’ tough to win in this league if you only have one line going and a couple of other guys and a goaltender,’’ he said. ‘‘Especially with us, we need a little bit more. But tonight it just wasn’t there.’’

Krejci’s goal broke a 1-1 tie early in the second period. Trailing and coming down the center of the ice, Krejci took a drop pass from Jarome Iginla before waiting and firing a wrist shot past Enroth’s glove.

Krejci fed Lucic in the slot from the left circle, and Lucic beat Enroth with a wrister inside the left post.

Smith scored his empty-netter 21.4 seconds left.

Rask made a pair of right-pad saves seconds apart early in the third. Matt Ellis stole the puck from Brad Marchand near the blue line and cut in alone. Linus Omark fired in the rebound.

‘‘It’s a one-goal game. You try and keep it that way,’’ Rask said. ‘‘We gave them some turnovers and they couldn’t score. I guess you can say it was a momentum changer.’’

The Bruins were short-handed two players for a lengthy stretch in the second period after Patrice Bergeron was called for cross-checking, and Gregory Campbell got a four-minute penalty for high-sticking Jamie McBain 11 seconds later. Boston held Buffalo to two shots during the initial 1:49 stretch, and one when they were down one man.

Krejci felt like it was the truning point.

‘‘It was big,’’ he said. ‘‘It was a long 5-on-3, but we killed that. From there it felt like we took over the game and were in control.’’

Buffalo’s captain Steve Ott said his team didn’t challenge enough in Boston’s end of the ice.

‘‘I didn’t think we did a good job of getting pucks behind them and then creating a fore check,’’ he said.

Boston was short two players again with just over 6 minutes left in the game, but Ott got a slashing penalty seconds into the advantage.

Boston took a 1-0 on Smith’s power play goal 9:39 into the game. Carl Soderberg sent a pass across the top of the crease to Smith, who one-timed a shot into an open side of the net.

The Sabres tied it late in the period when Girgensons banged in the rebound of Matt Moulson’s shot. Moulson’s wraparound attempt popped into Rask’s stick side.

NOTES: Bergeron had his first career regular-season fight late in the second period, taking on Sabres defenseman Tyler Myers. ... The Sabres had killed 14 straight penalties before Smith’s goal. ... Marchand was helped off the ice midway into the first period and was assisted down the runway to the dressing room area before returning to action a few minutes later. ... Bruins forward Shawn Thornton, who is appealing his 15-game suspension for taking down, punching and injuring Pittsburgh’s Brooks Orpik, watched from the press box.



Game 36: Sabres at Bruins

Posted by Amalie Benjamin December 21, 2013 05:09 PM

Amused

Psyched

Shocked

Sad

Annoyed

Tonight brings the Sabres to the TD Garden, just two nights after the Bruins lost to them in Buffalo on Thursday. The Bruins would much prefer that that outcome didn't happen again, with the Sabres having the fewest points in the NHL.

The game on Thursday night saw the Bruins fail to capitalize on quite a few chances, leading to the opening for the Sabres to score on a fluke shot off David Warsofsky's stick to Marcus Foligno and on a wraparound by Drew Stafford.

The Bruins have just two games before the Christmas break -- tonight and Monday in Nashville -- so they'll be looking to turn around their results before those three days off.

Game time: 7 p.m.

TV/Radio: NESN/98.5 The Sports Hub

Records: Bruins 23-10-2, Sabres 9-23-3

Projected lineups:

Milan Lucic-David Krejci-Jarome Iginla

Brad Marchand-Patrice Bergeron-Reilly Smith

Carl Soderberg-Ryan Spooner-Matt Fraser

Jordan Caron-Gregory Campbell-Nick Johnson

Zdeno Chara-Torey Krug

Matt Bartkowski-Dennis Seidenberg

David Warsofsky-Johnny Boychuk

Tuukka Rask

Chad Johnson

Notes: There is a chance Adam McQuaid could play tonight against the Sabres, but the Bruins could also choose to keep him out for another night and use David Warsofsky again. ... Brad Marchand scored twice against the Sabres on Thursday, bringing his season total to seven goals. The Bruins would dearly like to see him build on those results, after Peter Chiarelli said he was not going to trade the winger. ... Always interesting to see the ice conditions on these quick changeover days -- the Celtics played at 1 p.m. at the Garden today.



Patrice Bergeron gets little punchy

Sunday, December 22, 2013

Stephen Harris, Bruins Beat

Patrice Bergeron brings a wide variety of skills to a hockey rink, but never will be a guy asked to earn his paycheck with his fists.

That doesn’t mean he’s not willing to give it a try every now and then.

Last night, in a fairly competitive (and at times chippy) encounter with the Buffalo Sabres, Bergeron found himself squared off with Tyler Myers — all 6-foot-8 of him — and said what the heck. Off went the gloves.

“He’s one of those guys: A tough Irishman,” said Tuukka Rask of Bergeron after the 4-1 win against the Sabres.

The Bergeron-Myers tiff erupted at 14:07 of the second period, with the B’s up just 2-1. It was sparked by a goalmouth battle for position between the pair, during which Myers gave Bergeron a pretty good pop in the face.

As the play went up ice toward the B’s end, the players skated side-by-side for a few feet, discussing the situation, then away they went. It was the first regular-season fight for Bergeron (in his 615th game), to go with playoff bouts he had against Pittsburgh’s Evgeni Malkin last year and Canadien Josh Gorges in 2009.

“It’s just one of those things,” said Bergeron. “It was in the heat of the moment. We were both going at each other, cross-checking each other, and we both decided to drop the gloves.

“We were kind of talking. He asked me if I wanted to do it; I was fine with it. I kind of asked him also. So we did it. His last cross-check, he got me in the face. That got me fired up.

“It’s part of the game. I was battling to get to the front of the net. He was obviously trying to keep me away from his goalie. He’s a pretty tall guy, so he got me in the face.”

Coach Claude Julien wasn’t pleased Myers was allowed to rough up Bergeron without anything being called. Indeed, Julien wasn’t too happy about the officiating in general in this game.

“He’s going to stand up for himself,” he said. “I couldn’t believe they didn’t call the cross-check and the punch to the head. It was one of those nights when I didn’t agree with a lot of the calls. It was a tough night.”

As fights go, it wasn’t much. The early voting at Hockeyfights.com had it just about a draw, but it certainly sent a message to Bergeron’s teammates — he is willing to do whatever he can to try and help the team win, even if it means fighting a guy six inches taller.

“It’s good to see him get in there and have a spirited bout,” said Milan Lucic. “It’s never easy when the guy’s got you by half a foot.”

Offered Bergeron’s linemate, Reilly Smith, who scored twice: “You don’t expect him to do something like that, but it’s part of his character. He’s a tough guy. He’s a leader.”

Jarome Iginla said he’s watched from afar for many years as Bergeron showed the willingness to do what it takes.

“He’s a great competitior and leader,” said Iginla. “He just battles. He plays hard all the time and he plays to win. He’s an all-round, complete player. You name it, he can do it.”

Bergeron demonstrated much of his skillset in this one: He went 16-5 on faceoffs, helped kill all six tries by the unimpressive Buffalo power play (including two 5-on-3s), and assisted on Smith’s empty-net goal that wrapped up the evening.

But it was the fight that dominated the postgame conversation.

“It’s not the first time,” said Rask. “He doesn’t live off that, but he’s got that ability. When the time is right, he does it. This was one of those games when someone got on his nerves and he decided to go.”

Needless to say, Bergeron is far too valuable to the Bruins to be getting in a lot of fights. His absence was felt earlier in the second period, when he and Gregory Campbell landed in the penalty box at the same time. With main PK guys Chris Kelly and Daniel Paille already absent, Julien had to get creative, using defenseman Torey Krug as the up-top man during the 1:49 of 5-on-3.

“We’re getting pretty thin for killers,” said Bergeron. “It was a big job by all the guys who went out there and killed the penalty for us. . . . We’re a team where all the guys can do the job. We have a system and we believe it. They did a great job.”

But as the fight started, Bergeron wasn’t thinking about the potential ramifications. He was just mad.

“You’re fired up and you’re not happy about what just happened,” he said. “You kind of realize quickly he’s pretty tall (and) he has a pretty good reach. But you don’t think about it.

“Really that last shot that I got in the face, I guess that was the last straw. That really got me going and fired up. I’d had enough.”

Boston Herald LOADED: 12.22.2013


Minus mates, Campbell continues pivotal play


Steve Conroy, Bruins Notebook

If you want to know how close Bruins center Gregory Campbell has grown to his regular linemates Shawn Thornton and Daniel Paille, just ask him what it’s been like to skate without the wingers. Thornton has missed the last seven games as part of a 15-game NHL suspension he is appealing, while Paille has been out for six games with concussion-like symptoms.

“Oh, it’s devastating,” Campbell said with a smirk before last night’s 4-1 win over the Buffalo Sabres at the Garden. “I’m lost out there.”

Sarcasm, of course, is the best form of flattery among mates. And as much as Campbell might mock Thornton’s and Paille’s usefulness, he knows full well that the trio’s Merlot Line is pretty unique. With the exception of an injury here or a personnel shift there, the fourth line has been together late since late in the Stanley Cup-winning 2010-11 season.

“It’s definitely a luxury now in today’s game to be able to play with the same two guys, as long as I have, as long as we have,” Campbell said.

With Thornton and Paille out, Campbell has been skating between Jordan Caron and Nick Johnson.

“I’ve played with Jordy for a bit and he’s a good two-way player, strong player and we’re kind of feeling each other out on the penalty kill,” Campbell said. “We’re kind of getting a feel for one another on the penalty kill, Jordy and I. And with (Johnson), you saw what he’s capable of doing (in preseason before he was assigned to Providence of the AHL). He’s played a few games in this league and he can score goals. He showed that in training camp.

“Our role doesn’t change, whether it’s me, Danny or Thorty or whoever it is. It’s got to be a responsible line that can bring something every night. They’re good players and it’s just about us contributing.”

Warsofsky at home

Marshfield native David Warsofsky played his first regular-season game at the Garden and, though the defenseman didn’t earn a point, he moved the puck well on the power play that produced a Reilly Smith goal.

“I’ve been playing on the power play down in Providence and that’s kind of the role I want to come into,” Warsofsky, who was called up last Wednesday from the AHL and made his NHL debut Thursday in Buffalo, said. “So I felt comfortable out there and Spooner and Sodes made a nice play to Smitty and he buried it so it was good to get a goal.” . . .

Zdeno Chara was incensed when he thought the Sabres’ Steve Ott slew-footed him in the third period, but the defenseman said that it may not have been as bad as he originally thought. . . .

Ryan Spooner, who had been a liability in the faceoff circle when he first came up from Providence, won 7-of-9 draws in the win.

Injury updates

Defenseman Dougie Hamilton, who suffered a left leg injury two weeks ago, skated in the morning for the first time since being hurt against the Maple Leafs in Toronto, coach Claude Julien said.

Julien also said Paille skated and is expected to do so again today with the team. Defenseman Adam McQuaid (lower body) skated, too, but remained out of the lineup.

“(McQuaid is) feeling much better so again I would say day-to-day. Maybe in Nashville (tomorrow night) just before the Christmas holiday; so he’s that close right now,” Julien said.

The B’s looked like they might have lost Brad Marchand when he collided awkwardly with Sabres defenseman Christian Ehrhoff and had to be helped down the runway while favoring his left leg, but he returned and played 14:21. Marchand was also hobbled a bit when he blocked a shot.



Nick aims to stick


Stephen Harris

Bruins fourth-line winger Nick Johnson wants to make it very clear that he’s happy to be part of the team, as one of the call-ups during the B’s recent rash of personnel losses. The Calgary native, who will turn 28 on Christmas Eve, played his sixth game last night vs. the Buffalo Sabres.

“I’m here, I’m happy, I feel pretty good,” Johnson said after practice Friday in Wilmington. “I’m thankful for the opportunity.”

But you speak with Johnson about the hockey path he’s followed the past 5-6 years, and there is obvious frustration and discouragement in his voice.

Johnson was an NCAA standout at Dartmouth College, where he was the fourth generation of his family (including mom, Ann, a Wayland native) to attend the Ivy League school. He played there with numerous future NHLers (including T.J. Galiardi, Tanner Glass, David Jones, Ben Lovejoy and Lee Stempniak) and posted 57-68-125 totals in 133 games.

“It was a good time,” he said. “Great school, beautiful town and the hockey was good.”

With all these great players in those years, how was it possible Dartmouth not only never won a national title, but never even qualified for the tournament?

“I don’t know,” Johnson said with a smile. “Maybe we were having too much fun.”

He was a 2004 third-round NHL draft pick (67th overall) of the Pittsburgh Penguins, and seemed destined for a successful big league career. But it hasn’t worked out that way, as Johnson last night played just the 110th NHL game of his six-year pro career.

He has played for the Penguins, Minnesota Wild, Phoenix Coyotes and Bruins — but only once stuck around for a full season, playing 77 games with Minnesota in 2011-12 (8-18-26). Otherwise, year after year he’s been just outside the NHL roster, saddled with the dreaded identification as a “depth player.”

“It’s been tough a little bit,” he said. “I’ve been bumped around. It’s been a tough couple of years. It’s tough coming up (from the AHL) and doing well. It hasn’t been easy. I mean, it’s fine, (but) I haven’t developed like I expected.”

Johnson was hurt by last year’s NHL lockout. Despite playing full-time for the Wild (14:26 per game) in 2011-12, he was released and signed a one-year, two-way deal with Phoenix. He started last season in the minors, but was called up and played 17 games for the Coyotes (4-2-6). But in March, he was back on waivers and back down to the AHL with Portland.

Then he signed with the B’s in July — another one-year, two-way deal. When he enjoyed a terrific preseason, scoring four goals, it seemed he might make the team. Based on his play, he probably deserved a spot. Nope. Back to the AHL.

So now he’s here, a fill-in until injured guys return. Then it’s probably back to Providence.

“You know, it was just politics (going back down after his 77-game season),” said Johnson. “And then last year it was politics. This year, a little bit, politics. I don’t know. I’m just happy to be here, and we’ll see where it goes.”

He was asked how long he’ll keep chasing the dream.

“Oh, I don’t know,” he said. “We’ll see how this year goes. I’m not playing in the minors next year. It’s either I do well here and get a one-way . . . or go to Europe. Then again, there is a lot of opportunity in the (AHL) these days with money. There might be something there, but it’s got to be a good situation. You’ve got to find the right minor league team, city, everything. I know I’m not going to get all the benefit of the doubt with trying to get to this

level. I thought I proved it last year, and proved it the year before, and proved it this year in training camp.”

Bruins coach Claude Julien terms Johnson “a good call-up guy, a hard worker, reliable.”

“In camp, how he scored some goals was pretty impressive,” Julien said. “In reality, maybe his goalscoring output in the NHL may not quite be what we saw in camp. But there are a lot of good things with him. We considered him battling for that 13th (forward) spot.”

Julien was a “depth guy” himself in his playing days — spending most of 12 seasons in the minors, and playing just 14 NHL games with Quebec — and understands Johnson’s frustration.

“Yeah, but you know what? You control what you can control,” Julien said. “You do it with your play. If your play is worthy of (the NHL), then you’re there. It can be frustrating being a bubble guy. But he’s been through a few organizations and the same thing has happened over and over.

“We’re a team that’s gone to the Stanley Cup final two of the last three years, and he was the last player cut. He should be pretty proud to be part of our group.”

Johnson was a psych major at Dartmouth, and indicated he might pursue an advanced degree in the field after his playing career, perhaps becoming a psychologist. If he does, he’ll certainly have plenty of useful knowledge to share with people whose careers haven’t worked out quite as they hoped.



Bruins get creative in tough win


Steve Conroy

The Bruins should beat Buffalo on most nights, even with the Sabres’ new elevated compete level under interim coach Ted Nolan.

But when you’re as injury-riddled as the B’s are right now — and are in the situation they were in the second period last night — it sometimes takes a little bit of ingenuity to get the job done.

And that they did, eventually grinding out a 4-1 victory over the Sabres at the Garden, getting goals from Reilly Smith (Nos. 10, 11), Milan Lucic (12) and David Krejci (7), while Tuukka Rask (34 saves) was excellent. Zemgus Girgensons had tied the game for Buffalo with 1:06 left in the first period, but the B’s went ahead for good on Krejci’s goal 1:47 into the second.

In the middle of the second period, however, it looked like it would be an even tougher night for them. Already without regular penalty-killing forwards Daniel Paille and Chris Kelly, Patrice Bergeron took a cross-checking penalty at 9:28, and then Gregory Campbell received a double minor for high-sticking just 12 seconds later, giving the Sabres a lengthy 5-on-3 with the B’s nursing a 2-1 lead.

They managed to kill it, allowing just two shots on the two-man advantage and only three on the entire power play while at one point using defenseman Torey Krug in the up-top position usually reserved for a forward.

“You’ve got to ad-lib once in a while and be creative, and that’s what we tried to do,” said coach Claude Julien, who also used the quick Ryan Spooner in the same spot.

With all the injuries and illness that have befallen the team in the last few weeks, Krug said he’d discussed the possibility of filling the role with assistant coach Doug Houda, so it wasn’t completely out of the blue that he was pressed into service.

“I didn’t think about it until he tapped me and said, ‘Hey, do you know what you’re doing on top on the 5-3?’ ” Krug said. “I didn’t have time to think about it and just said, ‘Yeah.’ It’s taking the one-timer away. It was a simple job at the time because they had two one-timers up top and I just had to take that away.”

It wasn’t exactly easy after they traversed that sizable hump, but the B’s did get a lift from that kill.

“It was big,” said Krejci, who has seen some more PK work with all the injuries. “It was a long 5-on-3 for them, but we killed that and from there I felt like we took over the game and controlled it from there.”

Milan Lucic gave the B’s some much needed breathing room with his first goal in nine games 5:18 into the third period and, after the B’s survived some more late penalty trouble, Smith, who scored on the power play for the B’s first goal in the first period, salted it away with an empty-netter.

The B’s are a dominant 15-3-2 at home. They have not lost in regulation at the Garden since blowing a late lead to the New Jersey Devils on Oct. 26.

“It’s important,” Krug said. “Early on in the season we were flirting with .500 in our home building and we sat down as a group and talked about how we’ve got to make this a harder place to play for a visiting team. For us, we’re just kind of taking it one game at a time and we’ve been rolling now and we’re going to keep it going.”



Notebook: Let’s not make game punchless

Jason Spezza


The NHL has a big problem, and despite what the some people’s pretzel logic might have you believe, it has nothing to do with fighting.

It is, of course, the reckless behavior of players who, after saying time and again that they need to get the dangerous hits out of the game, go ahead and deliver them.

Already this year, there have been 28 suspensions, most of which have been for the dangerous, intent-to-injure type of hits. Despite the raised concussion awareness, that number is up from the 22 all of last season’s 48-game schedule and throughout the playoffs.

There are a lot of theories as to why and when these hits started to occur so frequently. The feeling here is the new, armor-like equipment, especially the shoulder pads, immunizes the checker from paying any price for delivering brutal hits, whether they are the suspension-provoking kind or last week’s crushing blow by Washington’s Tom Wilson on Philadelphia’s Brayden Schenn that was deemed not worthy of supplemental discipline. Secondly, the rule changes coming out of the 2004-05 lockout made the game much faster and more entertaining, but also far more dangerous. Too often the impact of “clean” checks puts players on injured reserve.

It is the scourge of the NHL for which the only solution appears to be the kind of whopping suspension that finally changed Matt Cooke’s game.

But as for fighting? One has to strain mighty hard to connect one with the other.

The no-respect head shots and hits from behind are relatively new to the game. Fighting is not. Starting in 1922, the NHL began regulating fighting with a five-minute penalty, with modifications such as third-man-in and instigator rules coming in subsequent years. Fighting has been both a staple and selling point of the game for decades. And it is a part of the game.

I am always wary of jumping into the quagmire that is the fight debate. On one side, there are too many armchair, hard guys who think that because they like watching other people bleed it somehow makes them tough. On the other side, there are too many pontificators desperately trying to get on the “right” side of history as they attempt to scrub their own consciences clean.

But with that disclaimer, I like the fighting. First and foremost, it’s entertaining. Maybe it’s a guilty pleasure, but no more so than watching Manny Pacquiao on a Saturday night or the old clips of Muhammad Ali.

And, yes, there are ancillary benefits to having it in the game.

It doesn’t keep the cheap hits from occurring, as the laundry list of suspensions clearly shows. But the feeling here is that without fighting, the retaliatory hits — delivered at 30 miles an hour — would be much more dangerous than two men dropping the gloves. Without fighting, the concussions absorbed in fisticuffs may be eliminated, but that will be offset by the payback hits.

Also, a well-timed fight can change momentum in a hockey game. It doesn’t happen all the time, but anyone who says they’ve never seen it happen is lying to you or themselves.

And finally, here’s a gut feeling: If fighting falls by the wayside, it will rob the game of some of its character. Hockey players have always carried themselves with more humility than any of the other high-priced athletes (OK, Brad Marchand’s Vancouver antics aside). The guess here is that at least some part of the hockey player’s grounded makeup has something to do with the fact that, if he gets too full of himself, he can get called out in front of 20,000 people.

And I’ll choose to side with the vast majority of players on the issue. As opposed to the head shots and dangerous boarding penalties, which every player will at least say he wants to get out of the game, there is no such movement among players concerning fighting.

Canadian junior leagues adopted much harsher fighting penalties and, according to a report in the New York Times last week, USA Hockey appears ready to follow suit. It’s the right thing to do. Teenagers, especially ones who’ll never see a real paycheck from playing hockey, should not be playing by the same rules as grown men. It will cut down on the head shots of the players who will continue to play. And hopefully, it will further the trend in the NHL of fighters having to be able to play hockey first. More Shawn Thorntons and Brandon Prusts, fewer John Scotts.

Getting rid of fighting might appease a certain lobby within the game, as well as earn a few pats on the head from pundits who wouldn’t be caught dead at a hockey game, now or in some distant fight-free future. And who knows? Maybe the NHL without fighting would be a better place.

But no one really knows that. A lot of us thought the 2005 rules change that added speed to the game would be a great thing, but no one saw all the concussions and injuries coming.

Change does not always equal progress.

This week’s B’s timeline

Tomorrow at Nashville, 8 p.m. — After flirting with becoming an elite team for a couple of years, the Predators have reverted to being just another .500 club. Three years ago, they were third in the league in goals against. Going into the weekend, they were ranked 18th. This being the last game before a three-day Christmas break, focus could be an issue for both teams.

Friday vs. Ottawa, 7 p.m. — The Senators are not who we thought they were. Going into the weekend, the Sens were five points out of a wild card berth.

Saturday at Ottawa, 7 p.m. — The last time they were in the Canadian capital, the B’s had an awful third period and gave the Sens just one of seven home victories.

SPEZZA, SENATORS NEED TO REGROUP

When Daniel Alfredsson bolted Ottawa for Motown, the Senators’ captaincy simply went to their most skilled player, Jason Spezza. And now, just three months into his new job, Spezza and the Sens find themselves in crisis mode.

After a loss in New Jersey on Tuesday, coach Paul MacLean ripped his team, saying: “There’s a lack of focus, there’s a lack of leadership and there’s a lack of preparation.”

That came after general manager Bryan Murray felt the need to address the team in a meeting that put players on notice.

Spezza said he accepts the responsibility and the criticism that come with his new role.

“Whenever you’re not winning, you start looking at the top down. As being the captain, it gets reflected on me first and I have to find a way to get our group more consistent and I have to find a way to get my own game consistent,” said Spezza. “When things go wrong you look at the top down. And it’s always been that way in sports.”

So how did the Sens respond? A 4-2 home loss to Florida.

While Spezza will get his share of the flak, the real problem is that goalie Craig Anderson has turned into a pumpkin. Going into the weekend, Anderson — once considered a real threat to make the U.S. Olympic team — had an .897 save percentage and 3.40 GAA. Can’t win many games with goaltending like that. Meanwhile, goalie Ben Bishop, who as a pending free agent was traded from Ottawa to Tampa Bay for undersized winger Cory Conacher, has kept the Lightning in the Eastern Conference hunt even with the loss of Steven Stamkos. Opting to keep Robin Lehner as his goalie of the future instead of Bishop, Murray could not have seen Anderson’s game fall off a cliff as it has, but that trade doesn’t look too good right now, especially with Conacher notching just 2-6-8 totals in 35 games.



Bruins bounce back with 4-1 win over Sabres

Saturday, December 21, 2013

Steve Conroy

The Bruins allowed the Buffalo Sabres to get their first two-game regulation win streak on Thursday, but they were not going to let them notch their first three-game win streak of the year.

David Krejci snapped a 1-1 tie early in the second period and, after the B's came up with a lengthy 5-on-3 kill, came away with a 4-1 win at the Garden. The B's also got goals from Reilly Smith (10, 11) and Milan Lucic (12) while Tuukka Rask was very good in stopping 34 Buffalo shots.

The B's are now 15-3-2 at home and have not had a regulation loss on Causeway Street since losing to the Devils on Oct. 26.

"That’s what you try to do every year," said Lucic. "You want to make your building a tough one to play in and the crowd’s been great. They’ve helped out a lot so far throughout the year and on the other hand I think we’re 9-7 on the road, so if we can clean that part up and get points on the road, we can move ahead in the standings but definitely want to do whatever we can in our power to make this a tough place to play."

The B's can improve on that home record on Monday night in Nashville before taking a three-day Christmas break.



David Krejci keys Bruins' 4-1 win over Sabres

Saturday, December 21, 2013

Associated Press

BOSTON — David Krejci snapped a tie and set up Milan Lucic's goal as the Boston Bruins earned a split of a two-game set with a 4-1 victory on Saturday night.

Reilly Smith had a power-play and an empty-netter for Boston, which won its seventh straight at home. The Bruins haven't lost there in regulation since late October, going 12-0-2 in their last 14 games.

Zemgus Girgensons scored for the Sabres, who beat the Bruins 4-2 in Buffalo on Thursday night. The Sabres, who haven't won three straight this season, had a two-game winning streak broken.

Tuukka Rask, who was rested Thursday, made 34 saves, including a pair of key stops early in the third period.

Buffalo backup Jhonas Enroth stopped 35 shots and dropped to 1-7-3.

Krejci's goal broke a 1-1 tie early in the second period. Trailing and coming down the center of the ice, Krejci took a drop pass from Jarome Iginla before waiting and firing a wrist shot past Enroth's glove.

Krejci fed Lucic in the slot from the left circle, and Lucic beat Enroth with a wrister inside the left post.

Smith scored with 21.4 seconds left.

Rask made a pair of right-pad saves seconds apart early in the third. Matt Ellis stole the puck from Brad Marchand near the blue line and cut in alone. Linus Omark fired in the rebound.

The Bruins were short-handed two players for a lengthy stretch in the second period after Patrice Bergeron was called for cross-checking, and Gregory Campbell got a four-minute penalty for high-sticking Jamie McBain 11 seconds later. Boston held Buffalo to two shots during the initial 1:49 stretch, and one when they were down one man.

Boston was short two players again with just over 6 minutes left in the game, but Buffalo's Steve Ott got a slashing penalty seconds into the advantage.

Boston took a 1-0 on Smith's power play goal 9:39 into the game. Carl Soderberg sent a pass across the top of the crease to Smith, who one-timed a shot into an open side of the net.

The Sabres tied it late in the period when Girgensons banged in the rebound of Matt Moulson's shot. Moulson's wraparound attempt popped into Rask's stick side.

NOTES: Bergeron had his first career regular-season fight late in the second period, taking on Sabres defenseman Tyler Myers. ... The Sabres had killed 14 straight penalties before Smith's goal. ... Marchand was helped off the ice midway into the first period and was assisted down the runway to the dressing room area before returning to action a few minutes later. ... Bruins forward Shawn Thornton, who is appealing his 15-game suspension for taking down, punching and injuring Pittsburgh's Brooks Orpik, watched from the press box.


730665 Buffalo Sabres

Sabres notebook: Omark hopes to make his mark in Buffalo

By John Vogl

on December 21, 2013 - 5:03 PM

updated December 22, 2013 at 12:41 AM

BOSTON — All Linus Omark wants is a chance to show he belongs in the NHL. He’s thrilled Buffalo will give it to him.

“I was so excited to get a chance here in the NHL and come to a new organization,” said Omark, who was acquired from Edmonton on Thursday and made his Sabres debut Saturday against Boston. “From the beginning when I signed there, I wanted to play in the NHL. It’s really tough. They have really good forwards in the top six there, and I never really got the chance this year. I’m glad I ended up here.”

The Sabres worked Omark in gradually against the Bruins, starting him on the fourth line. He shouldn’t expect to stay there after putting up 14 goals and 29 points in 29 games with the Oilers’ minor-league club.

“I’ve been going pretty good this season,” he said in TD Garden. “It’s another step to this league, but I got some confidence playing down there. Hopefully, I can bring it here, too.”

Wearing No. 17, Omark hopes to continue the trend of excelling at his stops. He led the Swiss league in assists last season.

The 26-year-old has obvious offensive talent and a flair for making individual plays. The Sabres’ Matt D’Agostini quickly made it clear that the newcomer will need to put the team first by taking care of the puck.

“D’Agostini said to him yesterday, ‘You can do all the fancy stuff you want, but make sure you get it in,’ ” coach Ted Nolan said. “We want to make sure we play a simple game. We’re not in an individual contest here. We’re in a hockey game.

“Right now we’re playing much better, so to break up some combinations just to squeeze him in would be difficult. We’ll keep him with the so-called fourth line right now, and we’ll see how he goes when we give him some minutes. As we move forward here, we’ll see how it all adjusts.”

Omark joined the Sabres in Beantown and played without having ever skated with his teammates. Because the Celtics played in the Garden on Saturday afternoon, the Sabres didn’t have a morning skate. Still, he already felt comfortable with the team after going to dinner with Swedish countrymen Jhonas Enroth and Henrik Tallinder.

“It’s nice to know two guys right away when you come to a new team,” said Omark, who has one primary goal. “That I can play in this league and play good.”

Aside from Omark stepping into the lineup for injured center Cody Hodgson, there were no other roster moves. Enforcer John Scott was scratched for the third straight game. Chad Ruhwedel also sat.

Key injuries continue to pile up in Rochester. The Amerks announced Saturday that Mike Zigomanis will be out indefinitely.

Zigomanis was run over by Lake Erie’s Michael Tam on Friday, with Tam earning a charging major and a game misconduct. Zigomanis left the ice on his own and went to a Rochester hospital for evaluation. He is believed to have a neck injury.

The Amerks lost veteran Jamie Tardif earlier in the week to an upper-body injury. He will not join the team for its Switzerland tournament this week.

Buffalo News LOADED: 12.22.2013


Cap hike may not mean lower ticket costs

By John Vogl

on December 22, 2013 - 12:37 AM

BOSTON — Back when Pat LaFontaine was a player and not a president, it didn’t take much money to kick off a Thursday or Friday night. My buddies and I would head to Garcia’s Irish Pub or Jim Kelly’s Network and get a ticket to the Sabres game, two beers and a pregame buffet for $17.

Just like the establishments, those deals are long gone. It’s $31 to $64 just for the cheapest seat to a game this season in Buffalo. Based on the latest salary-cap projections, folks are worried it will get a lot more expensive.

The cap is expected to rise to $71.1 million next season, the NHL estimated at its board of governors’ meeting this month. The salary floor, which is the minimum teams need to spend on players, could be $52 million. Those totals are up from $64.3 million and $44 million.

If teams are going to spend that much more on salaries, the cash has to come from somewhere, right?

“The reported increase in the salary cap for next season alone will not drive our ticket-pricing decisions,” Sabres President Ted Black said during an exchange of phone calls and emails. “With the current season not yet half completed, we have not made any decision on ticket pricing for the 2014-15 NHL season.”

While it’s possible fans could catch a break on tickets, the league’s collective bargaining agreement makes it unlikely. Here’s why:

1. Teams such as Chicago, Philadelphia and Toronto are expected to spend to the cap. To make up for the hike, they’ll probably raise ticket prices.

2. The CBA dictates that clubs that receive revenue sharing must keep pace with the league’s average ticket price. If the teams fall below 75 percent of the average they “shall be required to submit to the league and Revenue Sharing Oversight Committee a forward-looking three-year business plan to establish a framework for improving its financial performance.”

In other words, if a bunch of teams charge more, the Sabres need to follow suit in order to get a revenue-sharing check and avoid a trip to the principal’s office.

“With any revenue-sharing club, and I’ll speak specifically to the Sabres, to not jeopardize that you have to keep pace with what the league average growth is in ticket revenue,” Black said. “That’s the benchmark in order to not jeopardize that revenue source.”

Despite an owner with billions of dollars, the Sabres remain a business. They qualify for revenue sharing. If there’s free money available, it makes sense to take it.

The possible good news for fans is there are different types of funds available. The first wave of revenue sharing comes from the 10 teams that gross the most money. Playoff receipts are shared after that. Finally, there’s centrally generated league revenues.

The last clause includes the new 12-year, $5.2 billion deal the NHL signed with Canadian television broadcasters. The teams will get more money from that so – in theory – they may not have to raise ticket prices much to make up for the rising cap costs.

“Local revenue growth is obviously an important component in the ability of clubs to remain competitive on the ice,” Bill Daly, the NHL’s deputy commissioner, said in an email. “That’s always been the case and will continue to be the case.

“But the good news here is that the significant increases in rights fees generated from the new national television deals in the United States and now Canada, and the significant growth in league-wide revenues associated with our other national businesses have contributed to a much larger percentage of club revenue streams being sourced centrally, through the league, and not locally, primarily from gate receipts.”

As Daly says, business is booming. The estimated cap number for next season means that between $1.56 billion and $2.133 billion will be spent on players in 2014-15. Since the league and players have a 50-50 split, that means the league will take in about $4 billion.

That’s a long way from tickets, beers and buffets for $17. Prices won’t head back to that, but there’s a chance ticket prices won’t jump as much as the salary cap because of the league’s monetary intake.

“I think it’s a great sign for the health of the industry,” Black said. “I think it’s also a testament to the work that the commissioner and his staff have done to grow the profile of the league.”

Futa in Sabres GM running

The Sabres have asked for permission to speak with Los Angeles’ Michael Futa for their open general manager job. The 46-year-old is in his seventh season as the Kings’ co-director of amateur scouting.

Before joining the Kings, Futa was the Ontario Hockey League’s Executive of the Year as the GM of Owen Sound. The Attack went to the postseason in all five of Futa’s seasons. The Toronto resident played professionally in Europe.

Meanwhile, the Calgary Flames’ GM search could extend into the summer. Brian Burke, the president of hockey operations, said there are three to six people on his short list. He continues to insist he does not want the job.

Rare illness stops Doan

The Coyotes will be without captain Shane Doan this week when they visit Buffalo. He’s been out since Dec. 4 with a mysterious illness, which Phoenix has finally defined as Rocky Mountain spotted fever.

According to the Mayo Clinic, it’s a tick-borne bacterial disease that affects the cells in the lining of your blood vessels. It makes the vessels leak, which can cause serious damage to internal organs, especially the kidneys. Antibiotics can take care of it, but it’s lethal if untreated.

“It’s certainly not to the point that we’re worried that he’ll never return,” GM Don Maloney said. “There’s an uncertainty of how long it’s going to take him, and that’s why it’s hard to describe it because ideally you’d like to say after the holidays, another week or 10 days of rest, he’ll be ready to go. But that may not be the case. It could very well take weeks and weeks and weeks. We just don’t know.”

It’s good to be good

Patrick Kane is one of five players reaping the benefits of being a star. The Blackhawks forward is using new skates and equipment from Bauer that are lighter than anything else out there. The skates weigh a half-pound less than other models, and the carbon composite blade holders are customized to the users’ skating style.

“You fall in love with them right away,” Kane said. “As far as turning and skating, you feel like they’re like a lot quicker.”

The only skaters who have the gear are Kane, teammate Jonathan Toews, Washington’s Alex Ovechkin and Nicklas Backstrom, and Philadelphia’s Claude Giroux. While more NHL players might get to use the equipment, the public will not.

“This would be cost prohibitive for the consumer,” said Steve Jones, Bauer’s director of global marketing and brand strategy. “This is not something we’d like to market to the masses.”

On the fly

• What does a league-leading save percentage of .941 get you? A spot on the bench. The Kings’ Ben Scrivens has watched as Martin Jones became the third goaltender in history to win his first seven games.

• Nathan Horton, who left Boston for a seven-year, $37.1 million deal with Columbus, could make his Blue Jackets debut after Christmas. He had shoulder surgery in July.

• Minnesota’s Josh Harding, who is 18-5-3 with an NHL-best 1.51 goals-against average, is expected to return to the crease after the holiday break. He left the Wild for three games to alter his multiple sclerosis treatment.

• The below-average Ottawa Senators could begin making moves soon. “I’m not as quick to pull the trigger maybe as I should be sometimes,” GM Bryan Murray said. “There is a frustration here where you’d like to rock the boat somehow, and maybe that’s what will happen after the Christmas break.”


John Vogl’s Top Line: Three people or groups making an impact in the hockey world

on December 22, 2013 - 12:36 AM

John Vogl

Brendan Shanahan, NHL

The discipline czar is becoming the face of the league, though that’s not a good thing. It seems like he’s putting out a detailed suspension video on a daily basis.

« Ryan Miller, Buffalo

The Sabres goaltender donated $50,000 to Carly’s Club of Roswell Park Cancer Institute with money raised through his Steadfast Foundation and Catwalk for Charity.

Anaheim Ducks

The Ducks entered Saturday night’s game against the Islanders on a seven-game winning streak, their second of the season. They were on pace for 122 points.

The Sabres’ Week Ahead

Monday — Phoenix Coyotes: Tim Kennedy comes home. The South Buffalo native and former Sabres forward is averaging about 12 minutes per game with Phoenix.

Friday — At Toronto: When the Maple Leafs played in Buffalo, their fans chucked beer cans on the ice. Up north, the Sabres better be on the lookout for chardonnay.



Sabres fail to extend win streak

By John Vogl

on December 21, 2013 - 10:55 PM

updated December 22, 2013 at 12:49 AM

BOSTON – It takes a lot to beat the Bruins. The Sabres had the right recipe Thursday, scoring timely goals and playing complete hockey. Saturday’s rematch lacked both.

Buffalo failed in its bid to win three straight for the first time all year as the Bruins earned a 4-1 victory Saturday night in TD Garden. Despite their willingness to engage the Bruins physically, the Sabres were frustrated on the offensive end. Their power play went 0 for 6, which included two five-on-threes.

“It’s a momentum killer,” right wing Drew Stafford said. “You’ve got to give them credit. They have great penalty killers. That’s a true test against a penalty-killing unit like that. We just couldn’t get it done.”

The Sabres had 8:12 of power-play time but recorded just four shots.

“We didn’t really do much on those,” forward Ville Leino said. “You’ve got to score on those five-on-threes. You’ve got to create more than one chance.”

A blown call short-circuited the Sabres’ second two-man advantage, which came with just six minutes to play and the Bruins holding a 3-1 lead. Zdeno Chara broke his stick while whacking the lumber of Steve Ott, but the referee whistled Buffalo’s captain for slashing.

“It’s unfortunate,” said Ott, who was furious on the ice but calm in the dressing room. “That would have been a five-on-two basically with Chara without his stick, and it’s good chances you’re going to score in this league on a five-on-two and make it a 3-2 game and be right in it with a few minutes to go. Obviously, that didn’t happen.

“Still, no excuse. I don’t think we were totally good enough.”

The Bruins finished the Sabres off with an empty-net goal with 21 seconds left.

There are going to be a lot of sore players in Boston and Buffalo today. The teams banged, punched and hit each other often. Players moved slowly to the bench or limped to the dressing room throughout the game. Kevin Porter will miss time after suffering a leg injury on a big hit from Johnny Boychuk.

The Bruins will feel a little better, however. The Sabres have to massage both their muscles and their minds.

Linus Omark’s inaugural appearance on the Sabres’ stat sheet was a hooking penalty with 9:17 gone, and it turned a quiet game into an avalanche of scoring chances for the Bruins. The shots were only 4-4 when Omark departed, but Boston took control with eight of the next nine.

The first one went in. Carl Soderberg made a dynamic play, getting the puck down low and darting to the net. He promptly fed the puck across the crease to Reilly Smith for an easy goal.

“I just think we made some really bad decisions at wrong times,” interim coach Ted Nolan said. “We started off OK for a road game, kept it pretty quiet, then we took a bad penalty.”

Despite the pressure, the Bruins couldn’t beat Enroth again. It cost them as the Sabres escaped the period with a 1-1 tie on a late goal by Zemgus Girgensons.

It didn’t take long for the Bruins to re-establish their lead in the second period. David Krejci scored on an odd-man rush with just 1:47 gone.

The Sabres got caught after their own rush chance failed to result in a shot. Jarome Iginla picked up the puck and took off. He looked at driving forward Milan Lucic but instead dropped a pass to Krejci. The forward fought off Girgensons’ hook and ripped a shot over Enroth’s glove.

Buffalo blew an absolutely golden opportunity to at least tie the game midway through the second. Patrice Bergeron departed for cross-checking with 9:28 gone. Gregory Campbell followed him to the penalty box just 11 seconds later with a four-minute high-sticking penalty.

During the extended power play that included a two-man advantage for 1:49, the Sabres took just three shots. Leino also plunked the post from close range for the Sabres’ only real scoring opportunity.

The Bruins’ fans responded with a loud standing ovation when Campbell exited the box. They stood again when the game ended.

“It’s disappointing,” Leino said, “because we’ve been playing so good and we didn’t give our best.”



Enroth will start against Bruins; Omark to debut on Sabres' fourth line

December 21, 2013 - 5:35 PM

By John Vogl

BOSTON -- The Sabres will use Jhonas Enroth in goal as they try to win three straight for the first time this season.

"He’ll come in and we’ll see how he fares," Sabres coach Ted Nolan said this evening before facing the Bruins.

Enroth is 0-3-2 with a 4.00 goals-against average and .888 save percentage against the Bruins. He his 1-6-3 with a 2.61 and .908 overall this season.

He'll get help tonight from friend and countryman Linus Omark. The Swedish forward will make his Sabres debut on the fourth line.

"Right now we’re playing much better, so to break up some combinations just to squeeze him in would be difficult," Nolan said. "We’ll keep with the so-called fourth line right now, and we’ll see how he goes when we give him some minutes. As we move forward here, we’ll see how it all adjusts."

Omark's preferred position is left wing.

"I was so excited to get a chance here in the NHL and come to a new organization," he said in TD Garden. "I was real happy."



News and notes for Sabres at Bruins

December 21, 2013 - 12:42 PM

By John Vogl

BOSTON -- TD Garden is a happening place. Beyonce was in the arena Friday night, and the Celtics have an afternoon game today. The Sabres couldn't have a morning skate in the building, so they elected not to have one anywhere.

Ted Nolan will conduct a pregame chat at 4:45 p.m., so we'll have lineup details then. For now, here are news and notes for tonight's game against the Bruins:

*Sabres newcomer Linus Omark will wear No. 17. Omark's agent told The News that he sees Buffalo as a good spot for the forward.

*The Sabres will try to win three in a row for the first time this season.

*The Sabres will look to win consecutive games against the Bruins for the first time since February 2012.

*The Sabres have scored four times in each of the last two games. They haven't scored that many in three straight since the final three games of the 2010-11 season.

*Ryan Miller is 26-9-7 against the Bruins with a 2.56 goals-against average and .919 save percentage. He is 3-1 with a 1.48 and .954 in his last four starts.

*Buffalo is 3-11-1 on the road. The Bruins are 14-3-2 at home. They have won their last six with an 11-0-2 mark in their last 13. It is their longest home stretch without a regulation loss since a 14-game home win streak from Oct. 25, 2008-Jan. 1, 2009.

*The Sabres have led after one period just three times in their 35 games.

*Buffalo's power play ranks 27th at 13 percent. Boston is 11th at 19.1 percent.

*The Sabres' penalty-kill unit ranks 21st at 80.9 percent. Boston is fourth at 86.5 percent.

*Marcus Foligno has four points, including three assists, in the two games against the Bruins this season.

*While the above picture of Omark's sweater is the usual white road jersey, the Bruins say they are wearing their road white sweaters tonight because the Sabres requested to wear their third jerseys. I guess we'll see.

*Buffalo is one of just four teams that have outscored Boston in their lifetime series. They enter tonight’s game with a four-goal edge. Minnesota, Montreal and Toronto are the other teams.

*The Sabres have killed off their last 14 penalties. The last power-play goal allowed was Dec. 5 against the Rangers.



Amerks lose to Lake Erie Monsters

Dec. 21, 2013

Staff reports

The Rochester Americans were finally able to record a point on the road on Saturday, but the losing streak away from the Blue Cross Arena at the Rochester Community War Memorial continued.

For the second time in as many nights, the Amerks went beyond regulation with the Lake Erie Monsters, only to again come away with the single point in a 3-2 loss at Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland.

Rochester (13-11-3-3) had gone six straight road games without a point, dating to Nov. 15 at Utica.

The Amerks needed a rally to force the overtime after falling behind 2-0 less than five minutes into the game.

“That certainly was huge for us in terms of being down two after the first period and having an uphill battle,” coach Chadd Cassidy said after Rochester’s third game in four nights. We found a way to find our legs and battle through.”

The offense showed signs of breaking out after recording a total of just three goals in the last three games.

Luke Adam found the scoring sheet for the first time since returning from Buffalo, scoring a power-play goal with 9:52 left in the second period to get Rochester within a goal. It was his team-leading 14th.

“Obviously he gives us a proven leading goal scorer,” Cassidy said. “He’s going through a bit of an adjustment period. He was playing only 10 or 11 minutes (with Buffalo), and here he is out there 20 to 25 minutes a night. It takes time to get his feet back.”

The power-play goal snapped an 0-for-29 stretch with the man advantage, a drought that lasted six-plus games.

“It was a long time coming,” Cassidy said.

Nick Tuzzolino tied the game for Rochester with his first point as an Amerk.

The defenseman delivered a one-timer just inside the left post off assists from Dan Catenacci and Johan Larsson.

Larsson also assisted on Adam’s goal.

Neither team had many scoring chances for the remainder of regulation.

Stefan Elliott snuck a shot between the crossbar and the shoulder of Matt Hackett 1:12 into the overtime to win it for Lake Erie.

Rochester has recorded a point in all six matchups with the Monsters this season, taking nine of a possible 12.

The Amerks will not play another American Hockey League game until Jan. 3 as they head to Davos, Switzerland, for the Spengler Cup.

Democrat and Chronicle LOADED: 12.22.2013

730672 Calgary Flames

Flames close road trip in 4-3 loss to Penguins

By Kristen Odland, Calgary HeraldDecember 21, 2013

When you look at the way the Calgary Flames fared on this five-game road trip, think about this.

Last Sunday in New York, they are up against one of the best shootout goalies in the National Hockey League (Henrik Lundqvist) and lose 5-4 in a shootout.

On Tuesday against Boston, they get shut out by Zdeno Chara and Jarome Iginla by a 2-0 count and allow two power-play goals.

On Thursday against Detroit, they face one of the best players in the world in Pavel Datsyuk and lose 4-3 in overtime.

On Saturday to wrap things up at Pittsburgh’s palatial Consol Energy Center, they face Sidney Crosby. And, well, you know who he is.

In this particular game, No. 87 and his band of injured Pittsburgh Penguins managed to build a commanding 4-1 lead. Which could be understandable considering it was the Flames last game of a five-game stretch and it is four days before Christmas.

But this group had no interest in giving up — this entire trip.

Pascal Dupuis and Harry Zolnierczyk had scored midway through the first period to give the Penguins a 2-0 lead after the first. But Paul Byron, hitting Marc Andre-Fleury’s post and in from the top of the circle, puts Calgary with one at 6:58 of the second period.

Crosby, arguably the best player in the world scoring probably one of the nicest goals Karri Ramo had ever seen, makes it 3-1. James Neal, a few minutes later, puts them up 4-1.

But Mike Cammalleri, just 46 before the end of the second period, cuts the Penguins lead in half by beating Matt Niskanen up the boards.

Then, just 1:03 into the third, a wrister by Jiri Hudler puts the Flames within one — again.

Which is why they probably should have received a better fate in Saturday’s 4-3 loss which dropped them to 1-2-2 on this grinding stretch away from the Scotiabank Saddledome.

They wound up out-shooting Pittsburgh 30-23 in the end and, especially, made life rough for Fleury late in the third period and crashed his net.

The Penguins, down 11 (!) players — 10 to injury and one, Deryk Engelland, to suspension — have now won seven in a row and 10 straight at home. They’ve also lost 200 man-games, the highest total in the NHL.

The Flames, who started the road trip off with a 2-1 overtime win at Buffalo a week ago, are now 13-17-6 and return home to face the St. Louis Blues Monday before the Christmas holiday.

They also received some bad news about Curtis Glencross.

Less than two minutes into the first period, the veteran drove into the boards with Penguins rookie Olli Maatta behind Pittsburgh’s net. He missed awkwardly and could barely skate off, favouring his left knee — which spelled the end of his day. The club will know more about his diagnosis when they return to Calgary late Saturday night.

Calgary Herald: LOADED: 12.22.2013


Calgary Flames' Glencross, Russell injured in loss to Penguins

By WES GILBERTSON,Calgary Sun

First posted: Saturday, December 21, 2013 06:30 PM MST | Updated: Saturday, December 21, 2013 09:14 PM MST

PITTSBURGH — First, Curtis Glencross.

Then, Kris Russell.

The Calgary Flames lost a lot of grit and a lot of character before they also lost the game in Saturday’s 4-3 setback to the Pittsburgh Penguins.

Glencross struggled to even get back to the bench after twisting his left knee — yes, that’s the same one the speedy left-winger sprained earlier this season, resulting in a 15-game absence — in the first period, and Russell also exited after hurting his own left leg in the third.

Neither returned to action, and Glencross was spotted on crutches after the contest and then placed on injured reserve a few hours later.

Not good.

“That sucks. There’s no way to sugarcoat it,” said Flames left-winger Michael Cammalleri of watching two teammates limp to the locker-room in Pittsburgh. “I’ve always said, I think injuries are the worst part of our business.

“Glennie has had a real tough year that way, and to see him go down? And then Russ on top of it, who has just been tremendous for us all year? I’m not going to pretend that doesn’t suck right now.”

Glencross crunched Penguins rookie Olli Maatta into the end-boards on his first shift of Saturday’s afternoon affair at Consol Energy Center, but his knee bent awkwardly as he fell backward, and the 30-year-old alternate captain wasn’t putting any weight on his left leg as he slowly pushed his way back to the bench.

Russell had already logged 20 minutes — a good indication of his significance to the Flames — when he was injured just after the midway point of the third period. It was a case of wrong place, wrong time, for the 26-year-old defenceman as Flames rookie Sean Monahan pushed the Penguins’ Zach Sill, and the young call-up fell forward into Russell’s leg.

There won’t be an official update on the severity of the injuries until the two players meet with team doctors in Calgary, but the Flames announced late Saturday that defenceman Derek Smith has been recalled from the AHL’s Abbotsford Heat, which suggests Russell also won’t be available for Monday’s meeting with the St. Louis Blues.

“Two great leaders, but there’s nothing we can do about injuries,” said Flames head coach Bob Hartley. “Unfortunately, it’s part of our game, and it’s going to give opportunities to two other players to step in and get good chunks of icetime and get the job done. It’s all about character, right now. Obviously, if we get good news, fine. If we don’t get good news, we’ll be facing major adversity.”

Around the boards

At his best, Glencross has a mix of skill and intensity that is tough to replace. The two forwards in the press-box for Saturday’s matinee — LW TJ Galiardi and C Blair Jones — are capable of playing that way but are sitting out because they haven’t shown enough of it … The Flames don’t seem to have any confidence in D Chris Breen, a healthy scratch in 11 consecutive games, so expect an arrival from the AHL’s Abbotsford Heat if Russell’s injury is serious … Instead of watching movies on the four-hour flight from Pittsburgh home to Calgary, Flames C Joe Colborne might have been replaying, in his mind, a third-period wraparound attempt on Penguins G Marc-Andre Fleury. Colborne slid the puck through Fleury’s leg on what coulda, woulda, shoulda been the game-tying tally, only to watch it hit the far post and stay out. “Less than an inch,” Colborne sighed. “It’s a long flight home to think about it. It’s going to bug me.”

Off the glass

I’ll eat my words if he really is the next Joe Nieuwendyk, but it’s easy to criticize the Flames’ call to select C Mark Jankowski at No. 21 in the 2012 NHL Draft, especially with Maatta — the 22nd pick — already playing a key role for the Penguins. Mattaa has been logging big minutes for the Pens’ injury-riddled blueline brigade, and it’s not far-fetched to think he could have 200-plus NHL games under his skates before Jankowski — a sophomore at Providence College — even turns pro. The 19-year-old Jankowski, by the way, has seven goals and four assists in 17 appearances for the NCAA Friars so far this year.

Calgary Sun: LOADED: 12.22.2013


Sidney Crosby the difference as Pittsburgh Penguins edge Calgary Flames 4-3

First posted: Friday, December 20, 2013 11:25 AM MST | Updated: Saturday, December 21, 2013 06:18 PM MST

WES GILBERTSON

PITTSBURGH - The score?

Four for the Pittsburgh Penguins. Three for the Calgary Flames. The difference?

Simple. Sidney Crosby.

The best hockey player on the planet put on a show Saturday afternoon, collecting three points — a goal and a pair of assists — as the injury-riddled Penguins posted a 4-3 victory over the Flames at Consol Energy Center.

“That’s one where we could have easily had a different fate,” said Flames centre Joe Colborne. “But that’s Sidney Crosby for you, too. He doesn’t miss many of those opportunities that he gets. He’s the best player in the world for a reason.”

He was the best player on the ice in Saturday’s matinee in Pittsburgh.

Period.

No question about it.

You could ask Ladislav Smid, a strong-on-the-puck type who was about to connect with a clearing attempt in the first period when Crosby gently tugged at his hands, politely picked his pocket and spun to fire a shot on goal.

Flames goalie Karri Ramo stopped the initial attempt, but Pascal Dupuis had an easy tap-in on the rebound to open the scoring.

Better yet, ask TJ Brodie, who tried to poke-check Crosby in the neutral zone during four-on-four action in the middle frame, only to get undressed by the NHL’s leading scorer, who sped away and finished with a rocket over Ramo’s left shoulder for the Pens third goal.

Crosby, who is riding a 10-game point spree, assisted on Matt Niskanen’s goal — Brodie accidentally deflected the point-shot — about four minutes later to give the Penguins a 4-1 lead, just enough to hold off a spirited rally by the Flames.

“In the second period, I thought we were coming right back into the game.

We had some momentum, and then Crosby made a couple of plays that were in the back of our net,” said Flames captain Mark Giordano.

“He’s a great player. He is who he is for a reason. I just thought he was opportunistic. He got some quality chances and made some quality plays.”

The Flames deserve full marks for a feisty effort, but outshooting and outworking the Penguins doesn’t count for anything in the end when you get out-Crosby’d.

Harry Z. — it’s Zolnierczyk, but few folks bother to try to pronounce it — had the Pens’ other tally, while Paul Byron, Michael Cammalleri and Jiri Hudler each scored for the Flames, and Colborne rang the post on a wraparound attempt in the third period on what was almost the equalizer.

Penguins netminder Marc-Andre Fleury finished with 27 saves, while Ramo made 19 stops. The worst news for the crew from Calgary wasn’t even the end result, it was that left-winger Curtis Glencross and top-pairing defenceman Kris Russell both departed with left leg injuries and did not return.

Calgary Sun: LOADED: 12.22.2013

730675 Carolina Hurricanes

Gudas scores in OT, Lightning beat Hurricanes 3-2

By MARK DIDTLER

Associated PressDecember 21, 2013 Updated 6 hours ago

TAMPA, Fla. — Justin Peters deserved a much better outcome after a stellar 47-save performance.

Radko Gudas scored 2:16 into overtime and the Tampa Bay Lightning beat Peters and the Carolina Hurricanes 3-2 on Saturday night.

"Sometimes the goaltender is the best player on the ice, and he was tonight," Lightning coach Jon Copper said about Peters. "Fortunately for us, we got that extra one by him."

Gudas beat Peters, who kept the Hurricanes in the game with a number of great saves, from the right circle during a 3-on-1.

"I wasn't 100 percent sure if I could make a pass," Gudas said.

Gudas helped setup the odd-man rush with a check on Jeff Skinner, who lost his stick on the play, in the Tampa Bay defensive zone.

Victor Hedman and Martin St. Louis also scored for the Lightning. Valtteri Filppula had two assists.

"It was real hot in there," Peters said. "They were throwing a lot of rubber at the net. We battled. We battled hard, and unfortunately, we weren't able to get the two points."

Carolina's Jiri Tlusty had a pair of goals.

"Our goalie stole a point for us tonight," Carolina coach Kirk Muller said. "Obviously, he was the difference for us."

St. Louis re-directed Hedman's shot during a power play 7:56 into the third that pulled the Lightning even at 2-2.

The Hurricanes went up 2-1 on Tlusty's short-handed breakaway goal at 10:11 of the second.

Carolina has seven short-handed goals this season, all coming on the road. However, the Hurricanes are 1-2-3 when scoring short-handed.

Tlusty put Carolina up 1-0 when he beat Ben Bishop with a wrist shot on the Hurricanes' first shot at 4:35 of the first. Bishop had shutout Carolina in both of his previous games against the Hurricanes, making 76 saves over the stretch.

Bishop finished with 25 saves.

Peters, who entered winless in three games with a 4.00 goals-against-average against Tampa Bay, made 15 saves before allowing Hedman's goal that tied it at 1 with 3:48 left in the first.

The Lightning outshot Carolina 19-8 during the first.

Peters stopped all 13 shots he faced in the second, including a post-to-post glove save on Filppula's shot during a power play late in the period. He turned aside 16 of 17 shots during the third.

Tampa Bay defenseman Eric Brewer left in the second with an upper-body injury. Hurricanes defenseman Jay Harrison played seven shfts during the first before leaving the game.

NOTES: Injured Lightning star Steven Stamkos briefly skated Saturday. Stamkos, who broke his right leg Nov. 11, resumed limited on-ice workouts about 10 days ago and skated for over 30 minutes Thursday. Stamkos has said he hopes to return in February. ... Hurricanes RW Radek Dvorak played in his 1,230th NHL game, which is two away from tying Dino Ciccarelli for 84th on the career list. ... Tampa Bay LW Ryan Malone (broken ankle) had an extensive on-ice conditioning session and could return by early next month. ... Lightning C Tom Pyatt played after missing 32 games due to a broken collarbone. ... Carolina D Mike Komisarek was scratched for the second straight game after being activated from injured reserve.

News Observer LOADED: 12.22.2013

730676 Carolina Hurricanes

Lightning strikes thrice: Canes lose 2 leads, fall in OT

Dec. 21, 2013 @ 10:47 PM

BY MARK DIDTLER Associated Press

Radko Gudas scored 2:16 into overtime as the Tampa Bay Lightning beat the Carolina Hurricanes 3-2 on Saturday night.

Gudas beat Justin Peters, who kept the Hurricanes in the game with a number of great saves, from the right circle during a 3-on-1.

Victor Hedman and Martin St. Louis also scored for the Lightning. Valtteri Filppula had two assists.

Peters finished with 47 saves. Jiri Tlusty had a pair of goals.

St. Louis re-directed Hedman's shot during a power play 7:56 into the third pulled that the Lightning even at 2-2.

The Hurricanes went up 2-1 on Tlusty's short-handed breakaway goal at 10:11 of the second. Carolina has seven short-handed goals this season, all coming on the road.

Tlusty put Carolina up 1-0 when he beat Ben Bishop with a wrist shot on the Hurricanes' first shot at 4:35 of the first. Bishop had shutout Carolina in both of his previous games against the Hurricanes, making 76 saves over the stretch.

Peters, who entered winless in three games with a 4.00 goals-against-average against Tampa Bay, made 15 saves before allowing Hedman's goal that tied it at 1 with 3:48 left in the first.

The Lightning outshot Carolina 19-8 during the first.

Peters stopped all 13 shots he faced in the second, including a post-to-post glove save on Filppula's shot during a power play late in the period. He turned aside 16 of 17 shots during the third.

Tampa Bay defenseman Eric Brewer left in the second with an upper-body injury.

NOTES: Injured Lightning star Steven Stamkos briefly skated Saturday. The center, who broke his right leg on Nov. 11, resumed limited on-ice workouts about 10 days ago and skated for over 30 minutes Thursday. Stamkos has said he hopes to return in February. ... Hurricanes RW Radek Dvorak played in his 1,230th NHL game, which is two away from tying Dino Ciccarelli for 84th all-time. ... Tampa Bay LW Ryan Malone (broken ankle) had an extensive on-ice conditioning session and could return by early next month. ... Lightning C Tom Pyatt played after missing 32 games due to a broken collarbone. ... Carolina D Mike Komisarek was scratched for the second straight game after being activated from injured reserve.

LIGHTNING 3, HURRICANES 2, OT

Carolina 1 1 0 0—2

Tampa Bay 1 0 1 1—3

First Period_1, Carolina, Tlusty 5 (Dwyer, Nash), 4:35. 2, Tampa Bay, Hedman 7 (Filppula, Killorn), 16:12. Penalties_Dvorak, Car (hooking), 5:06; Ruutu, Car (holding), 11:01; Gudas, TB (interference), 13:29.

Second Period_3, Carolina, Tlusty 6 (E.Staal, Hainsey), 10:11 (sh). Penalties_Bellemore, Car (holding stick), 8:48; Gleason, Car (tripping), 17:53; Gudas, TB (interference), 19:02.

Third Period_4, Tampa Bay, St. Louis 15 (Hedman, Filppula), 7:56 (pp). Penalties_Jo.Staal, Car (tripping), 6:49.

Overtime_5, Tampa Bay, Gudas 2 (Thompson), 2:16. Penalties_None.

Shots on Goal_Carolina 8-10-8-1_27. Tampa Bay 19-13-17-1_50.

Power-play opportunities_Carolina 0 of 2; Tampa Bay 1 of 5.

Goalies_Carolina, Peters 7-8-3 (50 shots-47 saves). Tampa Bay, Bishop 19-5-2 (27-25).

A_19,204 (19,204). T_2:31.

Referees_Dennis LaRue, Justin St. Pierre. Linesmen_Brian Mach, Jonny Murray.

Herald-Sun LOADED: 12.22.2013

730677 Chicago Blackhawks

Blackhawks depth keeping their lines fresh

By Chris Kuc, Chicago Tribune reporter

December 22, 2013

It's not hard to imagine a sigh of relief coming from the opposing bench when Patrick Kane heads off the ice after a shift without the Blackhawks scoring.

With points in 23 of his last 24 games, Kane is in the kind of zone during which it seems the winger will score or help a teammate do so every time he touches the puck. Realistically, that can't happen, but that doesn't mean opponents are off the hook as the Hawks are the only team in the NHL with six players who have at least 10 goals this season.

That offensive depth has allowed coach Joel Quenneville to rotate four lines so his top players aren't burdened with heavy minutes.

"It's a big reason why we're able to come back after a short offseason and still find a way to be at the top of the standings," captain Jonathan Toews said. "We're all smart defensively, and we have a lot of guys who can score. When the ice time is spread out like that, we don't have to rely on just a couple of guys."

It's noteworthy that Kane, who ranks second in the league in scoring with 48 points — including 21 goals — is on the Hawks' second line. The No. 1 trio is Toews centering for wingers Marian Hossa and Patrick Sharp, and they have 13, 14, and 16 goals, respectively.

Then there is second-line winger Brandon Saad with 12 goals and third-line center Andrew Shaw with 10.

"We like our rotation of lines," Quenneville said. "We like the depth we have offensively (and) defensively. We're all comfortable with the ability to create offense as well as we check. You look at Saad, whatever line he's on, (he) seems to give it some jump. Kane draws a lot of attention, as does Jonathan's line. It gives us a little bit more depth throughout our lineup. A lot of games you're going to need that."

That rotation has allowed the Hawks to put up a league-high 136 goals, 14 more than the next-in-line Ducks.

"It just shows the depth our team has and the confidence our coaches have in all four lines," Shaw said. "It takes more than just a couple of guys to win a championship. We have something special here, a lot of great hockey players."

Even the fourth line, generally reserved for a checking or energy role, has had its offensive moments. During the Hawks' 3-2 shootout loss to the Canucks on Friday night, wingers Ben Smith and Brandon Bollig had glorious chances, and center Marcus Kruger has the ability to chip in on the scoresheet.

"There is a lot of balance," Kane said. "You can see the way the minutes are distributed. There are so many good players that everyone is kind of struggling to fight for their minutes and trying to get on the ice more.

"It's a good thing. It's friendly competition. One of our strengths the past few years with this organization is the depth and the way the third line can chip in ... even the guys on the fourth line are playing great this year. You see that a lot these days as (Quenneville) is pretty much rolling four lines."

Chicago Tribune LOADED: 12.22.2013


Patrick Kane emerging as MVP candidate in best season yet

BY MARK LAZERUS Staff Reporter December 21, 2013 10:58PM

Updated: December 22, 2013 2:34AM

At some point, you just stop

being surprised by the ridiculous — the roofed backhand through a seemingly nonexistent opening, the no-look pass, the spin-o-rama, the fancy stickwork. This is just Patrick Kane doing Patrick Kane things, as he always has done.

But the new Kane, the 25-year-old Kane, the bigger and stronger Kane, the MVP candidate Kane, is different. He’s more than just highlight-reel passes, viral stickhandling videos and occasionally impossible goals. He’s a goal-scorer now, pure and simple.

That means fancy goals and ugly goals, goals off the rush and goals off hard work. Kane never has scored more than 30 goals in the NHL and scored 23 in his last full-length season. He has scored 21 through 38 games this season, on pace for a career-high-shattering 45.

‘‘I always feel like I’ve been a goal-scorer my whole hockey career,’’ Kane said. ‘‘For whatever reason, when I came into the league as a rookie and maybe a few years after that, I was more of a playmaker. . . . But as time goes on, you learn to try to find new ways to score goals.’’

Kane frequently talks about how much he has learned in his six-plus seasons in the NHL. He has become a better shooter by watching Patrick Sharp, a better backchecker by watching Marian Hossa, a better puck-protector by watching Jonathan Toews.

And now he’s putting it all

together in his finest season yet. He has at least one point in 23 of his last 24 games, including 11 in a row, with 14 goals and 23 assists during that span. With 48 points in 38 games, he’s six points behind Pittsburgh Penguins star Sidney Crosby in the scoring race. And he’s not doing it on a line with players such as Sharp, Toews and Hossa, but on one with Kris Versteeg and Michal Handzus (and rookie Brandon Pirri before that).

Beyond that, Kane has turned a minus-9 rating into a plus-8 in just seven weeks.

‘‘He’s been good,’’ coach Joel Quenneville said. ‘‘He’s a confident kid, but his patience level with the puck and his play recognition is as high as we’ve see it.’’

Kane, who always has had a knack for avoiding contact without sacrificing positioning or the puck, said the biggest step he has made as a goal-scorer is being willing to get to the middle of the ice and score in traffic, to take hits, to create ugly goals. Also, as a younger player, he preferred to shoot high. Now he goes low more often, so he has a better chance of generating a rebound for a teammate when he doesn’t score.

‘‘The biggest thing is you try to get to the net and either poke in loose things or be patient around the net and make some plays there,’’ he said. ‘‘You’re not going to score on a goalie from 40 feet away; it’s just not going to happen at this level.’’

Versteeg last played with Kane in 2010 before rejoining the Hawks this season, and he’s amazed at how far Kane has come. He said Kane is significantly faster on his skates than he was and noticeably stronger, which allows him that extra split-second to get a shot off in traffic.

‘‘I think he’s a bigger goal-scorer because his physical maturity has come a long way,’’ Versteeg said. ‘‘He’s turning into a man; he’s not a little boy anymore. He definitely has always been the best player I’ve ever seen in my life on edges and the way he can get away from guys and get away from checks and create room for himself. Now, when you get older and stronger, that’s just going to create more for him.’’

More goals, more assists, more respect and — if he keeps up this ridiculous pace — more Hart Trophy talk.

Chicago Sun Times LOADED: 12.22.2013


Pretty much all systems go for Blackhawks

By Tim Sassone

The Blackhawks lead the NHL in goals with 136 and have six players in double digits. That's the good news.

The bad news is they have allowed 101, largely because of their 28th-ranked penalty-killing unit. But even that area of the Hawks' game has shown some improvement as we approach the season's midpoint.

Offensively, there isn't a better team in the league thanks to Patrick Kane, Patrick Sharp, Marian Hossa, Jonathan Toews, Brandon Saad and Andrew Shaw, all of whom have 10 goals or more.

Defensemen Duncan Keith (32 points) and Brent Seabrook (24) also are in the midst of a big year offensively.

Kane leads the way with 21 goals and 27 assists, including points in 23 of the last 24 games.

"He's been good," Hawks coach Joel Quenneville said. "He's a confident kid, but his patience level with the puck and his play recognition is as high as it's ever been.

"It seems like he has the puck a lot as well. He's making a lot of nifty plays. Every night there's two or three A-plus chances and a lot of times he manufactures on his own. He's been real good."

The Hawks are rolling four lines and not thinking twice about it. Against the Canucks, the fourth line of Marcus Kruger, Brandon Bollig and Ben Smith found themselves matched up with Vancouver's top line of Daniel and Henrik Sedin more times than not.

"We like our rotation of lines and the depth we have," Quenneville said. "Offensively and defensively, we're all comfortable with the ability to create offense as well as we check."

Saad continues to get better and better in his second year in the league with 12 goals and 26 points.

"You've got a guy like Saad, and whatever line he's on he seems to give it some jump," Quenneville said.

"Kaner, he draws a lot of attention. Jonny's line gets a lot of attention and gives us more depth to our lineup, and a lot of games you're going to need that."

The power play has been real good, although it went 0-for-4 in Friday's 3-2 loss to Vancouver in a shootout.

Still, there was no frustration in the dressing room after the game.

"You can't win them all," Toews said. "We'll bounce back in a couple days. We know that after these couple days (off for Christmas), there has to be another level we need to get to that we didn't get to tonight."

The Hawks play New Jersey on Monday, then take a three-day break for Christmas along with the rest of the league.

"It's been a real busy stretch here and I know we have a couple days off here coming up," Quenneville said. "We can't think it's going to be easy just because we're at home. You've got the holidays and a lot of things that can get you away from where you need to be come game time.

"Let's take advantage of being home here and get excited about every game."

Daily Herald Times LOADED: 12.22.2013


LaBarbera happy to be a Hawk

By Tim Sassone

Jason LaBarbera has always played well against the Blackhawks, owning a career record of 4-1-0 against them. Now he's excited about possibly playing for the two-time Stanley Cup champs.

LaBarbera, acquired from Edmonton on Dec. 14 for future considerations, knew it was only a matter of time before he was dealt. When he found out it was to the first-place Hawks it was icing on the cake.

"I figured something would happen, but I didn't know how, when, where, why, who," LaBarbera said. "I had no idea. I knew something was going to happen. I just didn't know how it was going to play out.

"To go from one extreme to another, it's exciting for sure to come to an organization like this and a room like this with this group of people."

The Hawks are the sixth different team for LaBarbera. He will back up Antti Raanta until Corey Crawford returns from what is believed to be a groin injury, but that's fine with him.

"It's obviously a good opportunity," LaBarbera said. "I mean, just look around the room and see what these guys have done the last few years. Playing against them I know what they're all about. I'm just happy to be on this side.

"It was always fun to play against them and a challenge. They came hard. Now to be on this side and to see how they play, their structure and everything they're about, there's a reason why they've won two Cups over the last few years. There are a lot of good leaders here and a lot of smart people. I'm just excited to learn from these guys and to be a part of it."

Hawks coach Joel Quenneville doesn't know when of if LaBarbera will get a start.

"I think he gives some us some experiences and he's played in the league and some depth in the position there," Quenneville said. "With Antti being new and a couple young kids down in Rockford, our organization got a little thin with both (Crawford and Nikolai Khabibulin) being out. That's what he brings us. We'll see along the way when we can get him in."

Crawford skates:

Injured goalie Corey Crawford resumed skating this week and is expected to return to practice after Christmas.

Crawford has been sidelined since suffering a groin injury against Florida on Dec. 9.

"He skated again today," Quenneville said after Friday's morning skate. "Both light days yesterday and today, and he's progressing. We're probably looking with him (to practice with the team) more so after the holidays."

The Hawks won't rush Crawford back, especially with Antti Raanta playing so well.

"When you're ready to play, you're ready to play, whether it's goalies or up front," Quenneville said. "You've got to pass certain hurdles to get clearance. Once you're there, let's get ready, and they're usually ready."

Change of pace:

Normally it's the other way around. In the past, Joel Quenneville has reunited Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane on the same line whenever one of the two needed to get his game going.

But Kane's game has taken off since Quenneville split them up after about the first month of the season.

"I just think when those two guys got separated there it gave us a little more balance to our lineup," Quenneville said. "Whether it's coverage, problems for our opponents or it frees up Jonny, it gives the opposition a little more to be concerned with and that opens things up a bit."

Daily Herald Times LOADED: 12.22.2013


Tracey hands out Christmas gifts to Blackhawks, NHL

December 21, 2013, 3:15 pm

Tracey Myers

Christmas is almost upon us, the season of giving in full swing.

Yes, it’s a season of receiving also, and there’s no doubt you all will be getting your share of gifts. But here, we’re all about the giving. So while you go through your final preparations for the quickly approaching holiday, we hand out our “gifts” to some of the Chicago Blackhawks and others in the NHL.

To the NHL and NHLPA: a big Thank You. Thanks for realizing what Christmas is all about and, with the new Collective Bargaining Agreement, giving teams Dec. 24-26 off. There are no games, no practices and no traveling during those three days. That’s as it should be. Let other leagues send their athletes and scribes on the road. We’ll curl up with a cup of cocoa and some sugar cookies, grateful that the NHL and NHLPA has it’s holiday priorities straight.

To the Chicago Blackhawks: a penalty kill. Seriously, this team doesn’t need much else right now.

To Patrick Kane: continued scoring success. For all of Kane’s off-ice issues, which seem to be behind him, there’s never been a doubt that he loves hockey more than anything. It’s coming through in points this season, and if this keeps up, it’ll be hard to ignore him for the Art Ross or Hart trophies.

To Dave Bolland: once past his current malady, long-lasting health. The former Blackhawks/current Maple Leafs center can’t catch a break in terms of health. When he’s 100 percent he just makes teams better, as the Leafs can attest from earlier this season. Once the severed tendon in his leg is healed, here’s hoping he doesn’t have to see the doctor for a long time.

To Oliver Ekman-Larsson: attention. Who cares if he’s playing in the desert: this guy is one of the best defensemen in the league, and needs to be recognized as such.

To Teemu Selanne: A few more years in the league. You don’t even have to play; you can just keeping us fortunate media scribes. In a league that’s getting more vanilla by the day, it’s hard to say goodbye to a great personality.

To Sochi (and all of Russia, for that matter): Tolerance.

To NHL players who say they can only fight: Brandon Bollig’s bio. Because he’s proof that, just because you come into the league based on that one dimension, doesn’t mean you can’t add a few along the way.

To those who love comedy and carols: the Blackhawks Christmas album. It’s not Nat King Cole singing the Christmas Song, but it still brings joy in another way.

To Antti Raanta: a full cup of eggnog and a toast for what he’s accomplished in such a short amount of time. From North American hockey novice to the Blackhawks’ starting goaltender in the wake of Corey Crawford and Nikolai Khabibulin’s injuries, Raanta has put in some tremendous work in about three months. Well done, grasshopper.

To the Department of Player Safety: Stiffer punishments. There have been a rash of bad hits and bad behavior lately. And even with suspensions doled out, it’s obvious the message isn’t getting across enough yet.

To Twitter: Perspective, more of a sense of humor and a sarcasm font. Thank you.

To everyone: A safe, happy and healthy Christmas holiday.

Comcast SportsNet.com LOADED: 12.22.2013

730682 Colorado Avalanche

Francois Allaire a big part of Avalanche success as goalies coach

By Adrian Dater

Posted: 12/22/2013 12:01:00 AM MST

Avalanche goaltenders coach Francois Allaire never played in the NHL, but he provides expert advice on how best to handle a save situation.<!--IPTC:

When he was nothing but a rookie hopeful in the Montreal Canadiens organization nearly two decades ago, Patrick Roy essentially was told he would never amount to anything by Jacques Plante, then the team's part-time goaltenders coach.

When he was nothing but an unproven, recently acquired goalie with the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim in 2000, Jean-Sebastien Giguere described his career as "a mess."

Roy became a Hall of Famer and four-time Stanley Cup champion, arguably the best goalie in NHL history. Giguere is a Conn Smythe Trophy winner and Stanley Cup champion. Whom do these men credit greatly for the bulk of their success, when others doubted them?

Francois Allaire, a man nobody believed would amount to much of anything in the NHL.

"I can pretty much say I would never have made it in the NHL without Francois' help," said Giguere, now an Avalanche goaltender. "I had played some games, but I was never a regular. ... The day I got traded to Anaheim, he called me and said: 'Why don't you come over to my house? We'll watch some video.' We're from the same town (Blainville, Quebec), so I could do that. The day I did that, everything changed. Everything started to become a little simpler. What a lucky break for me."

Allaire, hired this past summer by the Avs, is something of a Wizard of Oz-like character and rarely talks to the media. He talked to The Denver Post when he was hired in June, but only briefly, and has declined all interview requests since.

Allaire, 58, never played in the NHL or in major junior. He played only one year of college hockey, in 1975 for the University of Sherbrooke in Quebec before the school downgraded the program to the intra- mural/club level. His dream of being an NHL goalie having ended early in life, he decided his best route to the big time was learning all he could about the position, and becoming a master professor.

J.S. Giguere

J.S. Giguere (Denver Post file)

Allaire's quiet, bookish nature lent itself to such a journey, and what he found after years of a nomadic, backpacking journey through European and North American hockey towns following his graduation in 1978 was that nobody seemed to have any idea what it really took to be a great goalie.

"A perfect fit"

What prevented Allaire from becoming just another person yelling from the peanut gallery was part gumption, part serendipity.

Bursting with ideas about what he had researched, Allaire persuaded a small Canadian publishing company to print "Hockey Goaltending for Young Players" in 1983. In the book, Allaire laid out his principles for what it took to succeed between the pipes.

The book drew the attention of some lower-level coaches in Quebec junior hockey, including Pierre Creamer, who coached a Montreal Canadiens affiliate in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League. Creamer would be later promoted to coach the Sherbrooke Canadiens and took Allaire with him. It was there that Allaire started working with a third-round Montreal draft pick named Patrick Roy, who proved to be an eager student.

"I was hungry to learn and soak up as much as I could, and he loved to teach. It was, to me, a perfect fit," Roy said.

At that time, it was commonly believed goaltenders needed to stay on their feet as much as possible and not move around much. Goalies also were supposed to keep their skates dull, better for sliding across the ice in last-

ditch, "stack the pads" situations where movement was necessary. But Allaire wanted his goalies to move around, adjusting to the play developing in front of them, and also had a radical idea that a goalie's skates should be as sharp as possible, to better "push and plant" the body with every movement of the puck.

"Every time there's a pass in the zone, there's a push and there's a stop," Giguere said. "There's no gliding. You push, you stop, you set with every pass. So you need skates that are sharp because you need to stop hard, and you need to have a good edge to push from one side to the next and stay ahead of the play. You always want to stay ahead of the play, so when the guy actually shoots, you're there in position to make the save."

"Keep it simple"

With the Roy-coached Avs, Allaire has found another willing young pupil in Semyon Varlamov. After Allaire was hired, he met with Varlamov and Giguere for a week in Montreal, going over techniques he thought could help the Russian goalie, including raising his catching glove and working hard on planting more from side to side. Allaire noticed a tendency of Varla- mov's to sometimes slide out of the blue- painted area in making saves, leaving him vulnerable to rebounds. Varlamov now uses the push-and-plant approach.

"I've learned so much working with him," said Varlamov, whose .924 save percentage this season is the best of his NHL career.

Roy said it's Allaire, not him, who makes the call on who should start in goal. Roy rarely talks with the Avs' goalies during drills at practice. That is Allaire's territory.

"We were very lucky when he was available to us this summer," Roy said. "For him to be available to me as my first goalie coach during my first NHL coaching job, that was an easy decision for me."

After being hired in June, Allaire told The Denver Post: "One of my trademarks is I try to make sure guys are feeling good and keep it simple, create good routine, make sure the guy is happy coming to the rink. Then, after that, look at the tape and then find their best strength and build around it."

So far, so good.

Goalie whisperer

A look at five notable goalies whom Francois Allaire has helped during his career:

Patrick Roy, Montreal: The Hall of Famer credits Allaire as the biggest reason for succeeding early in his NHL career.

D J.S. Giguere, Anaheim, Toronto, Colorado: Giguere is on his third team with Allaire as his goalie coach. He became a star with Anaheim under Allaire's watch in the early 2000s.

Guy Hebert, Anaheim: Before Giguere took over in 2000, Hebert had several outstanding seasons under the tutelage of Allaire.

Jose Theodore, Montreal: He developed into an all-star goaltender under Allaire, and later won the Hart Trophy.

James Reimer, Toronto: Although Allaire's tenure in Toronto was shorter than the others and criticized by some, he worked hard with Reimer, who now is one of the NHL's better goalies.

Denver Post: LOADED: 12.22.2013


Dater: Rinkside seats at NHL games provide glass full of remarkable action

By Adrian Dater

Posted: 12/22/2013 12:01:00 AM MST

The early Christmas present from my wife came Thursday afternoon: two tickets to the Avalanche's home game that night against the Edmonton Oilers, for me and my son. But not just any tickets: rinkside glass, just to the right behind one of the nets. Not since the days when I scrambled to the no-reserved-seating front row of Dartmouth hockey games as a kid in 1970s had I been this close to a game. I've seen a million practices from glass level, but this was a real game.

Thank you, Heidi Dater, for not only the sweet seats, but for the re-education in the game of hockey. My goodness, I think I learned more about the game Thursday night than the last 10 years way up in the press box. (And, no matter where the seats are, let me offer this piece of advice to all jaded sportswriters out there: Buy a ticket to a game, and go as the fan you used to be. You will rediscover feelings and observations you probably have let slide away for too long.)

Members of the media usually are seated in the nosebleed section, or above it. But, boy, if there could be one "rinkside glass seats for media" night per season, we'd be able to better educate the public about what really happens in a game.

Here's what I came away with from my up-close experience:

• When you can really get a look at the eyes of players, you learn so much more. I noticed that Avalanche defensemen Jan Hejda and Erik Johnson gave a lot of quick looks at each other before faceoffs, and they seemed to know exactly what each other was thinking and needing.

You get a real sense of which players are relaxed and confident and which players are playing tight. You notice how players steel themselves before big hits into the glass, their faces contorting in ways you'd never catch otherwise. It feels like you're at an aquarium, seeing what those big fish really look like swimming around.

• Everything happens so much faster than you realize. The game seems easier and more orderly the farther away from the ice you are. At the rinkside glass level, it's #quickcutszigzagnotimesplitsecond chaos. Another thing: Up high, the rink seems gigantic. Up close, it seems small and confined. That may sound elementary, Watson, but it makes a sizable difference in how the game is perceived. Up high, you can see the forest. Down low, all you can see are the trees.

• You realize how the game comes down to a few plays. The competition otherwise is so evenly matched. The best players in the world are out there on the ice, and there's little difference among most of them. I have a healthier respect for when players and coaches say something like "We/they just made a couple more plays than we/they did."

• Yet all those little things are important too. You see how close it was in just barely getting the puck out of the zone, and the looks on the faces of opponents when they realize they just barely missed an opportunity at capitalizing on a turnover. Hockey up close seems like a game of trying to toss a spear in a school of little fish.

You practically can see the wheels turning in the heads of defensemen retrieving a puck behind the net, with forecheckers steaming in on them. You see how fast they have to choose what they're going to do with that puck. I definitely came away with more respect for what the D-men have to go through.

Back up to the press box I go, back to where it all looks so easy. But it was good to get a reminder of how different a world it is down there.



Avalanche goalie Semyon Varlamov "excited" that legal ordeal is over

By Adrian Dater

Posted: 12/22/2013 12:01:00 AM MST

LOS ANGELES — Semyon Varla- mov remained stoic throughout his ordeal of being arrested and charged with third-degree assault against his former girlfriend. But it was never hard to see some evidence of stress on his face.

That stress is gone now, replaced by even a hint of a smile Saturday despite a 3-2 shootout loss to the Los Angeles Kings.

The Denver district attorney's office dropped the remaining charge against him Friday, an obvious relief to the young Russian goalie.

"You know what? I'm excited for sure. The process is over," Varlamov said. "Like I've said before, I'm glad to be here today, and just want to say thank you to my teammates, the ownership, the GM and the Avalanche fans for supporting me."

Avs coach Patrick Roy praised Varlamov for his professionalism throughout the trying time.

"From the first day this thing came out, he had the support of his teammates. Now it's behind us. Now let's focus and play hockey," Roy said.

Stastny milestone. Avs center Paul Stastny played in his 500th career game and became the third member of his family to play that many for the franchise, joining father Peter and uncle Anton. Footnotes. Nick Holden, Brad Malone and Ryan Wilson were healthy scratches for the Avs on Saturday. ... Tyson Barrie's assist on Ryan O'Reilly's tying goal in the third period for Colorado extended his career-best point streak to four games.



Los Angeles tops Colorado Avalanche in shootout

By Adrian Dater

Posted: 12/21/2013 04:55:51 PM MST

Updated: 12/21/2013 11:49:52 PM MST

LOS ANGELES — If it had been almost any game the previous two seasons, Avalanche players would have had that defeated, hangdog look. Down by two goals early in the second period to a hot team in its building, the Avs of yesteryear would have packed it in mentally and left with zero points.

The Avalanche still lost the game Saturday, but left the Staples Center with one point. This is the difference that has manifested itself with this season's Avs. That accounted for a good feeling in the Avs' dressing room despite a 3-2 shootout loss to the white-hot Los Angeles Kings and rookie phenom goalie Martin Jones.

The Avs fought back from a 2-0 deficit and could have won if not for a couple of great saves by Jones, who improved to 8-0 as an NHL goaltender despite being undrafted. In the end, Anze Kopitar proved just a little too much for Jones' counterpart, Semyon Varlamov, as his goal was the only one in the three-round shootout.

"I was very proud of our players. They showed a lot of character, because down 2-0 in L.A. is not easy. It was a big point for us, no doubt about it," Avs coach Patrick Roy said.

Ryan O'Reilly, playing in his 300th game, tied the contest with 9:33 left in regulation with a superb shot past Jones. The Avs got a power play when Mike Richards was called for closing his hand on the puck with 10:08 left, and O'Reilly came down the right side to beat Jones with a slick shot to the far post to make it a new game.

The Avs had a couple of dangerous chances late and in overtime, including one in which captain Gabe Landeskog had the puck alone on the right side, but Jones would allow nothing more.

Kings coach Darryl Sutter was grumpy after the game, despite his team's 16th win in the last 22 games (16-2-4). Sutter said his team's defense had a "bad" day despite allowing no goals at even strength.

Avs winger P.A. Parenteau had a bit of a rough day as well, going without a point for the seventh time in eight games and missing on his shootout chance. Parenteau, who had one shot and no points in nearly 21 minutes, said the team showed heart nonetheless.

"We should come out of this game with our heads up," Parenteau said. "It's a tough building to play in, and they're a really tough squad."

The Kings' first regulation goal was by Jeff Carter, who scored his 11th of the season near the end of the first period.

It became 2-0 at 5:25 of the second period when Justin Williams got a fortunate goal, batting a puck out of midair after a bit of a bobbled save by Varlamov.

The Avs line of Matt Duchene, Nathan MacKinnon and O'Reilly was on the ice for both goals.

Duchene got some redemption back late in the period, however, by making the play that got the Avalanche on the scoreboard. With L.A.'s Jarrett Stoll in the penalty box, Duchene completely fooled Kings defenseman Jake Muzzin with a turnaround move behind the net, then set a pass to Erik Johnson in the left circle. Johnson smoked a shot past Jones to cut the Kings' lead in half.

"We did a good job of working our way back into the game," Landeskog said. "We certainly had our chances to win 3-2 as well. But we'll be happy with one point here."

Adrian Dater: [email protected] or twitter.com/adater

Avs Recap

THE POST'S THREE STARS

1. Anze Kopitar. Scored the only goal of the shootout for the Kings and assisted on first goal.

2. Ryan O'Reilly. Scored a great third-period goal and added assist.

3. Martin Jones. Kings rookie goalie made 23 saves to improve career record to 8-0.

WHAT YOU MIGHT HAVE MISSED

Who says hockey doesn't sell in L.A.? The game was a sellout, the Kings' 87th straight at the Staples Center.

UP NEXT

At San Jose, 8:30 p.m. Monday.



Postgame Colorado Avalanche vs. Los Angeles Kings: They’ll take the point, cherish it

By Adrian Dater

One of the best hockey sayings for me is something Tim Panaccio, the Flyers’ beat writer for Comcast Philly or whatever they’re called, but more important, a former newspaper veteran, told me once: after a tie, former Flyers player and coach Bill Barber would always say “we’ll take the point and cherish it.”

So the Avs got a cherished point today in LA. The hand is raised here is someone who thought it was time to write the full game story early in the second period, when it was 2-0 Kings and the Avs hadn’t gotten a sniff on Kings rookie phenom goalie Martin Jones to that point. The Burgundy and Blue made me rewrite, getting that point before losing the extra one in the skills competition.

I asked Patrick Roy after the game what he thought of shootouts, and the answer is: not much. Roy wishes the old one-point-for-each-team final result would happen in games that are still tied after overtime. It’s too easy, he implied, for teams to get cheap extra points.

I’ll disagree with Saint Patrick on this one. While I do believe there are too many three-point games now and teams sit back too much in regulation to get that extra point, I never liked a game finishing in just a tie. If I’m a money-paying customer, I want to see a winner at the end. There were just as many tank jobs in the third period in the old system as there are now to get that one point, probably more.

More observations about today:

- Great goal by Ryan O’Reilly to tie the game in the third. Great deke, great shot to the far post.

- Not enough from the Stastny-Landeskog-Parenteau line today. PAP isn’t getting enough chances lately, and he’s had two weak shootout attempts in the last couple attempts that have contributed to the Avs not getting that other cherished point.

- Strong effort from Erik Johnson today. He was on the ice for the first goal against, but as Avs friend and fan Dario Ronzone made clear to me on Twitter, it wasn’t his fault. Cory Sarich was kind of gassed looking at the end of his shift and didn’t offer much resistance when the puck went in with 32 seconds left in the first period.

- It’ll be interesting to see what Roy decides in regard to Ryan Wilson on Monday. He still hasn’t played Wilson, despite him being healthy enough to play. If he does put him in against the Sharks, who sits? I thought Nate Guenin was good today, so I think he deserves another game. Sarich? Not a great game. Maybe he should get a night off. Tyson Barrie? He had some shaky moments defensively today, but got a point for the fourth straight game. Don’t think he can come out.

- Darryl Sutter was his usual grumpy self. He’s quite the character, though. I’m a fan, even though his nickname should be “pregnant pause” in his dealings with the press. He thought his defense had a bad day. Yet, the Kings didn’t allow anything at even strength.



Adrian Dater’s spotlight on Sharks center Joe Thornton

By Adrian Dater

Joe Thornton, C, Sharks

When: The Avalanche will play the Sharks in San Jose on Monday night. It’s the Avs’ first game there this season.

What’s up: The Sharks are off to another solid start and Joe Thornton again is a big reason. It seems like he’s been around forever and people keep expecting age to catch up with him, but it just hasn’t happened. Entering action Saturday, his 31 assists in 35 games ranked fourth in the NHL.

Background: Drafted No. 1 overall by Boston in 1997, Thornton had eight high-scoring seasons with the Bruins before being traded to the Sharks in 2005. He has had five seasons of 80 or more points with the Sharks.

Dater’s take: Thornton is a workhorse. He rarely misses a game, despite all kinds of checking attention and the physicality that comes with it. You think he’s ancient, but he’s only 34 years old. He probably will play another five seasons, if not more. His patience with the puck is almost unparalleled. He seems to have eyes in the back of his head, always finding the open man. On the power play, he’s as good as it gets as a playmaker. Yes, none of his teams have won the Stanley Cup. That is the black mark on his career, and he’s had some playoffs where he didn’t play as well as his teams needed. But he’s still working at it.


730688 Columbus Blue Jackets

Steve Mason back in top form after trade to Flyers

By Aaron Portzline

The Columbus Dispatch Saturday December 21, 2013 6:20 AM

Goaltender Steve Mason, whose NHL career began in Columbus with such glaring promise but then fell apart, is basking in new-found glory while playing for the Philadelphia Flyers.

Mason was at a career crossroads when he was traded to Philadelphia in April for a sixth-round pick and journeyman Michael Leighton, but he has found a happy home and has returned to top form.

“Right from Day One, my first day in Philly, the guys in this organization — not only the players, but the coaches, the training staff, everybody — have made me feel at home,” Mason said. “It feels like I’ve been here a lot longer than I have.”

Philadelphia is one of the nation’s most intense sports cities. It’s rare for an athlete to find refuge by leaving a small market for Philadelphia, where Santa has been booed.

“Everybody always says that, but it’s fun playing in a place where there’s that pressure night in and night out to be the best,” Mason said. “As a player, it’s fun to be part of an atmosphere like that.

“The fans can be hard on you, but if they see you working hard, they’re going to be behind you all the way.”

Mason is not expected to start tonight for the Flyers against the Blue Jackets at Nationwide Arena. Philadelphia coach Craig Berube has shown no signs of deviating from his schedule, which means backup Ray Emery will get the start in the second half of a home-to-home between the clubs.

But Mason will play in Columbus eventually. As Metropolitan Division rivals, the Blue Jackets and Flyers will face each other five times a season, so Mason will at some point take to the ice in the building and in front of the fans where his NHL career began.

Mason’s time in Columbus was filled with tremendous highs and lows. He won the Calder Trophy as the NHL’s top rookie in 2008-09 when, at age 20, he carried the Blue Jackets to the franchise’s only appearance in the Stanley Cup playoffs.

But despite flashes, Mason never got back to that level of play for more than a week or two at a time.

The play in front of him was often shoddy. The Blue Jackets have never given their goalies much margin for error. But Mason’s game fell apart and he became the scapegoat of fans.

“There was a snowball effect,” Mason said. “I was struggling to find answers. When you have expectations for yourself, and you’re not achieving them, you know you’re letting everybody down — teammates, the fans, the city — it’s a tough thing to swallow, especially at a young age. It’s something that started to wear on me, obviously.”

When the Blue Jackets traded for Sergei Bobrovsky in the summer of 2012, Mason knew change was in the wind.

“It was pretty much make-or-break for me,” Mason said. “But it’s worked out. Bob played extremely well and I was given a fresh opportunity to come (to Philadelphia).

“It gave me time to try and rebuild things from the ground up, just forget everything that happened in Columbus the last 41/2 years and really try to start a new chapter, not just in my career but in my life.”

Mason is 13-9-4 with a 2.40 goals-against average and a .922 save percentage — numbers that rank in the top 15 in the NHL this season.

“This year. he’s playing the way I remember him playing the first year in Columbus,” said Flyers forward Jakub Voracek, who was traded by the Jackets to the Flyers a year earlier. “He’s been our MVP so far.”

Mason didn’t play particularly well on Thursday, but the Flyers defeated the Blue Jackets 5-4 with a five-goal third period.

It was the first time Mason had faced his former club, and he went stall by stall after the game to thank his teammates for salvaging a meaningful victory.

The bigger moment will be when he plays the Jackets at Nationwide.

“It’ll be great,” Mason said. “There will be a lot of emotion, I know, even though I’ve tried to move on as much as possible.”

Columbus Dispatch LOADED: 12.22.2013

730689 Columbus Blue Jackets

Blue Jackets notebook: Richards shakes up forward lines

By Shawn Mitchell

The Columbus Dispatch Saturday December 21, 2013 6:09 AM

The Blue Jackets, a fitful night’s sleep removed from a late-game meltdown in which they allowed five goals in the third-period of a 5-4 loss at Philadelphia, reviewed their performance on video yesterday morning.

It was not easy to watch, nor will it soon be forgotten.

“I think (Thursday’s) game is going to stick with me for a while,” Blue Jackets coach Todd Richards said. “Just really disappointing. Disgusted. Embarrassed. Those were the words I used when I went back to watch.”

The Blue Jackets held leads of 3-0 and 4-2. But the consensus among them was that they did not deserve to win. They were outplayed.

“My game, it was certainly worse on the video than I thought,” Blue Jackets center Brandon Dubinsky said.

Richards, in response, retooled his forward lines during an intense practice yesterday.

“It was everyone,” Richards said. “Everyone had struggles. It wasn’t matchups. It wasn’t one particular line. It was all the lines, all the defensive pairs.

“The real response comes in the game (tonight).”

Gaborik, Wisniewski to return tonight

Right wing Marian Gaborik and defenseman James Wisniewski were activated from injured reserve and are expected to be in the lineup tonight against the Flyers.

Gaborik skated on a line with center Artem Anisimov and left wing Nick Foligno yesterday. He has missed 17 games because of a knee sprain and had not scored in the eight games before he was injured.

The Jackets, meanwhile, began to play an effectively direct game in his absence.

“He’s probably one of our most talented players, if not the most talented player,” Richards said. “If he works, and works hard, he’ll probably be our best player. But it has to go hand in hand, the work and the talent.”

Wisniewski missed six games because of an upper-body injury.

Horton inching closer

Right wing Nathan Horton (shoulder surgery) practiced without a no-contact jersey and took line rushes at practice. He has not been cleared for contact but expects to return after the Christmas break.

Slap shots

Flyers forward Jakub Voracek will play his first game in Columbus since he was traded to Philadelphia on June 23, 2011. … Richards said goaltender Curtis McElhinney will start tonight.

Columbus Dispatch LOADED: 12.22.2013

730690 Dallas Stars

Double whammy: Sergei Gonchar leaves game as Stars lose in shootout to San Jose Sharks

MIKE HEIKA

Published: 22 December 2013 12:31 AM

Updated: 22 December 2013 01:17 AM

SAN JOSE, Calif. — The Stars lost another veteran defenseman and lost a shootout to the San Jose Sharks, 3-2 Saturday at SAP Center.

Dallas out-sharked the Sharks and had a 46-39 advantage in shots, but San Jose back-up goalie Alex Stalock was strong in net, and eventually outwaited the Stars.

Stalock stopped all five shooters in the shootout, while Joe Thornton scored the lone goal for the Sharks in the tie-breaker.

It was a tough way to lose a game.

"It’s always frustrating to lose, but tonight felt really deep, really hurt," said winger Antoine Roussel, who scored a goal. "They’re a great team, and they pushed back, and that’s why they’re in the playoffs every year. For us, it’s a learning curve still."

Stars defenseman Sergei Gonchar was injured in the second period when he was hit in the face with a hard shot. He didn’t return to the game and now joins Stephane Robidas (broken leg), Trevor Daley (high ankle sprain) and Aaron Rome (lower body injury). Rome is practicing and might be able to return if Gonchar isn’t ready to play by Monday when the Stars visit Los Angeles. In addition, Maxime Fortunus has been called up from the minors and also would be ready to step in.

"He’s all right," said Stars coach Lindy Ruff of Gonchar. "He took a puck to the face and isn’t feeling well, so he has to stay out for a while probably."

San Jose moves to 22-8-6 (50 points). Dallas moves to 17-12-6 (40 points). The loss was a tough one, as the Stars won the possession battle against the best possession team in the league. San Jose entered the game with a league-best plus-8.6 advantage in shot differential, and Dallas won the shot battle 46-39. After two periods, the Stars had a 31-22 advantage.

"We had some great opportunities, we could have put the game away in the second period," Ruff said. "You come in here and win the faceoff battle (33-26) and get over 40-something shots, I thought we really skated well and didn’t get much puck luck tonight."

Ray Whitney started the scoring for the Stars, when he lifted a backhand shot through a defenseman that Stalock didn’t see. It flew over his shoulder and settled in the net for Whitney’s fourth goal of the season and third in the last three games.

That goal seemed to convince the Stars they could play the Sharks’ game and maybe even do it better than San Jose could. Dallas finished the period with a 14-10 edge in shots on goal, which is unheard of against the Sharks.

Heading into the game, San Jose had outshot teams 431-282 in first periods and outscored opponents in the first 20 minutes, 44-15.

Dallas moved the lead to 2-0 on a nice team effort. On a delayed penalty, Cody Eakin weaved the puck up ice and spread the Sharks defense. He fed Alex Chiasson at the blue line, and Chiasson found Alex Goligoski deep down the right wing. Goligoski flipped a shot on net, and Roussel crashed the net to deflect in his eighth goal of the season.

"It went off my skate, it was a great pass from Goose," Roussel said. "That’s where the puck is going, so I have to get there."

San Jose started pushing back, as Justin Demers scored his first goal of the season to make it 2-1.

Then, the Stars lost Gonchar late in the period, and that seemed to suck some of the air out of the defense, which already was using two youngsters in Kevin Connauton and Cameron Gaunce. Gonchar didn’t return for the third period, so much of the defending pressure went to Brenden Dillon and Alex Goligoski.

That duo was beat for the tying goal at the 4:24 mark of the third period. Joe Thornton beat Jamie Benn to keep a puck in the offensive zone, and then Joe Pavelski beat Dillon out of the corner on a power move to the net. Goligoski picked up Pavelski, but couldn’t block a backhanded shot, and Pavelski tied the game 2-2.

Dillon finished with 32:15 in time on ice and Goligoski with 31:58.

"I thought those five guys played a heck of a game," Ruff said. "Dillon and Goligoski logged over 30 minutes, and we had some great opportunities. We could have put the game away in the second period."

Both teams played a more strategic game for the remainder of the third period, and it pushed to overtime. Then, Stalock shut out the Stars in the shootout and San Jose pushed its home record to 12-1-3.

"No lead is safe against that team," Dillon said. "They’ve got a lot of firepower, and they capitalized on their chances."

Dallas Morning News LOADED: 12.22.2013

730691 Dallas Stars

Colton Sceviour proving too good to be taken out of Stars lineup

MIKE HEIKA

Published: 21 December 2013 11:26 PM

Updated: 21 December 2013 11:28 PM

SAN JOSE, Calif. — All you need to know about Colton Sceviour’s status in the NHL was revealed Saturday morning.

With solid veteran Vern Fiddler ready to return from a six-game injury absence and gritty forward Ryan Garbutt proclaiming his wonky ankle more than ready to take the stress of a game against the San Jose Sharks, Dallas Stars coach Lindy Ruff was asked if the easy decision would be to take Sceviour, a minor league call-up, out of the lineup.

“I can tell you he’s not coming out for tonight,” Ruff said. “He’s played too well.”

Those words are like a choir of angels to the 24-year-old ears of Sceviour. He was drafted by the Stars in 2007 (fourth round selection, 112th overall), started his pro career in 2009, and has logged 320 games in the AHL. That’s probably a lot more than he planned.

But after getting a couple of one-game chances to make the NHL in previous seasons, Sceviour said he is ready now. He has worked hard, he has improved his offensive game, and he is more experienced.

In four games so far with the Stars this season, Sceviour has three goals and put 15 shots on goal. He has not only created chances, but he has finished them, and the Stars were 3-1-0 with him in the lineup heading into Saturday’s game.

“You work hard for this, and so far I’ve been doing the best I can with it,” Sceviour said. “It’s obviously just a start, four games, but it’s good to have it. I would rather have four games like this than four games where I feel out of place.”

Sceviour’s history has taught him one thing — that he can do this. He has excelled in preseason and been sent back. He has vowed to fix any perceived holes in his game. He has watched as AHL teammates like Alex Chiasson and Antoine Roussel have stepped ahead of him. And he said he’s battled his share of doubt.

But now, confidence isn’t really a problem.

“I’d be lying if I said I was always positive and always optimistic, there are some tough times when it doesn’t always go in your favor,” Sceviour said. “As time passes, you wonder if the chance might not ever come, you consider the fact that it just might not be in the cards for you. But I always told myself to keep working. I did that, and it definitely seemed to work out this year.”

Sceviour was one of the team’s best players in training camp, but with a roster full of veteran contracts and 18-year-old rookie Valeri Nichushkin getting one of the roster spots, it was just easier to send Sceviour back to the minors. The Stars knew he would get top minutes in the AHL, and they knew he would continue to develop.

He did just that, leading the AHL in goal-scoring with 18 in 26 games, and tallying 30 points overall. It was his best start to a season, and it showed he was ready for the next step.

When he got the call-up to fill in for Fiddler, Sceviour was ready. Even though he was playing in a checking role, he used his offensive skill to score a key goal against Winnipeg in a 6-4 win, a beautiful breakaway against Colorado in a 3-2 win, and a great tap-in driving the net in a 4-1 win over Vancouver.

Each goal showed that having some goal-scoring skill in your depth forwards can be a very good thing for a team.

“Goal scorers find ways to put the puck in the back of the net,” Ruff said. “He’s taken advantage of his opportunities and made a difference in games he’s played.”

The fact those goals came at a time when several Stars players were having a tough time finishing worked in Sceviour’s favor. But as the lineup gets healthy, it will be a challenge to hold onto a regular spot, and Sceviour still is adjusting to hockey at the highest level.

“It’s a little quicker to begin with, and the guys are a little stronger,” he said of the NHL. “You can’t make the mistakes you can make down there. You can get away with a few things down there, where they make you pay for mistakes up here. But I do feel that the more you’re here, the more you adjust.”

And the more he adjusts, the tougher it might be to take his spot away.


730692 Dallas Stars

Cameron Gaunce OK with personal role reversal

MIKE HEIKA



SAN JOSE, Calif. — Cameron Gaunce knows his role.

The call-up defenseman from the Texas Stars of the AHL is a physical player who defends the front of the net well. And with the Stars missing Stephane Robidas (broken leg), Trevor Daley (high ankle sprain) and Aaron Rome (lower body injury) in recent games, having a player like Gaunce is the perfect option for the Stars coaches.

“He takes time and space away, he makes good decisions,” said Stars coach Lindy Ruff. “Those are things we need.”

Although Guance came up through the Ontario Hockey League as an offense-minded defenseman, he quickly learned that defending would be his path to the NHL.

Yes, he had 64 points (17 goals, 47 assists) in 67 games his second season in Mississauga, and he was a second round draft pick because of his offensive performance. But he said he understands his place now.

“I have to play a smart game, a defensive game, and I like that,” he said. “I think you need to find your role, and if you can do that, you can help the team more.”

Gaunce was taken 50th overall by Colorado in 2008 and worked his way up through the AHL with some solid seasons. He felt he was doing well in his first season in the NHL, but then broke his finger and saw his progress train screech to a stop.

He followed with a so-so season in the AHL in 2012-13, and was traded to the Stars last year for Tomas Vincour.

“I understood all of that, and it’s fair,” he said. “I broke my finger, and new management came in and wanted to go with veterans. I didn’t play my best year of hockey last year, so I ended up getting traded.”

But he said his time with the Texas Stars has been rejuvenating, and now he’s ready to take advantage of the new opportunity.

“I know my role, it’s been defined very clearly, and I like that,” he said. “I know I have to be able to make plays when they are there, but I also know they like a simple game.”

And with the Stars missing some of their best defenders, that simple game means playing defense.


730693 Dallas Stars

Stars take early lead on San Jose backup goalie, but Sharks come back to win in shootout

Associated Press



SSAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) — Alex Stalock's first start in more than two weeks mirrored the play of the rest of the San Jose Sharks: a shaky start followed by a strong finish that led to a much-needed victory.

Stalock made 44 saves in regulation and overtime before stopping all five tries in his first career shootout to help the Sharks overcome a two-goal deficit and beat the Dallas Stars 3-2 on Saturday night.

"Obviously it wasn't the start I wanted to get off to," Stalock said. "I just stuck with it and just gave the team a chance to win."

Joe Thornton helped deliver the victory by scoring the lone shootout goal in the fifth round. That gave Thornton two shootout game-winners this season on his only shootout attempts since 2009, even if he wasn't enthused about getting the opportunity.

"I've seen him win two games for us," coach Todd McLellan said. "We may call it more often. That's what you expect from your captain, to step up in those situations and deliver, and he did."

Thornton also assisted on Joe Pavelski's tying goal early in the third period. Jason Demers added his first goal of the season for the Sharks, who had lost six of eight before rallying for this win.

Ray Whitney and Antoine Roussel scored for the Stars, who were in position to win their third straight game but couldn't hold a third-period lead. Kari Lehtonen made 37 saves.

"It's always frustrating to lose, and tonight it felt deeper for whatever reason," Roussel said. "They push back and find a way to win. That's why they keep going to the playoffs every year. It's still a learning curve for us. We played a great game but we couldn't get the big bounce."

After neither team scored in the first four rounds, Thornton beat Lehtonen. Stalock sealed the win when he stopped Whitney.

"I just wanted to be as patient as I could," Stalock said. "They have so many guys with some talent and I didn't want to be aggressive and go poke check them because they'll just go around. I just wanted to stay back, and it all worked out."

After a lackluster start that led to a 2-0 deficit, the Sharks fought back and tied the game early in the third period, shortly after failing to convert on the power play.

Thornton did a good job keeping the puck in the zone at the blue line and fed Pavelski, who skated from the boards to the middle and beat Lehtonen with a backhand for his 14th goal.

"We haven't won many thirds in the last stretch," Pavelski said. "We kind of talked about being ready at the start of the third."

Stalock got his first career start at home in place of Antti Niemi, who got a night off after allowing four goals in a loss at Los Angeles on Thursday night. Stalock had four road starts this season, mostly playing on the back end of back-to-backs.

He was shaky at times as the Sharks fell behind 2-0 early in the second period. It is the second straight game and fifth this month that San Jose has allowed the first two goals after not doing it in the first two months.

Whitney, who played on the original Sharks team in 1991-92, capitalized on a bad clearing attempt by San Jose. He sent a backhand from the circle through Brad Stuart's legs and over Stalock's shoulder to give him points in 10 straight games against his former team.

Dallas struck again early in the second on a delayed penalty when Alex Goligoski's centering pass from a bad angle deflected off Roussel and into the net.

The Stars nearly added another but referee Mike Leggo blew his whistle even though the puck was loose in the crease, negating a potential goal by Colton Sceviour.

"I think we could have put the game away in the second period," Stars coach Lindy Ruff said. "We had five or six grade A opportunities but we couldn't get a foot on the head of the snake."

The Sharks picked up their play after that and got on the board midway through the second when Tyler Kennedy fed a trailing Demers, who beat Lehtonen with a one-timer to end a 44-game goalless streak.

NOTES: Dallas D Sergei Gonchar left the game in the second period with an upper-body injury. ... The Sharkswill be without rookie F Tomas Hertl for at least a month after he was hurt in a knee-on-knee collision with Los Angeles' Dustin Brown on Thursday. ... F Vern Fiddler (upper body) was activated from IR to take the place of injured D Aaron Rome (lower body).


730694 Dallas Stars

Stars forward Ryan Garbutt the odd-man out after dealing with lower body pain

MIKE HEIKA



SAN JOSE, Calif. — Ryan Garbutt has been battling lower body pain for several games as he has been struck by several shots in his feet and ankles. He has missed practices and morning skates to save himself for games, and on Saturday, Ruff sat him out.

Garbutt said in the morning he was ready to play, and he skated in the pregame warm-up, but with Fiddler returning and Colton Sceviour playing well, Garbutt came out.


730695 Dallas Stars

Vernon Fiddler returns after six-game absence, says he's one of the lucky ones

MIKE HEIKA



SAN JOSE, Calif. — Vernon Fiddler missed six games with an upper body injury but returned to the lineup Saturday. Fiddler said the six-game stretch was one of the longest he has missed in his 609-game NHL career.

“I’ve been lucky. I had should surgery one summer, but not much other than that,” he said. “So this has definitely been frustrating for me.”

Asked if he feels he might come back into the game with more jump, Fiddler said: “Absolutely. My legs are fresh, I’ve been resting a lot. When you’re not playing in the games, you don’t get worn down, so I’ve just been practicing and feel great.”


730696 Dallas Stars

Jaromir Jagr: Stars rookie Valeri Nichushkin will be the best in the world one day

Tom Gulitti



Devils beat reporter Tom Gulitti's conversation about New Jersey rookie Eric Gelinas with current Devil and former Dallas Star Jaromir Jagr didn't exactly go as planned.

After answering the original question, Jagr turned his attention to Stars rookie Valeri Nichushkin, saying the 18-year-old has impressed him the most of all the rookies this season.

"Maybe it was his best 3 games I watched, but I said, 'This guy is going to be the best in the world one day,' " Jagr said.

But Jagr said the rookie that has impressed him the most this season is 18-year-old Valeri Nichushkin of the Dallas Stars.

- Tom Gulitti (@TGfireandice) December 20, 2013

Jagr on Nichushkin: "Maybe it was his best 3 games I watched, but I said, 'This guy is going to be the best in the world one day.'"


730697 Dallas Stars

Morning skate update: Stars coaches could have tough decision tonight with forwards

MIKE HEIKA



SAN JOSE, Calif. _ Vernon Fiddler skated hard and looked great this morning. He has missed six games with an upper body injury, and could be ready to return.

However, his return could create some tough decisions for the Stars coaching staff.

Colton Sceviour has been magnificent in his call-up from the minors. He has three goals and 15 shots on goal in four games, and Ruff said when asked about possibly taking Sceviour out of the lineup: "I can tell you he's not coming out for tonight, he's played too well."

Asked about what Sceviour had done to earn that, Ruff said: "Goal scorers find ways to put the puck in the back of the net. He's taken advantage of his opportunities and made a difference in games he's played."

Sceviour, 24, said he's just trying to take it game by game. He has battled a long time to get this opportunity, so he wants to make the most of it.

"You work hard for this, and so far I've been doing the best I can with it," Sceviour said. "It's obviously just a start, four games, but it's good to have it. I would rather have four games like this than four games where I feel out of place."

Garbutt has been having problems with feet and ankles after taking several pucks to both feet. He said he feels good when he's skating.

"It's definitely better when you're out on the ice than when you're walking," he said. "It's especially good when you're playing in a game. You get the adrenalin flowing, and it feels great. These are big games, and you don't want to let little things get in the way."

Ruff said Garbutt can play tonight if that's what the coaches decide.

Fiddler said he's champing at the bit to play. He said this is as long as he can remember being out in one stretch.

"I've been lucky. I had should surgery one summer, but not much other than that," he said. "So this has definitely been frustrating for me."

Asked if he feels he might come back into the game with more jump, Fiddler said: "Absolutely. My legs are fresh, I've been resting a lot. When you're not playing in the games, you don't get worn down, so I've just been practicing and feel great. I just want to get into the game and hope I can contribute."

The line-up in the morning looked like this:

Jamie Benn-Tyler Seguin-Valeri Nichushkin

Antoine Roussel-Cody Eakin-Ray Whitney

Erik Cole-Rich Peverley-Colton Sceviour

Shawn Horcoff-Vernon Fiddler-Alex Chiasson

Alex Goligoski-Brenden Dillon

Jordie Benn-Sergei Gonchar

Kevin Connauton-Cameron Gaunce

Kari Lehtonen

The Sharks will be without winger Tomas Hertl, the leading candidate to win the Calder Trophy as rookie of the year. Hertl was injured in a knee-to-knee collision with Kings captain Dustin Brown, and is expected to be out for at least a month.

Check out the story here.

Sharks are struggling right now at 2-5-1 in the last eight, but they are 11-1-3 at home this season. Back-up goalie Alex Stalock will be in net. He is 3-1-0 with a 2.06 GAA and .930 save percentage. His last outing was Dec. 6 against Carolina when he allowed four goals on 34 shots in a loss.


730698 Dallas Stars

Sharks rally to beat Stars 3-2 in shootout; Gonchar hurt

Posted Sunday, Dec. 22, 2013

By Josh Dubow

The Associated Press

SAN JOSE, Calif. — Joe Thornton scored the lone shootout goal in the fifth round, and Alex Stalock stopped all five tries as the San Jose Sharks overcame a two-goal deficit to beat the Dallas Stars 3-2 on Saturday night.

Joe Pavelski and Jason Demers scored in regulation for the Sharks, who had lost six of eight before rallying for this win. Stalock made 44 saves and got the win in his first career shootout.

Dallas defenseman Sergei Gonchar left the game in the second period with an upper-body injury.

Ray Whitney and Antoine Roussel scored for the Stars, who were in position to win their third straight game but couldn’t hold a third-period lead. Kari Lehtonen made 37 saves.

After neither team scored in the first four rounds, Thornton beat Lehtonen for his second shootout goal in as many tries this season. Stalock sealed the win when he stopped Whitney.

After a lackluster start that led to a 2-0 deficit, the Sharks fought back and tied the game early in the third period shortly after failing to convert on the power play.

Thornton did a good job keeping the puck in the zone at the blue line and fed Pavelski, who skated from the boards to the middle and beat Lehtonen with a backhand for his 14th goal.

That is where the game stood until the shootout.

Stalock got his first career start at home in place of Antti Niemi, who got a night off after allowing four goals in a loss at Los Angeles on Thursday night. Stalock had four road starts this season, mostly playing on the back end of back-to-backs.

He was shaky at times as the Sharks fell behind 2-0 early in the second period. It is the second straight game and fifth this month that San Jose has allowed the first two goals after not doing it in the first two months.

Whitney, who played on the original Sharks team in 1991-92, capitalized on a bad clearing attempt by San Jose when he sent a backhand from the circle through Brad Stuart’s legs and over Stalock’s shoulder to give him points in 10 straight games against his former team.

Each team failed on a pair of power-play chances, and that is where the game stood after the first period.

But Dallas struck again early in the second on a delayed penalty when Alex Goligoski’s centering pass from a bad angle deflected off Roussel and into the net.

The Stars nearly added another but referee Mike Leggo blew his whistle even though the puck was loose in the crease, negating a potential goal by Colton Sceviour.

The Sharks picked up their play after that and got on the board midway through the second when Tyler Kennedy fed a trailing Demers, who beat Lehtonen with a one-timer to end a 44-game goalless streak.

NOTES: The Sharks will be without rookie F Tomas Hertl for at least a month after he was hurt in a knee-on-knee collision with Los Angeles’ Dustin Brown on Thursday. … F Vern Fiddler (upper body) was activated from IR to take the place of injured D Aaron Rome (lower body). … San Jose had its 150th consecutive regular-season sellout.

Star-Telegram LOADED: 12.22.2013

730699 Detroit Red Wings

Fans should plan ahead to park for NHL Winter Classic

11:54 PM, December 21, 2013

By George Sipple

Winter Classic

Matchup: Red Wings vs. Toronto Maple Leafs.

Face-off: 1 p.m. Jan. 1, Michigan Stadium, Ann Arbor.

TV: NBC (Channel 4 in Detroit).

Winter Festival events

At Comerica Park8:30 p.m. Monday: Warren De La Salle vs. Grosse Pointe North.

Tuesday: Open skates 9:30-10:20 a.m., 11-11:50 a.m., 12:30-1:20 p.m., 2-2:50 p.m.

Friday-Dec. 31: Coke Zero fan zone.

3:30 p.m. Friday: Michigan State vs. Michigan Tech, Great Lakes Invitational.

7 p.m. Friday: Michigan vs. Western Michigan, GLI.

3:30 p.m. Saturday: GLI consolation game.

7 p.m. Saturday: GLI championship.

1:30 p.m. Dec. 29: Windsor Spitfires vs. Saginaw Spirit.

5 p.m. Dec. 29: London Knights vs. Plymouth Whalers.

5 p.m. Dec. 30: Toronto Marlies vs. Grand Rapids Griffins.

1 and 3:30 p.m. Dec. 31: Maple Leafs Alumni vs. Red Wings Alumni, doubleheader.

More info: DetroitRedWings.com.

On football Saturdays in Ann Arbor, Perry Sankovich charges $30 to $50 to park up to nine cars at his property on Belmar Place, which is one block from Michigan Stadium.

Sankovich won’t be parking any cars on his property Jan. 1, when the Red Wings host the Toronto Maple Leafs in the Winter Classic at Michigan Stadium.

“New Year’s Eve and Day is traditionally, for my wife and I, just been used to visit family and friends,” Sankovich said. “We don’t plan on being here for the event.”

Though Sankovich said some of his neighbors will be opening their properties up to park cars for people attending the outdoor hockey spectacle, it’s clear that some lots will go unused by people who are either out of town or don’t want to bother with the event because of the holiday.

The University of Michigan Golf Course, which can accommodate about 2,000 vehicles, will not be used for parking due to winter weather concerns, and most of the Ann Arbor Golf Course will be closed for the same reason.

Rob Rademacher, U-M’s associate athletic director for facilities and operations, said Michigan’s golf course won’t be used because of the risk of the course being torn up.

“Same reason we close it if it rains is same reason we wouldn’t do it if it was frozen,” Rademacher said.

Parking within a half-mile of the stadium is expected to cost $50 to $60, according to NHL officials.

There is expected to be more congestion for the event than a normal U-M home football game, with 107,000 people expected to attend, so fans are being encouraged to arrive early for the 1 p.m. game. Many fans are coming from Canada and might not be familiar with the parking options around Michigan Stadium or how to navigate the local roads.

Parking lots will open at 7 a.m. Jan. 1.

The NHL has arranged a park-and-ride shuttle for 2,200 vehicles that park at Briarwood Mall. Parking will be free there. Another way to get to the game is a fan shuttle operated by the NHL that will service the same hotels and parking lots that the Ann Arbor Transit Authority does for its football shuttle. A round-trip ticket for the shuttles is $4, and the fan shuttle will begin operating at 9:30 a.m.

Rademacher said about 3,000 people use the fan shuttle during football games. As parking becomes more of an issue in the future for football games, Rademacher said he’s interested in seeing how the NHL uses more shuttles for this event.

“We’re going to learn a couple tricks from these guys,” Rademacher said.

A total of 66 school buses will be running before the game — 25 from Briarwood Mall, 18 from downtown Ann Arbor parking garages and 23 servicing local hotels and park-and-ride lots.

The postgame bus service will increase to 123 school buses — 50 for Briarwood Mall, 32 for the downtown Ann Arbor parking garages and 41 for the hotel and park-and-ride lots.

Rates at the downtown Ann Arbor parking garages will be $5.

Limousines, car services and charter buses will not be allowed to drop off passengers or wait curbside around Michigan Stadium to pick up guests.

The NHL worked extensively with the Ann Arbor Police Department and the U-M Police Department on traffic planning for the Winter Classic.

Street closures will be the same as for a U-M football game.

Main Street will be closed between Stadium Boulevard and Pauline Boulevard northbound starting at 10 a.m. and southbound between the same intersections at noon. Main Street will be open in both directions immediately following the game.

After the game, South Main Street will run all lanes southbound for cars exiting to I-94.

Fans who want to guarantee themselves a parking spot before the event can do so through parknparty.com.

Taylor Bond, the manager of Park n Party LLC, is taking reservations for about 5,000 parking spots throughout Ann Arbor, some within a half mile of Michigan Stadium and others at downtown parking garages.

Bond said he has about 300 spaces left within a half-mile of the stadium. Prices range from $20 to $60. Reservations for the downtown structures cost $10.25, not including the $4 round-trip charge to use the shuttle.

For more information, visit the website or call 888-926-7275.

Why would someone want to reserve a spot?

“We bring together the parking lots and the fans,” Bond said. “People hate having to worry about parking and the frustration that comes with it.

“The largest chunk of the inventory (left) now is the structures.

“My sense is that on game day, it’s going to be a wild ride.”

Detroit Free Press LOADED: 12.22.2013


Red Wings 5, Maple Leafs 4: Why the Wings won on Saturday night

12:17 AM, December 22, 2013

By Helene St. James

At Air Canada Centre, Toronto

IN THE FIRST PERIOD: Brendan Smith had a great chance early, had the puck alone on the right flank, but his shot was turned away by James Reimer. The Leafs scored at 7:15 when Cody Franson converted on a loose puck. Pavel Datsyuk replied at 8:57, taking the puck from Riley Sheahan and snapping a shot into the net while skating by the crease. Joakim Andersson picked up a pass from Daniel Alfredsson and turned it into a wrap-around goal at 13:18 to give Detroit a 2-1 lead. Tomas Jurco made it 3-1 at 18:08 when he had the puck alone in front of the net and threw a backhand past Reimer. Drew Miller went off for tripping at 18:56. Shots were 12-7 in favor of Detroit.

IN THE SECOND PERIOD: Jonathan Bernier took over in net. The Wings had 56 seconds to kill off when the period began. Brendan Smith was called for tripping at 4:14. Dion Phaneuf made it 3-2 when he scored on a slap shot at 11:45.The Wings sat back as the Leafs continued to attack, and saw their lead completely gone before long. At 17:06, Kyle Quincey went to the penalty box for tripping. At 18:34, Phil Kessel fed Joffrey Lupul, who strode forward from the goal line and swung the puck into the far corner for a 3-3 game. Shots were 21-15 in favor of Detroit.

IN THE THIRD PERIOD: The Wings finally got a power play at 5:25, when Dion Phaneuf went off for interference on Sheahan. Daniel Alfredsson and Todd Bertuzzi paired up on several attempts, but were stymied by Bernier. Tomas Tatar scored at 13:44, when he stayed behind at the blue line and turned a pass from Jurco into a goal. Shots were 35-22 in favor of Detroit.

IN OVERTIME: The Wings had a couple of good chances, while Jonas Gustavsson stopped one shot.

IN THE SHOOTOUT: James Van Riemsdyk was denied on a stick-side attempt. Daniel Alfredsson scored on a high snap shot. Mason Raymond was poke checked by Jonas Gustavsson. Pavel Datsyuk backhanded the puck past Bernier, securing the shootout.

UP NEXT: Monday against the New York Islanders.



Detroit 5, Toronto 4 (SO): Red Wings finally solve shootout problem

12:17 AM, December 22, 2013

By Helene St. James

TORONTO — The Detroit Red Wings were fired up to play at Air Canada Centre, few more than Daniel Alfredsson, who'd skated shift after shift through relentless booing.

All the warmer feeling, then, when Alfredsson scored in a shootout to lead the Wings past the Maple Leafs, 5-4, on a Saturday night that had seen an early lead go cold.

"I think we were better than them, so we should maybe have won the game even quicker," former Leafs goaltender Jonas Gustavsson said after making 19 saves. "But it doesn't always matter how it looks so long as it's two points."

The teams meet again Jan. 1 at Michigan Stadium in the Winter Classic. Saturday marked the first time the Wings were in Toronto in nearly two years, and the first time they were there with Alfredsson, dearly despised by Leafs fans after 17 seasons as a Senator. He was booed so much that when he set up Joakim Andersson's goal, fans didn't even seem to notice Andersson had scored.

"It fires you up a little bit, there's no question," Alfredsson said. "It's a big win for us. We're in desperate need of points."

The Wings had gone winless through six shootouts this season, 11 dating back to last season. This time they only needed two guys to go, as both Alfredsson and Datsyuk scored while Gustavsson denied James Van Riemsdyk's stick-side try and poke-checked Mason Raymond. Alfredsson's goal stood as the game winner since no Leaf scored.

"It was good," coach Mike Babcock said. "My assistant coach, Bill Peters, said to me, 'watch this, he's going to go bar down and then ride his stick. Watch this.' But he didn't ride his stick."

It's the first time all month the Wings have won two games in a row, but that has something to do with all the injuries they've had. It helped to get Danny DeKeyser back after a 15-game layoff: He had a hand in Datsyuk's goal, which saw Datsyuk stickhandle his way to the front of the net and score on James Reimer, minutes after Cody Franson had made it 1-0. Andersson made it 2-1, and then Tomas Jurco got the puck while all alone in front of the slot, pulled up and went to his backhand for a 3-1 end to the first period. Riley Sheahan picked up his first two NHL points with assists to Datsyuk and Jurco.

"I went to the net and Riley pass it to me and nobody was around me," Jurco said. "I had lots of time to do that move. I spun and luckily it went in."

The Leafs replaced Reamer with Jonathan Bernier, helping a rally. Dion Phaneuf scored on a rocket from the top of the right circle and Joffrey Lupul converted on a power play during the second period, leaving the game 3-3 going into the third period. David Clarkson put the Wings down by one when he batted at a rebound. Gustavsson had the puck under his right leg as he sat on the ice, but a crush by his own teammates pushed Gustavsson into his net, and the puck over the goal line.

Tatar came through with six minutes to go, stealthily staying deep in Toronto's zone, which allowed him to have plenty of room to score.

"I saw the puck came up and it wasn't 100% puck for them, so I just try to go to the net," Tatar said. "Jurky throw it there and I was by myself so I had lots of time.

"We had the game in our hand and they come back, so we're really happy to win."

The Wings have one game left, Monday against the Islanders, before their Christmas break. With several injured players expected back over the coming week, the Wings should be healthy as they get fired up for the Winter Classic.



Detroit Red Wings' Stephen Weiss to have surgery for sports hernia, out at least through February

7:08 PM, December 21, 2013

By Helene St. James

TORONTO — Detroit Red Wings forward Stephen Weiss will undergo surgery for a sports hernia, sidelining him at least through February.

Weiss is trying to have the procedure done before Christmas. His recovery period will include February, when the NHL is largely shut down because of the Sochi Olympics. Weiss hasn't played since Dec. 10, after which nagging groin pain prompted examination.

This further blights what's been a harsh debut season for Weiss with the Wings, as he's produced just four points in 26 games.

Weiss is on long-term injured reserve, giving the Wings $4.5 million in salary cap relief.



Game thread: Detroit Red Wings back on road to take on Toronto Maple Leafs

By Posted by Brian Manzullo

2:55 PM, Dec. 21, 2013

The Winter Classic isn’t quite here yet, but at least the Detroit Red Wings and Toronto Maple Leafs will get one look at each other before the big Jan. 1 game.

The two teams meet tonight in Toronto (7 p.m., FSD, NHLN, CBC).

Cameras from HBO’s “24/7” documentary series will be on hand for this one. The Red Wings are 16-12-9 (41 points), while the Maple Leafs are right behind them at 18-16-3 (39 points).



Detroit Red Wings anticipate fun game as Danny DeKeyser rejoins lineup vs. Toronto Maple Leafs

1:43 PM, December 21, 2013

By Helene St. James

TORONTO — As if returning to the lineup wasn’t enough of a feel-good story, Danny DeKeyser gets the extra boost from returning in Toronto.

DeKeyser is rejoining the Detroit Red Wings tonight when they play the Maple Leafs at Air Canada Centre tonight (7 p.m. FSD, NHLN, CBC). DeKeyser has been out since suffering a separated left shoulder Nov. 19.

“I’m really excited about it,” DeKeyser said. “There’s a really good history here between Detroit and Toronto, two pretty historic franchises. It’s going to be fun. It’s Saturday night. It’s going to be a great atmosphere and should be a good game.”

DeKeyser is paired with Kyle Quincey, which puts Brendan Smith with Brian Lashoff, as Niklas Kronwall and Jonathan Ericsson remain in tact as the top pairing. The Wings just broke a six-game winless streak with an overtime victory Thursday, while the Leafs also come in to tonight having won their last game, leaving them 2-5 in their last seven games.

The next meeting between the Wings and Maple Leafs is the jewel of the season: Jan. 1 at the Winter Classic at Michigan Stadium. As part of the lead-up to the big game, both teams are being filmed for HBO’s 24/7.

The Wings and Leafs have met 644 times since 1926-27; the Wings are 275-273-96. Having long been separated by conferences up realignment this past off-season, however, the Wings haven’t been in Toronto since Jan. 7, 2012, when they lost, 4-3. Renewing acquaintances is most welcome.

“I think that’s a real positive thing,” coach Mike Babcock said. “And maybe the 24/7 and maybe the Winter Classic can help with all that. To have a rivalry, to me what you do is, you meet in the playoffs, you have two really good teams, you have hard series and you build up some animosity for one another. That hasn’t been possible.”

Babcock wasn’t sure how his lines would shape up, but there are no personnel changes up front, he said. Of getting DeKeyser back, Babcock said, “he’s a good player who has been out for a long time. It’s the NHL, it’s hard to jump back in, but we’re confident he can make a difference for us.”



Jimmy Howard aims to play in Winter Classic, plus other Detroit Red Wings injury updates

1:24 PM, December 21, 2013

By Helene St. James

TORONTO — There’s good news on the health front for the Detroit Red Wings, who expect nearly all their injured players back by the end of December.

The only one who isn’t on the horizon is Stephen Weiss, who has a sports hernia. He’ll either have surgery now, or in the off-season. If he has it now, he’d miss two months, but that’d include February, when the NHL is largely shut down for the Sochi Olympics.

Johan Franzen has a concussion, but general manager Ken Holland said Franzen could be ready right after Christmas. Neither Weiss nor Franzen traveled to Toronto, where the Wings play the Maple Leafs at Air Canada Centre tonight (7 p.m. FSD, NHLN, CBC).

Captain Henrik Zetterberg - without whom the Wings are 2-5-2 - went through a good hour-long morning skate/practice, and remains on target to return Dec. 28 at Florida. He’s been out since Dec. 1 with a herniated disc.

Justin Abdelkader, out the past week after getting a blow to the head, spent part of Saturday undergoing neurological tests with the expectation he’d be cleared to play Monday. He and Gustav Nyquist are both on short-term IR, but can be taken off for Monday’s game against the New York Islanders. Nyquist is day-to-day with a sore groin.

Darren Helm, who hurt a shoulder Dec. 1, is also on the doorstep.

Jimmy Howard has been putting in extra workouts, and is aiming to play Dec. 30 at Nashville. He hurt his left knee Dec. 11 during practice. He, too, was on the ice for an hour Saturday, wearing the brown pads he hopes to be using as a starter Jan. 1 in the Winter Classic, when the Wings and Leafs meet at Michigan Stadium.

“I’m hoping for that Nashville game, playing in that game, and then hopefully taking off from there,” Howard said.

The NHL has a mandatory break from Dec. 24-26, but Howard said he’s got a plan to keep his recovery on pace even if he can’t come to Joe Louis Arena to skate.

“I’ll take some of the mobile units home with me and just set it up,” Howard said. “I already knows how all the stuff works, so that’ll be easy.”

Asked if he might go over to friend and mentor Chris Osgood’s backyard rink for a workout, Howard laughed. “And use the ice? I don’t know if I want to skate on that ice if he’s the the one working on it.”



December 21, 2013 at 11:20 pm

Ted Kulfan

Toronto — Believe it: The Red Wings won a shootout.

Ending a streak of 11 consecutive shootout losses dating back to last season (six this season), the Red Wings defeated Toronto 5-4.

Daniel Alfredsson and Pavel Datsyuk scored in the shootout, enabling the Red Wings (17-12-9, 43 points) to win the extra session 2-0 and securing a key second point for the standings.

“It’s been a long time for our team,” said goalie Jonas Gustavsson, who made 19 saves, then added two big ones in the shootout. “It felt good to get the win in the shootout, especially after I didn’t have my best game, so it was fun to step up there and get the win.”

The Red Wings let a 3-1 lead slip away but managed to salvage the two points.

Tomas Tatar was left alone in front of Toronto goalie Jonathan Bernier and tied the game with 6:16 left in the third period.

Tatar tapped in an uncontested rebound with no Maple Leafs close to him (a common theme on each Red Wings goal).Tomas Jurco and Niklas Kronwall assisted on Tatar’s seventh goal of the season.

“It was good to win, I’m probably not as hung up on the shootout as everyone else, but I like the points,” coach Mike Babcock said. “Our kids were real good. They’re obviously going to be real good players.”

Along with Tatar, Jurco had a goal and assist and Riley Sheahan had two assists, while Luke Glendening had four hits in almost 17 minutes of ice time.

“They’re big, fast and they know how to play,” Babcock said. “We’re fortunate to have a farm team with bunch of kids who are ready to come (up).”

Toronto forward David Clarkson broke a 3-3 tie midway in the third period.

Clarkson was credited with the goal, but it appeared Gustavsson steered the puck into his own net getting pushed by his own teammates during a scramble in front of the net.

Datsyuk and Joakim Andersson added the other Red Wings goals.

“It’s a big win for us; we’re in desperate need of points,” Alfredsson said. “Getting the extra one is a good feeling.”

Cody Franson, Dion Phaneuf and Joffrey Lupul (power play) scored for Toronto (18-16-4, 40 points)

Leading 3-1 after one period, the Red Wings let the Maple Leafs back in the game in the last half of the second period.

Phaneuf cut the lead to 3-2 at 11:45.

Lupul got the puck near the side-boards and saw Phaneuf open at the top of the circle. Phaneuf fired a one-timer that beat Gustavsson at 11:45.

Gustavsson made a highlight reel save shortly after the goal, scrambling on the ice and swatting a Phaneuf shot that appeared to be heading into an open net.

But the Maple Leafs continued to press and tied the game on Lupul’s goal.

The Red Wings dominated the first period, driving Toronto goalie James Reimer (in favor of Bernier) out of the net.

Franson opened the game’s scoring, but Datsyuk evened the score at 8:57 with his 14th goal at 8:57 driving untouched through the slot.

Andersson put the Red Wings ahead 2-1 at 13:18 with a wraparound, his sixth goal.

Jurco capped the first period explosion with his second NHL goal at 18:08. Alone in front of Reimer, Jurco patiently put a backhand shot through Reimer to put the Red Wings ahead 3-1 after one period.

“Their job is to bring some energy and enthusiasm and they’ve done that,” said Alfredsson of the Grand Rapids rookies.

Detroit News LOADED: 12.22.2013


Wings' Stephen Weiss to undergo hernia surgery; likely gone eight weeks

Ted Kulfan

December 21, 2013 at 11:28 pm

Toronto — The Red Wings won’t have forward Stephen Weiss for a while longer.

Weiss figures to be out for approximately eight weeks after choosing to have sports hernia surgery.

General manager Ken Holland said going this route, Weiss could be ready to return to the lineup after the three-week Olympic break in February.

“You can wait and they can do some things and help it along, or you can have the surgery now,” Holland said. “The good news is there’s a three-week Olympic break and he’d probably be ready to go after (the break).”

Weiss last played on Dec. 10. He missed six games in November with groin problems, returned to play in nine games, but was forced out of the lineup again with difficulties.

It’s been a difficult season thus far for Weiss, who signed a five-year $24.5 million deal as a free agent on July 5.

Expected to help fill an offensive void left when Valtteri Filppula signed a free agent deal in Tampa Bay, Weiss has been held to two goals and two assists in 26 games with a minus-4 rating.

Kindl out

Defenseman Danny DeKeyser returned to the Red Wings lineup Saturday, and Jakub Kindl became the odd man out.

It was the first game Kindl has missed this season.

“I just have to work harder, work harder and compete, and I’ll be back in the lineup,” said Kindl, who along with defenseman Kyle Quincey is tied for a team-worst minus-10 rating.

DeKeyser last played on Nov. 19 but he made an immediate contribution in Saturday’s 5-4 shootout victory with an assist in 17 minutes 42 seconds of ice time on 27 shifts..

“I’m as close to 100 percent as I can be,” DeKeyser said. “Feeling real good, I’m good to go.”

Said coach Mike Babcock: “He’s a good player who has been out a long time. It’s the NHL and it’s hard to jump back in, but we’re confident he can make a difference for us.”

Injury update

The Red Wings continue to get closer to full health.

Forwards Gustav Nyquist (groin), Darren Helm (shoulder) and Justin Abdelkader (concussion) all could be available Monday against the New York Islanders.

Abdelkader is expected to be cleared Saturday by neurologists.

Forwards Henrik Zetterberg (herniated disc) and Johan Franzen (concussion) and goalie Jimmy Howard (knee) all should return for the Dec. 28 game in Florida, the first game after the Christmas break.

Howard is definitely aiming for the Jan. 1 Winter Classic.

“I really don’t want to miss that,” Howard said. “It’s been a year and a half of waiting for it. I really don’t want to miss it but at the same time I’m going to be smart about it and if it doesn’t feel right, I’m not going to force the issue.”

Still, Howard said “we’re ahead of schedule. The plan is to get a couple of practices in and back up on the 28th. I don’t think that’s out of the possibility, barring any setbacks.”

Welcome home

Returning to Toronto was a homecoming for defensemen Brendan Smith and Kyle Quincey and forward Riley Sheahan, all Toronto natives.

Smith grew up about 10-15 minutes from Air Canada Centre “depending on the traffic,” Smith said.

It was Smith’s first regular season game in Toronto.

“This is pretty cool, especially being close to Christmas and everyone is home from college to watch,” Smith said. “It’s quite an experience It’s exciting to play the Leafs in the regular season with everything is on the line.”

Quincey is in his ninth NHL season but still gets excited about the opportunity to play in his hometown.

“Always,” Quincey said. “When you grow up in Ontario and you’re such a huge hockey fan, you’re also a huge Leafs fan, and when you to get the chance to play them, even 50 years from now it’ll be exciting (thinking about it).”

Sheahan, a recent call-up from Grand Rapids, had two assists and was a team-best plus-3 in his first regular season game at Air Canada Centre.

“It was unbelievable,” said Sheahan, who had about 10 family and friends in attendance. “I had family and close friends in the crowd and I know a lot of close friends were watching on ‘Hockey Night in Canada.’ It was good.”

Detroit News LOADED: 12.22.2013


Jonas-Gustavsson-12-12-13Toronto's Joffrey Lupul scores a second-period goal against the Red Wings' Jonas Gustavsson.

Ansar Khan

on December 22, 2013 at 5:02 AM, updated December 22, 2013 at 5:05 AM

TORONTO -- Detroit Red Wings goaltender Jonas Gustavsson didn't have his best game on Saturday, allowing four goals on just 23 shots.

But Gustavsson made an incredible diving stick save on Dion Phaneuf with 4:48 to play in the second period and the Red Wings went on to defeat the Toronto Maple Leafs 5-4 in a shootout at the Air Canada Centre.

Gustavsson raised his record to 10-3-2 in beating his former club. He played three seasons for the Maple Leafs before signing a two-year contract with the Red Wings on July 1, 2012.

Michigan Live LOADED: 12.22.2013


Red Wings battle back after blowing two-goal lead, beat Maple Leafs in shootout, 5-4

Ansar Khan

on December 21, 2013 at 10:06 PM, updated December 21, 2013 at 10:21 PM

TORONTO – The fragility Detroit Red Wings coach Mike Babcock spoke of regarding his team earlier this week resurfaced Saturday during the second period, when his team squandered another two-goal lead.

This time, the Red Wings also showed some resiliency.

Tomas Tatar scored late in regulation to tie it and the Red Wings went on to defeat the Toronto Maple Leafs 5-4 in a shootout at the Air Canada Centre.

Daniel Alfredsson and Pavel Datsyuk scored on Detroit’s only two shootout attempts. The Red Wings snapped an 11-game losing streak in shootouts that dated back to last season. They were 0-6 in shootouts this season.

The Red Wings (17-12-9) have won consecutive games for the first time since winning four in a row from Nov. 24-Dec. 1.

It was the first of four meetings between these long-time Original Six franchises who are rekindling their rivalry in the Eastern Conference as Atlantic Division foes, competing for a playoff spot.

It also was a prelude to the Jan. 1 Winter Classic at Michigan Stadium.

Jonas Gustavsson, playing against his former club for the first time, allowed four goals on 23 shots through regulation and overtime and raised his record to 10-3-2.

The Red Wings are 11-3-3 on the road, where they’ve gained points in eight consecutive games (5-0-3).

This was the teams’ first meeting since Jan. 7, 2012.

Datsyuk, Joakim Andersson, Tomas Jurco and Tatar scored for the Red Wings in regulation. Riley Sheahan recorded a pair of assists, his first NHL points. Jurco also had an assist.

Tatar scored his seventh goal of the season at 13:44 of the third period to tie it at 4-4.

David Clarkson had given Toronto the lead by scoring during a scramble around the Red Wings’ net at 8:32 of the third. The puck lay in the crease, a few inches from the goal line, when Todd Bertuzzi charged in and made contact with Gustavsson, knocking the puck into the net.

The Leafs came on strong in the latter half of the second period and scored twice to tie it at 3-3 at the intermission.

Dion Phaneuf blasted in a shot at 11:45. Joffrey Lupul scored on the power play at 18:24, firing a shot between Gustavsson and the goal post on the short side.

The Red Wings had a good first period, scoring three consecutive goals to take a 3-1 lead after spotting Toronto the first goal.

Datsyuk scored his team-leading 14th goal at 8:57, a backhand shot from right in front of the net, after some good work by Sheahan behind the net.

Danny DeKeyser, back after missing 15 games with a separated shoulder, also assisted. He has nine points (three goals, six assists) in his past 12 games.

Andersson scored his sixth goal at 13:18, on a wraparound.

Jurco capped the rally at 18:08 with his second goal in just his fourth NHL game. Jurco somehow was left wide open in front of the net when he spun and fired the puck past James Reimer.

Jonathan Bernier replaced Reimer at the start of the second period.

The Leafs got off to a good start, when Cody Franson scored on a shot through traffic from just inside the blue line. Brendan Smith attempted to clear the puck from in front of the net but put it on Franson’s stick.



Red Wings' Stephen Weiss will have surgery for sports hernia, should return after Olympic break

Ansar Khan


TORONTO -- Update on Detroit Red Wings center Stephen Weiss:

General manager Ken Holland said Weiss has opted to undergo surgery for a sports hernia. The date for the procedure hasn't been set, but Holland said Weiss should return just after the Olympic break (Feb. 9-25).

Weiss saw a specialist, Dr. William Meyers, in Philadelphia on Friday. He diagnosed the issue that apparently had been bothering the veteran center for some time. He missed six games last month with what he thought was a groin strain.



Live blog: Detroit Red Wings meet Toronto Maple Leafs tonight in Winter Classic preview

Brendan Savage


If you're viewing this on your mobile device, click here to get updates and comment

SHOOTOUT FINAL

Red Wings 5, Maple Leafs 4: The 11-game shootout losing streak is over.

Raymond shoots for Toronto. Gustavsson pokes the puck away. Datsyuk can win it for the Red Wings. He does. Backhand under the cross bar.

Van Riemsdyk shoots for Toronto. No goal; Alfredsson shoots for the Red Wings. He scores. Sidenote courtesy of FSD: He scored the first game-winning SO goal in NHL history for Ottawa against Toronto.

OVERTIME

Red Wings 4, Maple Leafs 4 (0:00): Red Wings will try and end their 11-game shootout losing streak after outshooting Toronto 3-1 in OT.

THIRD PERIOD

Red Wings 4, Maple Leafs 4 (0:00): Headed to overtime. Red Wings outshoot the Leafs 14-7 in the third, have a 35-22 edge through 60 minutes.

Red Wings 4, Maple Leafs 4 (6:16): Tomas Tatar scores his seventh of the season to tie it.

Maple Leafs 4, Red Wings 3 (9:37): Maple Leafs back on the power play when Lashoff goes off for slashing.

Maple Leafs 4, Red Wings 3 (11:28): Toronto scores third straight goal on a snap shot by Clarkson.

Red Wings 3, Maple Leafs 3 (14:35): Red Wings go on the power play when Phaneuf goes off for interference.

Red Wings 3, Maple Leafs 3 (19:59): Toronto with 39-17 edge in hits. Yikes.

SECOND PERIOD

Red Wings 3, Maple Leafs 3 (0:00): Red Wings outshooting Toronto 9-8 in the second, have 21-15 edge for the game.

Red Wings 3, Maple Leafs 3 (1:36): Lupul ties it on a wrist shot.

Red Wings 3, Maple Leafs 2 (8:15): Dion Phaneuf cuts the Maple Leafs' deficit in half.

Red Wings 3, Maple Leafs 1 (15:46): Maple Leafs on the power play when Smith goes off for tripping.

Red Wings 3, Maple Leafs 1 (19:59): Bernier replaces Reimer in the Maple Leafs' net.

FIRST PERIOD

Red Wings 3, Maple Leafs 1 (0:00): Red Wings outshoot Toronto 12-7.

Red Wings 3, Maple Leafs 1 (1:04): Leafs get the first power play when Miller goes off for tripping.

Red Wings 3, Maple Leafs 1 (1:52): Jurco gets his second goal in three games since being recalled. Spin move in front. From Sheahan and Tootoo.

Red Wings 2, Maple Leafs 1 (6:42): Joakim Andersson scores on a wraparound. His sixth of the season. From Alfredsson and Smith.

Red Wings 1, Maple Leafs 1 (7:39): Red Wings could have easily had a couple of goals on the same shift. Outshooting the Leafs 7-3.

Red Wings 1, Maple Leafs 1 (10:36): DeKeyser with an assist on Datysuk's goal. That's nine points in his last 12 games.

Red Wings 1, Maple Leafs 1 (11:03): Datsyuk comes out from behind the net and scores on a backhand to tie it.

Maple Leafs 1, Red Wings 0 (12:45): Franson scores on a slap shot from the point to open the scoring for Toronto.

Red Wings 0, Maple Leafs 0 (14:15): Brendan Smith picks up a loose puck at center ice, goes in alone on the right side but fires a wrist shot right into Reimer's pads.

Red Wings 0, Maple Leafs 0 (19:59): Danny DeKeyser back in the lineup for the Red Wings. Jakub Kindl out to make room for DeKeyser. Jonas Gustavsson starting in goal.

PREGAME

Detroit Red Wings' fans will get a preview of the upcoming Winter Classic tonight.

Well, without the giant stadium, 100,000-plus fans and potentially frigid outdoor weather.

But the teams will be the same as the Red Wings visit the Toronto Maple Leafs at Air Canada Centre 10 days before the teams are scheduled to meet in the Winter Classic New Year's Day at Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor before the largest crowd ever to witness a hockey game.

Tonight's game will mark the first time in almost two years the Original Six rivals have met. The last time they played was Jan. 7, 2012, when the Maple Leafs won 4-3 in Toronto.

Two points separate the Red Wings (16-12-9) and Maple Leafs (18-16-3) in the Eastern Conference standings. They're holding down the final two playoff spots in the East.

Join Brendan Savage and Ansar Khan to discuss all of tonight's action from start to finish.



Red Wings' Jimmy Howard (MCL) ahead of schedule, aiming to return before Jan. 1 Winter Classic

Ansar Khan


TORONTO – Detroit Red Wings goaltender Jimmy Howard was back on the ice Saturday morning with his teammates, with special brown pads, glove and blocker, equipment he will wear for the Winter Classic.

Howard is confident he will return for the Jan. 1 outdoor extravaganza at Michigan Stadium against the Toronto Maple Leafs. He has been out since Dec. 11 with a sprained left MCL.

“We’re ahead of schedule, we’ve been doing a great job, rehabbing hard with (trainers) Piet (Van Zant) and Russ (Baumann), training with Renzo (strength and conditioning coach Pete Renzetti),” Howard said after the morning skate at the Air Canada Centre. “Hopefully tomorrow I’ll be able to let the pads hit the ice.”

If all goes according to plan, Howard will back-up Jonas Gustavsson Dec. 28 in Florida, start Dec. 30 in Nashville and play in the Winter Classic.

“I don’t think that’s out of the possibility, barring setbacks,” Howard said. “We’ve been working really hard and the knee’s really responding, so it’s good to see.”

He said his chances of being ready for the Winter Classic were 50-50 when he got injured. Now he places them at 75 percent.

“I really don’t want to miss that; it’s been a year and a half just waiting for it,” Howard said. “But at the same time I’m going to be smart about it. If it’s not feeling right, I’m not going to force the issue.”

Howard said he will have about 50 family members and friends coming from out of town for the Winter Classic.

“I’m looking forward to sharing the whole experience with my family and friends,” Howard said. “I’m looking forward to all of them enjoying themselves, but at the same time remember that it’s still a very important game and there’s two points on the line.”

Howard said making the U.S. Olympic team, which will be announced at the Winter Classic, is “the farthest thing on my mind right now.”

Teams are not allowed to practice during the three-day Christmas break (Dec. 24-26), but Howard isn’t concerned that the time away will slow his progress.

“We got a plan,” Howard said. “I’ll take some of the mobile (training) units home with me and set it up. I know how all the stuff works so it’ll be easy that way.”

Others getting closer to return

General manager Ken Holland said he thinks Johan Franzen (concussion) will be ready to play Dec. 28. Franzen, however, hasn’t skated with the team since getting injured last Sunday.

Justin Abdelkader (concussion) was hoping to be cleared this afternoon after having some neurological tests, Holland said. If so, he can play Monday against the New York Islanders at Joe Louis Arena.

Holland said if Darren Helm (sprained shoulder) doesn’t play Monday he’ll return on Dec. 28.

Gustav Nyquist (groin) might play Monday. If not, he should be ready for the 28th.

The club is confident Henrik Zetterberg will play on the 28th, the first game he is eligible to return from long-term injured reserve.



Jakub Kindl, scratched from Red Wings' lineup tonight, says he needs to work harder, compete more

Ansar Khan


TORONTO – Defenseman Jakub Kindl was arguably the Detroit Red Wings’ most improved player last season.

Kindl was strong defensively, chipped in some offense (13 points in 41 games) and led the club’s defensemen with a plus-15 rating.

It earned him a four-year, $9.6 million contract extension in the off-season.

Kindl hasn’t been as sharp this season, and tonight he will be a healthy scratch against the Toronto Maple Leafs at the Air Canada Centre (7 p.m., Fox Sports Detroit).

Kindl is the odd-man out because Danny DeKeyser will return after missing 15 games with a separated shoulder.

“I wouldn’t say disappointed; I just got to work harder,” Kindl said. “Just got to work harder, compete more and I’m sure if I do that I’ll be back in the lineup soon.”

Kindl has 10 points (goal, nine assists) in 37 games but he and Kyle Quincey are tied for the worst plus-minus on the team (minus-10).

Kind took his benching in stride, even joked that he wouldn’t have ate so much the night before had he known he wasn’t playing.

Meanwhile, DeKeyser is hoping to pick up where he left off. He had eight points (two goals, six assists) during a 10-game stretch before getting injured on Nov. 19.

“Once you get out there and start playing more and start making good plays, you kind of get into a good rhythm and good grove and just feel like you make good plays every time,” DeKeyser said. “It just comes with confidence and just playing.”

DeKeyser will be paired with Quincey.

“He’s a good player," coach Mike Babcock said of DeKeyser. Any player that’s been out a long time – it’s the NHL, it’s hard to jump right back in, but we’re confident he can make a difference for us so we’ll give him a good opportunity tonight.”

Babcock said there are no lineup changes at forward. He said he might change his lines a little bit but wouldn't reveal specifics. Here is how they started Thursday’s 3-2 overtime victory over Calgary:

Tomas Jurco-Pavel Datsyuk-Daniel Alfredsson

Drew Miller-Joakim Andersson-Tomas Tatar

Daniel Cleary-Luke Glendening-Patrick Eaves

Todd Bertuzzi-Riley Sheahan-Jordin Tootoo

There are tonight's defense pairs:

Jonathan Ericsson-Niklas Kronwall

Kyle Quincey-Danny DeKeyser

Brian Lashoff-Brendan Smith

Jonas Gustavsson (starting)

Petr Mrazek



Red Wings' Stephen Weiss has a sports hernia; club deciding whether surgery is the next step

Ansar Khan

on December 21, 2013 at 10:32 AM, updated December 21, 2013 at 2:43 PM

TORONTO -- Detroit Red Wings center Stephen Weiss has a sports hernia and is deciding on the next course of action.

Doctors have recommended surgery, which would sideline him until after the Olympic break (Feb. 9-25).

“(Weiss) has got all the information, so obviously he’s going to have to (make the decision)," general manager Ken Holland said. “One option is you can wait 2-3 weeks, do conservative treatment and then try again and hope to get him through the year.

"We think he’s going to need surgery in the off-season if he doesn’t have it now. They can so some things to try to help it along, or if he has surgery now, the good news is there’s a 2½-week Olympic break and he probably would be ready to go after the Olympic break.”

Weiss saw Dr. William Meyers, a specialist in Philadelphia, on Friday, after missing five games with what he thought was a groin issue. He sat out six games in November with what the club now believes is the same problem.

“Doctors also said we can go conservative, wait 2-3 weeks and then he can skate and we’ll try to get him through, and if not, at that point we’ll do surgery," Holland said.

Holland said the club will have no salary-cap issues once its injured players return because it will get significant cap relief when Weiss goes on long-term injured reserve.

It has been a rough season for the 30-year-old the club signed to a five-year, $24.5 million contract on July 5. He has just two goals and two assists in 26 games.



Detroit Red Wings beat Toronto Maple Leafs in shootout

AP

Posted: 12/21/13, 10:55 PM EST |

TORONTO (AP) — Daniel Alfredsson scored the shootout winner for Detroit in the Red Wings’ 5-4 victory over the Toronto Maple Leafs on Saturday night in a Winter Classic preview.

The Red Wings had lost 11 straight shootouts, six this season.

Tomas Tatar scored for Detroit with 6:16 left in regulation to tie it at 4.

Pavel Datsyuk, Joakim Andersson and Tomas Jurco had first-period goals for the Red Wings.

David Clarkson, Dion Phaneuf, Joffrey Lupul and Cody Franson scored for Toronto. The Maple Leafs have lost six of their last eight games.

The teams will meet again in the Winter Classic at Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor on Jan. 1.

Toronto starter James Reimer was pulled after giving up three goals on 12 shots in the first period. Jonathan Bernier made 25 saves in relief.

Former Leafs goalie Jonas Gustavsson gave up four goals on 23 shots, then stopped James van Riemsdyk, Lupul and Mason Raymond in the shootout. It was Gustavsson’s third straight start as his work load has increased with starter Jimmy Howard injured.

Datsyuk also scored in the shootout for Detroit.

NOTES — The Red Wings were playing without the injured Howard (knee), captain Henrik Zetterberg (back), center Stephen Weiss (sports hernia) and forwards Gustav Nyquist (groin), Johan Franzen (concussion) and Justin Abdelkader (concussion). They got defenseman Danny DeKeyser back after he missed 15 games with a shoulder injury. ... Defensemen Mark Fraser and Paul Ranger and forward Frazer McLaren were healthy scratches for the Leafs.

Macomb Daily LOADED: 12.22.2013

730716 Edmonton Oilers

Oilers sing the Blues

By Joanne Ireland, Edmonton JournalDecember 21, 2013 11:52 PM

EDMONTON - The door to Edmonton’s locker-room remained closed long after the St. Louis Blues had thumped the Oilers 6-0 — long enough for head coach Dallas Eakins to have his say.

He questioned the players about their inability to sustain the level of play that they exhibited in the first period of Saturday’s game, and how it was that the team could just roll over and give the game to the Rexall Place visitors.

It was, of course, just one more miserable night for a team that has lost six straight games, 24 of the 38 they’ve played since the season opened with far more promise than this.

The Oilers have now been shutout six times — and three of those shutouts have come in their last five outings. Four of the six were on home ice, where they have given up a staggering 62 goals in 17 games at Rexall.

The power play was 0-for-4, so it’s now gone six straight games without producing a goal. It’s mustered just one in the last eight while giving up three short-handed goals in that same span.

“It’s like we love misery,” said Eakins. “I’ve had enough misery already and we have some players who have been here for a number of years. They have to be done with it. There has to be a change in the commitment level and the accountability — not from me but from within the room. That’s where it has to start.

“If it doesn’t start in there, this is just going to continue. It just will. I can sit guys out. I can yell at them, you can do all these things as a coach but you need guys in the room really holding each other accountable and not looking the other way.”

The Oilers got off to an impressive start, outshooting the Blues 14-5 in the first 20 minutes, but seconds after their first power play had expired, Ilya Bryzgalov ventured out to play the puck and didn’t get back in time to stop Chris Stewart’s one-timer.

It was the first of three Stewart would score before the end of the night, giving him his first hat trick as a member of the Blues. His last three goal night was on Oct. 28, 2010 when he was with the Colorado Avalanche.

St. Louis, an impressive 24-7-4, also got a second-period goal from Brenden Morrow, an even strength marker from Jaden Schwartz — who scored 52 seconds after Stewart notched his second — and a long-range goal from Patrick Berglund. The Blues went on to outshoot the Oilers 33-23.

“What is it, six (losses) in a row now?” said David Perron. “There are a lot of things that aren’t going well. We play some good spans of hockey but in this league it needs to be longer than 20 minutes. People have to get pissed off in this room.

“If I had been the coach, I would have been tearing the whole room apart but he’s trying to figure it out himself too. Like he said, how can we play that way in the first and not follow it up.”

“We played a great first period then we made a couple of mistakes and everything falls apart,” said Ales Hemsky. “It’s really frustrating. We just have to show up tomorrow and work hard and try to get better. Not try. We have to get better. We all have to face the mirror and ask if you’re a positive factor or a negative factor.”

Oil drops — Boyd Gordon was out for the opening faceoff but left for the better part of the period after he was pelted with a puck. After he was stitched up, he returned to close out the first period. He finished with a 71 per cent win percentage in the faceoff circle ... Nail Yakupov was pulled off the power play before Saturday’s game as was Justin Schultz, who was out for 41 seconds through the first three- man advantage.

Edmonton Journal: LOADED: 12.22.2013


Chris Stewart on Alex Ovechkin scoring pace for Blues

December 22, 2013. 12:05 am •

Jim Matheson

The St. Louis Blues were supposed to heading to the Century Grill for a team meal Saturday after leaving Rexall Place, before flying to Calgary but did they really need to eat twice?

They’d already chewed up the Edmonton Oilers and spit them out.

And this, ladies and gentlemen, is the Oilers TEAM. The cavalry isn’t coming. They’ve not used excuses–good on them–but nobody can say they’re getting their butts kicked because they, say, have injuries to Taylor Hall or Ryan Nugent-Hopkins or Andrew Ference or Jordan Eberle. This is their lineup, for better or worse, as we approach the halfway point (38 games) in the schedule and can it get any worse than 6-zip at home, booed off the ice again?This is now 3-0 (Dallas), 4-0 (Toronto), 5-0 (Detroit) and this one at Rexall Place in the first 17 games here.

They didn’t have Mark Arcobello (ribs) and Ryan Jones (blow to his head that knocked him out in practice Saturday morning) and sat Philip Larsen on defence for Corey Potter as a No. 6 guy, but, again, they can’t say they’ve got too many guys seeing the team doctor as, say, Pittsburgh can or the Red Wings . Again, what you see is what you get if you’re an Oiler fan.

They shot their bolt in the first 20 minutes, outshooting the Blues 14-5 with maybe their best first-period of the year at home, but trailed 1-0 on a risky play that went bad by goalie Ilya Bryzgalov, who made the mistake early and an awful one late–on the first trying to clear the puck up the boards that Chris Stewart finished off with a virtual empty-netter and the last one when Patrik Berglund’s muffin hit the goalie in the mitt and tumbled into the net.

After the first period when Blues’ goalie Brian Elliott stopped everything and the Oilers will to win seemed to dissipate as it often does with a fragile team, the visitors maybe got a mouthful from coach Ken Hitchcock, or he got out the ruler to rap some knuckles, because they went and suffocated the Oilers 28-9 on the shot-clock after that, with four goals in the third, and they did it without their best player Alexander Steen. He appeared to hurt his leg but Hitchcock wasn’t offering a medical update.

“We owed this one to our goalie,” said Hitchcock.

“Our goalie was our best player. We’ve had some starts like this, some we’ve recovered from, some we haven’t We were disappointed after I thought we’d turned the corner in the Montreal game (5-1 on Thursday in St. Louis) but the old stuff came back in the first period (they were outchanced by Elliott’s reckoning 11-2). We snapped to attention in the second and third periods,” said Hitchcock.

Stewart had three goals on four shots, which gives him eight goals on his last 12 shots.

“Mike Bossy stuff or (Alex) Ovechkin,” somebody tossed at Stewart afterwards.

“Ovechkin? Yeah, sure,” he said with a laugh.

He’s probably right. The Zamboni driver probably could have scored his three. The first when Jaden Schwartz intercepted Bryzgalov’s clear and fed Stewart, the second 106 seconds into the third from the slot off a sweet feed from from Berglund, the third when Derek Roy sent a pass through the skates of an Oilers’ defender right to Stewart.

Again, eight goals in his last 12 shots? “Guess I better keep shooting,” he chuckled.

The first one where Bryzgalov’s attempt to move it failed, Stewart’s eyes were as big as man-hole covers. “I came off the bench and was praying Schwartzie saw me,” he said.

Two more in the third and he had his third career hat-trick. He had no goals in 10 October games, but has 13 in his last 25, and eight in his last six. “After the first month I decided I wasn’t going to pass up any more chances, who has 19 points in the same 25 games.

“It’s the continuity with that line (Roy and Morrow),” said Hitchcock. “Three weeks ago they weren’t automatic, but now there’s great reads. They know where Brenden’s going to be and where Derek’s going to be. From the red-line in they were great.”

“In the first month, he (Stewart) was guilty of making the next play, now he’s just going into the shooting areas and firing away. His release is unbelieveable. We spent some one-on-one time with him and got him to change his mind-set, too, in the value in checking, rather than just score goals. As he started to value checking, he started to get odd-man rushes and goals,” said Hitchcock.

Could Stewart see the Oilers getting discouraged?

“Yeah, I think so. They’ve got some high-end talent…the more time you can make them spend in their zone, it can be frustrating,” he said.

And it doesn’t get more frustrating than six losses in a row and six goals in that time, three shutouts in their last five games. Twenty-three goals for the teams they played.

Again, this is their team, no reinforcements coming.GM Craig MacTavish has traded Ladislav Smid for a good young prospect goalie Laurent Brossoit who may play on the team when the new building is up and running, backup goalie Jason LaBarbera for futures and farmhand Linus Omark for a conditional sixth-round draft pick in June.

It doesn’t appear MacTavish is making any blockbusters anytime soon (he’d have to move Hall, or RNH or Eberle for that to happen and he’s not going to do that) and,, for the most part because it’s almost impossible to make a deal in this tight cap world. MacTavish can’t even shuffle some deck chairs with a minor trade. It appears he will wait until March 5 when he has a raft of UFA’s–Ales Hemsky, both goalies, Bryzgalov and Devan Dubnyk, Nick Schultz and Potter on defence, Ryan Smyth and Jones. His phone will be ringing then.

Until then, it’s plainly obvious the Oilers are flat-out not good enough. They have beaten three teams–Montreal, Colorado and New Jersey–in the playoffs. They have been beaten by three or more goals 11 times. Enough of the negative stuff.

Christmas is coming. Time to think about happier stuff.



Edmonton Oilers Taylor Hall tells HNIC’s After Hours he and teammates just have to fight through current circumstances

December 21, 2013. 11:34 pm •

John MacKinnon

His team thumped 6-0 by the St. Louis Blues on Saturday night at Rexall Place, left winger Taylor Hall still showed up on CBC’s post-game fixture, After Hours, and answered all the questions.

Among other things, Hall said he has no answers for the current slump the Oilers are slogging through (six losses in a row; outscored 24-6 over that stretch), but that he and his teammates just have to fight through their current circumstances and cobble together a successful game.



Magnus Paajarvi still finding his way with the St. Louis Blues

December 21, 2013. 2:45 pm •

Joanne Ireland

The transition has been far from seamless for Magnus Paajarvi, who returns to Rexall Place tonight as a member of the St. Louis Blues. But the team is winning, and he does have a head coach who sees a future fit.

Drafted 10th overall by the Oilers in 2009, Paajarvi spent his first three seasons with the club then found himself in St. Louis in a deal that delivered David Perron to Edmonton. He had played only four games with the Blues before a chest injury knocked him out of the lineup for a month.

“Magnus had a great start to the season with us then he got a very significant injury. He struggled until the last two games but the way we play and with the style of game we have, he’s a really good fit,” said Blues head coach Ken Hitchcock.

“He’s got enough skill to make plays off the rush but he’s tremendous on the forecheck . . . He’s just starting to dig in again.

“But this is an emerging role. We’re asking him to play a big man’s game, and he’s not a big man yet. He’s 22 and he’s got the body of a 19-year-old.”

Paajarvi, who’s spent more than a few nights in the press box since he’s come back from his injury, will play on the fourth line tonight with Maxim Lapierre and Chris Porter.

He was quick to admit he does have work to do but he’s confident he is on the right track. The injury certainly didn’t help. He’d never missed a game with an injury before, then he was out for nine straight.

“It was a bit weird to take the bus to the rink but I’m not going to think about it too much. I had three pretty good years here, a lot of good memories but now I’m with a new team,” said Paajarvi, who arrived with two goals in 15 games. “I do have a different role here but I’m also aware of what kind of team I’m on. We’re a contender.”

Perron, meanwhile, had spent six seasons with the Blues but he has quickly evolved into an impact player for the Oilers. Head coach Dallas Eakins said he’s been asked to play a lot of different roles for his new club and has done so willing.

“(He’s) just nodded his head. I love those bobble head players,” said Eakins. “He is what we want to rub off on our whole group.”



A wonderful step back in time for Ken Hitchcock

December 21, 2013. 2:03 pm •

Jim Matheson

Ken Hitchcock turned 62 on Wednesday but two nights later at a dinner at a downtown Edmonton restaurant, the St. Louis Blues coach with 628 NHL wins took a step back in time to when he was 12 and a member of the infamous Riverside Rats golf pack.

Hitchcock and a group of his old buddies–Brent Bailey, Brent Hughes, the Godsell brothers–Paul and Steve–Felix Stark, Jan Willey, Don Ovelson, Steve Kuchmak–gathered for the first time and spun tales of the good, old days when they were winning junior golf tournaments around the city, raising a little hell, and when they got to, say, 15 years old, playing big money games against the men at Riverside.

Hitchcock says he’s a 14 to 15 handicap golfer these days but back then all the Rats were five and under handicaps, ripping it up at the public track Riverside with the wonderful late club pro Sandy Robertson looking out for them. When they weren’t beating each other’s brains out, they were doing terrifically well in local tournaments. They were 14 and 15-year-olds, winning tournaments against kids four years older. I know because I covered golf then and saw them all.

“We’d play on the weekend at Riverside and sometimes you’d have 20 to 25 games going on at the same time and you had to be really focused. We were playing with mum’s milk money. You had a summer job but you played for cash. You could win $150 in a day or lose $150. The men were in it too, men and us junior and the men wanted to kick our butts,” said Hitchcock, who was 15 at the time when he first started with the real golf gambling.

“If you had a bad day you needed to spend another couple of days working. I did OK. My game pissed a lot of people off (great short game). All the games going…you needed two scorecards, one for the right pocket and one for the left. The one for the left had all your games going. It was competitive, man.”

“We used to line up on Wednesdays at 4 in the morning at Riverside to get our tee times for the weekend, with the men. Men and boys, 10 to 15 foursomes. You’d be sitting in a lawn chair at 4 in the morning. Then, you’d get to the course at 7:15 for an 8:15 tee time Saturday and Sunday, and make all your bets and then you played. You’d put $10 or $20 into a pot and away you’d go. A guy who won low gross, man, he won a lot money. And low net? We needed a handicap guard to make sure they were right,” chuckled Hitchcock.

Hitchcock is now one of the most successful hockey coaches of all-time–eighth in career NHL –and he doesn’t have to worry where his next buck is coming from. He did when he was a kid, though, especially gambling with money he didn’t have, like Lee Trevino used to. He did this from when he was 15 until he was 30, every summer

“Don Ovelson’s dad gave me a job twice a week when I was young, twisting oil plugs in the oil and gas business and I’d make my $80, $90 a night and that’s what I’d use for the golf games,” he said.

He lived at the golf course when he was a teenager. He hadn’t gotten together with all of his old friends in years, rushing in and out of town for NHL games, though. He managed to score a luxury box for the guys for Saturday’s game.

“It was the most incredibly competitive group of athletes I’ve ever been around and that’s what helped us later in life, I think,” said Hitchcock, who was part of Mike Babcock’s Canadian Olympic gold medal team in 2010 and will also be in Sochi in February. “I knew we angered a lot of people in the city with our displays (youthful exuberance in tournaments) but we were a band.”

“The only one of us still playing really well is Bailey, who is a one (handicap) at Windermere. He was always the best with his all-around game. We were all whining last night about our games today. We all hit it shorter and we all talk better than we played,” said Hitchcock.

There might have been a few clubs thrown in anger in those days, including by Hitchcock. “Me? Not that I can remember, but my memory’s pretty short” laughed Hitchcock. “The North Saskatchewan is full of a lot of clubs.”



Ryan Jones knocked out at morning skate; Edmonton Oilers coach Dallas Eakins makes changes prior to game against St. Louis Blues

December 21, 2013. 1:32 pm •

Joanne Ireland

Tough turn of events for Ryan Jones, who bumped into defenceman Andrew Ference at the morning skate and wound up unconscious on the ice.

It wasn’t a hit of any notable impact but Jones was clipped in the wrong spot. He was lucid after he was helped off the ice.

“We just ran into each other. It was very weird,” said Ference. “I hope he’s all right.”

“Crazy,” said head coach Dallas Eakins. “He got hit in the perfect spot and was out cold on the ice.”

Jesse Joensuu, who had been scratched for the previous two games, was skating with Anton Lander and Ales Hemsky in preparation for tonight’s game against the visiting St. Louis Blues, so Jones may not have had a spot anyway.

Eakins revamped three of his lines to get some heavier players in the mix. Luke Gazdic was skating with Sam Gagner and Nail Yakupov while Ryan Smyth, Boyd Gordon and David Perron made up another line. Only the combo of Taylor Hall-Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Jordan Eberle remains intact.

The second power play unit has been changed up as well — and rightly so. The Oilers have scored just one power play goal in the last seven games but have given up three shorthanded goals in that same stretch.

“Playing on the power play is a privilege. I don’t care if you’re in Pee Wee or in the NHL, it is a privilege to go out . . . and we’ve given players chance after chance after chance,” said Eakins.

“The units haven’t changed at all so we’ve said, you get your five-on-five game in check then you’ll earn the privilege to play on the power play.”

The Oilers, who are dragging a five-game losing streak into the game, did not skate on Friday and as a consequence, Eakins wanted to go over some things on the ice in the morning. When he sensed some disinterest, he didn’t disguise his frustration.

“These are desperate times. We have to do everything we can to win the game and we have to have discipline in our game. What we ask our players to do is do the right thing the right way all the time,” Eakins continued. “This morning, we weren’t doing the right thing, we weren’t doing it the right way, and we were doing it about half the time.

“But that was a minor snap. I threw a marker. For me, that was a two out of 10.”

Oil drops

Ilya Bryzgalov will start in net for the Oilers; Brian Elliott gets net for St. Louis . . . Defenceman Corey Potter is back on the blue line after serving a two-game suspension for his hit on Nick Bonino of the Anaheim Ducks . . . The Blues David Backes, who has been out for the last two games with a concussion, is back in the lineup . . . Chris Stewart has five goals and six points in his last five games . . . Alex Steen’s next goal will give him a career high 25.



Oilers lose sixth in a row

By Robert Tychkowski,Edmonton Sun


The Edmonton Oilers tried their best and kept it close for a while, but lost a 6-0 decision to the LA Kings.

Or was it the Anehim Ducks? Or Boston Bruins?

Whatever. Doesn’t matter.

Point is, the Oilers lost again. Didn’t generate much on the power play, couldn’t finish their chances, stumbled into a some bad defensive lapses, got crappy goaltending, weren’t strong enough...

You know, the usual.

They’re frustrated and need to be more consisted and use their speed against big teams and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

The Oilers, who’ve now lost 18 of the last 19 games when returning home from a road trip of two or more games, kept it close for as long as they could - 2-0 through 40 minutes - before St. Louis boot-heeled them into defeat with two goals 53 seconds apart to start the third and about three or four more after that.

Whatever. Doesn’t matter. Thanks for coming.

“We have this uncanny ability to shoot ourselves in the foot,” said head coach Dallas Eakins, who ripped into the players during a length venting session after the game.

“It’s like we love misery. I’ve had enough misery. I’ve only been here awhile and these players have to be tired of it. There has to be a change in the commitment level and accountability.”

The Oilers were shut out for the sixth time this season and third time in the last five games.

“It’s tough to win games when you’re not scoring,” said winger Jordan Eberle. “And it’s tough to win games when you’re letting in six, too.”

The Oilers were booed off the ice by the fans again, who seem to think

“Once it’s four or five nothing you can see the frustration of the fans,” said former Blue David Perron. “If I was sitting in the stands I might be doing the same or probably worse. What is it, six in a row now? There are a lot of things that aren’t going well.”

He doesn’t blame Eakins, either.

“If I was the coach I think I would have been tearing the whole room apart,” said Perron. “He’s still trying to figure it out himself, too. People have to get pissed off in this room. We just take it. Everyone has to get pissed off.”

In what has become a typical refrain around the OIlers these days, they played solid for a while, (out-shooting the Blues 14-5 in the first period) but still came out of it trailing 1-0 after Chris Stewart opened the scoring.

The shots were 10-2 Edmonton at the time.

The momentum took a violent swing the other way in the second period, with St. Louis out-shooting Edmonton 14-4 and expanding their lead to 2-0 on a beautiful connect the dots play that consisted of five tape-to-tape passes as Brenden Morrow, Stewart and Derek Roy danced through Jeff Petry and Anton Belov at 5:50.

The Blues poured it on in the third: Stewart made it 4-0 at 1:46, Jaden Schwartz made it 4-0 at 2:38, Stewart’s hat-trick goal made it 5-0 at 7:27 and Ilya Bryggalov let in another floater at 12:46.

“I wasn’t good enough tonight,” said Bryzgalov. “I didn’t give our guys a chance to win.”

What happens now? It’s the same game being played over and over and the same things being said over and over. And nothing ever changes.

“We just talked about that,” said Eberle. “The coach can’t do anything, the GM can’t do anything. The fans can’t do anything. It comes down to the guys in here. We’ve said the same things over and over again and it starts to piss you off when you’re just not doing it.

“The biggest thing I see in our game right now, the thing that separates us from good teams, is we’re not on the same page. We don’t play like a team. It’s been like that in too many games.”

Edmonton Sun: LOADED: 12.22.2013


Former Oiler Paajarvi returns with Blues to face his former team

By Derek Van Diest ,Edmonton Sun


Magnus Paajarvi is enjoying his reduced role on a better team.

The St. Louis Blues winger is still trying to find his comfort zone after being traded from the Edmonton Oilers this summer.

An injury set him back early in the year, but having battled back, is now starting to get into the good graces of his head coach.

“I started off well, then I got injured and I was away for a month,” Paajarvi said. “I came back and it’s been up and down. I’m still trying to find it.

“I do have a different roll here a little bit, but I’m also aware of what kind of team I’m on. I’m playing on a contender and it’s really nice to be here. I’m aware of the situation, but it’s getting better.”

Heading into Saturday’s game against the Oilers, Paajarvi had two goals in 15 games. He suffered a chest injury early in the year, which knocked him out of the lineup.

“It was tough, it was only 10 games in and I was just starting to get a rhythm and momentum,” Paajarvi said. “It happens, although I had never missed games before in the league, so coming into a new team and missing games, that wasn’t fun.

“But that’s over and the team is still winning, so that’s good.”

Paajarvi, 22, was acquired by the Blues along with a second-round pick for David Perron this past off-season. While Perron has stepped in and excelled with the Oilers, who languish at the bottom of the standings, Paajarvi has had to find his way with the Blues, who are near the top.

“Magnus had a great start to the season with us and then he got a very significant injury,” said Blues head coach Ken Hitchcock. “He struggled until the last two games to come back from the injury. But the way we play and the style of game that we play, he’s a really good fit.

“He’s got enough skill to make plays on the rush, but he’s tremendous on the forecheck, he really hunts pucks. His first go until he got hurt, he won a lot of puck battles and used his reach and quickness to do that and now he’s just starting to dig in again.”

Originally selected in the first round – 10th overall – of the 2009 NHL draft, Paajarvi was projected to be a big part of the Oilers future.

He had 15 goals and 34 points in 80 games during his rookie season and was considered one of the team’s big three, along with Taylor Hall and Jordan Eberle. However, he was unable to maintain a place among the Oilers top six forwards, particularly when Ryan Nugent-Hopkins showed up on the scene.

Paajarvi eventually became expendable and was traded for Perron.

“What the Oilers were trying to do with him is what we’re trying to do,” Hitchcock said. “We’re trying to put him into a similar role and quite frankly, he was there and he was doing well and then he got hurt. The injury that he had doesn’t allow you to have a lot of confidence to go back in there and do what you need to do. But his confidence is back and he’s starting to look like the player that he was before.

“This is an emerging role, we need him to play a big-man’s game and he’s not a big man yet. He’s 22 and he’s got the body of a 19-year-old and it’s going to take a year, another good off-season for him to get back up to speed where we want him to be and the role that he needs to play for us is going to be effective.”

Playing on a better team, Paajarvi doesn’t have the pressure with the Blues he did in Edmonton to provide offence.

And if anyone can turn the product of Norrkoping, Sweden, into an effective two-way player, it would be Hitchcock, who has taken the Blues to the next level upon his arrival in St. Louis three seasons ago.

“It’s definitely different, we’ve been winning a lot here,” Paajarvi said. “It’s very nice and I know things have been tough in Edmonton. I know they have been playing really well, but haven’t been able to get wins. It’s tough, I know how it is, but I’m happy to be here in St. Louis.”

Edmonton Sun: LOADED: 12.22.2013

730724 Florida Panthers

Growing continuity helping Florida Panthers

By Geoff Kirbyson

Posted on Sun, Dec. 22, 2013

Perhaps all you need to know about the Panthers since Peter Horachek took the reins are the joyful sounds that echo down the hallway during their pregame warmup.

It was just a couple of months ago that the team could have been mistaken for a troupe of mimes while playing “two-touch” with a soccer ball before taking the ice.

“They did not say anything. They were a very quiet team,” the rookie head coach said.

But nowadays, they’re laughing, joking around and engaging in the kind of friendly trash talk that you’d expect from a group that has come back from the dead in the last seven weeks.

In fact, one member of the serving staff at the MTS Centre in Winnipeg told the coach during lunch on Saturday that his team is one of the chattier ones to come through town.

“They’re confident [now]. They like each other, they talk a lot, they chirp at each other in a fun way and that stems from believing where they are right now,” he said.

“I used to talk into video rooms when I took over and you could have heard a [pin drop]. Now when I walk in, it’s like, ‘holy cow.’ They’re just talking and talking. I’ll sometimes wait and let them talk it out because I think it’s good for them to have that kind of chatter.”

After a 3-9-4 start under former coach, Kevin Dineen — who is now at the helm of the Canadian Olympic women’s hockey team —the Horacheck-led Panthers have gone 11-9-1 to climb within six points of the playoff line.

They took six out of a possible eight points on their just-completed four-game Canadian road trip, winning in Montreal, Toronto and Ottawa before falling 5-2 to the Winnipeg Jets on Friday night. The loss snapped a five-game winning streak.

The Panthers kick off a five-game home stand with cross-state rival, the Tampa Bay Lightning, on Monday night at the BB&T Center.

So, how did the 53-year-old, who spent 15 years in the minors and then another decade as an assistant or associate in The Show before getting his first head coaching gig in the NHL, exorcise the Panthers’ demons so quickly?

Well, he could have started by taking a page out of any minor hockey association coaching guide — accentuate the positive.

“I don’t really talk about what they did or what they didn’t do, I just talked about what we have to do and what we are going to do and the way we have to play. It’s important not to talk about the negative. The negativity was all over [the place]. They felt it with every move. You have to get by it and get into a position where you feel confident and you feel everybody trusts each other,” he said.

Cultivating that kind of environment requires a combination of words, actions and accountability to the guy next to you, he said.

Horachek singled out Bjugstad and fellow rookie Aleksander Barkov, as well as the likes of Tomas Kopecky, Marcel Goc, Brian Campbell, Scottie Upshall and Krys Barch, as players who have stepped up as leaders since becoming coach.

“It’s going to grow. I expect the leadership to come from more than one guy. We don’t have Ed Jovanovski in the line-up anymore. We don’t have Bill Lindsay in the line-up anymore. These things have to be shared,” he said.

Miami Herald LOADED: 12.22.2013

730725 Florida Panthers

Panthers making noise with turnaround

By Craig Davis, Staff Writer

3:51 PM EST, December 21, 2013

Winning has cranked up the volume markedly around the Florida Panthers.

Even the Canadian media couldn't avoid taking notice as they streaked across eastern Canada on a five-game winning streak with conquests in Montreal, Toronto and Ottawa.

Or as interim coach Peter Horachek said after the streak ended Friday in a 5-2 loss to the Jets on the second night of a tough back-to-back: "When you're in the South you don't get a lot of respect until you come up here and win up here, mostly because Canadian media don't think much of the teams in the South."

The 11-9-1 surge since Horachek took over for fired Kevin Dineen has also had an audible effect internally.

"I've walked into some video rooms when I took over and you could have heard a small animal make noises. They did not say anything," Horacheck said.

And now?

"There was a comment made at lunch time that one of the [servers] said that our team is one of the chattier teams. They're confident. They like each other. They chirp at each other in a fun way, and that stems from that they believe in where they are right now."

That is a byproduct of having some success. Perhaps the Panthers did need a different voice in the room, the main reason General Manager Dale Tallon cited in making the coaching change.

"Pete has come in and done an absolutely great job. He's got us believing in a system that works," defenseman Tom Gilbert said. "Maybe we just needed a little more structure. Just the way he approaches the way he wants to play; guys understand and it's really easy to buy into it."

Horachek said the best early sign was that the players were receptive to the work ethic he stressed: "We needed to be a harder working team and we needed to play at a faster pace."

Second-year forward Jonathan Huberdeau said, "I think we're more aggressive. Before we were stepping back a little waiting for them to come at us. … I think we're putting pressure on [opposing] defensemen a lot. It's much more fun playing like this."

Keep in mind, the Panthers won a division title with Dineen two seasons ago and extended a playoff series to seven games against the New Jersey Devils, who went on to reach the Stanley Cup Finals that year.

Struggling to a 3-9-4 start this season under Dineen, goaltending was shaky. Tim Thomas was coming off a one-year layoff and was sidelined twice by groin troubles. Young Jacob Markstrom struggled and was eventually sent to the minors.

In addition to having to integrate several veterans who joined the team just before the season, the Panthers were counting on some very young players in key roles. Top draft pick Alexsander Barkov is 18. Another rookie, Nick Bjugstad, 21, missed training camp and the first six games with a concussion.

Now the two young centers are emerging as the key components of the top two lines.

"Barkov and Bjugstand are playing at such a high level. You don't see another team in the National Hockey League that has two first-year players being their No. 1 and No. 2 centermen. I can't remember a team that has had that," Horachek said.

Meanwhile, goaltending has stablized. When Thomas went on injured reserve with a recurrence of his groin troubles, veteran Scott Clemmensen stepped in for four consecutive wins.

Even after winning seven of their past nine and climbing to within six points (three wins) of the last playoff spot in the Eastern Conference, the Panthers remain a flawed team. Their power play is last in the league with 13 goals in 37 games. Their penalty killing ranks 29th of 30.

"Our specialty teams, they're bottom of the league. But beyond that, our 5-on-5 play has been great and goaltending has been great for us too," Gilbert said. "That's a factor of guys just buying in and believing if you just keep working hard and do the right things you'll give yourself a good chance to win every night."

"It's a group thing," forward Scottie Upshall said. "We're making each other accountable for playing hard and playing the right way."

Left wing Sean Bergenheim pointed to breaking the habit of falling behind early in games as a key factor in winning seven of the past nine. They scored first in each game on the trip, although Winnipeg seized momentum with two first-period power-play goals Friday.

"Even [Friday], you're learning how to deal with adversity," Horachek said of dealing with fatigue and early calls going against them. "This is part of the process. … "We won three out of four on the road. We're moving up, we're learning how to win."

The next step, he said, is learning to bounce back quickly after a loss. The Panthers open a five-game holiday homestand Monday against Tampa Bay.They are one one win away from their most ever in December (eight, 1995-96, 2005-06) with four games remaining.

While the turnaround has gotten the Panthers out of a deep hole and given them something meaningful to play for approaching the midpoint of the season, Horachek hasn't talked to the team about their place in the standings.

Right now he's content to listen when he walks into meetings with his suddenly raucous bunch.

"Now when I walk in there, it's like, holy, cow, they're just talking and talking," he said. "So sometimes I wait and let them talk it out. I'm OK with it. I want them to have fun and enjoy the process. … With the work, hopefully comes success."

Sun Sentinel LOADED: 12.22.2013

730726 Los Angeles Kings

Martin Jones, Anze Kopitar lead Kings to 3-2 shootout win

By Lisa Dillman

December 21, 2013, 7:16 p.m.

Ryan Getzlaf, Corey Perry, Teemu Selanne and now Matt Duchene, PA Parenteau and Ryan O'Reilly.

One former league most valuable player, another certain future Hall of Famer and others wildly gifted with world-class talent and offensive skill.

The only thing Kings' Martin Jones loses is his shutout The only thing Kings' Martin Jones loses is his shutout

Anaheim Ducks prevail over New Jersey Devils, 3-2 Anaheim Ducks prevail over New Jersey Devils, 3-2

Kings won't rush Jonathan Quick's return Kings won't rush Jonathan Quick's return

Still, Kings rookie goalie Martin Jones has stopped them all in separate shootouts, the classic one-on-one, high-noon-type showdown. This is what Jones had to do along the way to making the NHL record book, winning his first eight NHL starts.

BOX SCORE: Kings 3, Colorado 2 (SO)

With the Kings' 3-2 shootout win over the Colorado Avalanche on Saturday afternoon at Staples Center, Jones tied Bob Froese, who won his first eight starts in the 1982-83 season with the Philadelphia Flyers. For the Kings, who have won nine of their last 10 games, the goals came from Jeff Carter (11th of the season) in the first period and Justin Williams (12th) in the second period.

The first of the eight victories for Jones was a nine-round shootout Dec. 3 against the Ducks, in which he stopped all nine Anaheim players, Getzlaf, Perry and Selanne, among others.

This was the impressive bookend.

Jones denied the Avalanche trio of Duchene, Parenteau and O'Reilly, and Anze Kopitar secured the win for the Kings, as he was able to solve Colorado goalie Semyon Varlamov in the second round.

The Kings' room was not exactly buzzing about the record. But for differing reasons.

First, Jones looked bemused. He has heard of Froese but wasn't aware of the mark, which came well before Jones was born. It might as well have been a question about an Original Six goalie.

"I didn't even know that, to be honest," Jones said. "Honestly, I don't even know what the record is. To be honest, I'm not sure what you guys were talking about."

Another reporter later didn't even get to finish a question about Jones before Kings Coach Darryl Sutter interrupted him, having heard the word "accomplishment."

"I don't want to talk about it," Sutter said. "Talk about the team. One guy doesn't win games."

OK, so two guys won the shootout — Kopitar and Jones.

The most challenging save of the shootout was the first one, by Jones, on Duchene, who looked as if he had the rookie beaten after a clever fake.

"It was a pretty good move," Jones said. "It was a good fake and it got me out of position. I just tried to throw my legs back and take away as much of the bottom of the net as I could and I got lucky there."

Jones could move past Froese with a win Monday if he starts against the Dallas Stars. His goals-against average is 0.98 and save percentage .966.

Ray Emery won his first nine decisions with the Ottawa Senators, a distinction made by the Elias Sports Bureau, and that accomplishment was spread over several seasons.

"I don't know what to say, to be honest with you," Kopitar said about Jones. "You get a couple and it's pretty much a done deal. He's been great. I don't know how many times I've said this, but he's giving us a chance every night and that's all you want."

Jones has not allowed a goal in the first period of his eight wins, and has not given up three goals in a game. Both Avalanche goals came on the power play after the Kings led, 2-0. Defenseman Erik Johnson beat Jones stick side from the left circle, at 14:02 of the second period and O'Reilly tied it at 10:27 of the third period after Mike Richards had gone off for delay of game for closing his hand on the puck.

"Pretty skilled player down low," Jones said of O'Reilly. "That's the save we need in the third period, in a 2-1 hockey game. But it was a good play and he got it up pretty quick."

Sutter was not pleased with the defense in front of Jones.

"They had a rough night," he said. "We're so used to playing at a high level. Why is that? … We expect to be better than OK."

Fatigue could be a factor right before the Christmas break and the early start is often a problem with the Kings.

"We gutted it out," Kopitar said. "It shows the character of the team and the mental toughness."

LA Times: LOADED: 12.22.2013


Kings goalie Jones ties NHL mark with 8-0 start

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: Dec. 21, 2013 Updated: 9:41 p.m.

LOS ANGELES – Martin Jones has done something even Hall of Fame goalie Patrick Roy never did — win his first eight NHL games.

Roy watched Jones become the second goalie to accomplish that feat — from the other bench — as the 23-year-old phenom made 23 saves for the Kings and stopped all three shots in the shootout for a 3-2 victory over the Colorado Avalanche on Saturday.

Jones has allowed eight goals on 234 shots while filling in for the injured Jonathan Quick, and has posted shutouts against Montreal, Edmonton and the New York Islanders. The only other goalie to win his first eight games was Philadelphia's Bob Froese in the 1982-83 season.

“Honestly, I don't even know what the record is,” Jones said. “It's a good start and it's something to build off of. I just wanted to make sure I came in here and did the things that made me successful in the past.

“Every night our guys come to play, and the pride they take in their defensive game is pretty impressive. So I can't give them enough credit.”

This was the second shootout involving Jones, who in his NHL debut on Dec. 3 stopped all nine shots in the tiebreaker against the Ducks. In this one, he stopped Matt Duchene, PA Parenteau and Ryan O'Reilly.

“These guys can put together a pretty good shootout lineup, so you know you're going to face some skilled players,” Jones said. “I just try to stay patient and try not to bite on the first move all the time.”

The only goal in the shootout was by Anze Kopitar, the Kings' second shooter. Kopitar has scored the deciding goal in four of the Kings' six shootout wins.

“Any goalie for us that is back there, we have a lot of confidence in them,” Kopitar said. “It's up to the shooters to get a couple.”

Jeff Carter and Justin Williams scored for the Kings (25-8-4), who are off to their best start after 37 games and have won nine of 10. They are 22-1-2 when allowing fewer than three goals.

O'Reilly and Erik Johnson scored power-play goals, and Duchene had two assists for the Avalanche, 4-4-2 in their last 10 following a 17-5-5 start.

Semyon Varlamov made 37 saves, one day after prosecutors in Denver dropped a domestic violence case against him.

Down 2-0, Colorado cut the deficit in half at 14:02 of the second with Johnson's fifth goal and third in four games. He got a cross-ice pass from Duchene in the left circle and one-timed it to the short side past Jones' glove while Jarret Stoll was off for tripping.

“It was a good play by them, a low lateral play,” Jones said. “I got a decent read on it, but I just wasn't able to extend my blocker out far enough. I thought we deserved to win in regulation. We needed one more big save that we didn't get.”

The Avalanche, 2 for 39 on the power play in their previous 13 games, cashed in again with 9:33 left in regulation while Mike Richards served a delay-of-game penalty.

O'Reilly, playing in his 300th regular-season game, converted a pass from behind the net from Duchene for his 12th goal.

“I thought we showed a lot of character. Being down 2-0 in L.A. is not easy,” Roy said. “We had a big break on that power play, and you see how important it is to score on it. That was a big point for us, no doubt about it.”

The Kings came in having allowed six goals in 77 short-handed situations over their previous 21 games.

The Kings, who needed almost eight minutes to get their first shot, opened the scoring 32 seconds before the end of the first period. Varlamov made a glove save on Drew Doughty's one-timer from the top of the left circle, but

Carter beat defenseman Cory Sarich to the rebound and tucked his 11th goal past the goalie's outstretched left leg.

Williams made it 2-0 at 5:25 of the second, batting a fluttering puck over Varlamov's left shoulder for his team-high 12th goal.

NOTES: The Kings will always have a connection with Hollywood Park racetrack, which is closing its pari-mutuel windows for good following Sunday's card. The Kings' former home, the Forum, still sits just across the street from the Inglewood oval. One of “Hollypark's” most successful jockeys — Hall of Famer and 1976 Eclipse Award-winner Sandy Hawley — served as a penalty box timekeeper at Kings games during the `70s and `80s after hanging up his tack for the afternoon. … Four days before Christmas, the in-house camera crew showed a fan holding up a handmade sign with a photo of Jones and the words: “Glory to the newborn King.” … The Kings have been shut out only once this season — when the Avalanche beat them 1-0 at Staples Center on Nov. 23 with an overtime goal by McGinn and 33 saves by Varlamov.



Backstopped by Martin Jones, Kings beat Avalanche

By Elliott Teaford, Daily Breeze

Posted: 12/21/13, 5:55 PM PST | Updated: 3 hrs ago

The Kings were good, bad and indifferent Saturday afternoon at Staples Center.

They couldn’t be beaten, though.

They gave away a two-goal lead but still defeated the Colorado Avalanche 3-2 in a shootout despite having one of those rare games in which they weren’t at their best and almost paid for it with a defeat. They instead won their third in a row and ninth in 10 games.

“I think we’re on the right track,” Kings center Anze Kopitar said. “Is our game as sharp as it can be? Probably not, but we’re collecting points and that’s what it is this time of year. You have to collect points even though you’re maybe not playing the best hockey.

“The way this Pacific Division has been going, you lose a couple you fall back in a pretty big way. So, we just want to keep on going, keep on plugging away. We gutted it out (Saturday). It shows the character of the team and the mental toughness.”

Rookie goaltender Martin Jones stopped all three Avalanche shooters in a shootout, including a remarkable save after Colorado’s Matt Duchene faked him to the ice. Duchene appeared to have Jones beaten, but the 23-year-old stuck out his right leg and denied the Avalanche forward.

“Pretty good move,” Jones said. “Got me out of position. I just tried to throw my legs out and take away as much of the bottom of the net as I could and I got lucky there. He made a nice fake on the shot and got me to go down a little bit.”

Jones handled shots from PA Parenteau and Ryan O’Reilly a good deal easier in the second and third rounds. Kopitar scored the only goal in the shootout and made Jones a winner for the eighth consecutive start to begin his NHL career, tying a league record.

Bob Froese of the Philadelphia Flyers also won his first eight starts to begin his career in 1982-83. Ray Emery of the Ottawa Senators won nine consecutive decisions spread over three seasons beginning in 2002-03, but they weren’t all starts, to begin his career.

Jones said he had no idea he matched Froese’s mark and seemed confused when reporters asked him about the significance of such a remarkable start to his career. After all, Jones would have been in the minor leagues if No. 1 starter Jonathan Quick hadn’t suffered a groin injury Nov. 12.

“I didn’t know that, to be honest,” Jones said when reporters asked about matching Froese. “Honestly, I don’t know what the record is, so I don’t know what you guys are talking about. It’s a good start, but it’s something to build off and make sure I keep working here.”

Jones might want to brush up on his NHL history, especially if he intends to continue to play as well as he has during his first eight games. Once again, it was nearly impossible to find fault in his game, with the Avalanche beating him only on a pair of power plays.

Kings coach Darryl Sutter went into Grinch mode when asked about the significance of Jones’ superb play and grumbled when a reporter tried to get him talking about the North Vancouver, British Columbia, native.

“Talk about the team,” he said. “One guy doesn’t win games.”

The Kings actually might have lost to the Avalanche if not for Jones’ play, especially during the shootout. Jeff Carter and Justin Williams scored to give the Kings a 2-0 lead before the Avalanche rallied on power-play strikes by Erik Johnson and O’Reilly.

Sutter said he didn’t like the way the Kings played in front of Jones.

“They had a rough night,” Sutter said.

Someone asked, “Why was that?”

“Because we’re so used to playing at a high level,” Sutter said. “Why is that? We think we have, well, we do have the best goals-against in the league, so we expect to play at a high level. Why is that? We expect to be better than OK every night.”

LA Daily News: LOADED: 12.22.2013


Jones remains perfect, ties Froese’s record

Posted by JonRosen on December 21, 2013

Martin Jones received his share of shootout practice early in the season in the American Hockey League, when five of the first six Manchester Monarchs games extended past overtime.

In those five games, Jones led the team to a 3-2 record by stopping a perfectly respectable 18-of-23 shootout attempts.

National Hockey League shooters? Piece of cake. Jones remained perfect with the Los Angeles Kings by stopping all three Colorado Avalanche shooters and has now stopped all 12 shootout attempts through two opportunities this season.

With the win, he improved to 8-0-0 and tied the NHL record held by Bob Froese, who won each of his first eight games with Philadelphia in 1982-83. Should he win his next game, Jones will surpass Froese and tie Ray Emery’s record for the most consecutive winning decisions to start an NHL career, set between 2002-03 and 2005-06.

Jones has been so lights out that he was in the dark when it came to individual accolades.

“Honestly I don’t even know what the record is,” he said before noting that he was unaware of Froese’s record.

“It’s a good start, but again, it’s something to build off. I just want to make sure I keep working here.”

Through eight games, Jones is 8-0-0 with a 0.96 goals-against average and .966 save percentage.

He didn’t allow an even strength goal on Saturday and has not allowed a first period goal since joining the Kings. Though the Avalanche had solved him twice while on the power play, he saved his finest save for the shootout, when he stood toe-to-toe with world class forward Matt Duchene, who had scored in both of his shootout attempts this season.

Duchene beat him with a fake before a lunging Jones put his right pad on the sniper’s shot.

“It was a pretty good move. It was a good fake and it got me out of position,” Jones said. “I just tried to throw my legs back and take away as much of the bottom of the net as I could, and I got lucky there.”

The perfect shootout and the denial of all 22 even strength chances drew notice from the opposition.

“I think he’s got a great future in the NHL for sure. He looks really good,” P.A. Parenteau said after the game.

“I knew he was on a run, but I didn’t know him before that. I had no clue who he was and he’s made a name for himself. There’s no doubt about that right now. He looks really good between the pipes.”

Emotion? It wasn’t exactly flowing in the business-as-usual Kings locker room after the game. Jones, who has drawn notice for his steady demeanor – described as “unflappable” by one reporter after the game – articulated the team’s nature after the game.

“I think that’s the key, is to stay even,” he said. “There are going to be stretches where things go well and stretches where they don’t go well. If you can stay pretty even and keep working and make sure that you stick to what’s made you successful, that’s going to help a lot.”

LA Kings Insider: LOADED: 12.22.2013


Game 37 Preview: Colorado at Los Angeles

Saturday, December 21, 2013, 1:00 p.m. PT


STAPLES Center, Los Angeles, CA

Referees: #19 Gord Dwyer, #11 Kelly Sutherland

Linesmen: #88 Mike Cvik, #91 Don Henderson

FOX Sports West, KTLK 1150 AM

Los Angeles Projected Starting Goaltender – Martin Jones

2013-14 Season: 7 GP (7 GS) / 7-0-0 record / 0.85 GAA / .971 Sv% / 3 SHO

Career vs Colorado: First appearance

Last Game vs Colorado: First appearance

2013-14, Home: 3 (3) / 3-0-0 / 0.33 / .986 / 2

Colorado Projected Starting Goaltender – Semyon Varlamov

2013-14 Season: 25 GP (24 GS) / 16-8-1 record / 2.37 GAA / .924 Sv% / 1 SHO

Career vs Los Angeles: 7 (7) / 5-2-0 / 1.82 / .935 / 1

Last Game vs Los Angeles: 11/23/13 / 63 MP / 19-19 shots / 1-0 OTW

2013-14, Away: 9 (8) / 6-3-0 / 2.61 / .916 / 1

2013-14 Los Angeles Leaders

Total Points: Anze Kopitar (11-18=29)

Goals: Anze Kopitar (11-18=29), Justin Williams (11-11=22)

Assists: Mike Richards (6-21=27)

Plus/Minus: Anze Kopitar (+18; 11-18=29)

Penalty Minutes: Daniel Carcillo (57; 1-1=2)

Time On Ice: Drew Doughty (25:43; 6-12=18)

2013-14 Colorado Leaders

Total Points: Matt Duchene (16-15=31)

Goals: Matt Duchene (16-15=31)

Assists: Matt Duchene (16-15=31)

Plus/Minus: Jan Hejda (+20; 3-7=10)

Penalty Minutes: Cody McLeod (69; 2-5=7)

Time On Ice: Erik Johnson (22:18; 4-8=12)

Rankings and Statistics

Goals/Game: LAK – 13 / 2.67; COL – 8 / 2.88

Goals Against/Game: LAK – 1 / 1.86; COL – t-6 / 2.32

Power Play: LAK – 20 / 16.0%; COL – 24 / 14.7%

Penalty Kill: LAK – 5 / 86.4%; COL – 20 / 81.1%

Shots/Game: LAK – 10 / 30.9; COL – t-12 / 30.1

Shots Against/Game: LAK – 6 / 27.4; COL – 23 / 31.1

Faceoffs: LAK – 2 / 54.2%; COL – 18 / 49.2%

Save Percentage: LAK – 1 / .932; COL – 4 / .925

Noah Graham / National Hockey League

Los Angeles Projected Lines

Dwight King – Anze Kopitar – Jeff Carter

Dustin Brown – Jarret Stoll – Justin Williams

Trevor Lewis – Mike Richards – Tyler Toffoli

Kyle Clifford – Colin Fraser – Jordan Nolan

Jake Muzzin – Drew Doughty

Robyn Regehr – Slava Voynov

Alec Martinez – Matt Greene

Martin Jones

Ben Scrivens

Level of confidence in projected lines: B+. There are no morning skates prior to home afternoon games, so the above alignments represent the same lines that were used during the first period of the Los-Angeles San Jose game. Darryl Sutter acknowledged that Willie Mitchell is nearing a return. “He’d probably be available, but I’m happy with the six guys that are in there,” he said yesterday of the team’s defense. As the Kings are coming off a 4-1 win over the Sharks, lineup changes are unlikely.

Notes and milestones: The Kings are 58-47-12 all-time against the Avalanche, and are 34-18-8 at home in the all-time series. The teams will conclude the season series in the first game after the Olympic Break on February 26 in Denver. … Martin Jones is the first Kings goalie to win his first seven games with the club. The NHL record for consecutive winning games to start an NHL career is Bob Froese, who won his first eight games in 1982-93 with PHI. The NHL record for consecutive winning decisions to start an NHL career is Ray Emery, who won his first nine decisions with OTT. Emery’s streak started in 2002-03 and ended in 2005-06. … The Kings are averaging 3.33 goals per game in December and have recorded at least three goals in six of their last seven games. … The Kings are 8-1-0 in their last nine games, having outscored their opponents 30-11. They are 15-2-4 in their last 21 games. … The Kings have held their opponent scoreless in the first period in 20 of their last 21 games. … The Kings have allowed two goals or fewer in 20 of their last 21 games. … The Kings are 12-4-2 both at home and on the road. … The Kings’ 24-8-4 record (52 points) is the best 36-game record in club history. … The Kings have scored three power plays in their last 46 opportunities. … The Kings have killed off 71 of the last 77 penalties, dating back to November 7, and 64 of the last 69 penalties, dating back to November 14. … Jeff Carter has eight points in the last five games (3-5=8). … Dwight King has six points in the last four games (3-3=6). … Alec Martinez has three goals in the last six games. … Dustin Brown has gone 13 games without recording an assist and 25 games without recording a point on the power play. … Should he dress, Jordan Nolan will play in his 100th career game today.

Bill Wippert / National Hockey League

Colorado Projected Lines

Nathan MacKinnon – Matt Duchene – Ryan O’Reilly

Gabriel Landeskog – Paul Stastny – P.A. Parenteau

Jamie McGinn – John Mitchell – Max Talbot

Patrick Bordeleau – Marc-Andre Cliche – Cody McLeod

Jan Hejda – Erik Johnson

Cory Sarich – Andre Benoit

Tyson Barrie – Nate Guenin

Semyon Varlamov

Jean-Sebastien Giguere

Notes and milestones: Lines via Mile High Hockey. … At 23-10-1, Colorado has equaled its most wins through 34 games in franchise history. In 1994-95, the Avs were 23-8-3. Colorado’s 47 points represent the third highest haul through 34 games in franchise history. … Paul Stastny will appear in his 500th career game today, joining Anze Kopitar, Marc-Edouard Vlasic and Sidney Crosby as players from the 2005 draft class to have played in 500 games. … Jamie McGinn and Ryan O’Reilly will appear in their 300th career games today. … Jan Hejda will appear in his 499th career game. … Matt Duchene has 10 points (4-6=10) in his last five games. He has multi-point efforts in three straight games, which ties a career high. … The Avs

are 13-0-0 when leading after the first period and 18-1-1 when scoring the game’s first goal. … Colorado has a plus-17 goal differential in the second period. In the first period, overtime and the third period, Colorado has a combined plus-2 goal differential. … The Avs are 5-1 in games that extend past 60 minutes.

Graig Abel / National Hockey League



December 21 postgame quotes: Darryl Sutter


On Martin Jones’ accomplishments:

I don’t want to talk about it. Talk about the team. One guy doesn’t win games.

On the team’s turnaround at the end of the first period:

You know what? Our last two shifts of the first period were really good. They had an icing, so we were able to get Kopi’s line out there and they scored, and we were able to play the last 30 seconds with the puck because of Colin Fraser’s line. It wasn’t just the last shift. It was the two last shifts.

On the Kings looking to “stay out of the box”:

Well, you’re going to get penalties. It’s not ‘Stay out of the box,’ but Jarret’s was a tripping penalty. They’re both penalties – Jarret’s and Mike’s – against a team like that, especially when you’ve got Duchene, who’s arguably the best player in the league right now. You can’t take those.

On the team’s defense in front of Jones:

They had a rough night. [Reporter: Why is that?] Because we’re so used to playing at a high level. It’s not ‘Why is that?’ We do have the best goals against in the league, so we expect to play at a high level. So why is that? We expect not to be OK. We expect to be better than OK every night. [Reporter: You were pretty good at even strength though, weren’t you?] Yes.



December 21 postgame notes\


-The Kings improved to 59-47-12 all-time against the Colorado franchise, which includes a home record of 35-18-8 at home.

-Each of the last three Los Angeles-Colorado games has extended past 60 minutes. The Kings have won twice in a shootout, while the Avalanche won in overtime.

-The Kings are 9-1-0 in their last 10 games and have outscored their opponents 32-13, not counting shootout goals. They are 16-2-4 in the last 22 games

-Excluding shootout goals, the Kings have allowed two goals or fewer in 21 of the last 22 games.

-The Kings haven’t allowed a first period goal in 21 of the last 22 games.

-The Kings’ 25-8-4 record (54 points) is the best 37-game mark in club history.

-Martin Jones is 8-0-0, tying the NHL record for consecutive winning games to start a career. Bob Froese also won his first eight games with Philadelphia in 1982-83. Ray Emery won his first nine decisions with Ottawa between 2002-03 and 2005-06 to set the NHL record for consecutive winning decisions to start an NHL career.

-Martin Jones has stopped all 12 shootout attempts.

-The Kings allowed two power play goals in a game for the first time since their loss to Nashville on November 2.

-The Kings have scored three power plays in their last 48 opportunities.

-Jeff Carter has nine points in the last six games (4-5=9).

-Jordan Nolan played in his 100th career game.

-Anze Kopitar is now 5-for-7 in shootouts.

-Dustin Brown ended a 13-game assist drought by earning an assist on Justin Williams’ second period goal. He has gone 26 games without recording a point on the power play.

-Dustin Brown recorded a game-high eight hits.

-Justin Williams recorded a game-high six shots.

-Robyn Regehr logged 23:30 of ice time, a season high. He has logged at least 20 minutes of ice time in six straight games.

-Jake Muzzin recorded 24:01 of ice time, the fourth highest single-game total of his career.

-With two assists, Matt Duchene has 12 points (4-8=12) in his last six games. He has multi-point efforts in four straight games, a career high.

-The Kings won 39-of-64 faceoffs (61%). Among regular performers, Mike Richards won 7-11, Anze Kopitar won 8-of-17, Colin Fraser won 6-of-9, Jarret Stoll won 12-of-18, and Jeff Carter won 6-of-9.

The Kings are scheduled to practice at Toyota Sports Center at 10:30 a.m. on Sunday, December 22.



December 21 postgame quotes: Colorado

Posted by James Nicholson on December 21, 2013

Semyon Varlamov, on the game:

Tough game for us, for sure. After the first period, I think – not just the first one – I think that we played well for all three periods. We had some really good chances to score, but just didn’t score. Jones played well today, the other goalie. We get a point which is good.

Varlamov, on the assault charge against him being dropped:

I’m excited for sure. The process is over. Like I said before, I’m glad to be here today. I just want to say thank you for my teammates, for ownership, for the general manager, for the Avalanche fans for supporting me. That’s what I want to say. [Reporter: It’s over. You never seemed too worried about it.] Yeah, it’s over. I’m leaving everything behind right now. Right now I can sleep and focus on my job, on hockey and that’s it.

P.A. Parenteau, on the game:

I thought we can get out of this game with our head up. We played a strong game. It’s a really tough building to play in, they’re a really good squad and I think we played a pretty strong game overall.

Parenteau, on coming back to tie the game:

I think that’s the difference with last year. We had a timeout there. Patty talked to us, and said to stay with the plan, to start playing with more confidence and we did that. We came back in the game and it was nice to see. Last year, we probably would’ve packed it in, and that’s the big difference between last year’s team and this year’s team.

Parenteau, on the shootout:

No, [Martin Jones] didn’t bite on it. He kind of went up on me too, same with Duchy. The puck went up a couple times. It’s tough to get an extra point like that in the shootout after a battle like that. But it is what it is. It’s the rule. It’s part of the game. But there’s a lot of positives for us today to take out of this game, for sure.

Parenteau, on Martin Jones:

Really good, he looks good. He’s a big guy. He’s quick. I think he’s got a great future in the NHL for sure. He looks really good. [Reporter: What did you know about him coming in?] I knew he was on a run, but I didn’t know him before that. I had no clue who he was and he’s made a name for himself. There’s no doubt about that right now. He looks really good between the pipes.

Patrick Roy, on being happy with getting a point in the standings:

Yes we are. I thought we showed a lot of character. Down 2-0, midway in the game, we had a big break coming back to that power play hitting the post and then we scored on our power play. You see how important it is to score power play goals. We scored two power play goals tonight. I thought it was a big point for us. No doubt about it.

Roy, on Semyon Varlamov’s performance:

You know what, Varly was outstanding. At the end of the second, he made a great save with the glove and he made a really good save towards the end with the left pad. I thought that was important. A key save.

Roy, on shootouts:

I don’t mind the shootout. I honestly think it should go back to what we were before. If you can’t win the game with that five minute overtime, it should be a tie. Because in the end, these are big points teams pick up and I think it will make a big difference in the standings. But at the same time, it’s kind of entertaining for the fans. The fans seem to like it.

Roy, on Los Angeles:

I mean it’s a good team. When you come here, you have to be ready. It was a good challenge for our team. I really think we’ve played well lately. It was a good challenge for us this afternoon. But like I said, I’m very proud of our

players. They showed a lot of character. Because down 2-0 in LA, it’s not easy to come back, but our power play came through for us and then our penalty killing was really good. We also had good goaltending again tonight.

Roy, on the charge against Semyon Varlamov being dropped:

My relationship with our players is based on respect and trust. I think Varly was very professional from the first day this thing came out and he had the support from his teammates. And now it’s behind us, let’s focus and let’s play hockey.



December 21 postgame quotes: Anze Kopitar


On the team’s direction after a 3-0 start to the homestand:

Yeah, I mean, I think we’re on the right track. Is our game as sharp as it can be? Probably not. But we’re collecting points, and that’s what it is this time of the year. You have to collect points, even though maybe you’re not playing the best hockey. The way this Pacific Division has been going, you lose a couple, you fall back in a pretty big way, so we just want to keep on going, keep plugging away, and we’ve done a pretty good job with that.

On the “mental toughness” shown by the team in winning Saturday’s game:

Yeah, for sure, and then you throw in the one o’clock start factor, it’s not, I guess, the most ideal thing. But we gutted it out. It shows the character of the team and the mental toughness, just like you said.

On Martin Jones being “unflappable”:

I don’t know what to say, to be honest with you. You get a couple, it’s pretty much a done deal. He’s been great. I don’t know how many times I’ve said this before, he’s given us a chance every night, and that’s all you really wanted.



Game 37: Colorado at Los Angeles


Los Angeles Kings 3, Colorado Avalanche 2

Final – Shootout

Radio Feed

Six Things to Watch for on FOX Sports West

LA Kings Insider Preview

Box Score

Ice Tracker

SOG: LAK – 39; COL – 25

PP: LAK – 0/2; COL – 2/4

Attendance: 18,118

First Period

1) LAK – Jeff Carter (11) (Drew Doughty, Anze Kopitar), 19:28

Second Period

2) LAK – Justin Williams (12) (Jarret Stoll, Dustin Brown), 5:25

3) COL PPG – Erik Johnson (5) (Matt Duchene, Ryan O’Reilly), 14:02

Third Period

4) COL PPG – Ryan O’Reilly (12) (Matt Duchene, Tyson Barrie), 10:27

Overtime

No scoring

Shootout

LAK – Carter: SAVE

COL – Duchene: SAVE

LAK – Kopitar: GOAL

COL – Parenteau: SAVE

LAK – Brown: SAVE

COL – O’Reilly: SAVE

Los Angeles wins shootout, 1-0

Los Angeles Kings (24-8-4) vs Colorado Avalanche (23-10-1)

Saturday, December 21, 2013, 1:00 p.m. PT

STAPLES Center, Los Angeles, CA

FOX Sports West, KTLK 1150 AM

Referees: #19 Gord Dwyer, #11 Kelly Sutherland

Linesmen: #88 Mike Cvik, #91 Don Henderson

LAK starters: G Martin Jones, D Robyn Regehr, D Slava Voynov, LW Dustin Brown, C Jarret Stoll, RW Justin Williams

LAK scratches: F Daniel Carcillo, F Matt Frattin, D Willie Mitchell

COL starters: G Semyon Varlamov, D Jan Hejda, D Erik Johnson, LW Gabriel Landeskog, C Paul Stastny, RW PA Parenteau

COL scratches: D Nick Holden, F Brad Holden, D Ryan Wilson


730736 Minnesota Wild

Granlund has 'great practice' with Wild, is eager to return

Article by: MICHAEL RUSSO , Star Tribune

Updated: December 21, 2013 - 11:51 PM

NEW YORK – Based on Mikael Granlund’s effort and battle level all over the ice at Manhattan’s Chelsea Piers on Saturday, the Wild’s second-line center was all but begging to return to the lineup Sunday against the New York Rangers.

Granlund has missed 11 consecutive games and 13 of the past 14 because of a concussion.

He has said he is cobweb-free and showed discernible disappointment Thursday in Pittsburgh when told he couldn’t play against the Penguins.

Still, despite Mike Yeo saying Granlund had another “great practice” Saturday, the Wild coach was not able to declare that he’ll print Granlund’s No. 64 on Sunday’s lineup sheet.

Granlund has been cleared to practice, but Yeo said the clearance for a game has not yet arrived and whether it will by Sunday, “I’m not sure yet.”

The Wild wants to be cautious with Granlund, who has a history of concussions and lasted one shift totaling 29 seconds when he returned to the lineup after two games off Nov. 27 against Phoenix.

Yeo said Granlund will return once he gets the all-clear from athletic therapist Don Fuller in consultation with team doctors.

“We’ll just keep getting him ready,” Yeo said. “Hopefully he’s in [Sunday], but we at least know he’s very close.”

Granlund was not made available to the media and General Manager Chuck Fletcher wouldn’t comment, but Yeo said if Granlund returns, he will likely be reunited on the second line with Nino Niederreiter and Jason Pominville.

“Those guys were so good together,” Yeo said specifically about the Granlund-Pominville chemistry. “I’d like to get right back to that and balance things out a little more.”

But Yeo said he’s more focused on the lines used in Saturday’s practice and if Granlund can play, “it’s a bonus.”

Without Granlund, the Zach Parise-Mikko Koivu-Pominville line will be reunited. Kyle Brodziak looks like he will center Niederreiter and Dany Heatley, while Charlie Coyle will center Matt Cooke and Justin Fontaine. The fourth line was centered by Zenon Konopka with Erik Haula and Torrey Mitchell as his bookends.

The Wild, the NHL’s second-lowest scoring team at 2.19 goals per game, has scored 22 times in the past 14 games (1.57 a game).

The Wild can’t have a morning skate Sunday because of a women’s basketball doubleheader at Madison Square Garden, but Yeo plans to meet with several players at the team hotel to tell them it’s beyond time for them to step up offensively.

One will be Brodziak, who has gone 25 games without a goal since Oct. 28.

“He’s playing hard, he’s been more physical, he’s doing his job defensively,” Yeo said. “With where we’re at, we need somebody to jump up and take a little bit more, and he’s a guy that’s capable.”

Brodziak scored a career-high 22 goals two seasons ago. He has two in 37 games this season despite several terrific scoring chances, including many odd-man rushes and point-blank tries.

Brodziak’s line has been strong defensively. Consider that Brodziak is still plus-2 even though his line hasn’t contribute much offensively the past six weeks.

But Yeo said, “It’s not enough to just go out night after night and just play the system.”

Brodziak, who in 2009-10 went 28 games in a row without a goal, feels the pressure to start scoring.

“It is difficult, especially when the team’s struggling to score,” Brodziak said. “When you know you’re capable of contributing and you’re not, it’s tough. It’s tough. I want to score. I want to contribute and help out.

“I’ve got to find a way to get more pucks to the net and go to the net harder and hopefully get a lucky one to get the ball rolling in the right direction.”

Goalie update

The Wild has run into another goaltending pickle beyond Josh Harding’s absence as he alters his treatment of multiple sclerosis.

On Saturday, the Wild was expected to swap minor league goalies Johan Gustafsson and Darcy Kuemper, who has been one of the three stars in seven of his past eight Iowa starts and made 44 saves in a shutout Friday against Hamilton.

But Kuemper is banged up, so the transaction never happened. This likely means either Niklas Backstrom will have to make back-to-back starts Sunday and Monday or Gustafsson, 21, will have to make his NHL debut Monday in Philadelphia.

Star Tribune LOADED: 12.22.2013


Gameday preview: Wild at New York

Updated: December 21, 2013 - 7:48 PM

MICHAEL RUSSO

wild gameday

6:30 P.M. at N.Y. RANGERS • MADISON SQUARE GARDEN • FSN, 100.3-FM

Preview: Battle between up-and-down teams. The Wild is 7-7-1 in its past 15 overall and 1-5-1 in its past seven road games with seven goals scored. The Wild is 6-9-3 on the road, including three regulation wins and none since Nov. 20. The Rangers are 1-4-2 on a nine-game homestand. They are 6-10-2 at home and 3-5-2 in their past 10 overall. The Rangers are 9-5 all-time vs. the Wild, 4-2 at home.

Players to watch: Wild G Niklas Backstrom will start. He is 2-6-2 with a 3.12 goals-against average and .896 save percentage but has received seven goals of support in his past seven full games played and four goals in his past five. D Jared Spurgeon and D Clayton Stoner are expected to play their 200th games. C Mikko Koivu is one assist from becoming the first Wild player to reach 300. Rangers LW Rick Nash has 13 goals and 26 points in 32 games against the Wild. C Brad Richards has 22 points in 18 games against the Wild. Two of New York’s best players are Minnesotans Derek Stepan and Ryan McDonagh, who will likely be U.S. teammates with the Wild’s Zach Parise and Ryan Suter at the Olympics. Suter has assists in five straight games.

Numbers: The Wild has scored seven goals in the past 310 minutes, 6 seconds of hockey. … The Wild has given up the first goal in 10 consecutive road games. … The Wild has scored 22 goals in the past 14 games (1.57 goals per game) and two or fewer in 12 of the past 14 games. … The Wild is 0-for-6 on 5-on-3s. The Rangers are third in the NHL with three 5-on-3 goals.

Injuries: Wild C Mikael Granlund (concussion) is questionable and G Josh Harding (MS-related) is out. Rangers D Marc Staal (concussion) and F Ryan Callahan (knee) are out.

Star Tribune LOADED: 12.22.2013


Minnesota Wild: Matt Cooke has changed his game, but he's still a pest

By Chad Graff

Posted: 12/21/2013 12:01:00 AM CST

Updated: 12/21/2013 10:15:16 PM CST

NEW YORK -- Matt Cooke scooped a pile of snow that had accumulated in the corner of the rink onto his stick at Wild practice Saturday afternoon.

He found an unsuspecting Nate Prosser and flung the snow down his back. Cooke skated away, smiling.

It was an early gift from the Wild's chief agitator.

In his first season with the Wild, perhaps nothing about Cooke's game has stuck out more than his ability to remain an obnoxious pest to opponents despite his changed game. Even more, he's been able to remain a pest without making any questionable hits.

As long as he's on their side, players love that about Cooke.

"He still manages a fine line with the type of style that he wants to play and to be able to stay on the right side of the line and still manage to get under the nerves of guys is definitely a special quality," Kyle Brodziak said, "and something that I know he takes pride in."

Cooke enters the Wild's game Sunday night after consecutive games against teams he spent the most time with in his career, most recently a reunion in Pittsburgh, where he spent five seasons.

On the first shift of the night, 28 seconds in, he was jawing with Penguins defenseman Robert Bortuzzo after the first whistle of the game.

Even in Pittsburgh, where he raised a Stanley Cup in 2009, he was still participating in post-whistle scrums and got in the face of a former teammate.

It's something Pittsburgh fans -- and now Minnesota fans -- respect.

At the first commercial break, the Penguins honored Cooke with a lengthy video tribute. He waved and nodded from the visiting bench.

"When you spend a certain amount of time in a place, you get attached to the guys in the room, the trainers, all that kind of stuff," Cooke said. "There's an emotional element to it. So at the end of the day, it was cool to be back. But I was out there trying to help my team win.

"I didn't expect the reception that I got. I guess I didn't know what to expect. That was a little overwhelming."

Coach Mike Yeo said the Wild identified a need in the offseason for the role that Cooke plays. It's a role that extends beyond getting under the skin of opponents, even if that's what stands out most. He plays on the top penalty- kill unit and is relied on to shut down an opposing team's best players.

He has been able to continue playing that style of game even after the multiple suspensions forced a change in his game. He no longer looks for the big hit. He plays a more conservative game. But that doesn't mean he's going to avoid contact or extracurriculars.

"I think he's pretty smart in recognizing that when he's playing his best hockey, he's playing with an edge," Yeo said. "When he's getting under the other team's skin, when he's bumping into guys, when he's kind of involved in some stuff after the whistle, his game sort of follows."

Teammates said he's not a big talker on the ice. But for whatever reason, be it his suspension-filled past or his feisty playing style, he provokes players on the opposing team in each Wild game.

He did it on the last road trip, when he drew Ducks captain Ryan Getzlaf into post-whistle festivities, sending them both to the penalty box. He did it to his former team Thursday in Pittsburgh.

And, with no opponents around, he did it to Prosser with a stick full of snow.

"Guys don't like playing against him," the Wild's Torrey Mitchell said. "No one in the league likes playing against him. But it is nice to play with him."

Pioneer Press LOADED: 12.22.2013

730739 Montreal Canadiens

Desharnais’ OT winner saves Habs from collapse against Predators

Jim Diamond

Published Saturday, Dec. 21 2013, 10:17 PM EST

Last updated Saturday, Dec. 21 2013, 11:27 PM EST

David Desharnais enjoys playing in high-pressure situations, and showed how much Saturday night.

Desharnais scored at 1:43 of overtime to give the Montreal Canadiens a 4-3 victory over the Nashville Predators.

Desharnais stripped the puck from defenceman Mattias Ekholm along the left boards, skated to the left faceoff dot and put a slap shot over goalie Carter Hutton’s left shoulder.

The Detroit Red Wings practised outdoors Wednesday, hoping it will help them re-focus amid a six-game losing streak. Players say practising at the home stadium of baseball's Detroit Tigers was a great way to have some fun.

Kevin Dineen says becoming coach of Canada's women's hockey team so close to the 2014 Sochi Olympics is like jumping on a "fast-moving train." Dineen was named to the post after Dan Church's surprise resignation.

“I like playing those overtimes, those shootouts, I want to make the difference,” Desharnais said. “I knew he was going to try to hold that puck there, so I just beat him to the puck and took a shot.”

P.K. Subban, Max Pacioretty and Tomas Plekanec also scored for Montreal.

“The most important thing was for us to win the hockey game,” Montreal coach Michel Therrien said. “What an effort from David Desharnais. It was a great effort to pursue the puck and stay in the play, and he took a perfect shot.”

Gabriel Bourque, Nick Spaling, and Shea Weber scored for Nashville. The Predators have lost three straight.

The Predators lost rookie defenceman Seth Jones late in the first period. A shot from the left point by Montreal defenceman Andrei Markov hit traffic in front and struck Jones on the left side of his face, and he did not return to the game.

Subban opened the scoring at 11:30 of the first period, taking the puck from the right point into the high slot and then beating goalie Marek Mazanec with a slap shot. It was the reigning Norris Trophy winner’s fifth goal of the season.

Just under two minutes later, Pacioretty doubled the Montreal lead. Brendan Gallagher sent a pass from inside the Montreal blue line to Pacioretty in the neutral zone. He drove down the left side around defenceman Kevin Klein and beat Mazanec with a backhand.

Plekanec made it 3-0 with 5:23 left in the period when he redirected a feed from Brian Gionta past Mazanec.

That ended the night for Mazanec. Hutton, who started Nashville’s last five games, relieved him. Hutton was lifted from Nashville’s last game Thursday night in Tampa after allowing four goals on 14 shots.

“I think this is a strong point in coming back,” Nashville coach Barry Trotz said. “I look at the first period and we didn’t play poorly. They executed on a couple of things, but we didn’t get any saves. I mean three goals in five shots. Unfortunately, it wasn’t Maz’s night.”

Montreal’s three-goal outburst ended a stretch of eight games in which it failed to score in the opening period.

Bourque got Nashville on the board at 11:51 of the second when he beat Carey Price with a wrist shot from the lower part of the right circle.

With less than two minutes remaining in the period and Nashville on the power play, Spaling tipped home a pass by Shea Weber.

Nashville carried the play in the second, outshooting Montreal 20-6 in the period.

“It was a tough start for us, and we’ve talked about having good starts in this building,” Weber said. “But we showed a lot of character tonight and did a lot of good things. That’s going to build some confidence.”

Weber tied it 3 with a power-play goal at 13:40 of the third. Just 8 seconds after Subban was sent off for tripping Matt Cullen, Mike Fisher found Weber on the left side, where he beat Price with a one-timer for his team-leading ninth goal.

“You have a player like Webs out there making some pretty good plays,” Price said. “That was a pretty top-notch slap pass to the back door guy and that was a great shot. And he’s going to shoot a puck like that, you are going to score almost every time.”

Price made 31 saves for his 17th win of the season.

NOTES: Entering Saturday, Nashville and Colorado were the only teams Price had failed to beat. ... Nashville C Colin Wilson returned to the lineup after being a healthy scratch Thursday night in Tampa ... Montreal D Josh Georges missed the game because of a lower-body injury, ending his games streak at 167.

Globe And Mail LOADED: 12.22.2013


Habs almost sing the blues in Nashville

By Pat Hickey, The Gazette December 21, 2013

NASHVILLE — David Desharnais scored at 1:43 of overtime to give the Canadiens a 4-3 win over the Nashville Predators on Saturday night at the Bridgestone Arena. The Canadiens scored on three consecutive shots to take a 3-0 lead in the first period, but the Predators came back and tied the score on a power-play goal by Shea Weber at 13:40 of the third period. Andrei Markov felt he was tripped behind the net on the tying goal and received a 10-minute misconduct penalty.

Canadiens chase Mazanec: Rookie goaltender Marek Mazanec faced only five shots and was pulled after he gave up the third Montreal goal at 14:37. P.K. Subban scored on the Canadiens’ third shot, burying a slapshot at 11:30. Max Pacioretty scored his team-leading 15th goal with the Canadiens’ fourth shot. He took a stretch pass from Brendan Gallagher, went around defenceman Kevin Klein and scored on a breakaway at 13:20. Tomas Plekanec scored on Montreal’s next shot when he worked a give-and-go with Brian Gionta. It was Plekanec’s 12th goal this season. Carter Hutton stopped 17 of 18 shots in relief.

Leaving the door open: While the Canadiens scored in the first-period for the first time in nine games, they let the Predators back into the game in the second period when Nashville outshot Montreal 20-6 and scored twice. Patric Hornqvist spoiled Carey Price’s shutout at 11:51 and Nick Spaling redirected a shot by Shea Weber for a power-play goal at 18:01. The Canadiens rank No. 2 in penalty-killing, but Nashville scored on both of its power plays. Montreal was 0-for-2 on the power play.

Injury update: Josh Gorges was a game-time scratch because of a lower-body injury. He was injured when he blocked a shot Thursday in St. Louis. Nashville rookie defenceman Seth Jones left the game after he was struck in the face by a Markov one-timer late in the first period.

Stalberg snake-bitten: The Predators’ Viktor Stalberg had a breakaway at 2:29 of the first period, but hit a post. He had another chance at 13:55, but hit the crossbar.

What’s next: The Canadiens will have time to rest and enjoy the holidays before launching a four-game road trip Saturday in Tampa. They follow up with games against the Florida Panthers on Sunday, the Carolina Hurricanes on New Year’s Eve and the Dallas Stars on Jan. 2. The next home game at the Bell Centre is Jan. 4 against Ottawa.

Montreal Gazette LOADED: 12.22.2013


About … aw, forget last night. Merry Christmas!

Posted by Mike Boone

In the spirit of the season, let’s not dwell on your Montreal Canadiens’ inglorious performance in Nashville.

They had a 3-0 lead.

They blew a 3-0 lead.

Then a brilliant individual effort by perennial HIO whipping boy David Desharnais got the Canadiens two points they didn’t deserve.

And for all their recent suckitude, the team has 47 points and sits comfortably fourth in the Eastern Conference.

Hands up everyone who expected that at the Christmas break.

The Canadiens don’t play again until Dec. 27, when they’ll begin their Florida trip in Tampa.

That gives coach Michel Therrien and his staff plenty of time to work on a few issues.

They’re making a list and checking it twice.

Going to find out who belongs on the ice.

Based on the Nashville game …

SIX forwards managed to play an entire game plus OT without recording a single shot on goal:

• Brandon Prust, who didn’t even have an attempted shot and has kinda sucked for a while now

• Brendan Gallagher, who plays his heart out and goes to the net

• Brian Gionta, who hustles and backchecks

• Alex Galchenyuk, whose play in his own end is starting to worry me

• Travis Moen, whom Therrien subbed on the Tomas Plekanec line late in the game because he doesn’t trust Galchenyuk’s D

• Daniel Brière, who worked hard and wasn’t bad in Nashville

There were also no shots from defencemen Douglas Murray, Alexei Emelin, Raphael Diaz (not even an attempted shot!) and Francis Bouillon, whom Therrien praised as probably his best Dman, forgetting to add “except for P.K. Subban”.

Three players accounted for 15 of the Canadiens’ 23 SoG: P.K. with six, Max Pacioretty with five and Tomas Plekanec with four. May as well add DD’s three and there’s 78 per cent of the shot total from four guys.

What’s that you say?

Shots aren’t everything. There are other ways to contribute.

Indeed.

Like making good decisions with the puck, working the boards, winning puck battles, clearing your zone efficiently and maintaining possession in the other team’s end.

The Canadiens were woefully inept in those aspects of the game in losses to L.A. and St. Louis and during the second period in Nashville

Like the Ghost of Christmas Past, failure to compete in all three zones afflicted the Canadiens through 20 miserable minutes.

Carey Price faced 20 second-period shots and gave up goals to Gabriel Bourque and Nick Spaling.

That’s the worst bombardment since Price faced 21 shots last March 7 in Carolina. He stopped 19 of them – including Eric Staal’s penalty shot. The Canadiens won that game 4-2, despite being outshot 44-28.

That was then, this is now.

And now isn’t too shabby.

Again, the Canadiens occupy a place in the standings few few fans expected when the season began.

They’re up there mainly because of Carey Price and Peter Budaj, P.K. and Andrei Markov (we won’t dwell on the boneheadedness of a misconduct in a 3-3 game).

There’s still a lot of hockey – 44 games – to be played.

For now, let’s all take a break and celebrate Christmas with our families and loved ones.

Montreal Gazette LOADED: 12.22.2013

730742 Nashville Predators

Predators show ability to fight back despite loss

Dec. 22, 2013

Josh Cooper

Shea Weber was asked point-blank after Nashville’s 4-3 overtime loss to Montreal if the defeat felt like a point lost or a point earned.

Weber didn’t need to ponder the Canadiens’ 3-0 first-period lead, or how defensive blunders gave Montreal the early advantage. Instead he focused on the comeback, how the Predators (16-16-4) got the game to the extra session and squeezed out one point in front of a Bridgestone Arena crowd of 16,095.

“It was a great team effort in here,” Weber said. “You’re not going to get up one or two nothing every game, you’re going to have to play from behind, and we showed a lot of good things tonight. I’m definitely proud of the guys in here.”

Overall, the Predators players didn’t appear down or upset. They were OK with the fact they found a way to scratch three goals out against a solid Canadiens team in the last two periods before David Desharnais’ overtime score.

“They want to play fast, they want to chip pucks behind us, and we didn’t put pucks in areas where we could retrieve them. We allowed them to play an easier game,” forward Matt Hendricks said. “Once we got away from that, we got back to playing hard hockey, putting pucks in areas where we could retrieve them. They had to come back further into their defensive zone, which made it harder for them to get odd-man rushes.”

After the first period, Nashville outshot the Canadiens 27-15 and tied the game, but simply couldn’t get a lead.

With 8:30 left in the first period, defenseman P.K. Subban ripped a slap shot past Nashville netminder Marek Mazanec for a 1-0 lead. Then with 6:40 left in the frame, forward Max Pacioretty got behind defenseman Kevin Klein, flew in on a breakaway and swiped a backhand past Mazanec. By the time Tomas Plekanec deflected a Brian Gionta pass into the net with 5:23 left in the first, Montreal led 3-0.

With 8:09 left in the second period, forward Gabriel Bourque fired a wrist shot past Montreal netminder Carey Price. This put the score at 3-1. Then with 1:51 left in the second, defenseman Shea Weber passed the puck to Nick Spaling, who was waiting in front of Price. This made it 3-2. A Weber blast on the power play with 6:20 left in the third period tied the game at 3-3.

“Well-earned point,” Hendricks said. “We played a solid 40 minutes.”

Tennessean LOADED: 12.22.2013

730743 Nashville Predators

Preds show trust in goalie combo

Dec. 21, 2013 11:29 PM

Josh Cooper

Predators general manager David Poile still believes in Nashville’s tandem of backup goaltenders — despite the fact starter Pekka Rinne remains out with a hip infection. The team announced Friday that Rinne would have to wait two more weeks to start strenuous workouts. Rinne has been out since Oct. 22

“We’re still going with Maz and Hutton,” Poile said before Saturday’s loss to the Montreal Canadiens. “Like anything else, since we first knew about Pekka being out, we’ve always been looking to improve our team, be it goaltending specifically or any other area. Two more weeks, not perfect, but I think it’s much better for us to be on the same page with the doctor.”

Though a few “rent-a-goalies” remain out on the market in Jonas Hiller and Ryan Miller, Poile still doesn’t see bringing in one of those two as the prudent course of action at the moment.

“It’s a game at a time, we have to improve in some different areas,” Poile said. “If we do, that’s good, and if we don’t we’ll have to adjust to that at a future time, but I don’t think it does any good to show any more desperation than we’re currently trying to display.”

Poile believes the key for Nashville more involves making sure that Rinne is healthy for the length of his contract. Rinne’s deal lasts for another five years after this season.

Said Poile, “Especially with Pekka in the long run, we have him signed to a long-term contract, this has been a tough situation for our team and for him personally, but we have to make sure that this (infection) never comes back again.”

Hendricks fires up: The final stat sheet will show that forward Matt Hendricks played 10:38 and didn’t record a point.

But if Nashville somehow makes the playoffs by one point at the end of the season, Hendricks’ fight with Travis Moen on Saturday and angry screams at the Predators bench will be considered a major reason Nashville came back from 3-0 down to to steal an extra point against Montreal.

Hendricks fought Moen with 4:05 left in the first period and then stormed off the ice railing at the Predators bench. At that point, the Predators were down 3-0. They eventually tied the game at 3-3.

“I knew I was going to have to do something to help change it,” Hendricks said. “It was my next shift, I finally got a chance to go out and play and had to do what I could to help change the momentum.”

Said captain Shea Weber, “With Hendricks, that’s huge — what a guy like that does a lot for our team. Guys go to war, and put their bodies on the line and that gets guys fired up, and we came in here and discussed it and said we have to go for it.”

Jones out: Defenseman Seth Jones left Saturday’s game with 6.7 seconds left in the first period after taking an puck to the face off the stick of Andrei Markov. Jones was seen walking around the locker room after the game. The Predators said he was out with an “upper-body” injury and may have more news at today’s practice.

Tennessean LOADED: 12.22.2013

730744 New Jersey Devils

Devils Prevail in Overtime; Jagr Ties Messier in Goals

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: December 21, 2013

The season is not quite half over, and Devils Coach Pete DeBoer might already be running out of ways to praise Jaromir Jagr.

Jagr had a goal and two assists, Andy Greene scored 43 seconds into overtime and Marek Zidlicky had two goals as the Devils rallied past the host Washington Capitals, 5-4, on Saturday night.

“He amazes me every night I come to the rink,” DeBoer said of Jagr, a 41-year-old forward. “I don’t have a lot more adjectives to describe him, but he’s a pleasure to work with.”

It was Jagr’s 13th goal of the season and his 694th over all, moving him into a tie with Mark Messier for seventh on the career list.

Greene, who knocked the rebound of a shot by Jagr past Braden Holtby for the winner, also had two assists.

Alex Ovechkin scored his 30th goal and Joel Ward had a goal and an assist for Washington, which led, 3-1, after two periods. The Capitals’ Jason Chimera and Mikhail Grabovski also scored, and Martin Erat had two assists.

DUCKS 5, ISLANDERS 3 Ryan Getzlaf scored three goals and Anaheim rallied for their team-record eighth straight win, beating the host Islanders.

Behind by 3-1, the Ducks scored four times in the third period. The Islanders played a spirited first two periods, taking the lead on two goals by Thomas Vanek and one by Frans Nielsen.

But Getzlaf scored his second of the game at 1 minute 10 seconds of the final period, and Mathieu Perreault tied it at 10:32. Kyle Palmieri had the winner at 13:44.

Getzlaf completed his hat trick with an empty-net goal.PENGUINS 4, FLAMES 3 Sidney Crosby scored his 20th goal of the season, helping host Pittsburgh win its season-high seventh straight game by beating Calgary.

The Penguins, who lead the Eastern Conference with 55 points, played without center Evgeni Malkin and five of their top six defensemen for the fourth straight game, but that did not stop them from winning their 10th straight at home and picking up their 12th victory in 13 games.

KINGS 3, AVALANCHE 2 Martin Jones made 23 saves and stopped all three shots in a shootout to become the second goalie in N.H.L. history to win each of his first eight games, and host Los Angeles got goals from Jeff Carter and Justin Williams in a victory over Colorado.

The only other goalie to win his first eight games was Philadelphia’s Bob Froese in 1982-83.

BRUINS 4, SABRES 1 David Krejci snapped a tie and set up Milan Lucic’s goal as host Boston earned a split of a two-game set with a victory over Buffalo.

Reilly Smith had a power-play goal and an empty-netter for Boston, which won its seventh straight at home. BLUE JACKETS 6, FLYERS 3 Ryan Johansen and R. J. Umberger each scored two goals, and host Columbus pulled away in the third period to beat Philadelphia.

Blue Jackets forward Marian Gaborik broke a collarbone in the first period and is out indefinitely.

COYOTES 4, SENATORS 3 Antoine Vermette completed a hat trick at 2:23 of overtime to lift visiting Phoenix past Ottawa.

Vermette pounced on the loose puck in front of goalie Craig Anderson and pushed it through to the back of the net to beat his former team. Radim Vrbata also scored to help the Coyotes snap a three-game losing streak.

LIGHTNING 3, HURRICANES 2 Radko Gudas scored 2:16 into overtime as host Tampa Bay beat Carolina. Gudas beat Justin Peters, who kept the

Hurricanes in the game by making 47 saves, from the right circle during a three-on-one.

Jiri Tlusty had a pair of goals for Carolina. CANADIENS 4, PREDATORS 3 David Desharnais scored at 1:43 of overtime to give visiting Montreal a victory over Nashville.

The Predators have lost three straight.

RED WINGS 5, MAPLE LEAFS 4 Daniel Alfredsson scored the shootout winner for Detroit in the Red Wings’ victory over host Toronto in a Winter Classic preview.

The teams will meet again before a crowd expected to exceed 100,000 at Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor on Jan. 1.

New York Times LOADED: 12.22.2013


Greene, Devils Rally Past Capitals 5-4 in Overtime


Published: December 21, 2013 at 10:01 PM ET

WASHINGTON — Andy Greene scored 43 seconds into overtime, Marek Zidlicky had two goals and the New Jersey Devils rallied past the Washington Capitals 5-4 Saturday night.

Greene knocked the rebound of a shot by Jaromir Jagr past Braden Holtby for the game-winner. Greene also had two assists.

Jagr scored his 13th goal and added two assists. Dainius Zubrus had a goal and an assist for New Jersey, which trailed 3-1 after two periods.

Alex Ovechkin scored his 30th goal and Joel Ward had a goal and an assist for Washington. Jason Chimera and Mikhail Grabovski also scored for Washington and Martin Erat had two assists.

Martin Brodeur made 18 saves for the Devils, who lost in overtime to Anaheim on Friday night.

Holtby finished with 32 saves in the first meeting of the season between Metropolitan Division rivals.

Jagr, on a power play, and Ovechkin traded third-period goals three minutes apart. Zidlicky pulled the Devils within 4-3 when he beat Holtby from the slot at 9:21.

New Jersey tied it when Travis Zajac intercepted Holtby's clearing attempt and fed in front to Zubrus, who poked it home at 11:47.

Both teams were playing the second of back-to-back games and there was little action early on.

Brodeur made several good stops during a Washington power play midway through the period. New Jersey got the man advantage when Tom Wilson went off for high-sticking at 10:52.

Less than a minute later Greene fed Zidlicky in the left circle and Zidlicky one-timed a drive past Holtby on the short side to make it 1-0. It was New Jersey's first shot on goal.

The Devils tested Holtby several times early in the second period, but he kept the deficit at one.

Chimera finally tied it at the 10:07 mark when he came around the back of the net and tried to stuff the puck home. Brodeur made the initial save, but Chimera poked the loose puck past him.

Grabovski gave Washington the lead at 14:38 of the period with his 10th of the year, off a feed from Eric Fehr in the left circle.

The Capitals went ahead 3-1 with 45 seconds left in the period. They skated in three on two and Mike Green fired from the right side. Brodeur made the save, but it went right to Ward who put it past him for his 11th of the season.

NOTES: Ovechkin has scored 30 or more goals in nine straight seasons. ... Jagr extended his points streak to seven games with a first period assist. ... The Devils were without C Andrei Loktionov (illness) and RW Damien Brunner (knee), who was injured Friday against Anaheim. ... Olympic swimming gold medalist Michael Phelps was in attendance.



Ducks Win 7th Straight, 3-2 Over Devils


Published: December 20, 2013 at 10:09 PM ET

NEWARK, N.J. — Kyle Palmieri scored at 2:37 of overtime, and the Anaheim Ducks extended their winning streak to seven with a 3-2 victory over the New Jersey Devils on Friday night.

Palmieri, from nearby Montvale, N.J., swung around Devils defenseman Eric Gelinas and circled behind the New Jersey goal. He then tucked a wraparound behind goaltender Cory Schneider.

Mathieu Perreault and Cam Fowler also scored for the Pacific Division-leading Ducks, who matched the franchise record with their second seven-game winning streak this season. Jonas Hiller made 19 saves in the win.

Andy Greene and Michael Ryder had the Devils goals.

Perreault, who assisted on Palmieri's score, gave the Ducks a 2-1 lead at 10:47 of the third. He converted a centering feed from Palmieri that bounced off Gelinas' skate and landed on his stick in the slot for his sixth goal.

New Jersey tied it again with 5:02 to go in regulation. Greene's power-play goal was set up by Jaromir Jagr, who hit the defenseman in the left circle with a backhand pass.

Ryder and Fowler scored in the second period.

Ryder put New Jersey in front with his 10th goal at 4:15. He got a backhand pass from Adam Henrique and lifted a shot over Hiller's left shoulder.

Fowler made it 1-1 at 14:06 with a blast from the left point, using Palmieri as a screen against Schneider.

NOTES: This was the second contest of a four-game road trip for the Ducks. ... Anaheim had time to adjust to the Prudential Center. The Ducks practiced here on Wednesday and Thursday. ... Ryan Getzlaf was in the lineup for Anaheim. He left the previous game against Detroit in the first period with a facial injury. ... The Devils concluded a three-game homestand. They play in Washington on Saturday night. ... Devils RW Steve Bernier played in his 500th game; Hiller made his 300th appearance. ... Devils RW Damien Brunner was helped off the ice late in the first period following a knee-on-knee hit along the boards by Ducks D Mark Fistric. He did not return.



Devils' Damien Brunner out at least four weeks with knee injury

Rich Chere/The Star-Ledger

on December 21, 2013 at 11:04 AM, updated December 21, 2013 at 11:33 AM

WASHINGTON -- Devils winger Damien Brunner, who suffered a right knee injury during the first period of Friday night's game against the Ducks, will be sidelined for a minimum of a month.

Brunner will not need surgery.

"He'll be out a minimum of four weeks," GM Lou Lamoriello said. "He does not need surgery."

Brunner, of course, did not accompany the Devils to Washington.

With 2:52 remaining in the first period of the overtime loss to Anaheim, Brunner was checked into the right corner boards by Ducks defenseman Mark Fistric. The Swiss winger took the hit to his right knee and dropped to the ice in pain.

After several minutes, Dainius Zubrus and Andy Greene helped Brunner off the ice and he headed to the dressing room to sit out the remainder of the night with what the Devils called a lower body injury.

Coach Pete DeBoer did not think it was a dirty hit from Fistric.

“It didn’t look dirty to me,” DeBoer said.

After Brunner's departure, Michael Ryder moved into the right wing spot on the line with Adam Henrique and Patrik Elias

"I've played with them before for a few games so it was nothing new," Ryder said. "It was tough seeing Bruns go down there. I'm not sure how he is. We'll see how that goes.

"It's tough losing a player. i just have to step in on that line and try to play my games and help out, get those guys room and shoot the puck."

Star Ledger LOADED: 12.22.2013


Devils: Damien Brunner injury won't rush Ryane Clowe return; Andrei Loktionov ill



WASHINGTON -- The Devils will make several lineup changes when they face the Washington Capitals Saturday night at Verizon Center.

In addition to winger Damien Brunner, who will be lost for at least four weeks with a right knee injury, center Andrei Loktionov will sit out the game because he is under the weather.

"I wasn't feeling good the last game. I felt a little bit sick. I have a cold," Loktionov told me. "i don't feel any better today. I feel the same."

Both Jacob Josefson and Mattias Tedenby will be in the lineup., so he may also be in the lineup.

Cam Janssen did not skate Saturday morning

The injury to Brunner won't mean a faster return for winger Ryane Clowe, who has been out with a concussion since Oct. 13.

"I don't really get the feeling that that's how they do things around here," Clowe said after skating with Bryce Salvador, Reid Boucher and Martin Brodeur at Verizon Center. "I'm not sure exactly when they want me to come back. If they have a plan in place for me, it feels like they're sticking to it.

"They've been pretty patient with me through this whole thing. So an injury here or there, or a loss, they're not going to push any buttons. It was pretty unfortunate for Brunner. I don't know what the injury is but it looked pretty bad when I was watching it. I had an ACL tear a few years ago. I hope it's nothing like that."

General manager Lou Lamoriello said Brunner will miss a minimum of four weeks with a right knee injury, but will not require surgery. After undergoing an MRI it was determined Brunner will undergo rehab.

"I think going into the boards might've helped him brace it," Clowe said. "I think the boards helped him for sure. It was a weird play. (Mark Fistric's) knee was out. I was talking to (Cam Janssen) about this. A lot of times you finish your hits like that. You're not really sticking your knee out. The guy might pull up. He just got him in the right spot. It's too bad. He was playing well."

The Devils were looking to get some injured players back when Brunner went down.

"The thing is, when you're injured the game just passes you by. So many games. This year if you miss a couple of weeks you're missing a bunch of games with the condensed schedule," Clowe said. "You look around the league. There are so many teams. I was watching St. Louis the other night. They have a bunch of injuries. So many top guys out. That's just how it is.

"One thing about this team, the structure we play helps us as far as dealing with that. Guys step in and there is no in-between. We play to win and guys adapt well to that."

The Devils are being cautious with Clowe because of his history with head injuries.

"I totally understand why they would want me to get a few extra days and just some more contact," he said. "When you're out as long as I am, you take a little extra time. It has nothing to do with me. I want to get back as soon as possible. But I understand that part of it.

"I think I'm at a stage now whenever I do come back and play I'll feel comfortable. I feel like I've done everything I needed. Sometimes it's hard to be patient, but at this stage it's the right thing."

Rookie winger Reid Boucher thought he was going to be a scratch when his name wasn't in the lineup for the Capitals game. But he was informed that he would, indeed, be in.

"I wasn't in the lineup. It changed two minutes ago. Now I am playing," a relieved Boucher said.

Still, Boucher said he wasn't surprised that he came close to being scratched.

"I'm not surprised. I didn't play great. I didn't play very good," he said. "Obviously I want to play and compete every night. I have to work harder."



Andy Greene goal gives Devils 5-4 win over Capitals in overtime



WASHINGTON – The superstars did not disappoint.

Alex Ovechkin scored his league-leading 30th goal and Jaromir Jagr scored the 694th of his career to tie Mark Messier for seventh on the NHL’s all-time list.

But it was a player who seems to get little notice and not enough respect — both in the NHL and from USA Hockey officials — who made the timely plays that lifted the Devils into sole possession of eighth place and a playoff spot in the Eastern Conference Saturday night at Verizon Center.

Defenseman Andy Greene assisted on Jagr’s power play goal, which started the Devils’ third period comeback from a 3-1 deficit, and then scored the winner 43 seconds into OT to lift the Devils to a 5-4 victory over the Washington Capitals and once again remind his teammates of his underrated skills.

“Oh, man. I can’t believe he’s not even mentioned on the U.S. Olympic team’s list. That’s their fault as far as I can see,” center Travis Zajac said. “He’s been playing well this year. He’s been our best D-man at both ends of the ice.

“He plays against the top guys. He plays lots of minutes. He’s having a great year.”

But he won’t be in Sochi, Russia with Team USA at the Olympics in February. It is a decision Team USA likely will regret.

“I don’t know. Honestly, that’s not what I’m trying to go out there do, to prove them wrong,” Greene said. “I’m just trying to go out and play and make sure we’re getting points. It’s a tough decision. There are a lot of good players now in the U.S. A lot of good young D and a lot of good older D.”

Good, yes. What Greene did last night has many thinking he’s an elite defenseman.

“In my mind he is. He can do everything,” coach Pete DeBoer said. “The plays that stand out for me are, obviously the winning goal, but also the power play goal where he steps in and goes around the net.

“And also the one-on-one with Ovechkin. Ovechkin’s got a head of steam coming at him in the second period and he handles maybe the best one-on-one player in the world like that. He’s a solid, solid player.”

Greene finished the game with a goal and two assists. He set up Marek Zidlicky’s first of two goals during a power play in the opening period. But his assist on Jagr’s power play goal at 5:28 of the third was impressive as he went around the net and found Jagr at the right side of the crease.

“I kind of jumped into the slot and hit a bouncing puck. I chipped it over everything,” Greene explained. “Originally I was trying to slide it across and the goalie (Braden Holtby) put his pad out and it came right to me. Jags was sitting right there on the other side. I just gave him a quick pass and he made a nice play and buried it.”

Jagr’s 13th goal of the season tied him with Messier all-time.

“I played with Mark. Not for long, but I had a chance to play with him on the New York Rangers,” Jagr recalled. “He is a great player and a great person. He accomplished a lot in the NHL. To be able to tie him is a big honor. It’s a big honor for me to hit those numbers.”

It wasn't just Greene's pass that impressed Jagr.

“Not only the pass. He jumped into the play before. He read it well. He surprised everybody. He even surprised me," Jagr said with a smile. "The way he jumped into the play, everybody stopped because when you play power play you don’t really do that. He kept skating and the defensemen lost the coverage.”

Third period goals from Zidlicky and Dainius Zubrus sent the game into OT and it took less than a minute for Greene to win it. Jagr took a shot and Greene knocked in the rebound, which was only allowed to stand after a video review showed he scored it legally.

“I don’t know if maybe they thought I hit it with my hand or kicked it with my knee,” Greene said. “I knew obviously it went right off the middle of my stick between my hands on the shaft.”

It was the first overtime goal Greene has scored in the NHL.

“Dating back a long time, I honestly can’t remember the last overtime goal I scored," he said. "It feels great to do it.”

DeBoer said: “Greenie is a clutch guy. He has a way of finding the right goal at the right time. We’ll take it. We needed it.We obviously have a tough game left in Chicago, but we’re putting some points in the bank, which is what we want to do.”

It was a big victory in the playoff race.

“We have to make sure we’re staying close. We can’t be getting down by 10 points,” Greene said. “It’s too hard once the season starts going on to make up ground with three-point games.”

Greene is recognized by his teammates, but not from others.

“I didn’t know he wasn’t even on the long list for Team USA,” goalie Martin Brodeur said, “so I guess not.”

Jagr on Ovechkin: “He’s hot. All he needs is one opportunity to score and he got it. He doesn’t hesitate. He’s in the zone. He’s got a lot of confidence in his shooting. He’s just waiting for an opportunity to score. I remember those years when I was hot. I was shooting everything. I don’t have it anymore, but that’s the way he plays. He’s very dangerous one-on-one, so the defense has to back up a little bit. If you step up on him he might go around you. You might give him the shot, but his shot is so good so he can score. He’s averaging probably 10 shots a game.”

Despite falling behind, 3-1, the Devils insisted they believed they'd come back.

“I think we kind of felt we were playing well going into the third. I think we felt like we were the better team," Zajac said. "We had a couple breakdowns and they capitalized. That’s what that team is good at. We stuck with it. We got one on the power play, which was huge for us.”

Brodeur added: "The guys just continued to play hard. We know they're not a great team defensively."

DeBoer was okay with matching firepower with the Caps.

“We gave up 18-20 shots (actually 22). They happened to go in tonight, but I think we played a pretty good game," he said. "It’s not like we opened it up and gave up 40 shots. I liked the way we played.”

“We stuck with it. Gutsy effort, resilient effort. I really liked our bench tonight, even when we were down, 3-1. I thought there was a lot of positive chatter. Probably the least surprised that we came back were the guys in our room. I think they felt confident all night that we could make a game of it.”



Devils making move up in standings with hot streak

Randy Miller/NJ.com

on December 21, 2013 at 11:13 PM, updated December 22, 2013 at 12:10 AM

WASHINGTON –There’s been a lot of chatter over the last week among Devils players about where their team will sit heading into the Christmas break.

Almost halfway through an up-and-down season, they looked at a tough stretch that was coming up, remembered how they’d played well against elite teams, and decided the time was right for a run.

Four games and seven points later, the Devils accomplished their mission, at least for a day, thanks to a wild and crazy 5-4 comeback win in overtime Saturday night over the Washington Capitals.

Check out the updated Eastern Conference standings: Amazingly, the Devils are sitting alone in the eighth and final playoff spot with 37 points, one more than both Philadelphia, which lost Saturday in Columbus, and Carolina, which picked up a point for its OT loss in Tampa.

Greene, the hero of the night, is paying attention to the standings.

“We have to make sure we’re staying close to (a playoff position),” he said. “We can’t be down like 10 points. … With three-point games, it’s tough to make up ground. We just gotta make sure we’re fighting there with 3 or 4 other teams above us and below us, make sure we give ourselves a chance and that we’re playing good hockey when it comes to the stretch run.”

Eight days earlier, getting into a playoff spot by Christmas seemed far-fetched as the Devils were just three points out but alone in 13th place following a loss in Pittsburgh two Fridays ago.

Since, they’re 3-0-1 with victories over two of the top teams in the East, Tampa Bay and Washington, plus a point for Friday’s OT loss against Anaheim, which is second in the West. They also beat Ottawa, which was ahead of them before their meeting.

It has helped the Devils’ that the Eastern Conference is the weaker of the two this season. They're currently eighth with a 15-15-7 record, while Minnesota has the final playoff spot in the West with a 20-12-5 mark. Phoenix is on the outside looking in, sitting 9th in the West with a 19-10-6 record.

“We feel that we’re playing some decent hockey and we have the luxury of being in the weakest division,” Devils goalie Marty Brodeur said. “We have to take advantage of it. We can’t just say, ‘We’re in the weakest.’ We’re got to start putting points on the board, and the last four games we just dropped one point. If we continue to do that, good things will happen for us."

The Devils getting any points seemed unlikely after Alex Oveckin scored 8:07 into the third for a 4-2 Caps lead, but by the 11:47 mark, the game was tied.

“You know what?” Devils coach Pete DeBoer said. “We stuck with it. Gutsy effort. Resilient effort. Our bench tonight, even when we were down, I thought there was a lot of positive chatter. I think everyone is surprised we came back. Probably the least surprised guys were the guys in our room. I think they felt confident all night they could make a game of it.”

The Devils made it a game again when Marek Zidlicky scored his second of the night at 9:21 to cut the Caps’ lead to 4-3, then 2:26 later Dainius Zubrus shocked the home crowd by scoring the equalizer.

From there, the Devils got to overtime to assure they’d get a point for their effort, then one night after falling at home in OT to a very strong Ducks team, they earned a second against a hot Caps team.

The 2 points jumped the Devils into the 8th place, but to stay there before their 3-day Christmas break, they’ll probably have to get at least one point in their final game before the holiday. That’ll be a difficult task because next up is a trip to Chicago for a Monday night game against the Blackhawks, who sit atop the NHL standings this season after winning the Cup last season.

“I’m sure before the break, like any team, (the Blackhawks) are going to want to play really hard and have a nice Christmas,” Brodeur said. “We’re in that same boat. It’ll be fun. We play well against good teams. We just gotta continue the way we’re playing.”



Devils, Capitals instant analysis

Randy Miller/NJ.com


HIGHLIGHTS

• D Andy Greene was the biggest hero in a night of many heroes with a goal 43 seconds into overtime off a rebound of a Jaromir Jagr shot, lifting the Devils to a 5-4 OT win in a game they trailed 4-2 in the third period on the road.

• The Devils roared back from a 4-2 deficit in the third period to force overtime, as goals by D Marek Zidlicky at 9:21 and RW Dainius Zubrus at 11:47 drew them even.

• Jagr’s third-period goal, No. 694 for his career, pulled him into a tie with Mark Messier for 7th all-time.

• Zidlicky had his first 2-goal game as a Devil and the fourth of his career. The others all came in the 2005-06 season when he accomplished the feat three times playing for the Nashville Predators. Zidlicky opened the scoring Saturday with his 4th goal of the season on a first-period power play, then sliced into a 4-2 Caps lead with his second of the night midway through the third.

• The Devils’ power play cashed in for the third game in a row, the tally coming 5:28 into the third when Jagr scored to make it 3-2 Caps.

• Jagr had a 3-point evening, and in the first period extended his point streak to 7 games, longest this season by a Devil, with a second assist on Marek Zidlicky’s goal that opened the scoring.

• D Anton Volchenkov had 5 hits, all in the first 2 periods, to match his season high.

• The Devils did a nice job not being burned by the Caps’ lethel power play, which went into the game having scored 9 man-advantage goals in a five-game stretch. The Devils succeeded by taking just one penalty, and the one minor, a first-period high-skating infraction on Travis Zajac, was killed.

LOWLIGHTS

• Marty Brodeur turned in his second rough performance in his last 4 starts, allowing 4 goals. Brodeur had allowed just 2 goals in his previous 2 starts, one of them a shutout, but prior to that allowed a season-high 5 goals in a Dec. 10 loss at Columbus.

• After making a nice setup to nearly tie the game 2-2 late in the second, Jaromir Jagr couldn’t keep up with Joel Ward during a 4-on-2 rush the other way and it led to a backbreaking goal that put the Caps ahead 3-1 when Ward was alone in the left circle to knock in a rebound of a Mike Green shot from the right point.

• The Devils were playing well and leading 1-0 halfway through the game, then fell apart in the final 10 minutes as Jason Chimera scored at 10:07, Mikhail Grabovski at 14:38 and Ward at 19:14 for a 3-1 Caps lead.

• The Devils got bad news on RW Damien Brunner, who will be lost for 4 weeks due to a knee injury suffered in the first period of Friday night’s 3-2 overtime loss to Anaheim.

• With the game tied 1-1 in the second, Brodeur stopped a wraparound attempt by Jason Chimera, but then lost track of the puck when it was a foot in front of him … and it wound up in the Devils net when Chimera poked in his own rebound.

EMPTY NETTERS

• During a first-period break, the Caps recognized Ovechkin for scoring his 400th career goal Friday night in Carolina, an empty-netter that sealed a 4-2 Caps victory. Caps fans responded by giving a standing ovation to Ovechkin.

• Ovechkin scored No. 401 in the third for a 4-2 Caps lead.

• Olympic swimming legend Michael Phelps, a Baltimore native, attended the game.



Like in Pittsburgh, Caps fans show no love to Devils' Jaromir Jagr

Randy Miller/NJ.com

on December 21, 2013 at 8:07 PM

WASHINGTON - When talking up two of the NHLs aging superstars before Friday’s game at Prudential Center, Anaheim Ducks coach Bruce Boudreau mentioned how his right wing Teemu Selanne and Devils right wing Jaromir Jagr are beloved by fans everywhere.

Selanne may be a hero to hockey fans across the glove, but not Jagr.

Not quite everywhere.

A lot of Capitals fans showed how they feel about Jagr at the Verizon Center on Saturday night by booing No. 68 every time he touched the puck.

Caps fans apparently haven’t forgiven Jagr for not producing in Washington like he did during his heyday with the Pittsburgh Penguins.

Jagr won four consecutive scoring titles and five in seven seasons prior to being traded from Pittsburgh to Washington, then topped out at 36 goals and 79 points in his 2 ½ disappointing seasons with the Caps while being the league’s highest-paid player.

The Jagr booing is far worse in Pittsburgh, as fans there still are bothered by the "dying alive" comment that he made in his final season with the Penguins with the team struggling in the standings and in such financial trouble that the franchise was in danger of relocating.

Penguins fans were ready to embrace Jagr again during the summer of 2011 when he was close to returning to Pittsburgh after playing three seasons in Russia, but he instead infuriated a lot of people there by signing with the team's hated rival, the Philadelphia Flyers.

Other than Washington and Pittsburgh, Jagr is a fan favorite.

Jagr was very popular in Philly while playing there in 2011-12, and it was the same last season when he played for the Dallas Stars and Boston Bruins.

This season, Devils fans really have warmed up to Jagr, and why not? He’s been their best player thus far with the team lead in goals, assists and points … as a 41-year-old, to boot.

It didn’t take Jagr long, incidentally, to show Caps fans that he still has game, as he assisted on a first-period goal by Marek Zidlicky that put New Jersey up 1-0.



Devils wary of Alex Ovechkin and Capitals' dangerous power play



WASHINGTON – The Devils face the difficult task of trying to stop Alex Ovehckin when they face the Capitals Saturday night at Verizon Center.

That won’t be easy as Ovechkin leads the NHL with 29 goals in 33 games.

“Obviously we have to pay attention to Ovechkin. He’s been hot lately. He’s scoring every night,” Devils coach Pete DeBoer said. “That’s one challenge. The second challenge is to make sure the other guys on the ice don’t beat us.”

Washington’s power play can be deadly.

“I don’t know if it’s unique. Adam Oates ran our power play with (Ilya) Kovalchuk here two years ago,” DeBoer noted. “I think the uniqueness of their power play is the skill set and how complementary their five guys are to each other.

“You’ve got a great half-wall guy in (Nicklas) Backstrom who controls the play. You’ve got a great shooter in the slot in (Troy) Brouwer. You’ve got Ovechkin with the one-timer back door. And you’ve got a bomb at the top with (Mike) Green. You’ve got personnel there that perfectly fit what Adam is trying to do and they execute.”

Ovechkin leads the league with 12 power play goals.

He became the sixth fastest to score 400 goals in the NHL. He did it in his 634th game. Only Wayne Gretzky (436), Mike Bossy (506), Mario Lemieux (508), Brett Hull (520) and Jari Kurri (608) reached 400 goals faster.

DeBoer admitted the Devils will feel the loss of Damien Brunner with a right knee injury.

“It looks like probably a four-week type timeline. It’s unfortunate for him. He was playing great and he was just starting to consistently find his game,” DeBoer said. “This will be someone else’s opportunity.”

Mattias Tedenby will be in the lineup against the Caps. Andrei Loktionov, battling a cold, is out.

“Tedenby is in the lineup tonight. We’re going to make some decisions in the warmup with the rest of the group,” DeBoer said.

“I think (Loktionov is) dealing with a little something but nothing major.”

Rookie Reid Boucher was critical of his own performance against the Ducks. DeBoer was not as unhappy with the young winger.

“As a group, sometimes guys are a little hard on themselves,” the coach said. “That Anaheim team can make you look bad. They’re a big, heavy physical team. There’s a reason they have the record they have. I thought our guys hung in there pretty well for the most part again.

“I’m not as hard on his game as he is.”



Devils find way to win without playing perfect; Head to Chicago next to face reigning Cup champs

Posted by Tom Gulitti on 12/22 at 02:58 AM

Friday morning, Devils coach Pete DeBoer described his team’s usual formula for success as follows.

“We defend well. We’ve got great goaltending. It’s going to be a race to three goals every night,” DeBoer said.

In tonight’s 5-4 overtime win in Washington, the Devils didn’t play up to their usual standard in the first two parts of that equation, so the race as to five goals to get a win instead of three. Fortunately, they’ve started to score a bit more lately, reaching at least four goals for the fourth time in seven games.

“Not every game is going to go perfect” center Travis Zajac said. “Especially sometimes on the back to back, you’re a little tired. Coverage and sticks and awareness isn’t as high as that first game. So, I think it’s normal. But, for us, I think we did a great job battling back.”

Tonight, they came back from deficits of 3-1 and 4-2 in the third period.

“We stick with it. It was a gutsy effort, resilient effort,” DeBoer said. “I really liked our bench tonight. Even when we were down 4-2, I thought there was a lot of positive chatter. I think everyone’s surprised we came back. Probably the least surprised guys are the guys in our room. I think they felt confident all night that we could still make a game of it.”

“It’s kind of nice to win some of them like that,” goaltender Martin Brodeur said. “If you want to be successful and you want to keep growing, you need wins that you’re not going to be 100 perfect. We did a lot good stuff offensively to win the game.”

Although DeBoer pointed to them allowing only 22 shots on goal, there were defensive breakdowns on the first two goals that led to wide open players scoring goals and a bad turnover by Patrik Elias to Karl Alzner led to the fourth goal scored by Alex Ovechkin.

But the Devils were able to overcome that with big efforts from Jaromir Jagr and Andy Greene (one goal, two assists apiece) and Marek Zidlicky (two goals). Dainius Zubrus added a goal an assist and Patrik Elias and Zajac had two assists each.

“Our veteran guys were real good tonight,” DeBoer said. “The Jagr-Zubrus-Zajac line, I thought, was dominant. Zid and all our defensemen gave us a solid game.”

The Devils improved to 3-0-1 in their last four games and moved back to NHL .500 at 15-15-7. They also took over third place in the mediocre Metropolitan Division and a playoff spot with 37 points.

“We feel we’re playing some decent hockey,” Brodeur said. “We have the luxury of being in the weakest division and we have to take advantage of it. We can’t just say, ‘We’re in the weakest. We’re in the weakest.’ We have to start putting points on the board and the last four games we just dropped one point. If we continue to do that over and over good thing will happen for us.”

The Devils head next to Chicago to take on the reigning Stanley Cup champions Monday night in both teams’ final game before the Olympic break. The Devils would love to head into the three-day respite on a victory over a Blackhawks team that has been very good again this season with 25-7-6 record and 56 points – good for second overall in the NHL behind only Anaheim with 57.

“It’s going to be a great test,” Greene said. “We’re had Anaheim (a 3-2 overtime loss Friday) and we had Washington here and then Chicago on Monday. If we’re not ready, they’ll embarrass us. We’ve just got to make sure we’re ready to play and go into the Christmas break with a good mood and feeling good about our team.”

“I know they lost a tough one against Vancouver (Friday). They were up 2-0,” Brodeur said. “I’m sure before the break – like any team – they’re going to want to play really hard and have a nice Christmas. So, for us, we’re in that same boat. It will be fun. We play well against good teams. We’ve just got to continue the way we’ve been playing.”

Through their first 10 sets of back-to-back games (out of a league-high 22), the Devils are 3-5-2 in the first game and now 6-1-3 in the second one.

Bergen Record LOADED: 12.22.2013


“Clutch” Greene comes through for Devils with OT goal, shakes off Olympic snub; Jagr ties Messier

Posted by Tom Gulitti on 12/22 at 01:24 AM

After Martin Brodeur watched defenseman Andy Greene score the overtime winner and also register two assists in the Devils’ 5-4 win in Washington tonight, he thought he’d have a little fun with his teammate and tease him about needing to cancel his plans the Olympic break in February.

“I was just joking,” Brodeur said. “I was like, ‘Here we go. You thought you were going on vacation.’ He goes, ‘I was not even on the long list.’”

That those in the hierarchy of the U.S. Olympic team didn’t think enough of the Greene to put him on the “long list” of players being considered to represent the country in Sochi, Russia this February – making him ineligible to be picked even if they changed their minds now – was a significant oversight in the eyes of his teammates.

Greene denies it provides any extra motivation for him, though.

“Honestly, that’s not what I’m trying to go out there and do is prove them wrong,” he said. I’m just going out there and trying to help and play and make sure we’re getting points here. It’s a tough decision. There’s a lot of good players now in the U.S and a lot of great young D and older D. I don’t look at it one way or another.”

Greene’s goal 43 seconds into overtime got the Devils back to NHL .500 at 15-15-7 for the first time since they were 11-11-5 three weeks ago. It also put them in third place in the Metropolitan Division—and in a playoff spot – for the first time since Nov. 22.

“Greenie’s a clutch guy,” Devils coach Pete DeBoer said. “He has a way of finding the right hole at the right time. So, we’ll take it. We needed it. We’ve got a tough one left in Chicago here, but we’re putting some points in the bank, which is what we wanted to do.”

The Devils rallied from third period deficits of 3-1 and 4-2 to force overtime and then won for the fifth time in their seven games that have been decided in the five-minute extra session this season.

“Dating back a long time, I honestly can’t remember the last overtime goal I scored,” said Greene, who also scored the power-play goal that got the Devils to overtime Friday night against Anaheim. “It feels great to do it and get a big win there.”

Patrik Elias fed Jaromir Jagr on the rush for the initial shot from the slot that Capitals goaltender Braden Holtby sticked aside to his right, but Greene was there to bunt in the rebound with the shaft of his stick for his sixth goal of the season.

“It hit right in the middle of my stick, between my hands on the shaft there,” Greene said.

Jagr had a goal and two assists to extend his points streak to seven games (two goals, nine assists). His goal was team-leading 13th of the season and the 694th of his career tying him with Mark Messier for seventh place all time.

Defenseman Marek Zidlicky scored twice as the Devils got three goals from defenseman. Dainius Zubrus also scored on a deflection with 8:13 left that knotted the game at 4.

“I thought we responded very well when we were down two goals and it’s a big win for us,” Jagr said. “We needed to get points to get back to the .500 mark.”

Jagr admitted he “didn’t know much” about Greene before he joined the Devils this season, but he’ been very impressed by his play. Greene’s 20 points (six goals, 14 assists) rank third on the team behind Jagr’s 33 and Elias’ 24 and ties him for fifth among American-born defensemen in the NHL. Greene ranks fourth among U.S. defensemen in averaging 24:54 in ice time per game.

“He’s a great offensive player, never mind defensive player,” Jagr said. “He’s great defensively, but for me I’m surprised the way he can read the play, he can make the passes. His skating is excellent, so even if he gets

into trouble he’s always in the right position to make a play, make a pass, jump in the play. He plays a lot of and he made great plays today again.”

Jagr benefited from Greene’s aggressive play to score a power-play goal that pulled the Devils within 3-2 5:28 into the third period. After Travis Zajac won the right circle draw, Greene jumped up to grab the puck and move in on the left side. Holtby made a save on his initial shot at the left post, but Greene got the puck back, headed behind the net and found Jagr alone to the right of the net for the easy finish.

“It was not only that pass, but the play before,” Jagr said. “He jumped in the play. He read it well, so he surprised everybody. He even surprised me. The way he jumped in the play everybody stopped because when you play on the power play you don’t really do that.”

Unfortunately, it seems not many outside of New Jersey are noticing how well Greene has been playing.

“I didn’t even know he’s not on the long list for Team USA, so probably not,” Brodeur said. “It’s crazy”

“I can’t believe he’s not even mentioned on the U.S. Olympic team on the list,” said center Travis Zajac, who had two assists. “That’s their fault as far as I can see. He’s been playing well this year. He’s been our best D-man at both ends of the ice. He plays against the top guys, plays lots of minutes and he’s having a great year.”

Another night, another milestone for Jagr. The 41-year-old future Hall of Famer scored his team-leading 13th goal of the season and the 694th of his career Saturday, tying him with Mark Messier for seventh place all-time. In the span of a month, Jagr went past Mario Lemieux (690 goals) for ninth and Steve Yzerman (692) for eighth and now has caught Messier.

“I played with Mark, not for long, but I had to chance to play with him on the New York Rangers,” Jagr said. “He’s a great player, a great person. He accomplished a lot in the NHL. To be able to tie him, it’s a big honor.”

Jagr seemed to be having a lot of fun in tonight’s game as the Capitals’ fans, still unhappy from his days of playing in Washington, booed him every time he touched the puck.

“That was about Zuuuuuubie!” Jagr joked, referring to Zubrus’ nickname.

Being more serious, Jagr said of the boos, “I don’t really pay attention to that. Once you play hockey, you’re in the game so much, you don’t even hear it. You concentrate on the game so much, you don’t even hear it.”

Jagr’s play appears to be lifting the rest of the team offensively. He leads the team with 13 goals, 20 assists and 33 points in 37 games.

The Devils have scored four goals or more four times over their last seven games – with Jagr having points in all seven. Jagr played a complete game tonight with the three points, a team-high five shots on goal and eight attempted shots (matching Alex Ovechkin in both categories) and even was credited with just his second hit of the season tonight on defensemen John Carlson in the second period.

Jagr’s power-play goal was his second in the last three games after he had none in the first 34.

“Seriously, did you see that today? It was unbelievable,” Brodeur said of Jagr’s play. “Who comes in the zone backwards with his (rear end first)? I’ve never seen that before. Even in his prime he didn’t need to do that. Now, he finds a way to be dominate with protecting the puck.”

Greene said he’s enjoyed getting to play with the legend.

“It’s awesome,” Greene said. “Coming into this season, I had no idea. You hear stories about how he’s a great guy and all the other stuff and you just kind of go in with an open mind and it’s been unbelievable. It’s been a lot of fun and I’ve really enjoyed playing with him. Playing with him and Marty, two of the best in their positions, it’s been unbelievable.”

With Zidlicky’s two goals and Greene’s OT winner, the Devils now have 17 goals from their defensemen in 37 games this season after getting only 13 in the 48-game 2012-13 lockout shortened season.

Greene has six goals, Zidlicky five and rookie Eric Gelinas four, adding a much-needed dimension to the Devils’ offense.

“That’s what we’re looking to do: to help in the offensive zone,” Zidlicky said. “That’s what happened tonight and that’s very important for us to get the two points.”

“Guys like Z and Gelly, we’re all chipping in out there,” Greene said. “It’s huge. Obviously, we don’t have the most offensive depth, but guys are really stepping up and playing well. We’ve been having some timely scoring here.”

Greene set up both of Zidlicky’s goals. The first was a one-timed blast from the left circle that beat Holtby high to the short side.

“That’s my spot,” Zidlicky said. “I got the nice pass and also on my second goal, I got the nice pass. I was going to the net and nobody was around me.”



Tedenby back in Devils’ lineup tonight in Washington, Loktionov (ill) out; Henrique back to center

Posted by Tom Gulitti on 12/21 at 06:16 PM

With right wing Damien Brunner sidelined with a right knee injury and center Andrei Loktionov also out because he’s ill, Devils coach Pete DeBoer said he’s “going to move some guys around” in his line combinations.

DeBoer wouldn’t get specific on his lines, but confirmed that Mattias Tedenby will be in the lineup for the first time since Nov. 29 in Carolina (He played two AHL games on a conditioning loan to Albany last weekend.

“Then, we’re going to make some decisions in warm-up here on the rest of the group,” DeBoer said.

Those decisions would appeared to involve Jacob Josefson, Cam Janssen and Tim Sestito.

Adam Henrique confirmed he will shift from left wing back to center tonight with Loktionov out, so if Josefson plays, it would likely be as a wing.

DeBoer said it was a bad break for Brunner, who had scored four goals in his last four games before he was injured in the first period of Friday’s 3-2 overtime loss to Anaheim.

“It looks like probably a four-week type timeline, so unfortunate for him,” DeBoer said. “He was playing great and was just starting to consistently find his game, so it will be someone else’s opportunity.”

Martin Brodeur will start in net for the Devils. There is no word yet on who will start in net for the Capitals.

The Devils shift their focus tonight from trying to stop Ryan Getzlaf and Corey Perry to trying to contain Alex Ovechkin, who leads the NHL with 29 goals in 33 games and has seven goals in his last five games, including his 400th career goal Friday night in Carolina.

“We played Perry and Getzlaf last night and we did a good job eliminating them from being a major factor in the game,” DeBoer said. “They found another way to get two or three goals and that’s what deep teams do. That’s the challenge tonight. Obviously, we have to pay attention to Ovechkin. He’s been hot lately. He’s scoring every night.

“That’s one challenge and the second challenge is to make sure the other guys on the ice don’t beat us.”

Although the Devils have been good on the penalty kill this season (ranked sixth in the NHL with an 86.1 percent success rate), limiting the number of penalties they take against the Capitals’ lethal power play will be essential. The Capitals rank second in the league with a 26.3 percent success rate and Ovechkin leads the league with 12 power-play goals.

With former Devils assistant Adam Oates as their head coach, the Capitals utilize a similar power play set-up to the one the Devils used two seasons ago with Ilya Kovalchuk. What separates the Capitals’ power play is the talent they have around Ovechkin.

“I think the uniqueness of their power play is the skill set and how complementary their five guys are to each other,” DeBoer said. “You’ve got a great half wall guy in (Nicklas) Backstrom, who controls the play. You’ve got a great shooter in the slot in (Troy) Brouwer. You’ve got Ovechkin with the one-timer back door and you’ve got a bomb at the top with (Mike) Green.

“So, you’ve got personnel there that perfectly fit what Adam’s trying to do and they execute.”

DeBoer said Loktionov is “dealing with a little bit of something, but nothing major.”

Rookie wing Reid Boucher said this morning he “didn’t play very well” in Friday’s game and was looking to bounce back tonight. Although he played Boucher only 9:30 (the lowest total in his eight NHL games so far) DeBoer didn’t necessarily agree with Boucher’s assessment.

“I think as a group sometimes guys are a little hard on themselves,” DeBoer said. “That Anaheim team can make you look bad. They’re a big, heavy,

physical team. There’s a reason they have the record they have and I thought our guys hung in there pretty well for the most part against them. So, I’m not as hard on his game as his game as he is.”

Henrique played a strong game Friday, picking up his second assist in as many games and hitting the post in a shorthanded rush in the first period.

“I thought he had good jump,” DeBoer said. “I thought hit was his best game in a while.”

DeBoer on the play of Michael Ryder, who scored his 10th goal of the season Friday:

“He’s hot. A lot like Brunner, he’s found his touch. They’re going in for him. I think even prior to him starting to score I liked how he was playing. He was creating two or three chances a night. They just weren’t going. They are now, so we want to ride that as long as we can.”

There’s no word yet on the Caps’ full lineup tonight, but former Devils defenseman Alex Urbom—claimed off waivers on Oct. 3—will be a healthy scratch for the 10th consecutive game. Urbom, 23, has not dressed since Nov. 29.



Devils’ Clowe doesn’t expect plan for his return to be impacted by Brunner’s knee injury


Left wing Ryane Clowe doesn’t expect Damien Brunner’s right knee injury to change the timetable for when he might return to the Devils’ lineup.

“I don’t really get the feeling that’s how they do things around here,” said Clowe, who has been sidelined since Oct. 13 with a concussion. “If they’ve got a plan in place for me – I’m not sure, like I said (Friday), when they want me to come back – it feels like they’re sticking to it. They’ve been pretty patient with me through this whole thing, so an injury here or there or a loss, I don’t think they’re going to push any (panic) buttons.”

Brunner is out for “approximately four weeks,” according to Devils GM Lou Lamoriello, but won’t require surgery “just rehab.”

Clowe is on the trip with the Devils in Washington, but won’t play tonight against the Capitals and is still unsure if he’ll play Monday night in Chicago – the team’s final game before the three-day Christmas break. When considering this is what Clowe categorizes as his second concussion in the last nine months, he understand the team being cautious and making sure he’s 100 percent ready before putting him back in the lineup.

“I totally understand why they would want me to get a few extra days and just some more contact,” he said. “When you’re out as long as I have been, to take a little extra time, it has nothing to do with me. I want to, obviously, get back as soon as possible. But I understand that part of it.”

Clowe said he feels ready to play now, though.

“I think I’m at a stage where when I do come back and play – whenever (that is) – I feel comfortable,” he said. “I keep saying there’s only so much you can do in practice, but I feel like I’ve done everything I needed to. Sometimes it’s hard to be patient, but I think at this stage it’s the right thing.”

Clowe felt bad for Brunner and was hoping he wouldn’t be out very long.

“I don’t know what the injury is, but it looked pretty bad when I was watching,” he said. “I had an ACL tear a few years ago and I hope it’s nothing like that.”

Clowe suggested that Brunner being close to the boards when Anaheim defenseman Mark Fistric made contact with a knee-on-knee hit might have saved Brunner from a more serious injury.

“I think the boards helped him for sure,” Clowe said. “It was a weird play because the knee was out, but I was talking to (Cam Janssen) about this. A lot of time, you finish your hits like that. You’re not really sticking your knee out, but that’s just the way you go.”



Lamoriello: Brunner “out approximately four weeks” with right knee injury, but doesn’t need surgery


Devils general manager Lou Lamoriello said today that right wing Damien Brunner will “be out approximately four weeks” with a right knee injury he sustained in the first period of Friday night’s 3-2 overtime loss to Anaheim.

“It’s not a surgery,” Lamoriello said. “It’s just rehab.”

Brunner was injured on a knee-on-knee hit from Ducks defenseman Mark Fistric with 2:52 left in the first period. That Brunner, who underwent an MRI, will not require surgery indicates that his anterior cruciate ligament was not impacted—something Lamoriello confirmed. Lamoriello would not reveal the exact nature of Brunner’s injury, but the prognosis of four weeks and rehab is common for a medial collateral ligament sprain.

Although it’s bad luck that Brunner was injured at all, Lamoriello said they consider it “very fortunate that he doesn’t need surgery.”

After struggling through a 17-game goal drought, Brunner had been hot with four goals in four games heading into Friday’s contest.

“He had been playing very well,” Lamoriello said. “And he started off well (Friday). It’s just unfortunate (he was injured).”

With Brunner out for tonight’s game in Washington, there will be some lineup changes, but I won’t be able to confirm what they are until head coach Pete DeBoer’s pre-game media availability at approximately 5 p.m.

The only Devils to skate this morning at Verizon Center were goaltender Martin Brodeur, rookie wing Reid Boucher, left wing Ryane Clowe and defenseman Bryce Salvador. Brodeur and Boucher, who will both play tonight, skated only briefly.

Clowe (concussion) and Salvador (left foot stress fracture) skated for an extended period and did some physical one on one work to help prepare for their eventual return to the lineup. Neither will play tonight. Clowe said he does not believe the plan for his return will be impacted at all by Brunner’s injury. I’ll have more on that later.

Oddly, Boucher initially was under the impression he will be a healthy scratch tonight, but later returned to say he will be in the lineup. Boucher, 20, played only 9:30 in Friday’s game (he did a get as shift in overtime) and did not register a shot on goal or even attempt a shot. He admitted, “I didn’t play very well,” but was “definitely” happy that he’ll be in the lineup tonight.

“I just have to work harder,” Boucher said.

Boucher’s reprieve appears connected to center Andrei Loktionov, who was at the arena this morning and has been battling a cold the last two days. It also looks like Mattias Tedenby and Jacob Josefson, who did not skate this morning, both will play.

Right wing Cam Janssen also did not skate this morning after being a healthy scratch Friday night, so that would seem to indicate he will play tonight.

Lamoriello said left wing Ryan Carter, who has been sidelined since Nov. 30 with a leg injury, has resumed skating. There is still no timetable for his return.

Defenseman Peter Harrold has the cast removed from his broken foot this week. Lamoriello said the timetable for his return is unclear.

“It’s like with (Salvador),” Lamoriello said. “Sometimes it heels faster. Sometimes it takes longer than you think.”

Defenseman Adam Larsson, who has been out since Nov. 23 with a lower-body injury, continues to skate on his own and apparently is very close to joining the team for practice. Lamoriello still will not reveal the exact nature of Larsson’s injury, which DeBoer said Thursday was, “fairly significant.”



Andy Greene scores game-winner for Devils in overtime victory against Capitals

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Saturday, December 21, 2013, 10:51 PM

WASHINGTON (AP) — Andy Greene scored 43 seconds into overtime, Marek Zidlicky had two goals and the New Jersey Devils rallied past the Washington Capitals 5-4 Saturday night.

Greene knocked the rebound of a shot by Jaromir Jagr past Braden Holtby for the game-winner.

Greene also had two assists. Jagr scored his 13th goal and added two assists. Dainius Zubrus had a goal and an assist for New Jersey, which trailed 3-1 after two periods.



Holtby finished with 32 saves in the first meeting of the season between Metropolitan Division rivals. Jagr, on a power play, and Ovechkin traded third-period goals three minutes apart.

Alex Ovechkin rips a shot at Devils goalie Martin Brodeur while a defenseman falls in front of him.

Alex Brandon/AP

Alex Ovechkin rips a shot at Devils goalie Martin Brodeur while a defenseman falls in front of him.

Zidlicky pulled the Devils within 4-3 when he beat Holtby from the slot at 9:21. New Jersey tied it when Travis Zajac intercepted Holtby’s clearing attempt and fed in front to Zubrus, who poked it home at 11:47.

Both teams were playing the second of back-to-back games and there was little action early on. Brodeur made several good stops during a Washington power play midway through the period. New Jersey got the man advantage when Tom Wilson went off for high-sticking at 10:52.

Less than a minute later Greene fed Zidlicky in the left circle and Zidlicky one-timed a drive past Holtby on the short side to make it 1-0.

It was New Jersey’s first shot on goal. The Devils tested Holtby several times early in the second period, but he kept the deficit at one. Chimera finally tied it at the 10:07 mark when he came around the back of the net and tried to stuff the puck home.

Brodeur made the initial save, but Chimera poked the loose puck past him. Grabovski gave Washington the lead at 14:38 of the period with his 10th of the year, off a feed from Eric Fehr in the left circle.

The Capitals went ahead 3-1 with 45 seconds left in the period. They skated in three on two and Mike Green fired from the right side.

Brodeur made the save, but it went right to Ward who put it past him for his 11th of the season.

NOTES: Ovechkin has scored 30 or more goals in nine straight seasons. ... Jagr extended his points streak to seven games with a first period assist. ... The Devils were without C Andrei Loktionov (illness) and RW Damien Brunner (knee), who was injured Friday against Anaheim. ... Olympic swimming gold medalist Michael Phelps was in attendance.

New York Daily News LOADED: 12.22.2013


Following big win over NY Rangers, Islanders come back down to earth in loss to Ducks

By Stephen Lorenzo / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

Updated: Saturday, December 21, 2013, 11:29 PM

Any momentum the Islanders might have gained with their win over the Rangers on Friday quickly faded Saturday night at the Coliseum once they remembered they simply aren’t a good hockey team.

The Isles blew a two-goal lead in the third period, surrendering four unanswered goals, and landed right back in the loss column in a 5-3 defeat to the Ducks, who got a hat trick from Ryan Getzlaf in winning their eighth straight. Thomas Vanek summed up the third-period effort perfectly:

“Tonight you saw again why we are exactly where we are in the standings.”

Getzlaf started the Anaheim scoring carousel in the final frame with a rebound goal at 1:10. Mathieu Perreault then tied the game at 10:32, Kyle Palmieri gave the Ducks (26-7-5) their first lead at 13:44 and then Getzlaf completed his hat trick in the waning seconds with an empty-netter. Amid the scrambling, Jack Capuano curiously chose not to call a timeout to settle his team down.

At least two of the Ducks goals were helped by questionable calls, but instead of fighting through tough calls, the Islanders (10-20-7) let them go to their heads, something Vanek said has been a trend.

“I think right now we’re not closing games and it’s costing us points and at the same time I think we focus sometimes on the wrong things,” Vanek said. “I think two of the goals came off faceoffs that were both icing calls, which I don’t think were icings, but we tend to focus on the bad stuff instead of regrouping and getting the puck out.”

Vanek put the Islanders on the board with a rebound goal at 11:27 of the first period and then scored again at 17:55 of the second with a blazing slap shot from the right faceoff circle on a breakaway. Frans Nielsen followed with another goal at 18:52 for a 3-1 lead after two, but sadly, no lead is safe at the Coliseum.

“This game here I think is a little bit different, honestly, than the past games, but it still comes down to battle level,” Capuano said. “It’s not structural, it’s about the will to compete every single shift and have that desperation in a game. We did it for 40 minutes, but to me… it was the fact that we didn’t move the puck the way that we should have.”

The Isles remain firmly rooted in last place in the Metropolitan Division and are arguably already running out of time to resurrect their season.



Devils rally past Capitals in OT

By Associated Press

December 21, 2013 | 10:16pm

WASHINGTON — The season isn’t quite half over, and already Devils coach Pete DeBoer might be running out ways to praise about Jaromir Jagr.

Jagr had a goal and two assists, Andy Greene scored 43 seconds into overtime and Marek Zidlicky had two goals as the Devils rallied past the Capitals 5-4 Saturday night.

“He amazes me every night I come to the rink,” DeBoer said of the 41-year-old forward. “I don’t have a lot more adjectives to describe him, but he’s a pleasure to work with.”

It was Jagr’s 13th goal of the season and career No. 694, moving him into a tie with Mark Messier for seventh all-time.

Greene, who knocked the rebound of a shot by Jagr past Braden Holtby for the game-winner, also had two assists.

“I honestly can’t remember the last overtime goal I scored,” Greene said.

Dainius Zubrus had a goal and an assist for New Jersey, which trailed 3-1 after two periods.

“I think everyone’s surprised we came back, [but] I think the least surprised guys are in our room,” DeBoer said. “I think they felt confident all night they could still make a game of it.”

Alex Ovechkin scored his 30th goal and Joel Ward had a goal and an assist for Washington. The Capitals’ Jason Chimera and Mikhail Grabovski also scored and Martin Erat had two assists.


“Today, I felt like we were playing very good hockey the first two periods, and I look at the scoreboard and we were down 3-1,” Jagr said. “That was kind of tough to swallow, but we got some lucky bounces in the third period, and tied the game and went into overtime again.

“I thought we responded very well when we were down two goals, and it’s a big win for us,” he said.


“They are a relentless team. They kept coming,” Capitals coach Adam Oates said. “We made a couple of mistakes.”


New Jersey tied it when Travis Zajac intercepted Holtby’s clearing attempt and fed in front to Zubrus, who poked it home at 11:47.

“We just gave them a little momentum to get back into it and they capitalized on their chances right to the end,” Ward said.

Both teams were playing the second of back-to-back games, and there was little action early on.


Less than a minute later Greene fed Zidlicky in the left circle and Zidlicky one-timed a drive past Holtby on the short side to make it 1-0. It was New Jersey’s first shot on goal.




“We kind of shot ourselves in the foot there in the second period,” Greene said. “There were a couple of breakdowns and they capitalized.”


“We played a good 40 minutes,” Green said, “but we needed 60 tonight.”

Ovechkin has scored 30 or more goals in nine straight seasons. He’s scored a goal in four straight games. … Jagr extended his points streak to seven games with a first-period assist. … The Devils were without C Andrei Loktionov (illness) and RW Damien Brunner (knee), who was injured Friday against Anaheim. The Devils said Brunner will be out a minimum of four weeks. … Olympic swimming gold medalist Michael Phelps was in attendance.

New York Post LOADED: 12.22.2013

730762 New York Islanders

Getzlaf’s hat trick sinks Islanders

By Associated Press

December 21, 2013 | 11:20pm

Coming off a win against the Rangers Friday night, the Islanders grabbed a two-goal lead heading into the third period against the elite Ducks — and then reality struck.

Ryan Getzlaf scored three goals and the Ducks rallied for their team-record eighth straight victory, beating the Islanders 5-3 Saturday night at the Coliseum.

“We talked after the second of just continuing to play our game,” Ducks coach Bruce Boudreau said. “We were very calm about it and knew if we got one quickly, we’d have a great chance.”

Down 3-1, the Ducks scored four times in the third period. The Islanders played a spirited first two periods, taking their lead on two goals by Thomas Vanek and another by Frans Nielsen.

But Getzlaf scored his second of the game at 1:10 of the final period and Mathieu Perreault tied it at 10:32.

“We didn’t move the puck the way we should have in the third period,” coach Jack Capuano said. “You can’t play the way we played in the third period against a big Stanley Cup-caliber team like this. It won’t work.”

Kyle Palmieri, a native of Montvale, N.J., who scored the overtime winner Friday night against the Devils, found himself in front of Evengi Nabokov with a clear shot at 13:44. The 22- year-old forward, who also scored the winning goal when the Ducks beat the Rangers 2-1 at Madison Square Garden on Nov. 4, knocked in his sixth goal of the season.

“Those goals feel really, really good,” Palmieri said. “We find ways to win and tonight was another example of our patience and skill.”

Getzlaf completed his hat trick with an empty-net goal. The Ducks won in their first visit to Long Island since a 3-2 loss on Dec. 16, 2010.

Vanek finally had the type of game the Islanders envisioned when they acquired him from Buffalo for popular left wing Matt Moulson on Oct. 27.

The Austrian right wing opened the scoring at 11:27 of the first, putting a rebound past backup goaltender Frederik Andersen, who made 18 saves to improve to 9-1.

After Getzlaf tied the game at 15:10 of the second, Vanek gave the Islanders again with a perfectly placed shot as he sped down the right side, beating Andersen to his stick side at 17:55.

The goal was Vanek’s ninth since joining the Islanders and his third in two nights. Nielsen made it 3-1 for the Islanders 57 seconds later.

“It came down to execution,” Capuano said. “We were icing the puck too much and not making plays when we had to in the third period.”

Anaheim forward Teemu Selanne was a healthy scratch. The 43-year-old Selanne usually doesn’t play the second half of back-to-back games. Selanne played Friday night as the Ducks upended the Devils 3-2 in overtime.

This was the 10th time in 36 games this season the Islanders have lost a third-period lead. … Forward Dustin Penner and defenseman Hampus Lindholm were healthy scratches for the Ducks, as were Islanders forwards Colin McDonald and Peter Regin, plus defenseman Aaron Ness. … The Islanders have been without defenseman Lubomir Visnovsky (concussion) since has injured Oct. 19.



Point taken as Strome makes scoresheet

By Brett Cyrgalis

December 21, 2013 | 3:53pm

The hope for the Islanders is this is the beginning for Ryan Strome, that his first career NHL point recorded in Friday night’s 5-3 triumph over the Rangers at the Garden can someday be a nice footnote in history.

“Obviously it’s exciting, and to do it in a game with a win is good too,” said Strome, the fifth overall pick in the 2010 draft who was playing in the third NHL game of his career since being recalled Dec. 11. “You want to contribute as much as you can, and pitch in, and I feel like we did that.”

It might not have been highlight-reel stuff, but midway through the third period, with the Islanders trailing 3-2, Strome made a nice little backhand pass off the boards to Josh Bailey, who teed up a point shot from Brian Strait that snuck past Henrik Lundqvist.

The play was noteworthy in many ways, as Strome got the second assist, Bailey got his first point in 13 games, and Strait got his first career regular-season goal. (He had his first career goal last season in the playoffs.)

For the Islanders, what Strome represents is a boost to their offensive depth beyond just the top line of John Tavares, Thomas Vanek and Kyle Okposo.

“For us to have success, we have to get secondary scoring,” coach Jack Capuano said. “Those are usually the teams that win hockey games.”

J.T. Miller made his return to the Rangers lineup, being recalled Thursday to complete his third round trip of the season to and from AHL Hartford.

Miller centered a line with Brad Richards and Benoit Pouliot, and the 20-year-old played 11:22 with just three shifts in the third period.

“J.T. had been playing real well at both ends of the rink,” coach Alain Vigneault said before the game about Miller’s time in Hartford. “They had been using him at center, and after discussing where we were, at this time, that it might be a good time to give him a look.”

With the holiday roster freeze now in effect, Miller will be with the club at least until Dec. 27, when it is lifted. Miller said he wasn’t expecting his most recent demotion, which came Dec. 9, but knows he now has another opportunity to stick.

“Don’t take it as negative all the time, just kind of take the positive out of things and don’t sit back and worry about things that happened previously,” Miller said. “My focus is just on today. Obviously you want to stay, so that’s going to be my goal from here out.”

With the Rangers sending down forward Arron Asham to make room for Miller, winger Taylor Pyatt remained a healthy scratch for the third straight game.

The Islanders got fourth-line winger Casey Cizikas back after he missed the previous two games with a jaw injury. It resulted in Colin McDonald remaining a healthy scratch for the third straight game after playing 17 of the previous 18 before that.

“Where we are in the standings, guys shouldn’t have an excuse when they’re sitting out,” Capuano said before the game. “Colin is an integral part of this team. … I wouldn’t say the odd guy out right now because it’s based on your performance and we’ll continue on a daily basis on who is going to go in and out.”

Rugged winger Eric Boulton played his fifth straight game while Peter Regin was scratched up front. Matt Carkner came in to add some size on defense, replacing diminutive rookie Aaron Ness.



Islanders blow another two-goal lead to lose to Ducks

Originally published: December 21, 2013 10:37 PM

Updated: December 22, 2013 12:06 AM

By ARTHUR STAPLE

These games and points handed away by the Islanders in the third period this season have come in all shapes and sizes.

They've had the last-second malfunction, against the Lightning earlier this week. They've done the brain-cramp thing, allowing a tying shorthanded goal to the Caps last month. They've been beaten by the best, when Sidney Crosby did in the Isles three weeks ago.

Saturday night brought another unsightly meltdown at the Coliseum, another blown two-goal lead in the final 20 minutes. This one, which ended 5-3 for the NHL-leading Anaheim Ducks, featured a few new wrinkles -- blown officiating calls, plus two fast goals from lost faceoffs for the tying and winning goals in the latter half of the third period.

That makes 10 blown third-period leads in 37 games for the Islanders, including five blown two-goal leads. They are 0-2-3 in those games they led by two, which have been different in the details but consistent in one aspect: This team is not mentally strong late in games.

"Our third periods have been absolutely horrendous," said John Tavares, who was held without a point for the second straight game. "Whether the calls go against you or not, you still have to find a way to get the job done."

The Islanders did not. After Thomas Vanek scored twice -- including a pretty solo rush and big slap shot past Ducks goaltender Frederik Andersen late in the second -- and Frans Nielsen scored off the rush, the Isles brought a 3-1 lead into the third period.

But they gave one back, quickly, on Ryan Getzlaf's second of the night off a slow-moving scramble 1:10 into the third. And after a badly missed call -- Josh Bailey got knocked down by Francois Beauchemin outside the Ducks' blue line, resulting in no penalty and an unjust icing -- Mathieu Perreault beat Nielsen on the draw, then outworked Nielsen to bury a rebound with 9:28 to go to tie it.

After another questionable icing -- and a missed high-stick on Kyle Okposo -- Getzlaf beat Nielsen on a draw and Smithtown-born Kyle Palmieri muscled past Andrew MacDonald, tapped the puck through Brian Strait's legs and backhanded the winner by Evgeni Nabokov with 6:16 remaining.

Getzlaf scored into an empty net to complete his hat trick and seal the Ducks' victory.

"I think we focus on the wrong things, icings that weren't icings, and we lose our focus," Vanek said. "We take our frustrations out [on the officials] and we turn around and get more penalties. We just need to shut up and play."

There were a few missed opportunities, as Tavares' line had a handful of odd-man rushes with the Isles holding a 3-2 lead and Bailey pinged a rebound off the crossbar.

Somehow the emotion of Friday's win over the Rangers -- in which the Isles lost an early two-goal lead but rallied to beat an equally fragile team -- got lost as the horn sounded to start the final period.

"We could have made simple plays, but we iced the puck instead," Jack Capuano said after his team's 20th regulation loss. "We did the job for 40 minutes, but we didn't move the puck the way we should have in the third. That's a problem."

Newsday LOADED: LOADED: 12.22.2013


Islanders have 3 prospects in World Juniors

Originally published: December 21, 2013 9:13 PM

Updated: December 21, 2013 11:49 PM

By ARTHUR STAPLE

The 2014 World Junior championships begin Thursday in Malmo, Sweden, with three Islanders prospects participating.

Griffin Reinhart, the No. 4 overall pick in the 2012 draft, will make his second straight World Junior appearance for Canada. Adam Pelech, the Isles' third-round pick in 2012 and another defenseman, has made the squad.

Reinhart nearly made the Islanders after a strong training camp in September, but the team felt it had enough defensemen who would play ahead of the 6-4 Reinhart and sent him back to Edmonton of the Western League. Injuries to Lubomir Visnovsky and Brian Strait made the Isles regret their move.

Reinhart has two goals and nine assists in 20 games for Edmonton. Pelech has eight goals and 16 assists in 32 games for Erie of the Ontario League. One of his teammates is Dylan Strome, Ryan's younger brother.

Also in the World Junior tournament is 2012 second-rounder Ville Pokka, playing his second tournament for Finland. Pokka has three goals and 10 assists in 32 games for Karpat in Finland's SM-Liiga, that country's professional league.

Same lineup for IslesJack Capuano rarely messes with things after a win, so even on the tail end of back-to-back games, he kept the same 18 skaters and went back to Evgeni Nabokov in goal.

That meant Colin McDonald (healthy scratch for the last four games), Peter Regin and Aaron Ness were the healthy scratches.

With one more game, Monday in Detroit, before the four-day holiday break, Capuano felt comfortable playing Nabokov again. Kevin Poulin, who hasn't played since allowing six goals in Phoenix 10 days ago, might get the start against the Wings.



Islanders cautiously defend their star Tavares

December 21, 2013 6:06 PM By ARTHUR STAPLE

It's a situation that seems to happen often with the Islanders: An opposing player gets a little too zealous in trying to stop John Tavares and the Islanders' captain and star is slow to get up after a hit.

It happened in consecutive games. Montreal's Lars Eller, decidedly not a tough guy, leveled Tavares with a clean hit eight days ago; Kyle Okposo dropped the gloves to wrestle Eller to the ice immediately, and Tavares was fine.

On Tuesday, the decidedly tough Radko Gudas of the Lightning delivered a sneakier hit, pulling Tavares down after a shot and dragging Tavares awkwardly into the end boards. Tavares, who had absolved Eller of wrongdoing, did not do the same with Gudas, calling the play dirty.

Matt Martin and Eric Boulton tried to get Gudas to answer for the unpenalized play with a fight on their next shifts. Gudas declined and the game went on, despite the desire for some retribution inside the Coliseum, on the Islanders bench and across the fan base on social media.

"You have to be really careful now," Martin said. "We've seen some situations around the league and guys have gotten suspended for [retaliating]. There's cameras everywhere, so you have to do the right thing and challenge him. All eyes are on that stuff now."

Martin is referring to Bruins enforcer Shawn Thornton's "retaliation" on the Penguins' Brooks Orpik for a legal hit on Loui Eriksson. Thornton horse-collared Orpik in a scrum, threw Orpik down and punched the Penguins defenseman twice. Thornton received a 15-game suspension that he appealed; commissioner Gary Bettman's ruling comes down Monday.

So now is certainly not the time to play vigilante. But the Islanders and Lightning square off twice more, the next one on Jan. 16 in Tampa.

"You try to get a guy to answer the bell, within the rules as we have them now," Martin said. "And you remember it for next time. There won't be any targeting, but you remember what he did."

Boulton: Let Parros decide

Boulton, who played in his sixth straight game Saturday, fought Canadiens enforcer George Parros last weekend. Boulton caught Parros with a flush right hand, knocking Parros out. The big Canadiens wing had trouble getting to his skates and, after refusing to go to the dressing room, was forced to do so by game officials.

Parros hasn't returned and, amid the recent calls to ban fighting due to the lingering effects of repeated blows to the head, there was a public debate about whether Parros should retire. He also suffered an ugly concussion on opening night when the Leafs' Colton Orr dragged Parros down during a fight and Parros' face smashed the ice.

The debate will rage on, but the enforcers themselves feel the outside cries are useless.

"He's a hockey player who had two concussions this year. It's ridiculous that people who don't know anything about his medical situation are saying he should hang 'em up," Boulton said. "Loui Eriksson's had two concussions this year. Shouldn't he retire, too?"

Boulton played in his 627th NHL game Saturday. Though he plays only six or seven minutes a night, he wouldn't have stuck around through four teams and 13 seasons if he couldn't play a little, too. He knows the enforcer role has changed during his time in the league.

"Every guy who fills that role has to be able to skate and play," he said. "People are definitely trying to scrutinize that aspect of the game and looking for things. George is a grown man, he's a smart man and he's been doing this a long time. He's injured now, like anyone else. Just gotta get better and get back on the ice."

Isles too far gone?

The Islanders had 45 games left after Saturday night's game with the Ducks, and they could have been seven points out of the playoffs -- not a good position at all, but not horrible given how poorly the Islanders have played.

Still, history shows seven points is no lucky number when it comes to deficits on Dec. 22. Over the last seven seasons on this date (discounting last season, when there was no hockey being played), 18 teams have been seven or more points out of the Eastern Conference playoff picture.

Only two have recovered to earn playoff berths: The 2009-10 Flyers, who were seven points out, and the 2007-08 Capitals, who were also seven back.


730767 New York Rangers

Henrik Lundqvist, NY Rangers look for signs of life against Minnesota Wild

By Pat Leonard / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS


Henrik Lundqvist watches Thomas Vanek's shot sneak past him during Friday's loss to the Islanders.

Sunday night presents an opportunity for the freefalling Rangers' latest Garden snoozer, when the low-scoring but defensively-stingy Minnesota Wild visit from the West in the spirit of the NHL's new annual, 30-team, home-and-home scheduling system.

There is even less juice to the matchup considering that the Rangers (16-18-2) have been so flawed, it's almost no longer relevant to list stats that might bode well for their chances at two points, such as Minnesota's middling 6-9-3 road record.

What statistics matter for a Rangers team that frequently loses to backup goaltenders, can't score first in any games, can't win at home, can't get big saves from Henrik Lundqvist, and can't stop themselves from giving up what coach Alain Vigneault called on Friday "Grade-A" scoring chances?

"It's tough right now to really look at anything positive, but tomorrow will be a new day," Rangers center Brad Richards said Friday night after his team's new low point, a 5-3 home loss to the bottom-feeding Islanders.

The Blueshirts, who had off from practice Sunday before playing a back-to-back, are 6-10-2 at home this season. They are 2-8-2 in their last 12 at the Garden. They are 1-4-2 in the first seven games of this nine-game homestand, which concludes Monday night against the Toronto Maple Leafs before the Christmas break.

They have not won a game in regulation in their last seven. The only victory in that stretch was last Sunday's 4-3 shootout win over the Calgary Flames, which the Rangers also tried their best to give away.

On Friday, the Islanders were able to get a regulation win for the first time in their previous 16 outings, thanks to Lundqvist and the Rangers. The Blueshirts have fallen behind 2-0 to start five of their last six. It's incomprehensible not only how lost this team has looked, but how poorly Lundqvist has played. After all, without the franchise goaltender at his best, Vigneault's club is going nowhere anyway.

Lundqvist, whom GM Glen Sather waited too long to re-sign and then gave seven years and $59.5 million on Dec. 4, has a 2-4-2 record in his eight consecutive starts since inking the deal. He has a pedestrian 2.77 goals against average, a 10-15-2 overall record, and a .905 save percentage. Backup Cam Talbot (1.74 GAA, 6-2-0 record, .934 save percentage) unquestionably will start one of these two games before Christmas, but one wonders if the best thing for Lundqvist and the team would be for Talbot to start both.

Friday night, in addition to Lundqvist' four goals allowed on 19 shots, he was beaten badly on a second Michael Grabner breakaway that hit the crossbar. Then, in the third period, defenseman Dan Girardi was the only factor that prevented Islanders rookie Ryan Strome from crossing the net and tucking the puck inside the post, as a lumbering Lundqvist clearly was not going to get across his crease in time to make the save.

"I wish I could have been better," Lundqvist said.

The NHL's roster freeze lasts through midnight of next Thursday, after which the Blueshirts visit the Capitals in Washington, D.C. on Thursday night. So the Rangers group that faced the Islanders on Friday night is what fans can expect on Sunday and Monday, unless healthy scratch Taylor Pyatt reenters the lineup.

Second-year forward J.T. Miller, therefore, has at least two more games to assert himself in his latest recall from the AHL. He hardly played against the Islanders, especially since almost a full period was spent on special teams.

While Lundqvist underachieves, the Rangers also are getting much less than they're paying for from power forward Rick Nash, who leads this team with a $7.8 million salary cap hit until Lundqvist's $8.5 million annual number kicks in next season.

"As a player, you always have pressure on yourself to perform," Nash said after Friday's loss. "As a leader and a member of the leadership group, it's important in times like these that you step up and try to lead. We've got to turn this around, and it starts with our top guys."

Two of the Rangers' top guys are still out injured. Captain Ryan Callahan (sprained left MCL) is out until mid-January, and the status of defenseman Marc Staal (concussion) is unknown and worrisome given that the team has stopped providing updates on him altogether. That's after they reported positive progress in off-ice workouts shortly after the Dec. 7 injury.

Maybe the only encouraging stat pertaining to the Rangers is that they still are only two points out of the third and final automatic playoff spot in their Metropolitan Division, which is absolutely terrible. Extra motivation for a win over the Maple Leafs on Monday is that Toronto at the moment holds the Eastern Conference's second wild card, with 39 points in 37 games compared to the Rangers' 34 points in 36 games.

Toronto, which has stumbled recently as it gears up for the New Year's Day Winter Classic at Michigan Stadium against the Red Wings, nevertheless stood 18-16-3 heading into Saturday night's game against Detroit.

The Wild (20-12-5), meanwhile, boast former Devils captain Zach Parise and former Islanders 2010 fifth-overall pick Nino Niederreiter on their roster.

Minnesota will be without starting goaltender Josh Harding (1.51 goals against average, 18-5-3 record, .939 save percentage), who has multiple sclerosis and was placed on injured reserve recently - though the club assured during the week that the move was made simply so Harding could adjust some "protocols" in his handling of the condition.

The Rangers, of course, are accomplished at losing to second- and even third-string goaltenders anyway, so that potential advantage doesn't apply to them.



Cam Talbot ready for call

By Larry Brooks

December 21, 2013 | 4:30pm

The expectation is Cam Talbot will get the assignment in nets Sunday night when the Wild meet the Rangers at the Garden in the penultimate match of a heretofore disastrous nine-game homestand, during which the Blueshirts have won once (1-4-2).

And unless the trademark ceiling of the remodeled building caves in on the 26-year-old goaltender, there’s every chance he will play Monday night against the Maple Leafs as well, in the final game before the NHL’s civilized three-day Christmas break.

This wouldn’t represent a benching for Henrik Lundqvist so much as a mental-health break for The King, who lately has appeared to be carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders through the most wobbly sustained stretch of his career.

(Point of order: Remember when the Rangers put Mike Richter on IR for what essentially was a case of battle fatigue midway through the 2000-01 season? Ah, the old days … same as the new days?)

Talbot, who has a 6-2 record with a 1.74 goals-against average and .934 save percentage, hasn’t started in nearly three weeks, serving as the understudy for eight straight since a 4-2 defeat to the Jets at the Garden Dec. 2 that marked the first time in eight career starts in which he surrendered more than two goals.

The 26-year-old, however, did play 47:47 in relief Dec. 12, allowing the final goal of the Blueshirts’ 4-2 loss to the Blue Jackets.

Talbot told The Post on Friday morning he will be prepared for his next starting assignment whenever it occurs, and he has gone longer between starts, referencing his stay with the Rangers’ AHL club in Hartford.

“A couple of years ago I went for about a month toward the end of the season without starting,” said Talbot, who started 33 games in 2011-12 as the backup to Chad Johnson. “But then I won the job in the playoffs and started every game.”

Talbot, who was in his second pro season, recorded shutouts in each of the first two games of the then-named Whale’s opening round three-game sweep of Bridgeport before being beaten in six games in round two by Norfolk in the 2012 tournament.

“When I came up here, I expected to be in the position where I probably wouldn’t start very much, so I’ve been prepared for this,” said Talbot, who was summoned from the AHL Oct. 20. “I’ve worked hard in practice, I got that game in [against Columbus], and so I certainly feel ready to go whenever I get the call.”

The Rangers have matchup issues regardless of their alignment, but still, it’s one thing for coach Alain Vigneault to shift career center Brad Richards to the left in order to pack his top two lines, quite another for the coach to move Richards — who leads the team with nine goals, 17 assists (tied with Mats Zuccarello) and 26 points — to left wing on a third line in order to lend support to J.T. Miller in the middle, as he did in Friday’s 5-3 defeat to the Islanders.

Miller, rather than Carl Hagelin, was Vigneault’s choice to become the extra attacker when Lundqvist left the net with about 1:15 to go and the Rangers on a power play while trailing 4-3. Miller, who hadn’t been on since 10:16 of the third, joined forwards Zuccarello, Derick Brassard and Benoit Pouliot after Richards (on the point), Rick Nash, Derek Stepan and Chris Kreider had changed following lengthy shifts.

Hagelin, who had been among the Rangers’ best forwards in each of the previous two matches and had jump again on Friday, played just 11:56, including only 2:13 in the first period and 3:38 in the third, while Kreider played a sum of 12:42. Pouliot got 16:59. …

The Rangers have trailed by two or more goals during each of their past six games, outscored by an aggregate 10-4 in the first period during that span.



Point taken as Strome makes scoresheet

By Brett Cyrgalis

December 21, 2013 | 3:53pm

The hope for the Islanders is this is the beginning for Ryan Strome, that his first career NHL point recorded in Friday night’s 5-3 triumph over the Rangers at the Garden can someday be a nice footnote in history.

“Obviously it’s exciting, and to do it in a game with a win is good too,” said Strome, the fifth overall pick in the 2010 draft who was playing in the third NHL game of his career since being recalled Dec. 11. “You want to contribute as much as you can, and pitch in, and I feel like we did that.”

It might not have been highlight-reel stuff, but midway through the third period, with the Islanders trailing 3-2, Strome made a nice little backhand pass off the boards to Josh Bailey, who teed up a point shot from Brian Strait that snuck past Henrik Lundqvist.

The play was noteworthy in many ways, as Strome got the second assist, Bailey got his first point in 13 games, and Strait got his first career regular-season goal. (He had his first career goal last season in the playoffs.)

For the Islanders, what Strome represents is a boost to their offensive depth beyond just the top line of John Tavares, Thomas Vanek and Kyle Okposo.

“For us to have success, we have to get secondary scoring,” coach Jack Capuano said. “Those are usually the teams that win hockey games.”

J.T. Miller made his return to the Rangers lineup, being recalled Thursday to complete his third round trip of the season to and from AHL Hartford.

Miller centered a line with Brad Richards and Benoit Pouliot, and the 20-year-old played 11:22 with just three shifts in the third period.

“J.T. had been playing real well at both ends of the rink,” coach Alain Vigneault said before the game about Miller’s time in Hartford. “They had been using him at center, and after discussing where we were, at this time, that it might be a good time to give him a look.”

With the holiday roster freeze now in effect, Miller will be with the club at least until Dec. 27, when it is lifted. Miller said he wasn’t expecting his most recent demotion, which came Dec. 9, but knows he now has another opportunity to stick.

“Don’t take it as negative all the time, just kind of take the positive out of things and don’t sit back and worry about things that happened previously,” Miller said. “My focus is just on today. Obviously you want to stay, so that’s going to be my goal from here out.”

With the Rangers sending down forward Arron Asham to make room for Miller, winger Taylor Pyatt remained a healthy scratch for the third straight game.

The Islanders got fourth-line winger Casey Cizikas back after he missed the previous two games with a jaw injury. It resulted in Colin McDonald remaining a healthy scratch for the third straight game after playing 17 of the previous 18 before that.

“Where we are in the standings, guys shouldn’t have an excuse when they’re sitting out,” Capuano said before the game. “Colin is an integral part of this team. … I wouldn’t say the odd guy out right now because it’s based on your performance and we’ll continue on a daily basis on who is going to go in and out.”

Rugged winger Eric Boulton played his fifth straight game while Peter Regin was scratched up front. Matt Carkner came in to add some size on defense, replacing diminutive rookie Aaron Ness.



In sorry matchup, sorriest player is Lundqvist

By Larry Brooks

December 21, 2013 | 4:01am

In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is King.

If this means the Islanders represent the Battle of New York Royalty in the wake of their 5-3 victory over the Rangers at the Garden on Friday night, then so be it, for the position on our town’s hockey throne has been at least temporarily vacated by Henrik Lundqvist.

This was not a bout between giants in their chosen field. Indeed, our two teams have established themselves as Lilliputians in the Metropolitan Division that henceforth is to be known as Sidney and the Seven Dwarfs.

The winners recorded their first non-shootout triumph since Nov. 12, a span of 16 games in which they had gone 2-10-4.

The losers fell for the sixth time in seven games (1-4-2) on this homestand that still has two matches remaining even after they had climbed out of a hole in which they trailed by two goals for the sixth straight match.

Someone might want to review exactly how the Rangers are preparing for these games and then immediately adopt the George Costanza Method for Sunday’s contest against the Wild, which is, of course:

TO DO EXACTLY THE OPPOSITE.

If there is a toe-hold for the Rangers, winners of 16-of-36 overall (16-18-2), it is impossible to discern on this wall of frustration that’s as high as the fabled beanstalk.

Rick Nash, the Rangers’ lone weapon of destruction, continued to self-destruct even as he was more in the picture in the third period. He ultimately was unable to be the difference-maker the club was sure it had gotten — and has been, intermittently — from Columbus, failing to score for the fourth straight match and sixth time on the homestand.

“For sure this is mounting on me, and all of the top guys,” Nash told The Post. “I’m counted on here, and I’m expected to lead by example, so this has been very difficult.

“I think the most important thing is for us to stick together and support one another. We have to remain unified in here and not break apart.

“We can’t yield to frustration and go off on our own,” said Nash, who had three shots in 19:05. “We have to stick to what the coaches put in front of us. It’s the only way we’re going to break out of this.”

But regardless of the team’s strategy, or the system, the club’s psyche has been badly damaged by the longest and deepest slump of Lundqvist’s career.

There was one given when Alain Vigneault took the job behind the bench and that was his team would receive superior goaltending night after night after night, the way it had year after year after year.

But not this year, and not on Friday night, when Lundqvist could not make a second-period 3-2 lead — the Rangers’ first lead in six games — stand for more than 3:28 when he allowed a soft long one.

Three of the four against him — the fifth was an empty-netter — dribbled through, one on a penalty shot. For the first time in his career, Lundqvist has allowed three goals or more in seven straight starts. He is 10-15-2 with a plebian 2.77 GAA and .905 save percentage.

“I’m not doing my job,” Lundqvist told The Post. “It’s my job to clean up the mistakes and I’m not doing that.

“When we come into the room, all we can ask of one another as teammates is for everyone to work hard and for everyone to care,” he said. “I know I’m doing that, but it’s very difficult not to help my team the way I want to. It’s very disappointing.”

In the land of the blind, the one-eyed Islanders are Kings.


730771 Ottawa Senators

Vermette stuns Senators as Coyotes rally for win

James Gordon

December 21, 2013

Vermette stuns Senators as Coyotes rally for win

On an afternoon when Marc Methot appeared poised to play the hometown hero, it was a former Ottawa Senator who stole the show.

Antoine Vermette, a fan favourite who started his career and played parts of five seasons here, completed a hat trick in overtime to give the Phoenix Coyotes a 4-3 comeback victory at Canadian Tire Centre Saturday afternoon.

Not even an offensive outburst from their top defensive defenceman could lift the Senators from their season-long doldrums Saturday afternoon at Canadian Tire Centre.

Methot had a goal and an assist to help pace the Senators to 2-0 and 3-2 leads, but Vermette tied things up 3-3 with just over two minutes remaining in regulation, then buried the dagger at 2:23 of overtime.

Zack Smith had the Senators’ other goal, while Craig Anderson made 34 saves in his 10th loss of the season.

Radim Vrbata scored his 10th of the season for the Coyotes, while Canadian Olympic hopeful Mike Smith faced 40 shots in the loss.

Initially, it looked like Methot would pick up his first career power play goal in his 355th National Hockey League game six minutes into the first period, but Kyle Turris was given credit after the game for tipping the puck while it sailed toward the net.

That the Senators scored the first goal and Smith added another just minutes into the second period made this loss particularly dispiriting, given their penchant for spotting opponents one- and two-goal leads early in games this year.

Yet again, they were left wondering how it could all go so wrong.

Although Smith probably regretted the hooking penalty he took just over a minute into Period 2, he made amends on a play nobody saw coming. Smith went top shelf over Smith’s blocker after a stretch pass from defensive defenceman Eric Gryba.

Nothing seems to come easily to the Senators this year, so the Coyotes’ second period rally was no surprise.

Vermette struck first, finishing off a 2-on-1 with a nice deke past Anderson at 5:28. Vrbata sent a little wrister through the five-hole to knot the score 2-2 on a power play midway through the period.

“Here we go again,” the crowd of 16,716 was probably thinking.

Then Methot stepped to the front of the net unchallenged after picking up the puck deep in the Phoenix zone, depositing it in the far side past Smith’s blocker at 14:51 to get the Senators to the second intermission with a lead intact.

Everything was going smoothly in the third, until Erik Condra took a high-sticking penalty at 16:35 and kicked the door wide open again for the desert dogs in the process.

Vermette walked through it with a top corner blast, setting the stage for his OT winner.

GAME FILE

WHY THEY LOST

When teams are mired deep in slumps, even the games they play well enough to win seem to turn against them. Overall, there were positives to take away from this contest, but a few mental lapses cost them big.

CHEERS

Antoine Vermette, Marc Methot

Goals 10, 11 and 12 on the season made it a happy homecoming for Vermette. And two days before Festivus, Bizarro Marc Methot made an appearance at CTC — the defensive conscience of the Ottawa Senators was the offensive catalyst.

JEERS

The officials

They couldn’t stay away from their whistles for long, sending an endless stream of players to the penalty box. The final tally: 21 minors, many of them questionable.

BIRTHDAY BOY

Ottawa native Cody Ceci got a nice birthday gift from Senators coach Paul MacLean, who put the now 20-year-old in the starting lineup against the Coyotes. On the ice for the opening faceoff at the other end were former Sens Vermette and Rob Klinkhammer.

Ottawa Citizen LOADED: 12.22.2013


Scanlan: Play loose, start winning games

Wayne Scanlan

December 20, 2013

Scanlan: Play loose, start winning games

The wounds fresh, Jason Spezza said some interesting things following the Senators’ excruciating loss to Florida.

For one, the Senators captain let us know he took zero pleasure in scoring a highlight reel goal in a losing cause, telling reporters the goal “doesn’t count for (expletive)” because the Panthers turned that 2-1 Ottawa lead on its head and outlasted the Senators 4-2.

“I could care less about the goal,” Spezza said.

It was a rather captain-y stance by a player once considered merely a points-producer, back when the bulk of leadership duties fell on the shoulders of Daniel Alfredsson. Spezza reminded us how much he hates to lose, and always did.

Spezza also touched on something else, admitting that the pressure of trying to squeeze out wins, to crawl back in the wild card hunt, is getting to the Senators. These December “must-win” situations, for players whose morale is lower than the Canadian dollar, aren’t bringing the best out of a bedraggled bunch.

“It’s clear that we’re feeling the pressure right now, we’re feeling the heat,” Spezza said, after the Panthers game. “We want to try to win hockey games. Our effort is there but we don’t execute, we don’t play loose enough with the puck … we’re scared to make mistakes at the end. That’s the position we’ve got ourselves in, so we have to find a way to get out.”

Pressure? Here’s a thought: maybe it’s time for the Senators to stop thinking about standing among the lords of the NHL elite and act more like the 12th place team they are. In other words, play relaxed, adopt a spoilers mentality — “just play hockey” — as Erik Karlsson suggested Friday. Loose, but not careless: try to enjoy this kid’s game and who knows what might happen.

A few weeks ago, the 14th place Panthers did that, and look where they are today: sitting on a five-game winning streak, a single point behind the Senators in the standings, visions of wild card contention dancing in their heads.

(Pregnant pause … who imagined the Panthers as a role model for the Senators?).

Florida changed its coach on Nov. 8, bringing in Peter Horachek to replace Kevin Dineen (now coaching the Canadian women’s Olympic team). After the initial adjustment, the Panthers adapted to Horachek’s style and have developed into a tough out most nights, led by the play of exciting youngsters like Aleksander Barkov, Nick Bjugstad, Jonathan Huberdeau, Erik Gudbranson and good old Brian Campbell.

Horacheck’s first assignment was the Nov. 9 game in Ottawa, a 3-2 Senators victory. Since then, his team has gone 11-7-1.

The Panthers weren’t worried about the pressure of making the playoffs. But they eked out a Nov. 12 win over Anaheim, and soon after, back-to-back victories over Colorado and Vancouver, the prelude to this current run.

When Spezza was asked Friday what the Senators might do to relax, he answered in a word: “Win.

“Really, all you can do is win,” Spezza said. “You see Florida talking after the game about how they’re a confident group, when they were down 2-1 they felt they had a chance to win.

“That’s what happens when you start winning games, you feel like you’re doing enough to win. When you’re losing, you feel the opposite. You feel tighter and you’re scared to make mistakes. And we’re at that point right now.

“There’s no reason for us not to get to the point where Florida’s at, where we can win some games and get some confidence back.”

General manager Bryan Murray and head coach Paul MacLean called out the leaders on the Senators after Wednesday’s 5-2 loss in New Jersey, a move fraught with risk. So far, the move hasn’t been a disaster, as the leadership core of Spezza, Chris Neil, Chris Phillips and the rest responded with a strong game against the Panthers, even if the Senators lost.

Spezza has enormous respect for Murray, and any player who does would feel “embarrassed,” to use Spezza’s word, that the GM felt obliged to visit the dressing room to express his disappointment in Ottawa’s 14-17-6 record.

Management and coaches have tried everything else, including keeping players calm during the moments of the game when execution can make the difference between winning and losing. Thursday, the Senators were on a power play late in the third when defenceman Erik Karlsson fell on what looked like a triple lutz attempt. “Caught a rut,” he says. “Life sucks sometimes.” The Panthers skated up ice and iced the game with a short-handed goal.

“We try to tell them to breathe at the timeouts, encourage them when they come off to get ready for the next shift, but we can’t go on the ice and play for them,” MacLean said. “We try to give them support and encourage them at those times of the game but that’s about all we can do.

“When you’re there more often, you get way more comfortable at it.”

Saturday brings another chance to get “there,” with the Phoenix Coyotes in town.

Ottawa Citizen LOADED: 12.22.2013


Ottawa Senators special teams feelin' the pinch

Don Brennan

Saturday, December 21, 2013 09:01 PM EST

Oh how the mighty keep falling.

Last season's best penalty killing team dropped to 26th in the rankings Saturday afternoon when the Senators gave up two power play goals on six chances to the Phoenix Coyotes - including the game tying goal by Antoine Vermette at 17:47 of the minute third.

It was an eerily similar twist to Thursday's game, when Florida's Tom Gilbert scored the winner on the power play at 17:28 of the final period.

Not to give the Senators excuses, but does anybody else remember when referees used to put their whistles in their pockets late in the game, allowing the teams to decide the outcome?

"It seems like we've had to kill a few penalties late in the game," said centre Zack Smith. "It's tough. It wears on the penalty killers and the goalies too. We've seen a lot of shots towards the end of the game.

"But I don't think our special teams was the better of the two tonight. They were better on that. We had enough power plays to maybe get some more. I think that was the difference."

Indeed, Ottawa's power play specialists scored on just one of seven opportunities. The Senators were ranked 11th on the power play heading into Saturday night.

"We had the game with the lead, (then take) a penalty ... we've got to kill those off," said goalie Craig Anderson.

"At the same time, we had a couple of chances on the power play in that third period, if we're able to get another one, maybe it's a non-issue."

"You don't always score on the power play and you can't always kill them all. But it's one of those things where special teams could have made the difference tonight."

Ottawa Sun LOADED: 12.22.2013


B-day boy Cody Ceci tried to make it four OT winners this season

Don Brennan


On his 20th birthday, lightning would not strike a fourth time for Cody Ceci.

The Senators defenceman, whose three goals (two in Binghamton) this season have been overtime winners, went looking to turn the trick again when he joined a rush with Kyle Turris and Clarke MacArthur in the extra session Saturday. But as he skated hard to the net, Turris' shot was stopped by Mike Smith, who then made an extraordinary save off MacArthur on the rebound.

"That's what everyone was telling me," Ceci said when asked about the possibility of a four-peat. "We work on that play in practice all the time, so I figured I'd drive the net, give it a shot.

"The opportunity was there. It would have been nice. But it can't happen like that all the time."

Ceci, who a half dozen games ago became the 18th teenager to make his NHL debut with the Senators, finished the game with 18:38 of ice time and an even plus-minus rating.

At the end of the first, only Coyotes defenceman Keith Yandle had worked more than Ceci's 7:43.

"I feel good about my game, but it sucks we're just not winning," said the Orléans native. "We need to find a way to win."

Ceci has not been told what the future lies, he does not know how long he'll remain with the big team.

"I'm just going day-by-day," he said. "I don't even know if I'm in the lineup until the morning (of the game), or the night before. Right now I've just got to keep working hard and do whatever I can in practice and games to make them want to keep me in here.

And Saturday's disappointing result put a damper on any birthday celebration he might have had planned after the game.

"It would have been better if we won and we had been winning," said Ceci. "There's not too much planned for (Saturday) night. It's not the best atmosphere in the room right now. Everyone is a little down. We just have to come back focused and get ready for Monday, before the Christmas break."

Unless the Senators give him a bus ticket to Bingo for Christmas, Monday will also bring another big test for Ceci when Sidney Crosby, Evengi Malkin and the Pittsburgh Penguins visit.



Ottawa Sens are better off with Robin Lehner then Coyotes' Antoine Vermette

Don Brennan


Down the road, it's expected the Senators will be declared the winners of the trade they made with the Columbus Blue Jackets on Mar. 4, 2009.

But on a day when all the roads around Canadian Tire Centre were slippery, that deal put them in the gutter.

As disappointing as Pascal LeClaire was while in Ottawa, the Senators also received a second round pick they used to take Robin Lehner in exchange for Antoine Vermette almost five years ago. Lehner, the Senators goalie of the future, was on the bench as Vermette rounded out his hat-trick by tying the game with 2:13 left then netting the winner at 2:37 of OT.

Before Saturday, Ottawa was the only NHL team Vermette had not scored against. Didn't that change in a hurry?

"I didn't know. It's not something I was thinking about," said Vermette, who did have four assists in four previous meetings with the team that drafted him and then moved him after five years of wearing the Senator sweater. "I just tried to go in and play a good game. Try to make my team win a little bit. It just happened this way tonight."

Before scoring the deciding goal, Vermette won two faceoffs in the Ottawa end -- one off Jean-Gabriel Pageau and the other, right before his goal, against Jason Spezza.

On the day, he was 16-11 in the circles which is 59%, or slightly better than his season total of 57.5% -- the best of any player who has taken at least 800 draws.

"I try to bring whatever I can bring to help my team," said Vermette, a 31-year-old native of Saint-Agapit,, Que. "Sometimes it translates into something nice and sexy, with those goals, but it's one department I try to take a lot of pride in "¦ the faceoff dot."

Vermette has many fond memories of Ottawa.

"It's always going to be special, there's no doubt about it," he said. "I was driving from the airport, looking around, and it feels like home, to a certain extent.

"I'd been here for so long. I have great memories. It means a lot.

"Throughout my career it's always going to be a special place."

On Saturday, it had to be even more special than usual, as Vermettte singlehandedly fed the Senators their second choke job in a row.

STARTS AND STOPS

Being Mr. Brightside, I'll point out the Senators were not lousy at the start of the game for a change. They didn't give up a goal or an odd-man rush in the first minute. In fact, they didn't even allow a shot on Craig Anderson until the 2:49 mark, and even then it was a weak wrister from the slot by a Lauri Korpikoski. By that time, Chris Neil and Matt Kassian had already had a good chance to score "¦ What time of day was it when Marc Methot scored in the first period, around 3:15 p.m. or so? The goal was changed and awarded to Kyle Turris around 5 p.m., effectively erasing what would have been Methot's first power play goal and first multi-goal game in a career that is now 355 games old "¦ No review in the world could take away the goal saving defensive plays Methot made, however. Not only did he swipe wipe one off the goal line in the first period, but he also jammed Martin Hanzal and Gretel's stick when the Coyotes big centre was about to put a rebound off the end boards in an open side .. Watch, the NHL will tell you next week it was Turris who stopped those chances.

BETWEEN PERIODS

Before the game was 21 minutes old, the Senators had two odd-man rushes that did not even produce a shot on goal. Both times they had passes intercepted. The second was a 3-on-1 with the puck in possession of Bobby Ryan who, despite the nice feed he made on the Methot-turned-

into-Turris goal, should shoot every time. "¦ When Zack Smith scored on a harmless looking wrist shot, you might have wondered why Team Canada is considering adding Mike Smith to its Olympic roster. When Smith made that toe save off Clarke MacArthur in overtime, you understood better. "I'd love to have that shot back, obviously," said MacArthur. "It came off the pad so quick, it kind of caught me off guard, too. I just tried to shoot it as quick as I could. He made a couple of really big saves to kind of secure the win. There was a deflection on the power play where he made a glove save "¦ it was an incredible there, too."

THINGS I THINK I THUNK

Guess it's all a matter of interpretation, but it sure looked like Connor Murphy jumped up, lost his balance, then rolled on to the ice holding his head while he and MacArthur skated innocently into the boards. MacArthur got two for a gentle push that was called boarding, while Murphy, who didn't miss a shift, received a invite to the U.S. national soccer team "¦ Why send Derek Morris and Colin Greening off for "roughing" when no punches were thrown? And then just Keith Yandle from a wrestling match with Cory Conacher that threatened to erupt into a line brawl? When anybody can explain the rationale of NHL referees, please get back to me. "When it got revved up," noted Coyotes coach Dave Tippett, "it seemed liked the referees wanted to take the rev out of the game."

BITS AND BYTES

Right before the opening faceoff of the third, Erik Karlsson, Cody Ceci, Milan Michalek, Spezza and Ryan huddled just inside the Ottawa blue line. Those guys all sit in the same corner of the Senators dressing room. They couldn't have chatted during the intermission? "¦ The Senators fourth line had great pressure on a shift until it all ended with Pageau getting called for knocking the stick out of Hanzal's hands. Those who watched the Senators game in New Jersey Wednesday must have been thinking oh, so NOW that's a penalty "¦ The Chris Neil-Mike Smith tussle started when Neil slashed the Coyotes goalie in the chest, although it looked more like he was trying to get his stick free than intentionally give him a whack. Conveniently, a TV timeout was called right afterwards, and by the way he turned his head as he skated by the Ottawa bench, it looked like Smith was reacting to some chirping. We wonder if any came from Lehner, and we wonder how good a Lehner-Smith bout would be"¦ "Vermette is a guy who touches special teams on both sides for us," said Tippett. "He had to do a lot of penalty killing tonight and he came up with a big power-play goal for us. He's been a really valuable player. You could argue he's been our most valuable player this year. He's just been a guy who has been a workhorse for us, a guy that we rely on in all situations."



Ottawa Sens defenceman Marc Methot gets two-goal night scratched from score sheet

Bruce Garrioch


A healthy scratch Wednesday, Marc Methot looked like he was ready to help the club scratch out a victory.

But everything else went wrong on this Saturday afternoon so it only made sense that after the club dropped a 4-3 OT decision to the Coyotes the official scorer took away the first two-goal game of his career.

While Methot appeared to open the scoring at 6:14 of the first on the power play, a look at the replay indicated Kyle Turris tipped the puck for his eight of the season which meant Methot will have to wait for another day.

He did have a two-point day but he would much rather that happened with the club coming away with two points.

"I was hoping we would win and have a good feeling in the room after the game," said Methot, who did keep credit for his goal at 14:51 of the second.

"That's what makes winning so much fun is the atmosphere in the room afterwards. It's just a small margin for error. Instead of celebrating and playing music, we're all hanging our heads."

Methot said the club just can't find a way to play 60 minutes and finish the job.

"I'm sick of standing here and always saying the same things," said Methot. "You could just repeat everything I say after every loss.

"I'm frustrated, we're frustrated and I'm sure the fans are. It's almost like we found a way to lose the game and it pains me to say that."



Ottawa Sens lose in OT to Phoenix Coyotes

Bruce Garrioch


The Senators looked like they were going to gift-wrap the two points for their faithful just in time for Christmas.

Instead, they gave an early present to the Phoenix Coyotes in front of 16,716 at the Canadian Tire Centre.

The Senators keep finding different ways to lose in a season that has gone sour and Saturday was no exception as former Ottawa winger Antoine Vermette completed the hat-trick in OT to give Phoenix a 4-3 victory.

While Marc Methot, Zack Smith and Kyle Turris beat Phoenix goalie Mike Smith in regulation, the fun stopped there as Vermette tied it up on the power play with 2:13 left and then scored at 2:23 of OT to extend Ottawa's losing streak to three.

"That's an extra point that we just gave away," said Zack Smith, who gave the club a 2-0 lead at 3:10 of the second. "We've done that a few times the last little while by letting (the opposition) score late in the game. It's costing us points.

"Whether it's them going ahead by a goal or them tying it up, it's tough. It's not easy when they do that in the last two minutes of the game."

Instead of closing the gap in a pre-Christmas push for a playoff spot, the Senators continue to plummet. Goalie Craig Anderson made 34 saves, but mistakes resulted in great chances that turned into goals. Radim Vrbata also scored for the Coyotes.

Though Smith got off to a tough start for Phoenix, he bounced back to make 37 saves including a huge one on Clarke MacArthur in OT with his pads.

"It's tough," said MacArthur. "We have a good lead here and just mental breakdowns or defensive zone breakdowns and before you know it, it's 2-2 instead of having that lead going into the third.

"It wasn't enough."

It looks like the Senators are just waiting for something bad to happen.

After getting a two-goal lead for the first time since Nov. 9, the Senators gave it away as Vrbata beat Anderson on the power play at 8:47 to tie it. Vermette was left all alone in front and beat Anderson with a backhander at 5:28 to cut the lead to 2-1.

"We're trying out there, we're trying to win and we're trying to do things right," said captain Jason Spezza. "It just seems like right now we can't find a way to win and every mistake seems to end up in the back of our net.

"That's what makes it frustrating. We're trying to do it how (coach Paul MacLean) wants and we do good things for a long period of time but then we make a mistake (and the opposition) scores. That's not the goalie's fault, that's just how luck is going, our goalie is playing great for us."

This was the 17th one-goal game in 38 games for the Senators. They have a 6-4-7 record in those games, but this was ugly because twice they had the lead and weren't able to hold onto it.

Methot's third of the season at 14:51 of the second, when he came out from behind the net and went upstairs on Smith, looked like it would stand up as the winner. It wasn't meant to be and that's the way it has gone all season for this team.

"We did have a good start," said MacLean. "Then, we just basically gave them a goal. Then, we take a penalty we don't have to take, lose a puck battle in the neutral zone and it ends up in our net again. I thought the two goals that they got in the second period they didn't have to work for very hard."

MacLean said finding the right recipe for success is difficult at the moment.

"We're just trying to find a way to win a game," said MacLean. "Right now, for us, it's hard to do and we need maybe a little bit less and we might

accomplish more. Maybe, we're trying to do too much when the game gets to that point with a lead in the third. Maybe if we did a little less we'd be in a better position."

The Senators host the Pittsburgh Penguins Monday.


730778 Philadelphia Flyers

Blue Jackets top Flyers, 6-3

Sam Carchidi

Sunday, December 22, 2013, 2:02 AM

COLUMBUS, Ohio - It took the Flyers nearly three months to climb over the .500 mark.

It took them two nights to get knocked from their "perch."

Columbus, rebounding from its late-game collapse two nights earlier at the Wells Fargo Center, scored a pair of third-period goals 2 minutes, 3 seconds apart Saturday night, snapping a 2-2 tie en route to a 6-3 victory over the Flyers at Nationwide Arena.

David Savard sent a point drive past screened goalie Ray Emery with 16:24 left in regulation to give the Blue Jackets a 3-2 lead. A little over two minutes later, Boone Jenner tipped in Nikita Nikitin's point shot to make it 4-2.

"It's unacceptable to start a period like that," defenseman Luke Schenn said, adding the Flyers "sat back too much" early in the third period.

"I don't think we competed as hard in the third as we did in the second," said winger Wayne Simmonds, who had a pair of goals. "They just looked like they wanted it more than us."

Ryan Johansen scored his second goal of the night, this one from the right circle, to make it 5-2 with 7:38 to go.

Emery has allowed 11 goals in his last two starts.

The Flyers (16-16-4), who fell out of third place in the Metropolitan Division, sorely missed crease-clearing defenseman Nick Grossmann (flu) as Columbus had traffic in front of Emery most of the night.

The Flyers came within inches of facing a 3-0 deficit, but Brandon Dubinsky's shot hit the crossbar late in the second period, and the Flyers scored on the ensuing rush down ice - Simmonds beat goalie Curtis McElhinney with a shot from the high slot.

Just 20 seconds later, Sean Couturier scored with two minutes left in the second period, tying the game at 2 after taking a bouncing feed from Matt Read in front.

"We came back with a flurry at the end of the second, and we were excited going into the third," Emery said. "It's frustrating. Those shots found their way through."

Most of the Blue Jackets' goals came because there was traffic in front.

"I've got to battle and try to find them," Emery said of the shots.

Coach Craig Berube, whose team lost defenseman Erik Gustafsson to a third-period leg injury - he will be reevaluated Sunday - blamed turnovers and the forwards' inability to block shots for the loss.

Former Flyer RJ Umberger had two goals, including an empty-netter, for Columbus.

Jackets winger Marian Gaborik was hit by Zac Rinaldo and left the ice midway through the first period. Gaborik, who had missed the previous 17 games with a knee injury, suffered a broken collarbone.

Rinaldo appeared to hit Gaborik with his elbow, and the Columbus winger fell into Braydon Coburn. Rinaldo could have a disciplinary hearing with the league.

Most of the game was played with one referee. Referee Dan O'Rourke was injured in a first-period collision - he reportedly was coughing up blood after taking a skate to the chest - and did not return.

On Thursday, the Flyers overcame a 3-0 deficit by scoring five third-period goals in a 5-4 win over the Jackets.

Philadelphia Inquirer / Daily News LOADED: 12.22.2013


Changing concept of heroes reflected in new statues

Frank Fitzpatrick


The drive from Waco to Houston is so long and unremarkable that last week, when I passed a redwood-size statue of Sam Houston, I feared I'd fallen into a hallucinatory haze.

But, no, the white, 67-foot-high likeness of the 19th-century Texas hero, which hovers like a mutant ghost above Interstate 45 in Huntsville, was as real as Billy Penn atop City Hall.

Supersize Sam has been standing there like a Skull Island totem, frightening unsuspecting motorists, since 1994, which has to make him one of the more recent non-sports entries in the field of heroic statuary.

Heroic statuary just ain't what it used to be.

Throughout the late 20th century and into the early 21st, the venerable art form appears to have been given over entirely to the re-creation of sports figures.

In fact, other than the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial in Washington, I can't recall a recent example that depicted anyone but an athlete or announcer.

When's the last time - no, Caesars Atlantic City doesn't count - you saw a modern depiction of a Greek or Roman god?

What about war heroes, once the most popular of subjects for sculptors everywhere?

Is there a more moving tribute than that Kelly Drive statue of a caped Gen. Ulysses Grant astride his horse? Nearby, Fairmount Park is teeming with monuments to Grant's Civil War colleagues.

But the next Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf statue I see will be the first.

Aren't poets, politicians, civic leaders, and inventors as worthy a subject as pitchers, punters, and power forwards?

On the list of candidates for monuments, we've descended pretty low. We've gone from David, Moses, Venus de Milo, Grant, and Lincoln to Frank White and Chick Hearn, memorialized, respectively, in Kansas City and Los Angeles.

If the likenesses of White and Hearn don't bother you, then I'll bet the one of Danny Wuerffel in Gainesville, Fla., will. It's alongside bronze depictions of two other decidedly non-heroic Florida figures, Tim Tebow and Steve Spurrier.

We have either too few heroes or too much bronze.

Curiously, Philadelphia very likely leads the league in sculpted sports figures, perhaps because this city has seen more than its share of athletic stiffs.

Lined up end to end, our sports statues might be as numerous as China's Terracotta Warriors.

Like most modern ballparks, Citizens Bank Park is surrounded by them. There you'll find Mike Schmidt swinging, Robin Roberts and Steve Carlton throwing, Richie Ashburn running, Harry Kalas smiling, and Connie Mack contemplating ways to cut his leftfielder's salary.

Some are more abstract than others. Outside the Wells Fargo Center, for example, an arena in which he never played or visited, Wilt Chamberlain appears to be dunking a '39 DeSoto.

Once, heroic statues were designed to occupy reverent spaces - cemeteries, museums, imposing memorials. Not one, until Comcast-Spectacor had the inspiration, ever adorned the exterior of a sports bar.

Dr. J, Bobby Clarke, Bernie Parent, Gary Dornhoefer, and even "God Bless America" belter Kate Smith are clustered incongruously outside XFinity Live, as if all had been flagged by its bouncer. And Joe Frazier is expected to join those ranks sometime in the next year.

Still, for all the shallowness of their subjects, some of these sculptors produced real works of art. The image of Babe Ruth - thin, youthful, and relaxed - outside Camden Yards surely is museum-worthy.

Then there's Rocky Balboa.

Rocky Balboa is not a real athlete, which is just as well since his movie-prop likeness is not real art. The fact that this statue of a fictional pug occupies a prominent spot in front of the otherwise august Philadelphia Museum of Art is a civic embarrassment to rival the 76ers.

Philadelphia certainly isn't alone.

Pittsburgh's sports statues honor, among others, Honus Wagner, Mario Lemieux, Roberto Clemente, and Willie Stargell. There are at least four of Ted Willliams in and around Boston.

Likenesses of Harry Caray, Michael Jordan, and Scottie Pippen can be found in Chicago. And Anaheim's got one of Earl and Tiger Woods.

Alabama already has a statue of Nick Saban, a head-scratching development that, along with one of Lou Holtz in South Bend, makes my point nicely.

So what's different?

Is America truly that devoid of heroes? Maybe traditional sculptures are another victim of our polarized society? Perhaps sports idols are the only public figures we can still all rally around?

Until the late 20th century, the evolution of heroic statuary proceeded rather logically.

The oldest known sculpture, by the way, is at least 30,000 years old and, it's believed, was recently scouted by Phillies GM Ruben Amaro Jr.

Early sculptors created religious totems. Their Classical Age counterparts produced marble likenesses of madonnas, gods, emperors, and biblical figures.

Then came a trend to commemorate great battles and their heroes, followed by a more abstract period that gave rise to Rocky Balboa's more esteemed Parkway mate, Rodin's Thinker.

The next artistic iteration saw artists, inventors, businessmen, and heads of state memorialized.

And then, around 1980, by my estimate, we ran out of genuine heroes and turned to the sports pages.

I have nothing against sports figures, in either a literal or figurative sense. But being memorialized in bronze, marble, or clay ought to imply a certain moral gravitas that, frankly, you don't find often in locker rooms.

The Roman statesman Cato the Elder once said, "I would much rather have men ask why I have no statue, than why I have one."

Joe Paterno, something of an expert on ancient Rome if not statues, would have agreed.

The Penn State coach found himself cast in bronze while still alive. Then, shortly after his death and the controversy that likely precipitated it, that sculpture, much like Paterno's reputation, was removed from its pedestal and stored away, perhaps to be reassessed at some future date.

Maybe by then, our concept of heroes and heroism will have changed.

And we'll once again plant trees instead of statues outside our ballparks.



Lecavalier solid in return, but Flyers falter

Sam Carchidi

December 21, 2013, 11:41 PM

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Flyers forward Vinny Lecavalier returned ahead of schedule and did some good things Saturday night at Nationwide Arena.

But it wasn’t enough to overcome the team’s poor defensive performance in a 6-3 loss to the Columbus Blue Jackets.

Just like Thursday, this one came down to the third period.

Columbus outscored the Flyers in the final 20 minutes Saturday, 4-1 (including an empty-netter), to pull away from a 2-2 tie.

On Thursday, the Flyers used a stunning 5-1 third-period outburst to erase a 3-0 deficit and jolt the Blue Jackets, 5-4, at the Wells Fargo Center.

The Flyers, who are supposedly emphasizing a defense-first mentality under new coach Craig Berube, have allowed four goals or more in six of their last eight games.

As for Lecavalier, he was thrust into the lineup because of an injury to Steve Downie. Lecavalier was not expected to return for another week, but GM Paul Holmgren said he couldn’t do any more damage to his back and the veteran forward played on the third line, alongside Sean Couturier and Matt Read.

Lecavalier, who was also used on the second power-play unit, had an assist in 16:36, won seven of eight faceoffs and took three shots. He was minus-1 for the night.

“I thought my legs would be kind of tired because I didn’t skate much the last few weeks, but I felt good out there,” he said.

Lecavalier had been sidelined since Nov. 30 with a non-displaced fracture in his lower back. He wore padding to protect the back on Saturday.

“It got really better the last three days,” he said.

While Lecavalier returned, the Flyers were without defenseman Nick Grossmann (flu) — and his crease-clearing and shot-blocking ability was missed. Columbus (15-17-4) had traffic in front of goalie Ray Emery all night.

The Flyers (16-16-4) also lost defenseman Erik Gustfasson to a third-period leg injury; he will be re-evaluated on Sunday, the team said.

There’s a chance the NHL will have a hearing with Zac Rinaldo for a first-period hit on Marian Gaborik, who broke his collarbone on the play. No penalty was called.

“I’m not worried. Not at all,” Rinaldo said.

The Flyers host Minnesota on Monday, their final game before the Christmas break. They fell into fourth place in the Metro Division, one point behind the New Jersey Devils, who have played one more game.

Breakaways. Winger Wayne Simmonds had his first two-goal game of the season….Jake Voracek had an assist and extended his points streak to a career-best seven games….Claude Giroux (assist), who had a game-high six shots, has points in six straight, equaling a career high…. Emery has allowed a total of 11 goals in his last two starts....Former Flyer RJ Umberger had two goals, including an empty-netter, for the Blue Jackets…..The Flyers have allowed the first goal in the last four games....Hal Gill replaced Grossmann and was minus-1 14:31. It was Gill hadn't played in the last 20 games, and Berube surrpisingly bypassed Andrej Meszaros, who is an expensive healthy scratch.



Flyers Notes: Lecavalier makes surprise return to Flyers

Sam Carchidi


COLUMBUS, Ohio - Flyers forward Vinny Lecavalier made a surprise return Saturday night in Columbus, added to the lineup because of an injury to Steve Downie.

Lecavalier, sidelined since he suffered a non-displaced fracture in his lower back against Nashville on Nov. 30, had been expected to be out until next Saturday in Edmonton.

"A guy like Vinny has been around a long time, and you have to trust his judgment that he's ready to go," general manager Paul Holmgren said before the game.

After the Flyers' 6-3 loss, Lecavalier said he felt "better than I expected." He had an assist and won seven of eight faceoffs.

Holmgren said Lecavalier, who wore extra padding to protect the injury, could not do further damage to the back. Lecavalier began the night at right wing on a line with Sean Couturier and Matt Read.

The GM said Downie had an upper-body injury and that it was not a concussion. Downie will miss seven to 10 days, Holmgren said.

Defenseman Nick Grossmann missed the game with the flu, and Hal Gill played for the first time in 21 games.

Barber to be honored

Bill Barber, the Hall of Fame left winger who still holds the Flyers' record with 420 career goals, has been named the recipient of the Living Legend award by the Philadelphia Sports Writers Association.

Barber, 61, who is a scouting consultant with the Flyers, will be honored at the association's Jan. 27 banquet at the Crowne Plaza in Cherry Hill.

Coincidentally, the 1974 Flyers will be honored on the 40th anniversary of their first Stanley Cup championship. Most of the Flyers from that team, including Barber, will be honored.

Barber, a six-time all-star during his 12 seasons with the Flyers, said he was "lucky to play with so many great teammates and have great coaches."

Numerous pro and collegiate athletes will be honored at the banquet. Tickets are available at pswadinner.com.



Lecavalier returns tonight

Frank Seravalli


Vinny Lecavalier is back.

With Steve Downie sitting out the next week or more because of an upper-body injury, Lecavalier will fill the hole in the Flyers’ lineup on Saturday in Columbus.

The Flyers also had Jay Rosehill available on the roster.

Lecavalier, 33, was originally scheduled to return on Dec. 28 at the earliest in Edmonton. Flyers general manager Paul Holmgren said this week doctors were not worried Lecavalier could injure the non-displaced fracture on his back any further by playing.

Instead, the Flyers wanted to wait until Lecavalier’s back spasms - caused by the fractures - subsided and left him more comfortable on the ice.

Lecavalier first began skating on Dec. 7 in Dallas, before x-rays revealed his fracture. He has missed 13 games in all this season.

When he has been in the lineup, Lecavalier has been a positive influence and one of their most consistent scorers. He has 9 goals and 5 assists for 14 points in 22 games.



Flyers reach $1M+ settlement with season ticketholders

Frank Seravalli


On Friday, the Flyers announced the settlement of a class-action suit against the team that could be worth up to $1.125 million for 2011-12 season ticketholders if approved by the District Court of New Jersey.

The suit was originally filed on May 7, 2012 in United States District Court involving the manner in which tickets to the 2012 Winter Classic at Citizens Bank Park were "pakcaged and sold."

The complaint alleged the Flyers misled full season ticketholders by excluding the Winter Classic - a regular season game - from their contractual ticketholder agreement, which stated fans paid for 44 home games (all 41 regular season home games and 3 preseason home games).

Instead, full-time season ticketholders wishing to attend the Jan. 2, 2012 Winter Classic were forced to purchase tickets to the Winter Classic in a three-pack, which also included tickets to the Dec. 31, 2011 alumni game, an AHL Phantoms regular season game on Jan. 6, 2012, and pay $41 in processing fees per ticket.

The settlement, if approved by the District Court of New Jersey, will enable each Settlement Class Member to receive either a cash substitute voucher for food and drink at Wells Fargo Center worth $45.00 or a voucher for fan entertainment experience with an estimated value of $75.00, for each season ticket that he or she purchased.

The Flyers are believed to have a full-season ticket base of 15,000. Should all eligible parties participate to the highest dollar value allowed, the award could cost Comcast-Spectacor and the Flyers upwards of $1.125 million - plus legal fees.

As part of the settlement, the defendants have agreed to not oppose to paying attorney fees, court costs, expenses and incentive fees awarded by the Court as long as it does not exceed $500,000.

In exchange for accepting the settlement amount, the action will be dismissed.

A final settlement hearing will be heard by Judge Douglas E. Arpert on March 24, 2014. The NHL (National Hockey League Enterprises), under the supervision of lockout lawyer Shepard Goldfein, also acted as a defendant in the case with Comcast-Spectacor.

At the time of the filing last May, Comcast-Spectacor called the suit a “frivolous claim” and “a disgruntled few ... to attempt to profit from what was overwhemingly considered by those who attended the Winter Classic, and other games, an extraordinary experience.”

More than 145,228 fans attended the week-long outdoor celebration, including the three events season ticket holders were forced to purchase. The Phantoms game still stands as the largest crowd ever (45,653) to see an AHL game.

The settlement notice says the Flyers violated the Pennsylvania Unfair Trade Practices and Consumer Protection Law (UTPCPL) in addition to their breach of implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing with season ticket holders.

“We continue to believe that our actions in selling Winter Classic ticket packages were in all ways perfectly appropriate and in full compliance with the law,” Comcast-Spectacor wrote in a statement to season ticketholders on Friday. “However, to avoid engaging in protracted litigation involving our most valued customers, we are pleased that we have been able to craft a settlement that provides you with benefits to enhance your season ticket holder experience.”

The letter also thanked fans for their “continuing and unwavering support.”

A copy of the Notice of Settlement of Class Action can be found here.



Flyers' Downie will miss 7-10 days

Sam Carchidi

December 21, 2013, 4:04 PM

COLUMBUS, Ohio _ Flyers right winger Steve Downie will miss seven to 10 days because of an upper-body injury, the team announced.

Downie received medical attention after the Flyers' 5-4 win over Columbus on Thursday. He took part in Friday's practice and in Saturday's morning skate here.

The Flyers could insert Jay Rosehill into the lineup Saturday night in Columbus, or they might risk playing Vinny Lecavalier. Lecavalier has a non-displaced fracture in his lower back and was not expected to return until at least Dec. 28 in Edmonton.

Will Downie's injury speed up the process? Lecavalier took part in Saturday's morning skate.

Downie, who missed four games last month becasue of a concussion, has been a part of an effective third line, with Matt Read and Sean Couturier.

Ray Emery will be in the nets tonight; he is making his first appearance since being shelled for six goals in a 7-2 loss in Chicago on Dec. 11.



Giroux getting hot -- but enough for Olympic spot?

10:57 pm, Sat Dec 21, 2013.

Wayne Fish

Whether it was the Twilight Zone golf injury to his finger, the lack of consistent linemates or whatever, Claude Giroux got off to the slowest start of his NHL career this season.

No goals in his first 15 games. A double-digit minus number. And, as Flyers captain, the lightning rod for his team’s ugly 1-7 break from the gate.

While all this was going on, no one even thought about the fact that Giroux’s dream of playing for Canada in February’s Olympic Games appeared to be going up in smoke.

With a coaching change to adjust to and media people wondering if Giroux really was the right guy to be running the locker room, thoughts of Sochi would have seemed a bit frivolous.

But then came Nov. 1 and what would appear to be a season-changing 7-0 bombing by the Washington Capitals.

The embarrassment, the fights, the public’s cry of “this season’s over’’ finally served as a wake-up call.

A week later, Giroux scored his first goal in a win over Edmonton. Since then, Giroux has notched eight goals and 14 assists (prior to Saturday night’s game at Columbus) while the Flyers have gone 12-5-3.

Suddenly, Giroux just might be back in consideration for that Canada squad.

Giroux doesn’t like to talk about his chances and understandably so: The Flyers still aren’t in a comfortable position in the standings.

“When I stopped thinking about (the Olympics), that’s when I started playing better,’’ he said. “I don’t want to talk about it. It (selection) is something I can’t control. All I can control is my play. If I want to make the team, I have to give them a reason to put me on the team.’’

But pressed on the subject, he admits playing for Canada in the Winter Games is something he’s dreamed about since he was a kid.

“It’s the dream for any kid to play in the Olympics,’’’ he said. “You’re representing your country and hockey is a sport I can do that. If it happened, it would be unbelievable.’’

While it would be nice to make the team, the headline here is that Giroux’s recent play remarkably has him back in the conversation.

Just two years ago, Giroux finished third in the NHL in scoring with 93 points and many people thought he should have been a finalist for the Hart (MVP) Trophy (which he wasn’t).

But the Flyers’ recent misfortunes over the past season or so, along with his unsteady play at times, kind of dragged down his reputation.

How did the turnaround happen for Giroux? He shrugged his shoulders.

“I’m just keeping it simple,’’ he said. “Hitting a post and having it go in now obviously feels good. When the chances are there, just bury them.’’

Barber to be honored

Former Flyers star Bill Barber has been named the recipient of the Living Legend award by the Philadelphia Sports Writers Association.

Barber, 61, will be honored at the PSWA’s Jan. 27 banquet at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Cherry Hill.

A Hall of Fame left winger, Barber still holds the Flyers record with 420 career goals. He is currently a scouting consultant with the club.

The Flyers’ 1974 Stanley Cup champions will also be honored at the banquet on the 40th anniversary of the franchise’s first championship.

Tickets are available at pswadinner.com.

Downie out again

The Flyers announced that Steve Downie would miss Saturday night’s game against Columbus as well as the next seven to 10 days of action due to an upper-body injury.

Downie, you may recall, suffered a pretty serious concussion during a fight against Washington’s Aaron Volpatti in that aforementioned Nov. 1 game and needed two nights in a Philadelphia hospital to recover.

Nicklas Grossmann missed the game due to catching the flu, but Vincent Lecavalier was back in the lineup.

Burlington County Times LOADED: 12.22.2013


Blue Jackets get revenge on Flyers with comeback win

Rob Parent

12/21/13, 11:19 PM EST |

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Turnabout was a pretty fair play for the Columbus Blue Jackets Saturday night, as they spent the third period burning the Flyers rather than melting down as they had done in Philadelphia two nights before.

Perhaps with that five-goal Philly third period still ringing in their heads from Thursday, and having blown a two-goal lead on this night in the last few minutes of the second period, the Blue Jackets dug deep and found a way to beat the Flyers at their own final-frame comeback game...

They blitzed right by them.

Missing the shot-blocking ability of defenseman Nick Grossmann (flu), and really acting like they weren’t very interested in playing defense anyway, the Flyers stood by as the Blue Jackets scored four times in the third period en route to a 6-3 victory at Nationwide Arena.

That made it a pretty simple diagnosis for the post-game analysts in the visitors locker room.

“I don’t think we competed as hard in the third as we did in the second,” Wayne Simmonds said. “That’s what happens. They were obviously determined to win there. They just looked like they wanted it more than us, I guess.”

Ryan Johansen and former Flyer R.J. Umberger each scored twice and David Savard had a goal and assist for Columbus (15-17-4, 34 points), which had to deal with a hurtful injury along the way.

Having just gotten veteran skill player Marian Gaborik back after an 18-game knee injury absence, the Jackets had to watch Gaborik go off after getting checked high on the left shoulder by a speeding Zac Rinaldo. Gaborik first crashed into Braydon Coburn, then fell to the ice before being helped off.

He was later diagnosed with a broken collarbone and is out indefinitely.

The Rinaldo hit might get a look by the league just because he’s Zac Rinaldo, but replays indicate it was a perfectly legal hit.

“I’m not worried about it,” he said.

But during the second intermission, the Jackets might have been pondering it and other things, such as the 3-0 lead they had entering the third period Thursday night at Wells Fargo Center that somehow would turn into a 5-4 loss.

This time, they dispensed with giving up the lead early.

Goals by Johansen and Umberger had staked them to an early 2-0 lead. Then, during a Flyers power play late in the second period, the Blue Jackets broke back 2-on-1. Brandon Dubinsky had Ray Emery beaten with a shot that looked ticketed for a 3-0 lead. Instead, the puck rebounded off the crossbar all the way out to the blue line.

The Flyers picked up the loose puck and broke back 3-on-2, and Simmonds finished it with a scoring shot from the high slot, seven seconds after the Flyers power play had expired.

Essentially, that extended play was a two-goal turnaround, and who could blame the young Blue Jackets for being taken aback?

The Blue Jackets were stunned enough to not get back off the ensuing faceoff, and again the Flyers broke in. Vinny Lecavalier, fresh off a nine-game absence with a nondisplaced fracture in his back, chipped the puck slotward. It tipped off Matt Read’s stick and Sean Couturier managed to bounce it in off Jackets goalie Curtis McElhinney for a game-tying goal at the 18-minute mark of the period.

“It was a momentum game,” said Lecavalier, who reported he felt better than he thought he would. “I don’t think we played a bad game, it was 2-0, then we tied it 2-2. ... Then it went the other way.”

The Flyers goals that came 20 seconds apart could have brought back a flood of memories for the Jackets. Instead, they responded by getting people in front of Emery on a consistent basis. That allowed Savard to send a wrist shot from far out on the right point, and have Emery not see it as it flew over him and under the crossbar 3:36 into the third for a 3-2 lead.

Lecavalier had a great chance to tie it then, but McElhinney turned him away. Then at 5:39, Nikita Nikitin fired a distant shot into traffic, and it hit off Jackets center Boone Jenner and went past Emery for 4-2.

“We had a pretty good end to the second period, and I don’t know if we came out and thought they were just going to give up, or ... I don’t know what it was,” Luke Schenn said. “But it was unacceptable to come out and start a period like that and we weren’t able to recover again like we did the last time.”

The Flyers (16-16-4), having abandoned the defensive posture that serves them well, then tried to take some chances. And that helped Johansen essentially end it with a wrist shot off another Blue Jackets rush into the zone.

Asked if the slipping defensive sense of late by the Flyers was really exposed with shot-blocking specialist Grossmann’s absence, coach Craig Berube said, “He’s going to be missed ... when he’s not in the lineup. But those shots there, for me, were shots that should have been blocked by the forwards.”

•••

NOTES: Erik Gustafsson hurt his left leg in the third period and will be re-evaluated tonight. ... Lecavalier on playing for the first time since Nov. 30 in Nashville: “I thought my legs would be really tired. ... If you had asked me four days ago if I would have played tonight, I would have said probably not, because I still had trouble moving. It just got really better these last three days.”

Delaware County Times LOADED: 12.22.2013


Downie out, Lecavalier in for Flyers vs. Columbus

Rob Parent

12/21/13, 9:02 PM EST

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Something seemed up earlier Saturday when Flyers winger Steve Downie stayed on the practice ice at Nationwide Arena doing skating drills with assistant coach Ian Laperriere long after other players had departed for the locker room.

It was almost like a test instead of a punishment, a matter that was cleared up later when it was announced Downie would miss 7-10 days with what’s being called an upper body injury. Downie had been hit hard with an elbow to the jaw in a recent game against Montreal, but played through three games since to no apparent ill effects.

Yet he is believed to have been checked out by Flyers medical officials after Tuesday’s home win against Washington. Downie missed four games with a concussion in early November, just after being acquired from Colorado. But Flyers general manager Paul Holmgren said this injury has nothing to do with concussion symptoms.

“It’s something he’s been dealing with here for the last game or two,” Holmgren said.

Downie’s absence paved the way for a Vinny Lecavalier return that comes at least one week earlier than anticipated. Lecavalier had missed the previous nine games with a non-displaced fracture in his back.

“He wanted to play,” Holmgren said of Lecavalier. “A guy like Vinny has been around a long time. You have to trust his judgment that he feels good. He clearly wanted to play, so we’re doing everything in our power to get him into the lineup.”

It’s questionable whether that would have happened if Downie weren’t hurt. He was placed on injured reserve Saturday and will be eligible to return to action Dec. 28, when the Flyers begin a five-game road trip in Edmonton.

“I don’t expect it to be long,” Holmgren said. “He probably would have missed two (games) anyway. ... We’re hopeful he’ll be back right after the break. He’s a tough kid and to his credit he did try to play through it.”

Originally injured Nov. 30 and diagnosed with the fracture about a week later, Lecavalier skated Thursday and Friday and finally was cleared to participate in a full practice with his teammates here Saturday morning. Now with Downie out, Lecavalier feels it’s best to hop back in.

“I felt a lot better yesterday and today was good, too,” Lecavalier said before the game. “I would say four or five days ago, it was still (painful). These last three days have been really good.”

Lecavalier acknowledged his recovery has gone quicker than he expected. He replaced Downie on Sean Couturier’s third line at right wing, therefore able to stay away from taking faceoffs, which still stresses his iffy back.

“He feels good and ready to go,” Holmgren said of Lecavalier. “The injury is something from a couple of weeks ago. Once he felt good there wasn’t a danger of reinjuring that same area. So it’s just that he’s ready to go.”

Jake Voracek said after the morning skate that he was looking forward to playing in Columbus, his first game there since being traded to the Flyers in June of 2011.

“It’s a lot of memories,” Voracek said. “Three years there, I played 240 games or something like that. So it’s going to be exciting for me tonight. I’m not going to lie, when the schedule came out I was looking forward to the day when we were going to play in Columbus because it’s been too long.”

NOTES: Also removed from the starting lineup was defenseman Nick Grossmann, who had flu symptoms. He was replaced by veteran Hal Gill, who had been a healthy scratch the prior 20 games. ... Ray Emery started the game in goal over Steve Mason, who was a rookie along with Voracek in Columbus the year coach Ken Hitchcock took them to the playoffs in 2008-09. Mason hadn’t been back here since he was traded to the Flyers last spring, but coach Craig Berube said he liked the idea of starting Mason Thursday night at home against the Blue Jackets instead of playing under a

little more pressure here at Nationwide Center. The crowd started up a chant for Mason early in the game. ... The Flyers went 4-3-2 while Lecavalier recuperated, and overall this season they are 5-6-2 without him in the lineup.



McCaffery: NFL plan for Super Bowl Tuesday a well-played snow job

Jack McCaffery

12/21/13, 7:20 PM

If it snows in East Rutherford, N.J., on Super Bowl Sunday, the NFL reportedly has a plan to move its showpiece game to Tuesday night.

Ah-hah.

Got it.

Now it’s clear.

Uh-huh. Yup.

So there it was, the back-door motivation, the secondary plot, the hidden agenda for strangely agreeing to play a football game of significance outdoors in North Jersey in February. It’s the option for the NFL to try something it really wanted to try anyway, but didn’t want to seem too anxious — a prime-time, midweek game.

Stop it, already, with the conditions-make-football argument. Football was designed to be played in the fall, after baseball season. Basketball and hockey were to be the wintertime sports. Only TV greed whipped football toward a sporting alternative to the Iditarod.

But by trying a Super Bowl in the New York market, the NFL cannot lose. If the weather allows, the game will be its usual glorious event, only bathed in New York pizzazz (and advertising money). And that could happen. Even when it did snow recently on the East Coast, fans were able to maneuver in and out of stadiums without widespread catastrophe.

Yet should it snow, the extravaganza can be re-branded as — ta-da — Super Bowl Tuesday. And if those midweek TV ratings top the usual amazing early-Sunday-evening numbers, well, figure the NFL to move toward making prime time Super Bowls the rule.

Beautiful. As football plays work, the trick Super Bowl option is the best kind of all, as it is guaranteed to lead to a score.

Well-played, NFL. Just don’t celebrate too much in the end zone.

• How many years will it be before the NFL realizes it doesn’t need those seven intruders in prison stripes crowding their fields?

How many years before the league acknowledges that its games are being officiated by video-replay technicians, not by the refs, who soften just about every call with the qualifier, “The ruling on the field ...”

How soon will it be before it is feasible to provide video surveillance on each player? How soon before GPS technology proves a better way to determine the line of scrimmage than the guess of an on-field civilian?

OK, maybe it is not there yet. But it’s trending that way. And put it this way: The next time NFL referees threaten a work stoppage, it will be their last.

♦

I could do without the “plus-1” designation to acknowledge a well-made message board point. And, just so you know, I don’t get the phrase “meh”.

♦

Warning: Look for the upcoming 40th anniversary of the Flyers’ first championship team to be trumpeted in a news report, at a banquet, in an on-ice acknowledgment or at the top of a souvenir offering near you soon.

Ah, why not?

There was a window — oh, anywhere from 10 to 20 years ago — when the Flyers’ obsession with the Broad Street Bullies threatened a negative effect, with a few generations of otherwise talented players forever made to feel unable to live up to the legends. Any more? It has been so long since the Flyers’ Stanley Cup teams that the current players most likely wouldn’t be able to identify a single BSB if they would up in a fist fight with them.

Yes, the cycle has been completed — so much so that, at long last, the Flyers can be inspired, not haunted by, their distant championship past.

• You get Jake from State Farm?

• There is something different about the atmosphere in the Flyers’ dressing room this season, something soothing, something professional, something quiet, kind of like a kitchen seems quiet when the refrigerator suddenly clicks off.

Oh, that’s right: Ilya Bryzgalov is not there.

Not that Bryz was the only reason why the Flyers were so underachieving in recent years, but his relentless babbling about political nonsense, his wildly inconsistent play and his disrupt-the-room personality didn’t help.

The Flyers paid good money to shoo Bryzgalov away, and it is beginning to show why, for they have quietly returned to serious contention for the playoffs. Emphasis on quietly.

♦

I’ll tweet to let you know when I get around to inflating that snow-globe bubble on the front lawn.

♦

Seems Auburn and Missouri (and every other school in the SEC) are missing out on a tremendous money-making model.

According to reports, those schools were fined $5,000 each this week for violating a conference rule by not preventing their fans from storming the field after football games.

So why not charge 50,000 fans a buck a head on the way into the stadium, issue them after-game field passes, enjoy the ground-level rush, fork over the fine, and pocket 45 large every Saturday? If the fines begin to rise, make it two bucks a head. Mix in a sponsor for the event, and the profit climbs.

Beats Dollar Dog day.

• John Mizerock was trusted this week to replace hopeless Phillies batting counselor Wally Joyner … and not another one-two-three inning too soon. Mizerock first showed his clubhouse value in the extended area when he expertly managed the 1995 Blue Rocks to a Carolina League championship. And the addition of both him and Larry Bowa to newer manager Ryne Sandberg’s staff is proof at least of one thing: that Ruben Amaro’s offseason was only partially butchered.

• Irrepressible Delco fight promoter Damon Feldman reports that former contender Augie Pantellas of Broomall has passed a physical test and has tentative plans to fight professionally at the world record age of 70, either in Delaware or Los Angeles in the first week of January.

♦

Proving the movement is a worldwide sports obsession that will not be stopped, savor this headline last week from The Telegraph in Sydney, “Australian cricket greats believe team culture in desperate need of change.”

Of course it is. Every team in every sport at all times on every continent needs a (every-body-clap-your-hands) Culture Change. And once it is changed, it is going to need to be changed again, too. Don’t forget that.

♦

Season’s Greetings.



Despite loss, Lecavalier 'felt good' in return

December 22, 2013, 12:00 am

Tim Panaccio

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- He felt great and wanted to play. So he did.

Vinny Lecavalier returned to the lineup for the Flyers’ 6-3 loss Saturday night to the Blue Jackets after missing nine games with a non-displaced fracture in his lower back (see story).

“I thought my legs would kind of tire because I didn’t skate much the last few weeks,” Lecavalier said. “But I felt good out there.”

Lecavalier picked up an assist on Sean Couturier’s goal that tied it at two in the second period, finished with 16:36 ice time and won 88 percent of his faceoffs -- 7 of 8.

He didn’t get hit in the back, which was heavily protected with rubber padding, either.

“It got really better that last three days,” Lecavalier said of his back. “Yesterday, I felt great and today, even better. They decided to put me in.”

Lecavalier said that even if Steve Downie (upper body injury) was healthy enough to play, he was ready to go. He had a chance to make a serious dent in the game, too.

The Flyers were behind, 3-2, early in the third period when Lecavalier momentarily had an open shot with the puck.

“It’s 2-0, we score two quick goals and it’s 2-2, they score, it’s 3-2,” Lecavalier said. “And then I get a golden opportunity -- an open net -- and [goalie Curtis McElhinney] made an unbelievable save. If I score, it’s 3-3 and a new game.”

Instead, a minute later, Boone Jenner made it 4-2 Blue Jackets with a screened tip-in shot on goalie Ray Emery, who had precious little shot-blocking help in the game.

“We might have gotten out of it with two points,” Lecavalier said. “It went the other way every time there was a turning point. We score two, I miss an unbelievable opportunity and they score right away. It was all about momentum, and it changed.”



Late breakdown dooms Flyers vs. Jackets

December 21, 2013, 11:30 pm

Tim Panaccio

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Too many odd-man rushes, no shot blocking from the forwards and a costly mental lapse to start the final period.

That was all it took for the Blue Jackets to storm past the Flyers, 6-3, Saturday night at Nationwide Arena (see Instant Replay). With the loss, the Flyers dropped to fourth place in the Metropolitan Division, as the Devils moved into third place with their overtime win over the Capitals.

A 2-2 game after two periods quickly became a third-period blowout.

“We came back with a flurry at the end of the second and were excited going into the third,” said Ray Emery, who has given up 11 goals in his last two starts. “It’s frustrating. Shots found their way through, then we’re working from behind and trying to get 'em back.”

Nick Grossmann missed the game with the flu, and the Flyers significantly missed his 92 blocked shots.

“I didn’t think there were a lot of clears by the defense,” coach Craig Berube said, “but I think the wingers had to do a better job of blocking shots.”

Within the first four minutes of the third period, the Blue Jackets turned a 2-2 tie into a 4-2 lead.

“We were sitting back too much, maybe asleep in the third period,” Luke Schenn said. “We had a pretty good end to the second period. I don’t know if we thought they would just give up. I don’t know what it was, but it was unacceptable to come out in the third period like that.”

“I don’t think we competed as hard in the third period as we did in the second, and that is what happens,” said Wayne Simmonds, who had two of the Flyers' three goals. “They were determined to win. They looked like they wanted that one more than us.”

Unlike in the first leg of the home-and-home series in Philly on Thursday, there was no five-goal Flyers outburst in the final 20 minutes.

“If you are not ready to battle, you are not going to be in the game,” Flyers captain Claude Giroux said.

“We have to be better defensively and we have to help Ray better. We weren’t playing a bad game. We had a chance to make it a one-goal game. They had a couple tip-ins and screen shots. We have to do a better job fronting those pucks."

Down two goals in the third period, the Flyers tried frantically to tie the game.

“Naturally, you are going to try and jump up in the play offensively and they get all those odd man rushes like that,” Simmonds said. “We’re down two goals, the defense is trying to get up in the rush to get the two goals back and it led to odd-man rushes.”

They didn’t come back as they dropped their fifth straight road game.

And it doesn’t get any easier, as the Flyers have six of their next seven games away from home, five of which come against Western Conference teams.



Instant Replay: Blue Jackets 6, Flyers 3

December 21, 2013, 9:45 pm

Tim Panaccio

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Vinny Lecavalier’s return to the lineup wasn’t enough to prevent the Blue Jackets from splitting a home-and-home with the Flyers on Saturday night at Nationwide Arena.

The Jackets scored twice in 2:03 to begin the third period on goalie Ray Emery, breaking a 2-2 tie en route to a 6-3 rout.

Too many odd-man rushes and not enough defensive help in front of the net plagued the Flyers, as did a lack of blocked shots with Nick Grossmann (flu) not playing.

Worth noting: Emery has given up 11 goals in his last two starts. Ouch.

For the Flyers, it looked very bleak that they would even make a game of it. They were inches away from trailing 3-0 in the second period when Brandon Dubinsky’s shorthanded attempt clanged off the crossbar. The puck came back up the ice and Wayne Simmonds buried one from the high slot, making it a 2-1 contest as the power play expired.

Twenty seconds later, off the rush again, Lecavalier threw a bouncing puck across the slot to Sean Couturier, who somehow got it past goalie Curtis McElhinney to tie the game at two.

So for most of 38 minutes, Columbus had all the momentum until the Flyers stole it in less than a minute, but that all changed in the third period.

Injuries

Steve Downie missed the game with an upper-body injury (see story). Nick Grossmann also missed the game with the flu, while Erik Gustafsson had a leg-on-leg collision with Corey Tropp in the third period and limped off the ice.

Referee Dan O’Rourke left the game midway through the first period after taking an accidental skate to the chest from Tropp. O’Rourke was reportedly coughing up blood in the dressing room and did not return.

Lecavalier

Entering the game, how much he would play was uncertain. He finished with 16:36 ice time and played on the second power-play unit with Brayden Schenn and Matt Read.

Tiebreaker

David Savard’s shot early in the third period just got under the crossbar with Emery screened to give the Jackets a 3-2 lead.

Pulled

Coach Craig Berube pulled Emery with 3:29 left in the third period for an extra attacker. Columbus was leading 5-2 at that point.

Explosions

Whenever the Blue Jackets score a goal, there is a detonated canon ball explosion and fireball coming out of the rafters that shakes the entire building.

Chants

Fans were chanting, “We want [Steve] Mason,” for much of the game. It was his first trip back to Columbus since being traded to the Flyers last April.

Immediate lift, then it's gone

Marian Gaborik came off the injury list to assist on the Blue Jackets’ first-period goal -- scored by Ryan Johansen -- when Braydon Coburn was caught up ice, creating a 2-on-1 Columbus rush. Emery made the first stop on Gaborik, but Nick Foligno scooped the rebound behind the net and found Ryan Johansen open in front for an easy 1-0 lead.

Gaborik left the game after the goal, as he was sandwiched by Zac Rinaldo and Coburn on the play (see video). He was diagnosed with a broken left collarbone. Rinaldo got him with an elbow to the shoulder. Terrible loss, and remember Gaborik had missed 17 games with a sprained knee before being activated for Saturday’s game.

No penalty was called on the play, but the Department of Player Safety will review it. And the fact that it involves Rinaldo doesn’t bode well for the Flyers.

Special teams

The Flyers were 0 for 5 on the power play, though they had a couple of chances in the second period on McElhinney that were turned away.

Road woes

The Flyers came into the game with the fourth-best road power play -- 15 goals on 61 opportunities for 24.6 percent. But didn’t score on the man advantage Saturday. It was their fifth straight road loss, and they play six of their next seven games on the road.

Ex-Flyer

R.J. Umberger had a power-play deflection in the second period that made it 2-0, Blue Jackets. He also scored an empty-netter to secure the 6-3 victory.

Fights

Brayden Schenn and Nick Foligno fought to a second-period draw.

Scratches

Defenseman Andrej Meszaros and forward Jay Rosehill were healthy scratches.

Up nextThe Flyers return home Monday night to host the Minnesota Wild. Their next six games after that come on the road.



Holmgren: Downie doesn't have a concussion

December 21, 2013, 7:30 pm

Tim Panaccio

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- General manager Paul Holmgren shot down speculation that Steve Downie suffered another concussion on Saturday night after placing the rugged winger on injured reserve.

“It’s something he’s been dealing with for the last game or two,” Holmgren said.

Holmgren said it's not concussion-related, either. The Flyers announced he would miss seven to 10 days for IR purposes, but he's not expected to be out that long.

“He would probably have missed two games,” Holmgren said. “Steve’s a tough kid. To his credit, he played through it.”

According to Holmgren, Downie could be ready to play on the Flyers' post-Christmas trip, which begins next Saturday in Edmonton.

Vinny Lecavalier, who participated in an optional morning skate, re-entered the lineup after a nine-game absence (see story).

Lecavalier had aimed to return on the post-Christmas trip. Would he had played if Downie weren't injured?

“He wanted to play,” Holmgren said. “A guy like Vinny has been around a long time. You have to trust his judgment that he feels good. He clearly wanted to play.”

Lecavalier was wearing rubberized protection in his lower back. He suffered a non-displaced fracture in that area on Nov. 30 in Nashville.

There were subsequent back spasms, but they have not been present for several days now. Lecavalier said once the spasms were gone, he would likely feel comfortable playing again.

“We talked at length about that, he feels good, feels ready to go," Holmgren said. "The injury is something from a couple weeks ago. Once he felt good he was not in danger of injuring that same area, he’s ready to go.”

It was uncertain prior to the game against Columbus how much ice time Lecavalier would get vs. the Blue Jackets.

The Flyers were 5-6-2 during the time Lecavalier was out of the lineup.

Loose pucks

Defenseman Nick Grossmann missed the game with the flu. Hal Gill, who sat out the previous 20 consecutive games as a healthy scratch, replaced Grossmann.



Lecavalier to make return with Downie injured

December 21, 2013, 3:45 pm

Tim Panaccio

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Steve Downie, who skated on the ice late today by himself, will miss seven to 10 days with an upper-body injury.

General manager Paul Holmgren made the vague announcement this afternoon.

Shortly after, the Flyers said Vinny Lecavalier will make his return to the lineup tonight against Columbus.

Lecavalier took part in the optional practice Saturday morning. Earlier in the week, Holmgren said he was about two to three weeks away. With Downie out, is Lecavalier coming back sooner than he should? It's a fair question to ask.

Tonight will be Lecavalier's first game since Nov. 30. He sat out nine games, last playing against Nashville.

In his first season with the Flyers, Lecavalier has recorded 14 points (nine goals) in 22 games and has missed a total of 13 games with three separate injuries.

The Flyers acquired Downie from the Colorado Avalanche on Oct. 31 in exchange for forward Max Talbot.

In 20 games since that trade, Downie has posted two goals and 10 assists as a Flyer, with two helpers coming in his last three games.



Mason staying positive despite recent woes

December 21, 2013, 2:00 pm

Tim Panaccio

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- You don’t have to be a mathematician to understand something is a little off with goalie Steve Mason right now.

He’s given up 16 goals over four of his last six starts. That’s not the Mason from a month ago.

He knows it.

Goalie coach Jeff Reeese knows it, as well.

Shots off his pads aren’t going cleanly into the corners. Rebounds are eluding his reach directly around him, as well.

“Last month I had an extremely sharp game and it hasn’t been sharp in recent games and we’ve gone over a lot of video and Jeff has reinforced it’s still a very simple game,” Mason said.

“I got to start making more saves on key opportunities, whether it be a 2 on 1 or whatever. We’ve had a couple of bad bounces. It’s a matter of staying the course. And we had a couple pucks deflect off our guys into the net. These are things that happen over the course of a season.

“I keep saying, it’s not to lose confidence in what we’re building here. I have 100 percent confidence in my game. I know if I keep working, my sharpness will get back to where it was.”

Where it was on Nov. 30 after a 3-2 shootout win at Nashville, saw Mason with a 2.09 goals-against average and .934 save percentage.

Where it is now is 2.40 GAA and .922 save percentage, although his record over that span is 5-1-2 with one no-decision.

Mason hasn’t played badly. He just hasn’t played anywhere near the level he was in November.

Which is why Reese worked quite a bit with him Friday in Voorhees and at Saturday’s morning skate in Columbus.

Things like rebounds, clearing pucks to the corner, and shots from the slot off passes behind the net, all of which has been troublesome for Mason, lately.

Ray Emery will start tonight against the Blue Jackets.

“Right now, Steve’s game is up and down, no question,” Reese said. “It’s been inconsistent. The good news? He hasn’t lost in his last five. He’s 3-0-2 and he’s lost one game [in regulation] over his last nine starts.

“There’s no panic going on. We want to get him back to being consistent. That’s what we are looking for.”

Mason admitted he needed some additional practice time to work on technical aspects. The recent six-game road trip didn’t offer that and things began to unravel a bit.

“The season has been so busy we have not had time working on fundamental things, like tracking the puck into my body and really watching it from when it leaves the stick and hits your pad,” Mason said. “When you track pucks like that, it makes it easier handling rebounds.

“When you’re not getting that practice time, it slips away from you and my game hasn’t been as crisp as in previous weeks.”

Mason will play Monday against Minnesota, which is the Flyers' last game before the Christmas break.

Reese said they’ve gone over Mason’s entire game. He said handling pucks and rebounds are a tad off and it can be corrected.

“We want to get his focus back to going out on each shot and being consistent,” Reese said. “That’s what the team needs.

“Remember, one loss in his last nine starts and he hasn’t had his best stuff in net. That’s good news.”

Actually, that’s very good news because the Flyers are still winning hockey games and remain in a playoff berth -- third in the Metropolitan Division -- coming into tonight’s game.

Reese said that Mason has made some “technical” adjustments, but still has a little “mental” adjustments to make to get his full confidence back.

Flyers head coach Craig Berube made the decision early in the week to play Mason against his former club in Philly -- not Columbus.

“The plan was Ray would play here,” Berube said. “I liked Mace at home in that game.”

Reese added: “It’s extra pressure in an already pressure situation,” by having Mason face Columbus here in Ohio than at home.

“We thought about it, it was his first trade, first time back, no reason to put him into an extra-pressure situation,” Reese said.

Mason was fine with the decision, too.

“We went over the schedule prior to the first Columbus game in Philadelphia and they explained their thoughts and I was fully supportive of it,” Mason said.

“Playing in front of my home fans and getting the win in Philadelphia against my old team was special, especially, the way the boys performed for me.”

Relax and let Emery do the job tonight.

“Sit back, enjoy the game and being back in Columbus and seeing people I haven’t seen in a while will be nice,” Mason said. “I’ll be supportive of the boys on the bench.”

Loose pucks

Steve Downie was still on the ice long after others left the building, likely indicating he will not play tonight. … Jay Rosehill has been a healthy scratch for four straight games. … Vinny Lecavalier? He took part in the optional morning skate, but it seems more likely the Flyers allow him additional recovery time for his injured back and activate him for the post-Christmas road trip starting in Edmonton on Dec. 28.



Flyers-Blue Jackets: 5 things you need to know

December 21, 2013, 9:00 am

Tim Riday

The Flyers (16-15-4) will wrap up their home-and-home series with the Blue Jackets (14-17-4) when the two teams square off Saturday evening.

Puck drop is set for 7 p.m. (CSN) at Nationwide Arena in Columbus.

Here are five things you need to know:

1. Nothin’ but a G thang

Is Claude Giroux finally on track? If Thursday’s dramatic 5-4 come-from-behind victory over the Blue Jackets was any indication, then it’s a safe bet to say yes.

The Flyers’ captain led a furious rally, assisting two goals and netting the game-tying and game-winning markers to cap an incredible third period for the orange and black. Giroux looked like the player we’ve grown accustomed to seeing over the past few seasons. He was intense, motivated and would not let the Flyers settle for a loss against a team right behind them in the standings.

Giroux’s four-point performance also inched him closer to a point-per-game pace this season as the centerman now has 30 points in 35 contests. He’s collected 10 of those points during his current five-game scoring streak in which he’s potted four goals and assisted six more.

Just a few weeks ago, the Flyers were relying on their third line for offense. It’s been a completely different story since head coach Craig Berube placed Michael Raffl on the top line with Jakub Voracek and Giroux against the Montreal Canadiens. The trio has combined for nine goals, 13 assists and a plus-18 rating in the past four games.

The play of Giroux and the top line has helped the Flyers get over the .500 mark and back into the playoff race in a very weak Metropolitan Division. Now it’s time for the club to carry over the momentum from Thursday’s game and put a serious run together. If they want that to happen they’ll need Giroux, who shows no signs of slowing down anytime soon, to continue to lead the charge.

2. Mediocre Mason?

It’s hard to imagine where the Flyers would be without goalie Steve Mason this season.

Mason, who has been the team’s most valuable player, got off to an incredible start but has struggled lately. After Thursday’s 5-4 win, the netminder has now allowed four goals in four of his past seven games (3-1-2).

Mason went around the room and thanked his teammates for bailing him out Thursday, but there have been numerous occasions this season where it should have been his teammates thanking him.

In 27 games played, Mason is 13-9-4 with a 2.40 goals-against average and .922 save percentage. There’s no need for him to put any pressure on himself.

Berube has yet to name a starter for Saturday’s game. If it’s Mason, it will be his first start in Columbus since he was dealt by the Blue Jackets to the Flyers last season.

3. Help is on the way

A pair of key players will return to the Blue Jackets’ lineup Saturday. Columbus activated sniper Marian Gaborik and hard-hitting defenseman James Wisniewski off injured reserve Friday afternoon.

Gaborik hasn't played since Nov. 14. He's been out with a knee injury. His return led Blue Jackets coach Todd Richards to switch up his forward lines at practice. Gaborik skated with Artem Anisimov and Nick Foligno, moving Matt Calvert onto Ryan Johansen’s line with R.J. Umberger.

Wisniewski, who has been out since Dec. 6 with an upper-body injury, split time on the third defensive pair with Nikita Nikitin and Tim Erixon.

4. Injuries

Although Columbus has two players returning Saturday, it remains a banged-up club.

Forwards Nathan Horton (shoulder), Cody Bass (thumb), Jared Boll (ankle) and Derek Mackenzie (lower body), defenseman Dalton Prout (upper body) and goalie Sergei Bobrovsky remain out for the Blue Jackets. Forward Jack Skille (hand) is questionable to play.

For the Flyers, Vinny Lecavalier (back) is still sidelined. He remains optimistic of returning for the post-Christmas trip to Western Canada.

5. This and that

• Voracek has six goals and four assists during his current six-game scoring streak.

• Blue Jackets forward Cam Atkinson has three goals and three assists in his past five games.

• Giroux became the 31st Flyer in franchise history to score at least 100 goals with the team after registering two tallies Thursday.

• The Blue Jackets have a 91.7 percent penalty kill in December. The previous two months they were 79.1 percent.

• The Flyers are 0-2-2 in their last four games on the road.



Flyers have to shuffle lines again

Dec. 22, 2013

Dave Isaac

COLUMBUS, OHIO — Whether it’s a good thing or a bad thing, the Flyers have been defined as a team with forwards that can play on all four lines.

These days, that’s a trait the coaching staff feels is a good thing.

Left wing Steve Downie will be out for the next week to 10 days with an “upper-body” injury that he played with for the last game or two, but wasn’t able to play through Saturday in Columbus.

The vacancy on the wing provided a convenient time for center Vinny Lecavalier to return a week early from a non-displaced fracture in his lower back. After missing the last nine games, the 33-year-old center returned to the lineup on the wing so he could ease back into taking faceoffs.

“He wanted to play,” GM Paul Holmgren said. “A guy like Vinny’s been around a long time. You have to trust his judgment. He feels good. He clearly wanted to play.”

The Flyers talked “at length” about whether it was too dangerous for Lecavalier to return, if the risk of reinjuring his back was too high. Lecavalier won the battle.

“The injury is something where even a couple weeks ago, once he felt good he’s not in danger of reinjuring that same area,” Holmgren said. “He’s ready to go.”

While putting Downie on injured reserve and activating Lecavalier affected only one line, the Flyers don’t seem to mind who they’re playing with.

“I don’t think anyone on this team cares where they’re playing as long as we’re playing well,” Wayne Simmonds said. “You see guys slide from first line, second line, third line, fourth line, it just goes back and forth and whatever combination works is what gets stuck.”

In fact, within the room the players don’t even identify the lines numerically.

“I don’t think you can number the lines,” Simmonds said, “because on any given night (any line) should be the first line. It doesn’t really matter.”

Once Lecavalier feels even healthier, those lines may change again. He is, after all, a natural center. Putting him on Sean Couturier’s wing was just a chance to get him back in action and provide a little offensive firepower on a line usually tasked with shutting down opponents.

As always, the Flyers find a way to keep things interesting. In a week, when Downie returns, they may be looking for new places for their interchangeable parts.

“You can’t be too worried about what’s gonna happen,” Scott Hartnell said. “You’ve just got to go out there and play and earn your ice time, earn your spot on the power play .”

Gill returns:

Defenseman Hal Gill played his fourth game of the season after sitting 20 games as a healthy scratch. He was in for Nick Grossmann (flu).

Grossmann, 28, leads the Flyers in blocked shots with 92. He ranked fifth in the NHL in that category entering Saturday’s action.

Courier-Post LOADED: 12.22.2013


Flyers fade late in loss

Dec. 22, 2013

Dave Isaac

BLUE JACKETS 6 FLYERS 3

• Next: vs. Minnesota Wild

• When: 7:30 p.m., Monday

• TV/Radio: CSN/97.5 FM

COLUMBUS, OHIO — As bad as the score looked at the end of the night, the Flyers didn’t feel they played a bad game. The mistakes are easily correctable, they say.

The only problem is they made six of them.

Even though the Flyers stole the momentum back and tied the game in the second period, the wheels fell off in the third. Too much time backchecking in their end led the Flyers to a 6-3 loss to the Columbus Blue Jackets.

Of the five goals scored that Ray Emery was in the net for, he only saw a couple.

Columbus opened the scoring at 10:43 of the first period when Ryan Johansen scored the first of two goals on the night thanks to an odd-man rush. Braydon Coburn lost the puck in the Columbus end, leaving the Blue Jackets going the other way.

“Tonight that cost us, turnovers,” said Sean Couturier, who scored his seven goal of the season in the second period. “They capitalized.”

In the second period, the Flyers fought back.

They were down two goals after RJ Umberger tipped a James Wisniewski shot form the point on the power play.

Vinny Lecavalier, playing his first game since a fracture in his back cost him nine games, called it a “momentum game.” Columbus had it with time winding down in the second period and up two.

Brandon Dubinsky came flying down the wing looking for a third and he hit the crossbar. The Flyers promptly went down to the other end of the ice and beat goalie Curtis McElhinney on a Wayne Simmonds shot. Twenty seconds later, Couturier evened the game.

“We felt good,” Couturier said. “We were back in the game. We weren’t playing our best hockey, but we were still in the game. In the third period, you never know what could happen. We just made mental mistakes, little turnovers, and it cost us.”

In the third, the Flyers allowed more of the same. Turnovers led to odd-man rushes and Columbus scored three goals.

There were a few shots that originated from the point where Emery had trouble tracking the puck.

“Yeah, they came through traffic,” said the goalie, who made 23 saves. “I’ve got to battle and try to find them.”

The question is who was to blame for those.

The defense didn’t clear the front porch in front of Emery. It didn’t help that big defenseman Nick Grossmann was out with the flu.

Craig Berube saw the other side of the play because the Flyers’ bench was behind the blueline in the third period.

“We’ve got to do a better job of blocking the shots up top with our wingers,” the coach said. “We’ve got to get out in the D (zone) better. I didn’t think we were flat. Overall in the game, I thought we turned the puck over too much in the neutral zone.”

Once the Flyers were down, defenseman started pinching in to try and create offense on the other end of the ice.

“We’re told to try to keep the play alive if we can,” defenseman Luke Schenn said. “If we have a good forward recovering for us, we’ve got the green light to go down there and do that. We’ve got to be aware if we do have that forward. If not, we can’t go down and pinch. We’ve been giving up a few too many opportunities lately in odd-man rushes.”

Lecavalier thought he had a chance, too. When the Flyers were down a goal, he had the chance to tie the game at three apiece.

“I get a golden opportunity, open net, he made an unbelievable save,” said Lecavalier, who played wing in his return. We score, that’s 3-3 and it’s a new game. We might get out of it with two points. It went the other way.”

With the loss, the Flyers allowed the Carolina Hurricanes to use one point in an overtime loss to tie them. The New Jersey Devils leapfrogged them with an overtime win over Washington.

“We’ve got to eliminate turnovers,” Couturier said. “If we do that, I think we’ll be fine. They got their scoring chances on our mistakes. If we eliminate that, we have a better chance of winning.”



Flyers' fall to Blue Jackets, 6-3

Dec. 21, 2013

RUSTY MILLER

COLUMBUS, OHIO — Ryan Johansen and R.J. Umberger each scored two goals and the Columbus Blue Jackets pulled away in the third period to beat the Philadelphia Flyers 6-3 on Saturday night.

The game came 48 hours after the Blue Jackets led 3-0 after two periods and 4-2 with 5 minutes left in Philadelphia, with the Flyers scoring five times in the final period in a 5-4 win.

David Savard had a goal and an assist and Boone Jenner also scored, while Nikita Nikitin and Corey Tropp each had two assists for the Blue Jackets, who said they were humiliated by the Thursday collapse.

Wayne Simmonds had two goals and Sean Couturier also scored for the Flyers.

Tempering the victory was the loss of Blue Jackets forward Marian Gaborik, who broke a collarbone in the first period and is out indefinitely.

This time the Blue Jackets watched a 2-0 lead vanish in 20 seconds late in the second period, but Columbus took control at the outset of the third.

Savard took a pass from Nikitin at the 3:36 mark, adjusted to avoid a defender and then slid a rising shot from the right point that beat Ray Emery high on the stick side.

Just over 2 minutes later, Savard returned the favor by passing to Nikitin at the left point. His shot, with the Flyers slow to flow back into position, was redirected by Jenner in the slot to push the lead to two.

Johansen, who had opened the scoring, then flicked a wrister past Emery on a 2-on-1 break to make it 5-2 with 7:38 left.

Curtis McElhinney, victimized for all the goals on Thursday night, made the lead stand up with 33 saves.

The Blue Jackets, much like the earlier meeting, got off to a good start only to lose it.

At the 10:43 mark of the first period, Gaborik, just back after missing 17 games with a sprained left knee, got off a shot that was pushed aside by Emery. Nick Foligno collected the puck along the back wall and skated to the other side of the cage where he fed Johansen, who lifted a shot from the right doorstep for his 13th of the year.

Gaborik, sandwiched between Braydon Coburn and Zac Rinaldo on his shot, got up slowly and immediately skated off the ice to the dressing room. The club announced between periods that the veteran, with 341 goals and 345 assists in 686 games, had a broken collarbone and would be out indefinitely.

Columbus went up 2-0 at the 14:29 mark of the second — just 8 seconds after Mark Streit went off for hooking — when James Wisniewski’s hard slap shot from the right point was redirected by Umberger into the net.

The Blue Jackets came an inch from going up 3-0 late in the period before things went south.

At the end of a Philadelphia power play, Brandon Dubinsky skated down the right wing and wristed a shot at the dot that beat Emery. It hit the crossbar, skimmed across to the far post and then rattled away.

The Flyers gained the puck and roared down the ice on a 3-on-2. Simmonds pulled up and carried the puck to the high slot before wristing a shot that beat McElhinney at the 17:40 mark.

Just 20 seconds later, Matt Read’s pass from the short boards skipped past three Blue Jackets to Couturier, whose high shot from the right corner of the net knotted things.

Both teams made major roster moves in the past two days to add three key veterans.

Flyers GM Paul Holmgren announced just before the game that Vincent Lecavalier would play, ending a string of nine games missed with a displaced fracture in his back.

The Blue Jackets added Gaborik and Wisniewski (upper body, out six games) on Friday. Gaborik had five goals and seven assists this year in 18 games.

Notes: Philadelphia also announced just before the game that D Nicklas Grossman (flu) would be out and that RW Steve Downie would miss 7-10 days (upper body). … Early in the game, fans were chanting, “We want Mason!” — calling for the Flyers top goalie, Steve Mason, a former Blue Jacket. But Emery got the start. … Columbus lost LW Matt Calvert (upper body) in the 2nd period. He did not return. … The Flyers Erik Gustafsson went off with a left knee injury after a third-period collision with Columbus’ Corey Tropp. … Referee Dan O’Rourke, kicked in the chest by a skate in the first period, left the ice after Johansen’s goal and did not return. … Before Wisniewski’s return, the Blue Jackets four highest-paid players were sidelined.


730799 Phoenix Coyotes

Antoine Vermette lifts Phoenix Coyotes past Ottawa Senators in OT

Sat Dec 21, 2013 4:13 PM

Staff Writer

OTTAWA, Ontario — Antoine Vermette made himself right at home — at the Ottawa Senators’ expense.

The former Ottawa player completed a hat trick at 2:23 of overtime to give the Coyotes a 4-3 victory over the Senators on Saturday.

“It’s special. It’s always going to be special here,” Vermette said. “I started my career here and there have been good memories. A little part of me will always be here and when I was driving here from the airport I was looking around and it feels like home a little bit.”

Vermette pounced on the loose puck in front of goalie Craig Anderson and pushed it through to the back of the net to beat his former team. Radim Vrbata also scored to help the Coyotes snap a three-game losing streak.

Vermette tied it on a power play with 2:13 left in the third period. He took a pass from David Moss and deposited the puck into an empty net behind the fallen Anderson.

“It was huge,” Vermette said. “They were crucial points because the standings are so tight in the (Western Conference). It was a good performance and we found a way to get the two points.”

Marc Methot, former Phoenix forward Kyle Turris and Zack Smith scored for Ottawa. The Senators have lost three straight.

“It’s frustrating and we have to start winning games, eventually,” Senators captain Jason Spezza said.

“You just try to keep working and figure out what we have to do better and work at it. It’s not a matter of staying positive at this point it’s just trying to work our way out of it at this point and get on some sort of semblance of a roll.”

Phoenix’s Mike Smith made pad saves on Kyle Turris and Clarke MacArthur 2 minutes in overtime. Against MacArthur, The goalie was on his stomach and stretched his right leg out enough to get his toe on the puck.

“I saw it when it happened and I actually thought it went in, but it was a great save, a huge save and obviously a game-changing save,” Coyotes defenseman Keith Yandle said.

“When you’re in a little bit of a slide it’s a character win when you’re down. “Everyone did a good job getting into it and trying to get the win. There was a lot of desperation in the third when we were trying to find ourselves a goal and get back into the game. When it’s crunch time it amps up a little bit but it’s fun.”

Ottawa took a 2-0 lead early in the second period.

Fresh from the penalty box, Zack Smith got a long pass from Eric Gryba and skated in on a partial break and beat Mike Smith high to the stick side at 3:10.

Vermette beat Anderson from the slot at 5:28, and Vrbata tied it on a power play at 8:47 when he moved in from the point and beat Anderson to the short side.

Methot gave the Senators a 3-2 lead with 5:09 left in the period.

Notes: The Coyotes are the only NHL team this season that hasn’t scored a short-handed goal. … The game was Phoenix’s first in Ottawa since Oct. 26, 2010.

Arizona Republic LOADED: 12.22.2013

730800 Phoenix Coyotes

Phoenix Coyotes center Antoine Vermette masters language of leadership

Sarah McLellan

Sat Dec 21, 2013 5:34 PM

He was huddled on the ice with his teammates, awaiting instructions for how practice was about to proceed, and the words that floated from the coach’s mouth might as well have been spoken in a foreign language.

Actually, they were.

Coyotes center Antoine Vermette was in his first season with the Quebec Remparts, a 16-year-old on the brink of an illustrious junior career, and he couldn’t understand English. Vermette, of course, studied English in grade school in nearby Saint-Agapit, but apparently, “On the whistle, you go there and there,” wasn’t included in any vocabulary lessons.

“I remember thinking, ‘This guy doesn’t speak French,’ ” Vermette said. “ ‘On the whistle?’ I had no clue.”

But Vermette wasn’t discouraged. He not only completed the drill by mimicking the actions of his teammates, but he learned English and became one of the more-respected players — not just among the Remparts but on all his future teams.

It really wasn’t unusual, then, to see Coyotes coach Dave Tippett promote Vermette to an assistant captain earlier this month when captain Shane Doan fell ill.

Leadership has always been a staple of his game, even if he had to overcome a language barrier to continue it at the professional ranks.

“It’s not necessarily me that’s going to be a big rah-rah guy,” Vermette said. “I try to lead by example and do the things right and consistent.”

In his minor-hockey days, Vermette was always named a captain or assistant captain. And his approach didn’t change when he was challenged to learn conversational English.

The Remparts provided private teachers to the players, and in addition to studying physics and chemistry, Vermette worked on his English.

In preparation for a province-wide exam, Vermette’s tutor helped Vermette learn by watching “Seinfeld” with him and asking common questions.

“He asked me how was I doing, how was your weekend, stuff like that, and he wanted me to respond in English,” Vermette said. “And that was a huge step because it forced me to get going and use what I learned.”

Hockey helped, too — particularly when he’d receive blank stares from his teammates.

“I knew I was saying some stuff wrong, but I just laughed about it,” Vermette said.

It was this easy-going, affable personality that the Coyotes decided would be a perfect complement to the core they were assembling when they added Vermette at the trade deadline in 2012. And with three years left on his contract when he arrived from the Columbus Blue Jackets, Vermette wanted to become one of the team’s vital pieces.

But he didn’t consciously set out to accomplish that. He simply was himself.

“I want to have the best effect on the team and try to help the team and fit in as good as possible,” Vermette said. “Guys have been nothing less than tremendous to me — really great — and I felt part of it right off the get-go, so that’s a huge help, too. You just want to fit in and be respectful to the other guys.”

With so many responsibilities, it’s hard for Vermette not to influence the Coyotes. He’s their top faceoff specialist, a reliable penalty killer and an offensive threat — perhaps the team’s best two-way forward.

And yet Vermette was predicted to fall down the depth chart with the addition of Mike Ribeiro.

“I always want to have the biggest impact, positive impact, on the team, and I knew I didn’t want to let go on some offense and some key situations,

playing with some offensive guys,” Vermette said. “But if it’s different, it’s different.”

It certainly has been. Vermette’s value has only grown this season — especially in Doan’s absence.

“He’s one of the nicest guys I’ve met,” winger Rob Klinkhammer said. “He’s always friendly, ‘How you doing? How’s your wife doing?’ He’s always got something nice to say. He’s a real positive guy.

“And then on the ice, he plays just such a solid game. He’s great offensively. He’s awesome defensively. He’s great at draws. He’s counted on at both ends of the rink for us. He’s just kind of a utility guy that he’s good at everything. He’s not OK at everything. He’s good at everything.”

That wasn’t always the case, especially when it came to English. But Vermette couldn’t accept that or anything else that was at odds with his ultimate goal.

“I want to be the best player possible, and I want to help my team as best I can,” he said. “I’ll do the best that I could.”

Center of attention

Coyotes center Antoine Vermette’s season:

--Scored his second career hat trick Saturday in a 4-3 overtime win against the Ottawa Senators.

--Played in Game No. 700 Dec. 10 in Colorado against the Avalanche.

--Carries a 57.5 percentage on faceoffs — good for seventh in the league.

--Sits second in the NHL with 463 faceoff wins, first with 269 road faceoff wins and first with 79 short-handed faceoff wins.

--Tied for the team lead in goals with 12. The Coyotes are 6-0-3 when Vermette scores.

--Ranks first among Coyotes forwards with an average of 19:22 ice time per game.

--Leads Coyotes forwards with 31 blocked shots.

Arizona Republic LOADED: 12.22.2013

730801 Pittsburgh Penguins

Stats Corner: Penguins rookies earning their keep

David Golebiewski

Through injuries, suspensions and ever-changing line combinations, the Penguins just keep winning.

The Penguins lead the Eastern Conference with 55 points and have outscored the competition by 38 goals, trailing just the St. Louis Blues. While the club's established stars deserve plenty of praise, the Penguins wouldn't hold a double-digit point lead in the Metropolitan Division and a top playoff seed without a cadre of rookies playing like seasoned veterans.

Seven rookies have suited up for the Penguins already this season, playing crucial minutes and cushioning the blow of losing coach Dan Bylsma's top four projected defensemen and backup goalie, among others. You wouldn't know that these youngsters just ascended from junior hockey or stepped off a bus from Wilkes-Barre/Scranton based on their production.

Penguins rookies have racked up a collective 5.5 Point Shares (PS), which measures the number of standings points that a player contributes to his team through his offensive and defensive value. Only the Anaheim Ducks have benefited more from NHL neophytes.

Team Rookie PS

Ducks 6.1

Penguins 5.5

Predators 4.5

Sharks 4.0

Flames 3.7

Source: Hockey-Reference.com

Penguins rookies are proving to be catalysts between the pipes and on the blue line. Backup goalie Jeff Zatkoff (1.3 PS) has filled in admirably for Tomas Vokoun, helping Marc-Andre Fleury stay fresh as he re-establishes himself as one of the game's elite net minders. Olli Maatta, a 19-year-old defenseman who skated for the London Knights of the Ontario Hockey League last year, ranks third among rookies in Point Shares.

Player Team PS

Tomas Hertl Sharks 3.9

Hampus Lindholm Mighty Ducks 3.2

Olli Maatta Penguins 3.0

Martin Jones Kings 2.7

Marek Mazanec Predators 2.7

Tribune Review LOADED: 12.22.2013


Ex-Pens winger Asham looking forward to retirement

Rob Rossi

NEW YORK

Arron Asham knows this game.

“I took somebody's job when I came in,” Asham said earlier this week in the New York Rangers' dressing room at Madison Square Garden.

“Somebody is going to take mine.”

Asham is playing in his 15th NHL season. He does not expect a 16th. He is 35 and not unlike other journeymen at similar points in their career. The end is near. The difference about Asham is he is not shy about accepting it.

“I am looking forward to it,” he said, smiling.

His body feels the bruises and breaks that have come with having been willing to muck, grind, check and, indeed, fight. He still likes doing all of those on most nights, but Asham said there are some nights that end with him wondering — not what he has left in the tank, but whether he really wants to push the line that is near empty.

Six goals — a total he has not hit in a season since scoring at least that many in five successive years from 2005-10 — would please him. Those six would give him 100, a nice number on which to end.

Asham did not grow up with a lot of boys in Portage La Prairie, Manitoba, Canada, who went on to notch 100 NHL goals.

Of course, if he finished with 94 goals, that would make him the leading NHL scorer among childhood friends, too.

The Penguins are one of six clubs for which Asham has played. He left them two years ago for the riches of New York, which will have paid him $2.2 million upon the expiration of this contract.

Asham is wealthy beyond his wildest boyhood dreams but hardly rich enough never to work again. He has three young children, all of whom he would prefer to provide educational opportunities and help with things such as weddings, and maybe get around to spoiling grandkids.

“You miss so much when you're playing,” Asham said. “You notice that more with the little ones because they grow up so fast and you feel like you're not seeing any of it.”

Asham spent parts of this and last season playing in the AHL with the Rangers' affiliate. The experience did not jade him. It served only to remind him that the game he has made a living playing was in its final period.

The game has changed, too — and Asham is not sure he would have a place in where it is going.

So maybe his timing for expecting to leave is perfect, he said.

“It's true when you hear guys like me say the players are bigger and stronger than ever,” Asham said. “There are always going to be hits. Guys are always going to get hurt, but I think there are some liberties being taken that maybe weren't when I started.

“It's a different game now in some ways, but I broke in a long time ago. Everything has to change.”

That is the unavoidable reality that hockey and its players face.

“Don't get me wrong. I'm enjoying every minute that I'm up with the big club because it could always be my last game,” Asham said. “When it is, I'll be ready. I have things to look forward to after I'm done playing.”



Pens goalie situation intriguing

Joe Starkey

The Penguins' signing of backup goalie Jeff Zatkoff sparked a bit of speculation Saturday.

Zatkoff's NHL-only, two-year, $1.2 million deal got people to wondering: Does this mean the Penguins will go with a rookie behind Marc-Andre Fleury come playoff time? What if Fleury implodes again?

Does it mean the end of Tomas Vokoun, still recovering from a blood clot at home in Florida and hinting at retirement?

Would the Penguins consider signing a veteran before the playoffs if Vokoun cannot play?

A couple of conversations, including one with coach Dan Bylsma, led me to the following conclusions:

• The deal “has no significance” regarding Vokoun's situation, Bylsma said. Vokoun's status remains uncertain.

• The vote of confidence in Zatkoff would not prohibit the Penguins from seeking an experienced goalie should they feel the need.

• Zatkoff has established himself as no worse than a No. 3 goalie and a viable candidate to back up Fleury for the next few years.

Everybody in the organization is ready to ride with Fleury, who is off to a fabulous start and might be benefiting from the lack of a veteran pushing him for playing time the way Vokoun did last season.

I asked Fleury if he felt different without an experienced goalie behind him.

“Old?” he said, laughing. “Older, I guess.”

Believe this: Like any goalie, Fleury wants to play the vast majority of the games. It's easier to stay in rhythm. He was good when he needed to be Saturday, notching his NHL-leading 21st win by stopping 27 shots and protecting a late lead in a 4-3 victory over the Calgary Flames.

Fleury is 15-2 on home ice.

“He's run with the ball,” Bylsma said. “He's taken the net and done an unbelievable job for us.”

What's truly unbelievable is the way the Penguins have played in front of Fleury, employing Bylsma's new left-wing lock and playing a generally more responsible game. Fleury is forever a function of his teammates' performance, and this is shaping up as one of the better defensive teams in franchise history.

The Penguins entered Saturday's game with a 2.14 goals-against average, a number that would rank second in franchise history (behind only Kevin Constantine's trap-happy team of 1997-98) if it holds.

Fleury was clear and direct when asked if the difference in front of him is noticeable from recent years.

“Definitely,” he said. “I think we don't see as many quality scoring chances.”

Fleury entered the game with a 2.00 goals-against average and a .924 save percentage. Zatkoff, after his shaky NHL debut, is putting up even better numbers over his past six starts: 1.93 GAA, .930 save percentage.

“We've still got a ways to go,” Sidney Crosby said about whether this is the best defensive team he has been on. “But we're showing signs early on here of being really committed and disciplined in the way we play.”

The backup goalie situation will shake itself out over the next few months. In the meantime, the mood is light amid a seven-game winning streak — and the chatty Zatkoff has become a locker room favorite.

“The guy never shuts up, but in a good way,” defenseman Matt Niskanen said. “He's involved in the game even when he's not playing. He's talking to guys on the bench. He's very supportive.”

Is he a true No. 2? Would you trust him at playoff time if Fleury faltered?

Those are questions the Penguins don't have to answer today.



Letang has surgery on infected elbow

Rob Rossi

Defenseman Kris Letang had surgery last week to treat an elbow infection, and the Penguins expect him to return after the NHL's three-day Christmas break.

Letang has not been placed on the long-term injured reserve list, which would force him to miss at least 10 games and 24 days.

Letang had a medical procedure to clean an open wound that appeared after the Penguins won at home against New Jersey on Dec. 13. He participated in pregame warm-ups at Detroit the next day but was a late-decision scratch.

Letang did not have the surgery to repair a bone break or displacement or ligament damage. He had the procedure only to treat an infection in the wound. Temporary casting is in place to prevent arm movement that could reopen the wound.

Letang missed a fifth consecutive game Saturday, a 4-3 win by the Penguins over Calgary at Consol Energy Center. He missed the Penguins' opening nine games because of a strained right knee.

The Penguins are playing without each of their top-four defensemen: Letang, Rob Scuderi (ankle), Paul Martin (tibia) and Brooks Orpik (concussion).

Scuderi is expected to rejoin the lineup when the Penguins play Dec. 27 at Carolina. Martin has not resumed skating, and there is no timetable for Orpik's return.



Crosby leads Penguins to 7th straight win

Rob Rossi

James Neal, a former 40-goal scorer, knows something about shots.

He saw — but barely believed — the shot Penguins captain Sidney Crosby scored on in a 4-3 win over Calgary at Consol Energy Center on Saturday afternoon.

“I don't know how he shoots with that (flat) stick he uses, but with his speed and the power he creates — he's so strong,” Neal said, referring to the slap shot that Crosby buried top-right corner against Flames goalie Karri Rammo during the Penguins' two-goal second period.

“He makes a little inside-out move there. I've seen that move in practice 100 times. I think only (Penguins goalie Marc-Andre Fleury) maybe knows he's going to go there, but it's just a great shot.”

Fleury, who stopped 27 shots from the Flames for his NHL-best 21st victory, said he was not sure of Crosby's shot location upon seeing him enter the offensive zone with speed and wind up from the left side.

He did know the shot was headed where Crosby had aimed.

“He doesn't take slap shots too often going down the wing,” Fleury said of Crosby, whom he has faced in practices for nine seasons. “But it's going to go in. It's always pretty accurate.”

Crosby used the slap shot often on his way to 32 goals in 41 games before his 2010-11 season was lost to concussion symptoms.

He said Saturday afternoon that anymore there is not often enough free time or open space to make use of that particular shot. Fleury noted Crosby's “quick release” is mostly seen these days on a wrist shot, and Neal marveled at the backhand Crosby makes use of frequently to pass and shoot.

Whatever his shot selection, Crosby — if healthy — is moving along at one of his more impressive scoring paces.

With 54 points in 38 games he is on pace for 117. He is averaging 1.42 points per-game in a season with a 5.44 goals-per-game average that is the NHL's lowest since 2003-04 — before rules were adjusted to improve offense.

Crosby's career-best season is 120 points, when he averaged 1.52 and the league averaged 5.90 goals.

Crosby's 20th goal was one of three points against Calgary, and it proved the signature moment of a four-game stretch during which he made his strongest case as MVP frontrunner.

The Penguins, without six or seven regulars in each of the last five games, have won them all, and Crosby produced two goals and eight points while racking three multiple-point contests.

Coach Dan Bylsma said, after the Penguins' seventh consecutive victory, that Crosby has not mentioned feeling as though he needed to elevate his performance in the wake of injuries to fellow franchise center Evgeni Malkin and all top-four defensemen, but…

“There's no question he's been that (MVP) for our team,” Bylsma said. “I don't think anyone in that room thinks, ‘Oh, I have to do more, it has to come from us.'

“But there's no question in the elevated play from that line.”

Crosby and wingers Chris Kunitz and Pascal Dupuis have scored six of the Penguins' 15 goals in the last four games without Malkin, who was tied for third in NHL scoring at 41 points as of Saturday.

That line has combined for 19 points over that span.

Dupuis (seventh goal), winger Harry Zolnierczyk (first) and defenseman Matt Niskanen (third) also scored for the Penguins against Calgary, which ultimately pulled within a goal after falling behind, 4-1.

Fleury made 12 of 13 saves in the final period to preserve this win, the team's 10th straight at home.

Crosby, though, tied the bow on this final home game before Christmas with his blast.

“I don't know how to explain what he did there,” center Brandon Sutter said. “I don't even understand how he made a move against the grain the way he did there. We were kind of laughing about that on the bench.

“Just an unbelievable move and an unbelievable shot. Most guys would have just pushed the puck forward there and then you go get it.

“Not him.”



Penguins sign Zatkoff to new 2-year contract

Josh Yohe

Goaltender Jeff Zatkoff's recent strong play hasn't gone unnoticed by his employer.

The Penguins awarded the 26-year-old rookie with a two-year, $1.2 million contract Saturday.

Although it remains to be seen if the Penguins will have the services of goaltender Tomas Vokoun later this season — he has been out since September after surgery to remove a blood clot — and the organization certainly could acquire a veteran backup before the postseason begins, Zatkoff is now officially in their long-term plans.

He will make $600,000 per season in what is a one-way deal.

“It's a great organization,” Zatkoff said. “I'm happy to be a part of it for the next couple of years.”

The Penguins seem happy to have Zatkoff around for the next couple of years, too.

While he doesn't necessarily project as an every-day, NHL starting goaltender, Zatkoff has done solid work as Marc-Andre Fleury's backup. With Fleury's contract up following the 2014-15 season and Vokoun's status unknown — and given the Penguins do not possess a wealth of top-notch goaltending prospects in their system — locking up Zatkoff for a small price was a desire for the team.

“He just didn't have any NHL experience,” Penguins coach Dan Bylsma said. “He's a guy who we believed could go in there and be a good backstop. He's been that.”

Bylsma referenced Zatkoff's rough NHL outing against Florida, but suggested the Penguins were willing to be patient with him.

It has paid off.

Zatkoff is 6-2 with a 2.46 goals against average.

Close calls

The last thing the Penguins need is an injury to one of their defensemen. It almost happened Saturday against the Calgary Flames. Twice.

Defensemen Matt Niskanen and Olli Maatta — the tandem is currently being used as the Penguins' top defense pairing with five regulars out of the lineup — both missed about seven minutes of ice time because of separate injuries.

Niskanen left the game after being hit into the Penguins' bench. He returned later in the second period.

Maatta blocked a shot with his hand in the second period but returned for the start of the third.

Despite the missed time, Niskanen played a team-high 22:58 while Maatta played 20:21.

“I got knocked into an open door,” Niskanen said. “I got dinged there for a little bit, but it's OK. Nothing serious.”

Calgary's Curtis Glencross sustained an injury on his first shift of the game and did not return.

Geno to sit in Ottawa?

Center Evgeni Malkin has not played since sustaining in injury to his left leg Dec. 14 in Detroit, and the Penguins will quite possibly hold him out of the lineup until following the holiday break.

They play Monday in Ottawa but then don't play again until Friday in Raleigh against the Hurricanes.

“Considering the time period,” Bylsma said, “and Ottawa being the Monday game, there will be consideration given to the fact.”

Malkin did skate Saturday morning, and the session was more intense than when he skated on Friday.

Scoring change

Niskanen's goal late in the second period was originally awarded to right wing James Neal. However, following the game, it was changed to Niskanen, who now has goals in consecutive games and three this season.



Penguins minor league notebook: Wilkes-Barre still fields pair of NHL veterans

Jonathan Bombulie

WILKES-BARRE — It seems impossible, given the frequent call-ups of the past month, but there are at least two players in Wilkes-Barre with NHL experience who have yet to make their Penguins debut.

Defenseman Brendan Mikkelson has played 131 games with Anaheim, Calgary and Tampa Bay. Center Nick Drazenovic has played 11 games with St. Louis and Columbus. Both are 26-year-old, seventh-year pros who signed two-way NHL deals with the Penguins in July.

Lately, their No. 1 job has been to keep the Baby Pens afloat while nine of the team's top 19 scorers have been in the NHL. Ultimately, though, both have skills that might make them effective call-ups.

Mikkelson is a 6-foot-3, 210-pounder who leads AHL defensemen with 11 power-play assists. He isn't a dynamic talent, but he's solid in all areas of the game.

“I feel like I can play any style you want to play,” Mikkelson said. “I have the size to play a rough-and-tumble game. I can play in my own end, and I can play in the offensive zone.”

Drazenovic, meanwhile, has 14 points in 15 games and has become the Baby Pens' first-line center. He plays on the perimeter a bit too much, but he has the skill to be a short-term top-six fix.

“I just want to win and whatever happens, happens,” Drazenovic said. “Help the young guys develop and if they need me in Pitt, I'll play.”

Making room

The promotion of Simon Despres, Brian Dumoulin and Philip Samuelsson opened prime AHL ice time for some young defensemen. Rookie Scott Harrington has moved to the top pair, but he was effectively playing plenty of minutes in all situations anyway.

The biggest step up might be the one rookie Nick D'Agostino is making. A 2008 seventh-round draft pick out of Cornell, he's gone from being the sixth or seventh defenseman to playing on the second pair and on the power play.

A 6-2, 197-pounder with good puck skills, D'Agostino struggled with turnovers in November before rallying as his ice time increased.

“He's got it back,” coach John Hynes said. “Maybe his confidence dipped a little bit.”

Czech back

Czech winger Dominik Uher was scheduled to return to the lineup this weekend for the first time since taking a puck to the face in a Nov. 27 game.

Uher, a 2011 fifth-round pick, is in the midst of a breakout season. He has more points (nine) in 19 games this year than he had in 53 games as a rookie last year (seven).

Monster game

Notre Dame center Bryan Rust, a 2010 third-round pick, slips off the prospect radar at times, largely because there's nothing sexy about a defensively responsible forward. He'll soon play in a spotlight game, however, as the No. 13 Irish will face No. 7 Boston College on Jan. 4 at Fenway Park.

Rust, a 5-11, 198-pound alternate captain, is having a solid senior year. He has 12 points in 18 games, including a goal and four assists in his past five.



On the Penguins: Learning the value of a team

December 21, 2013 10:05 PM

Dave Molinari

The Penguins talk a lot about attention to detail, about being ready for virtually anything that could happen. That's an admirable approach, but almost nothing -- no series of brainstorming sessions, no run-throughs of worst-case scenarios -- could have fully prepared them for what they've endured this season.

Sure, it's true that injuries are an occupational hazard in hockey, and that every team has them. What the Penguins have experienced, though, is more like mass casualties.

They had lost 190 man-games because of injuries before facing Calgary at Consol Energy Saturday, and 200 will be a speck in the rear-view mirror by the time they limp into the holiday break that runs from Tuesday through Thursday.

Of course, "break" probably isn't the term the Penguins would choose to characterize their impending time off. They've heard that word used way too many times during the past few months to describe damage done to players' wrists, ankles, hands and leg bones.

Frankly, their team picture should be taken with an X-ray machine.

Only eight players have been available for every game, and their absentee list lately has been headlined by Evgeni Malkin and their top four defensemen: Paul Martin, Brooks Orpik, Rob Scuderi and Kris Letang.

Losing so many high-caliber players for so many games would be a perfectly plausible explanation for a miserable, exasperating season.

Except that the Penguins aren't having one.

Instead, they are perched atop the Eastern Conference and have had success bordering on remarkable for a team that has had to recall no fewer than nine players from its American Hockey League minor-league affiliate.

The Penguins not only have done that, but have brought up several of those guys multiple times. And they've seen a few, like Jayson Megna and Andrew Ebbett, end up on injured-reserve themselves.

Veterans who have bounced between the NHL and the minors -- Chris Conner, in particular -- have stepped into fairly prominent roles after being promoted and done a commendable job.

Fortunate as the Penguins were to have experienced guys like Harry Zolnierczyk, Conner and Ebbett on their depth chart when the run of injuries began, that doesn't mean it simply was a lucky break.

They have earned a reputation as an organization that promotes worthy players, even when there isn't a personnel crisis on the parent team, and that's a powerful selling point when trying to lure unrestricted free agents hoping to prove they are worthy of full-time work in the NHL.

The kind of free agents who are contributing so much now.

"It's certainly something we promote a lot to free agents of all kinds," said assistant general manager Jason Botterill, who doubles as GM of the Baby Penguins.

"What's happened with the Group 6 free agents and the Group 3 free agents -- guys like Andrew Ebbett or Chris Conner -- is we're continually showing, year-in and year-out, that we're utilizing these players."

New York Islanders winger Colin McDonald is one who parlayed good work in Wilkes-Barre and a cameo with the Penguins (five games in 2011-12) into a steady job in the NHL.

Bill Guerin, Tom Fitzgerald and goalie coach Mike Buckley, who make up the Penguins' developmental staff, are charged with polishing the games of not only promising young prospects, but older players trying to use Wilkes-Barre/Scranton as a launch pad to the NHL.

"We're working with 21-year-old players, but we're also working with the 28-year-old or 29-year-old who's down there, trying to get to the National Hockey League," Botterill said.

"With our development staff, their responsibilities aren't just to work with our young players. It's to work with all of our players."

Having a stable of quality veterans in the AHL helps prospects adapt to the pro game -- "You don't want to put them in situations where they're overwhelmed," Botterill said -- and the shot at earning an NHL paycheck is all the incentive most older players need to fill their roles effectively.

"If you play well," Botterill said, "you're going to get an opportunity to come up and be part of our group."

The list of players who can testify to that is a lot longer now that it was when training camp ended.

It has been a classic win/win situation, with a twist. Because the wins just don't seem to stop.

The week ahead

Monday: at Ottawa ... The Senators might not be the most disappointing team in the NHL this season, but they're on the short list of candidates.

Post Gazette LOADED: 12.22.2013


Penguins on 7-game win streak with defeat of Flames, 4-3

December 21, 2013 9:59 PM

Dave Molinari

The Penguins won’t play another game at Consol Energy Center until Jan. 3, and they can’t be very happy about that.

After all, their 4-3 victory against Calgary there Saturday was their 10th in a row on home ice.

They might not be unbeatable in their home rink, but they’re closer than just about anyone based east of Anaheim.

That’s a big part of the reason the rest of the Eastern Conference is struggling to maintain visual contact with them. And it certainly bodes well for the Penguins if they can sustain anything close to that pace over the balance of the regular season.

“We never really talk about it — or, we haven’t talked about it yet — but as we get further along in the season, you want this place to be a real home-ice advantage for you,” defenseman Matt Niskanen said. “Where teams come in here and know that it’s going to be tough to win.”

Of course, with the roll the Penguins have been on lately — think huge boulder on a steep mountainside — they probably could spend 60 minutes on an ice floe in the Arctic and come away with a couple of points to show for it.

Doesn’t matter where they play.

Doesn’t matter who they play.

Doesn’t even matter, to some extent, how well they play.

Certainly, they did not overwhelm the Flames, who rallied from a 4-1 deficit and battled in an attempt to force overtime until the waning seconds of play. Calgary’s tenacity earned it a lot of respect, though not a point.

“We didn’t have our best stuff today,” Niskanen said. “We had to muck-and-grind it out in the third period to hold onto the lead we’d built. Guys worked and competed really hard.”

For a stretch in which the Penguins lineup has seemed to change almost every game — usually because a prominent player has been injured — their willingness to work, to sacrifice, has been a constant.

Some of the names are different, but the effort remains the same.

The way things have gone lately, coach Dan Bylsma eventually might be compelled to send out a line with Baling Wire between Spit and Duct Tape — which just might be much of what’s holding this group together these days — but if so, he probably could count on getting the full measure of what those three have to offer.

Obviously, Philip Samuelsson and Brian Dumoulin aren’t, say, Paul Martin and Brooks Orpik (or, if you prefer, Rob Scuderi and Kris Letang), and no one is going to mistake Zach Sill’s game for that of Evgeni Malkin. Even if the Penguins had their lineup of choice intact, however, they couldn’t improve on their 7-0 current run.

“I’m not surprised, but it’s no joke when you have your top four [defensemen] out,” right winger Craig Adams said. “I don’t think many teams would be able to sustain that and still keep on going.

“That just says what good players we have coming in and filling in. You can’t just put anybody in there.

“These guys are making it look easy, but it’s not that easy.”

To be fair, Sidney Crosby made it look that way at times while piling up a goal and two assists for his third consecutive multiple-point game.

That was particularly true of his goal, when he carried the puck through the neutral zone and deked to the outside of defenseman T.J. Brodie before hammering a shot past Calgary goalie Karri Ramo from above the left hash mark at 14:44 of the second period.

“You give him like a foot and he’s going to make you pay for it,” Flames coach Bob Hartley said.

Give Crosby a millimeter, and it probably will happen then, too.

What the Flames mostly gave the Penguins, though, was an impressive fight and a legitimate scare.

Even after the Penguins built a 4-1 lead on goals by Pascal Dupuis, Harry Zolnierczyk, Crosby and Niskanen with just over 21 minutes left, Calgary clawed back on goals by Mike Cammalleri and Jiri Hudler.

OK, so perhaps it was a given that Cammalleri would get a puck past Marc-Andre Fleury — he has 12 goals in 20 career games against the Penguins — but Calgary’s relentlessness was a bit of a surprise, even though the Penguins said they expected nothing less.

“I’m kind of a more of a you-get-what-you-deserve kind of guy, but tonight, we did some good things,” Cammalleri said. “Unfortunately, when you’re in tight, tight games like this all the time, you end up losing some.”

At least for now, however, the Penguins will just have to take his word on that.

Post Gazette LOADED: 12.22.2013

730810 San Jose Sharks

San Jose Sharks beat Dallas Stars in shootout

Curtis Pashelka

12/21/2013 10:36:34 PM PST

SAN JOSE -- Sharks captain Joe Thornton admitted Saturday night he wasn't thrilled to be picked by coach Todd McLellan for the shootout after four of his teammates had failed in their attempts.

Thornton certainly didn't look uncomfortable, as he beat goalie Kari Lehtonen with a wrist shot to help give the Sharks a come-from-behind 3-2 shootout win over the Dallas Stars.

Goalie Alex Stalock stopped 44 shots in regulation time and overtime, and stopped all five shots he faced in the shootout as the Sharks won for just the third time in their past nine games.

"You don't really want to know what my reaction was when," McLellan called his name, Thornton said. "When my name was called, I was like, 'All right.' ... I just saw a little bit of net and put it in."

The game was the first for the Sharks since they lost rookie forward Tomas Hertl to a knee injury that will keep him out for at least a month, and possibly much longer.

In response, McLellan grouped his top three scorers -- Patrick Marleau, Joe Pavelski, and Thornton -- on one line. McLellan also had Logan Couture on a line with Brent Burns and Marty Havlat. Hertl had been on a line with Thornton and Burns for much of the season.

All Sharks lines and their defensive pairings were spotty for the first half of the game, as Dallas grabbed a 2-0 lead on goals by Ray Whitney and Antoine Roussel. Another would-be goal by Colton Sceviour, who tapped a loose puck past Stalock, midway through the second period did not count as the whistle had already been blown.

After that, the Sharks seemed to find some momentum. Jason Demers scored his first of the season shortly after the non-goal by Sceviour, and the Sharks applied a lot more pressure on the Stars in the third period.

Thornton and Pavelski accounted for the Sharks' second goal. Trailing 2-1, Thornton reached to keep the puck in the Stars' end and found Pavelski along the boards. Pavelski did the rest, skating to the middle of the ice and beating Lehtonen with a backhander that tied the score with 15:36 left in the third.

The Sharks may have been fortunate to be trailing just 2-1 entering the third, as Dallas outshot San Jose 31-22 through 40 minutes.

"We haven't won many thirds in a long stretch," Pavelski said. "This was another chance for us."

Stalock made his first career start at home Saturday, but couldn't stop the third shot directed his way. After the Sharks failed to clear the zone, the puck found its way to Whitney, whose backhand shot went through Brad Stuart's legs and over Stalock's left shoulder for a 1-0 Stars lead with 15:12 left in the first period.

The Stars made it 2-0 early in the second period. After gaining the Sharks' zone with not much defensive resistance, Dallas' Alex Goligoski fed the puck in front of the San Jose net and it deflected off Roussel and past Stalock.

After that, Stalock, who entered the game with a 2.06 goals against average and a .930 save percentage this season, seemed to settle down. Stalock's last start came Dec. 6 in a 4-3 loss at Carolina, as Antti Niemi has been in the San Jose net for the past six games.

INSIDE

Sharks rookie Tomas Hertl will miss at least a month -- possibly the season -- with a knee injury. page 5

Monday's game

Colorado (23-10-2) at Sharks

(22-8-6), 7:30 p.m. CSNCA

San Jose Mercury News: LOADED: 12.22.2013


Sharks' Tomas Hertl out a least a month, possibly longer

Curtis Pashelka

12/21/2013 11:42:45 AM PST

SAN JOSE -- Tomas Hertl's knee injury will keep him out of the Sharks' lineup for at least a month, and general manager Doug Wilson could not rule out Saturday that the rookie forward will miss the rest of the season.

Wilson said there was still extensive swelling in Hertl's knee, which will undergo more tests in the coming days to determine the full extent of the injury. Asked if Hertl will require surgery, Wilson said the team will know more in the next week or so but that Hertl's MRI exam "showed something" and that having surgery "would probably reveal the rest."

Regarding Hertl's status for the rest of the season, Wilson said: "It's too early. Ask me in a week or two or three. Right now, the prognosis is a month. But it could be longer. How much longer? I don't know."

Hertl was involved in a mid-ice, knee-on-knee collision with Los Angeles Kings captain Dustin Brown on Thursday night. Brown was given a five-minute major and game misconduct penalties.

Wilson would not comment specifically when asked what he thought of the hit, saying only that "the process is in place, it was a major penalty, players get injured. I'll leave it at that."

Hertl was a leading candidate for the Calder Trophy, awarded to the NHL's top rookie, with 15 goals and 10 assists in 35 games. The injury also would appear to eliminate Hertl from consideration to play for the Czech Republic in the Sochi Olympics in February.

In other injury news, Wilson said forwards Adam Burish (back surgery) and Raffi Torres (right knee) were progressing. Torres underwent surgery to repair a torn ACL in late September and was thought to be out until the Olympic break in February. Burish had back surgery in October, but the team at the time didn't set a timetable for his return. Both would need to get back on the ice on a regular basis to return to game shape, Wilson said.

San Jose Mercury News: LOADED: 12.22.2013


Reluctant shooter Thornton keys win over Stars

Staff Writer

December 21, 2013, 11:30 pm

SAN JOSE – Joe Thornton heard the chatter behind him while sitting on the bench, as the Sharks’ shootout with the Dallas Stars continued along with no one able to convert.

That’s when he was chosen as the team’s fifth shooter, and subsequently gave his club the extra point in the standings when he powered a puck past Kari Lehtonen in a 3-2 win at SAP Center on Saturday night.

“You don’t really want to know what my reaction was when he called me. It was like ‘oh man.’ The coaches behind me, Larry [Robinson] and Jimmy [Johnson] were kind of talking. … My name was called I was like, alright, hopefully I listen. I just saw a little bit of net, and put it in.”

Thornton is now 2-for-2 in shootouts this season, and both are game-winners, including on Nov. 27 against Los Angeles when his goal in the eighth round was the difference in a 3-2 victory.

“I've seen him win two games for us. We may call [his number] more often,” Todd McLellan said. “That's what you expect from your captain, to step up in those situations and deliver, and he did."

So, too, did goaltender Alex Stalock, who battled through some apparent early nerves before settling in and closing the door early in the second. The 26-year-old stopped 44 of 46 Stars shots, not allowing anything after a puck deflected through him off of Antoine Roussel’s skate at 4:47 of the second period.

That includes the shootout, Stalock’s first in the NHL. He made saves on Rich Peverly, Erik Cole and Ray Whitney in the skills competition, while Tyler Seguin and Jamie Benn missed the net. Stalock, in the first home start of his career, improved to 4-1-0.

“I just wanted to be as patient as I could,” Stalock said of his approach to the shootout. “They have so many guys with some talent, and I didn’t want to be aggressive and go poke check them, because they’ll just go around. I just wanted to stay back, and it all worked out.”

McLellan said: “He was in it the whole night, and by the end of the night he felt good. He looked good in the shootout."

In an ironic twist, the Sharks were the beneficiaries of a blown call by referee Mike Leggo. Dallas looked as if it had just taken a 3-0 lead when Colton Sceviour tipped in a loose puck in the crease in the second period, but Leggo blew the play dead despite the puck being anything but frozen.

Leggo was the referee that did not see what should have been Tommy Wingels’ overtime winner in a 5-4 shootout loss to Buffalo on Nov. 5, on a play the NHL laughably tried defending the next day.

On Saturday, the early whistle allowed the Sharks to climb back into the game when Jason Demers’ one-timer cleanly beat Kari Lehtonen at 11:47 to cut the Dallas lead to 2-1. Tyler Kennedy earned the primary assist, ending a 10-game scoreless streak.

“[Kennedy] really sold the shot, and I just tried to shoot as hard as I could, and it went in,” Demers said.

Before his shootout heroics, Thornton’s play at the offensive blue line helped the Sharks tie the game. The play led to a Pavelski backhander from the slot at 4:24 of the third period.

San Jose improved to 2-7-1 when trailing after two.

“Just be aggressive,” Thornton said of the team’s approach to the third. “We were hoping for 20 shots. But, just stay aggressive, stay out of the penalty box. Ee think we can come back in this game, and we did.”

The Sharks were fortunate it was still within reach after two periods, as Dallas poured 31 shots on net through 40 minutes, including several odd man rushes. Stalock survived the storm, though, crediting the players around him.

“The defensemen did a heck of a job clearing rebounds,” he said. “If you go back and watch, I don’t know how many real good second opportunities they had. It was really nice.”

McLellan disagreed with a suggestion that the Sharks stole the two points.

"When you're down two and you come back, it's not necessarily stealing,” he said. “You've stuck with the plan.”

San Francisco Chronicle LOADED: 12.22.2013


Instant Replay: Sharks save Stalock, beat Stars 3-2 in SO

December 21, 2013, 9:00 pm

Staff Writer

SAN JOSE – The Sharks erased a two-goal deficit and beat the Dallas Stars thanks to Joe Thornton’s shootout goal, 3-2 on Saturday night at SAP Center.

Jason Demers put the Sharks on the board midway through the second. Demers was left alone by Dallas’ Erik Cole, and rifled in a one-timer from Tyler Kennedy for his first goal.

San Jose had the early energy in the third period, and tied it on Joe Pavelski’s 14th of the season. Thornton made a nice play at the blue line to keep the puck in the offensive zone, and Pavelski’s backhander from the slot found its way inside the post at 4:24.

The Sharks had the better of the chances in overtime. Kari Lehtonen stopped Patrick Marleau on an early look from the circle, and Logan Couture nearly put in a Justin Braun rebound with less than two minutes to go.

In the shootout, Thornton was the only one of 10 shooters to convert.

The Sharks caught a huge break early in the second before Demers’ goal. Dallas’ Colton Sceviour appeared to tip in a loose puck in the crease that Alex Stalock failed to freeze, but referee Mike Leggo blew the play dead just before the puck crept across the goal line and it remained 2-0.

Leggo, ironically, was the same referee that did not see Tommy Wingels’ overtime goal against Bufflao on Nov. 5, a 5-4 shootout loss for San Jose.

Former Shark Ray Whitney opened the scoring. The 41-year-old backhanded a shot through Brad Stuart’s legs and high over Alex Stalock at 4:48 of the first period. Antoine Roussel was credited with a second period goal at 4:47, when Alex Goligoski’s shot deflected off of Rousell’s skate in the crease.

The Sharks and Stars meet once more this season, on Feb. 5 in San Jose. Dallas gave the Sharks their first loss of the season on Oct. 17 at American Airlines Center, 4-3 in a shootout.

The Sharks have won five straight home games against Dallas.

Special teams

The Sharks were 0-for-3 on the power play. Overall, they are just nine for their last 62 (14.5 percent).

Dallas was 0-for-2 on the power play, with both advantages coming in the first period. The Sharks have killed off 14 of the last 15 opponent power plays (93.3 percent).

In goal

Stalock was making his first career home start, and first appearance since losing in Carolina on Dec. 6. He finished with 44 saves on 46 shots, settling in as the game went along after what appeared to be some early nerves. The game was his first career shootout.

Lehtonen stopped 37 of 39 shots.

Lineup

Sharks forward Tomas Hertl missed his first game of the season, after general manager Doug Wilson announced it earlier in the day that the 20-year-old would miss at least one month with an apparent right knee injury.

In Hertl’s absence, Todd McLellan put together four new forward lines. Thornton played between Pavelski and Marleau; Couture was with Brent Burns and Marty Havlat; John McCarthy centered Wingels and Matt Nieto; while Andrew Desjardins skated alongside Kennedy and Mike Brown.

In the third period, Wingels and Havlat switched places.

Up next

The Sharks host Colorado Avalanche on Monday, break for three days from Dec. 24-26, and visit the Phoenix Coyotes on Friday. A home-and-home with Anaheim closes out the year on Dec. 29 at home and New Year’s Eve at Honda Center.



Stalock set for first career home start

Staff Writer

December 21, 2013, 12:45 pm

SAN JOSE – There will be a couple of firsts for Sharks goaltender Alex Stalock on Saturday night, when the Dallas Stars visit SAP Center.

For starters, the 26-year-old goaltender will be making his fifth career NHL start, but first in front of the home fans.

“I’ve only played here obviously in relief, so it will be fun coming out of the shark head and starting,” Stalock said.

Secondly, Stalock will appear in a game for the first time since suffering a regulation loss. The Minnesota native is 3-1-0 in four starts this season and 4-1-1 in his career, but his last time out, he allowed four goals to the Carolina Hurricanes in a 5-3 loss on Dec. 6.

The Sharks had a 2-0 lead, but Carolina scored once in the second period and four more times in the third (including an empty net goal) to take the win.

Stalock had been the Sharks’ best player up to the midway point of regulation of that game, but a Jay Harrison shot hit the end boards and deflected off of the back of Stalock’s pads and in. In the third, Stalock was unable to freeze a loose puck about seven minutes in, leading to Jordan Staal’s game-winner.

“It’s amazing how quick a game turns around. It’s a learning experience,” Stalock said on Saturday morning. “You try to take everything from every game you play in. It was start number four. I learned a lot from that start, and tonight it will be new stuff.”

Stalock’s last appearance at SAP Center was on Nov. 7, in relief of Antti Niemi. He stopped all 21 shots he saw in a 4-2 Sharks loss in his second career home appearance.

Stalock will give Niemi the night off, after Niemi allowed four goals in a 4-1 loss to Los Angeles on Thursday. Niemi is just 9-6-5 with a 2.76 goals-against average and .904 save percentage in his last 20 starts, dating back to the end of October.

Niemi has started 14 of the last 15 games, so action has been rare for Stalock, who has a 2.06 goals-against average and .930 save percentage. He’s tried to maintain his skills in practice.

“You obviously don’t want to be comfortable with this role because everybody’s ultimate goal is to play in this league,” he said. “That’s still my goal. To stay sharp, you have to be at your best in practice, and that’s what I try to do.”

Todd McLellan said: “Players have a tendency to play for him, but it's about him getting his chance to go again.”

* * *

McLellan said Logan Couture would be fine to play against the Stars, despite the center missing practice on Friday and staying off of the ice for the team’s optional morning skate on Saturday.

Couture is among a number of players mired in a scoring slump, with two goals in his last 17 games and none in his last eight. Brent Burns has just one goal and one assist in his last 10 games, Tyler Kennedy is scoreless in his last 10, and Tommy Wingels has one assist in his last six.

Tomas Hertl’s injury means other guys will have to fill the void left by the 20-year-old, who is second on the team with 15 goals.

“Tomas is a big part of this team, and has been from the get-go,” Wingels said. “His goal-scoring, as a group in this room, we have to find a way to pick up that slack.

“I think we’re more than capable of doing that. We have guys in here who can elevate their games, myself included, and find a way to score those goals that we’ve lost with Tomas not being in the lineup.”



In the Crease: Sharks move on without Hertl, host Stars

December 21, 2013, 12:00 pm

Kevin Kurz

Programming note: Sharks-Stars coverage gets underway at 7:00 p.m. with Sharks Pregame Live, only on Comcast SportsNet California

Where they stand

Sharks: 21-8-6, 48 points, 3rd Pacific Division, 5th Western Conference

Stars: 17-12-5, 39 points, 5th Central Division, 10th Western Conference

Vitals

Sharks

Goals per game: 3.14 (4th)

Goals-against per game: 2.37 (T - 10th)

Power play: 17.9 percent (15th)

Penalty kill: 83.0 percent (14th)

Stars

Goals per game: 2.82 (9th)

Goals-against per game: 2.91 (24th)

Power play: 11.4 percent (29th)

Penalty kill: 81.4 percent (19th)

Probable lines

Sharks

Forwards – TBD

Marc-Edouard Vlasic – Justin Braun

Matt Irwin – Dan Boyle

Brad Stuart – Jason Demers

Alex Stalock (confirmed starter)

Antti Niemi

Stars

Jamie Benn – Tyler Seguin – Valeri Nichushkin

Antoine Roussel – Cody Eakin – Ray Whitney

Erik Cole – Rich Peverly – Colton Sceviour

Shawn Horcoff – Vern Fiddler – Alex Chiasson

Alex Goligoski – Brenden Dillon

Jordie Benn – Sergei Gonchar

Kevin Connauton – Cameron Gaunce

Kari Lehtonen

Dan Ellis

The latest

Sharks: Tomas Hertl was injured and the Sharks lost a 4-1 decision to the Kings on Thursday night in Los Angeles. San Jose is just 2-5-1 in last seven games. Patrick Marleau, playing in his 1200th career NHL game, scored the only goal for the Sharks late in the third period when the game was well out of reach. Antti Niemi took the loss, allowing all four goals in starting for the 14th time in the last 15 games.

Stars: Dallas won its second straight game on Thursday, 4-1 at home over Vancouver. Erik Cole led the Stars with one goal and two assists, while Rich Peverly and Tyler Seguin added a pair of helpers. Goaltender Kari Lehtonen recorded his 100th career win with Dallas, making 27 saves. Dallas has won three of its last four in regulation (3-1-0).

Keep an eye on…

Sharks: Logan Couture. The Sharks desperately need Couture to break out of his scoring slump, as the center has no goals in his last eight games and just two in his last 17. Couture had six shots miss the net against the Kings, including a couple glorious chances, adding to his recent frustrations. In 19 career games against the Stars, Couture has nine goals and four assists.

Stars: Valeri Nichushkin. The Stars' 2013 first round draft pick (10th overall), Nichushkin is tied for third in the NHL in rookie scoring and is third on his team with 18 points. Playing alongside Tyler Seguin on the top line, the 18-year-old Russian has 10 points (4g, 6a) in his last nine games.

Injuries/Scratches

Sharks: Tomas Hertl (right knee), Raffi Torres (right ACL surgery), and Adam Burish (back surgery) are out.

Stars: Stephane Robidas (broken leg), Trevor Daley (sprained left ankle) and Aaron Rome (lower body) are out.

Season/All-Time series

The Stars won the previous game between these two teams, 4-3 in a shootout in Dallas on Oct. 17. It was the Sharks’ first loss of the season, after they had won their first six. San Jose hosts the Stars again on Feb. 5.

The Sharks are 48-46-5-12 all-time against the Minnesota/Dallas franchise.

Quoteable

“I think [Antti Niemi] is like some others on our team, some go-to guys that have to step up and bring their A-game a little bit more. He knows that, we know that, his teammates know it. But, we’re talking about one individual that wears the pads. There are some others that didn’t have a very good night tonight, as well.” – Todd McLellan, after the 4-1 loss in LA on Thursday

Burning question

How will Tomas Hertl’s long-term injury affect the Sharks?

Leave your answer in the comments section below.



GM Wilson prepared to lose Hertl for a long time

December 21, 2013, 11:45 am

Kevin Kurz

SAN JOSE – Could Sharks rookie sensation Tomas Hertl’s season be over, after he suffered an apparent right knee injury against the Kings on Thursday?

“I think it’s too early,” general manager Doug Wilson said. “Ask me in a week, or two or three. I think right now the prognosis is a month, but we are prepared that it could be longer. How much longer, I don’t know.”

As reported here on Friday, Hertl will miss at least one month, after a knee-on-knee collision with the Kings’ Dustin Brown. The NHL’s leading rookie scorer with 25 points, Hertl was spotted at the Sharks’ practice facility on Saturday morning wearing a significant brace on his right leg.

Wilson spoke at length regarding the 2012 first round pick’s injury.

Some highlights:

Wilson: “There is still some swelling in the knee. Preliminary report is he’ll be out at least a month, and then we’ll have some more tests that will be ongoing, and see what the extent is and go from there. That will take a little bit of time, for that evaluation to take place.”

Q: Any sense if it’s a sprain or a tear?

DW: “There are a couple of different things we’re looking at. I think the MRI shows something, and probably going in at some point will probably reveal the rest. That’s probably what the process will be over the next week or so.”

Q: Are greater precautions taken in that he’s only 20?

DW: “I don’t think that factors in. I think we take great pride in taking great care of all of our athletes, but obviously if it was a player in the last year of his career there might be a different risk/reward approach. With [team trainer] Ray Tufts and our doctors and our staff, we look at the present, but we also look in the big picture, especially in a guy like this.”

Q: How do you feel your team is set up to handle the loss of Hertl?

“There’s two parts of it. There’s the team part of it, and the person. He was playing extremely well, and consideration for the Calder [Trophy, as NHL rookie of the year] and Olympics and all that, so you’ve got all those emotions in place. Hopefully, he’s back sooner than later for those aspects of it.

“As far as our team, it’s part of the business. You look at Pittsburgh, other teams, you deal with it, in comes other players and opportunities. Right now, the majority of our attention is for Tomas right now. The team will be fine.”

* * *

Wilson, whose comments regarding Raffi Torres' suspension in the playoffs last season earned the club a $100,000 fine, declined to get into what he thought of the hit itself. Brown, who has a history of knee-on-knee hits, will not face any further league discipline, according to a report.

“The process is in place, there’s a major penalty. You don’t like to see players get injured. I’ll leave it at that,” said Wilson.

Can he accept that it was accidental?

“Ill leave it at that.”

“My concern right now is for Tomas. There obviously is a process in place for all that evaluation. The emotions are raw with us because of the state of where Tomas is at. It’s probably best I leave it there.”



Sharks GM Wilson on Hertl: 'More tests to be done'

December 21, 2013, 8:30 am

Kevin Kurz

SAN JOSE – Sharks general manager Doug Wilson said late Friday there is still no word on how much time rookie forward Tomas Hertl will miss after taking a knee-on-knee hit from the Kings’ Dustin Brown on Thursday.

Earlier on Friday, it was confirmed by a team source that Hertl will miss at least one month, and possibly much longer.

The NHL’s leading rookie scorer with 25 points, Hertl an MRI on Friday.

“There’s still a lot of swelling, so there are more tests to be done,” Wilson told CSNCalifornia.com. “It’s certainly is going to be a period of time … Until we get a couple more tests done, we won’t know what that duration is.”

Brown, who received a major penalty and game misconduct for the hit, will not receive any further discipline from the league, according to reports.

The Sharks host the Dallas Stars on Saturday.


730818 St Louis Blues

Backes returns, but the Blues lose Polak

Jeremy Rutherford

EDMONTON • Only three days earlier, injured Blues captain David Backes was labeled “out period” by coach Ken Hitchcock.

Following a collision with Ottawa’s Colin Greening last Monday, Backes was recovering from a neck injury and, as a precaution, he was being monitored for concussion symptoms. But after significant improvement with his neck and no evidence of a concussion, he was back in the Blues’ lineup Saturday against the Edmonton Oilers after missing only two games.

He didn’t figure in the scoring in the Blues’ 6-0 victory, but was plus-1 in 18:22 of ice time.

At the morning skate, where he was back in his familiar spot of centering the top line, Backes joked about Hitchcock’s insinuation that his return might take more time.

“If you listen to everything that big jolly man says, you’re in for a whirlwind,” Backes joked. “You don’t know ... when you’ve got an injury that’s unbeknownst, you don’t know. Everyday has been better. No complaints and no setbacks, so that’s a good thing.”

The Blues went 1-1 without Backes, who had 16 goals and 30 points in 32 games heading into Saturday’s contest.

“It’s another good player,” Hitchcock said. “You saw the impact of (Jaden) Schwartz and what he brought to the team. We expect Backes to bring the same element of play. They’re top-six forwards for us, really good players, and obviously it adds some more continuity to us.”

Polak ailing

But while the Blues are moving forward with Backes, they will be without defenseman Roman Polak for extended time.

In Thursday’s 5-1 win over Montreal, Polak suffered what is believed to be a broken right ankle. He has been placed on injured-reserve and will be re-evaluated in two weeks.

In the middle period, Polak was backskating near the Blues’ net. Montreal’s Michael Bournival gave Polak a shove and he got his feet tangled with teammate Barret Jackman, causing Polak to fall to the ice, hit his head on the post and crash feet-first into the boards.

“That just happens in hockey ... it’s unfortunate,” Blues general manager Doug Armstrong said. “We want to get him back as quickly as possible. I know that he has our team, and I know he has the (Czech Republic) Olympic team that he’s focused in on too. So we want to get him back up and running as quick as we can.”

Polak was back up and skating after the incident Thursday. He remained down for several minutes before going to the bench under his own power. But he stayed in the game and finished with 15:24 of ice time.

“I could see his leg was twisted up behind him as he went into the boards ... it looked bad,” Blues defenseman Ian Cole said. “So I was really worried at first, but then he came back out and started playing again. Then he was flying around and said he was feeling good. You could tell he was still hurting, but you didn’t think it was anything that serious. It shows how tough that guy is.”

Polak had played in all 34 of the Blues’ games this season. He has three goals, seven points and a plus-minus rating of plus-7.

Carlo Colaiacovo took Polak’s place in the lineup Saturday and was plus 2, with no points, in 14:26 of ice time. He’s a lefthanded shot, but he’ll play on the right, alongside Cole, for the foreseeable future.

“I think we’re lucky we’ve got Carlo,” Hitchcock said. “Carlo played well the last game he played. I think it’s going to increase the minutes of Ian Cole. Ian’s had two great games back-to-back here, so hopefully he keeps it up.”

Colaiacovo was signed in mid-November to provide competition for Cole and give the Blues added depth.

“Ian was on our team and he had to hold serve and he did,” Armstrong said. “Now we’re going to need both of those guys and we’re going to need both of them for a while.

“This is the reason you do that work in the summer and you bring in the depth. It’s like up front ... it looks like when you signed (Chris) Porter and (Adam) Cracknell and (Brenden) Morrow in the summer that you have too many players. But once you get into Game 30 and 40, you usually need them all. That’s going to be necessary for us to have success as we enter March and April, and hopefully May and June.”

The Blues are down to six healthy defensemen. They have one game left — Monday in Calgary — before the Christmas break but don’t have plans to call up a defenseman at this point. If the club chooses to bring up one from its American Hockey League affiliate in Chicago, the likely candidates would be Taylor Chorney or Cade Fairchild.

In the event of injuries at forward or defense, the Blues are attempting to avoid leaning on any of their prospects playing with the Wolves: Ty Rattie, Dmitrij Jaskin, Joel Edmundson or Jani Hakanpaa.

“We want to make sure we were not rushing younger players into the NHL before they’re ready,” Armstrong said. “I really think that not having to go to Rattie and Jaskin, Edmundson in October and November was really beneficial. They could get settled into Chicago, and they know that’s their team. You’re better off giving them that opportunity to be successful before they have to make that next step. As much as it was done for our depth, I think a lot of it was done for development.”

If the injuries continue to pile up, however, the club might have no choice.

St Louis Post Dispatch LOADED: 12.22.2013


Stewart's hat trick sparks Blues' romp

Jeremy Rutherford

EDMONTON • Of his last 12 shots on goal, Chris Stewart has put eight of them in the net.

Continuing a torrid offensive streak, Stewart scored a hat trick in the Blues’ 6-0 victory over Edmonton on Saturday night at Rexall Place.

“You get into streaks like that, you just start shooting it, pucks find a way to go in,’’ Stewart said. “Huge compliment to my linemates tonight. They gave me lots of prime-time scoring chances.’’

But the news for the Blues was not all good. Forward Alexander Steen, the team’s leading scorer, did not return after the second period. Following the game, coach Ken Hitchcok did not have an update on Steen’s status.

Stewart’s first hat trick as a Blue and Brian Elliott’s 14th shutout with the club helped the visitors win their 10th road game this season, avoiding a two-game trap before they break for Christmas. On a swing through Alberta, the club is visiting Edmonton and Calgary, seated No. 14 and 13, respectively, in the Western Conference standings.

The trip began Saturday against Edmonton, which entered the game on its fourth five-game losing streak of the season and holding a home record at Rexall Place of 5-10-1.

The Blues, splitting up the goaltending duties for the last two games before the holiday, turned to backup Elliott. He withstood heavy early pressure before a streaking Stewart triggered the club’s offense, sending David Perron and Co. to their sixth consecutive loss and sixth scoreless outing of the season.

The Blues play at Calgary on Monday before taking a four-day break.

In addition to Stewart’s trio, the Blues picked up goals from Brenden Morrow, Jaden Schwartz and Patrick Berglund — whose tally was shorthanded.

The score certainly was lopsided, but it didn’t begin that way.

The Blues were outshot 14-5 in the first period, but led 1-0 after the opening 20 minutes on Stewart’s 11th goal of the season.

“We were outplayed in the first, but our goalie was our best player’’ Hitchcock said. “We’ve had some of those starts before. Some we have recovered from and some we haven’t. I thought we really snapped to attention, played a great second and third periods.’’

An Oilers power play had ended just before the Blues scored their first goal.

Berglund, who was whistled for high-sticking, exited the penalty box with a beat on the puck.

Edmonton goaltender Ilya Bryzgalov came out of his net to play the puck, but his clearing pass went off the glass and landed on the stick of Schwartz.

Schwartz found himself on a two-on-one with Stewart, and with a few Edmonton players changing on the sequence, Stewart was left alone for a wide-open shot on a Bryzgalov, who had just settled back into the crease.

Stewart’s goal continued a recent surge for the forward, giving him six goals in his last six games.

The Blues had the game’s first goal on only their second shot. They were being outshot at that point 10-2 by the Oilers.

In the second period, Morrow gave the Blues some breathing room with his sixth goal of the season. It came on a lively passing sequence.

Defenseman Barret Jackman fed Morrow in the offensive zone, he dropped the puck to Derek Roy. Roy moved it along to Stewart, who set up Morrow in front of the net to wrap up the bang-bang play.

“Not sure if we caught them on a line change or we had numbers’’ in our favor, Morrow said. “But Stewie made a good heads-up play, and we were able to finish it off.

“The goalie may have been surprised. Stewie has been hot with the puck, so the odds were he was going to shoot and that’s what the goalie was playing for.’’

The Blues opened a 3-0 lead, but still trailed 16-9 in shots. They finally caught the Oilers in that department late in the second period, passing them at 19-18.

The offense padded the lead with four goals in the third period, beginning with Schwartz’s 10th of the season. With an assist earlier in the game, he now has 15 points (seven goals, eight assists) in his last 14 games.

Stewart then wrapped up his hat trick, the third of his career and first since October 2010, as a member of Colorado. At that point, he had eight goals in a span of 11 shots on goal.

With a four-point night, Stewart now has 13 goals and 21 points.

His third goal Saturday came on the power-play goal, ending the Blues’ season-long 0-for-14 drought with the man-advantage.

Derek Roy assisted on the goal for a two-point night.

Roy later went to the penalty box for four minutes, whistled for a four-minute double-minor for roughing. But with the Blues killing the penalty, Berglund netted his third goal of the year, in and out of the glove of Bryzgalov.

Elliott closed with 23 saves for his 23rd NHL shutout and second of the season.

“It was kind of like weathering the storm,’’ Elliott said. “ But we scored a goal in the first and that led us into the second, and I thought we got our feet under us and started to play like we wanted to.’’



Backes will return to Blues' lineup tonight

Jeremy Rutherford

After missing the last two games due to injury, the Blues' David Backes will be in the lineup against the Edmonton Oilers.

Backes, of course, was involved in the collision with Ottawa's Colin Greening last Monday. The club has been monitoring him for concussion symptoms, along with treating him for neck pain.

"Everyday has been better," Backes said. "No complaints and no setbacks, so that's a good thing."

It was viewed as a good sign when the Blues did not place Backes on the injured reserve list, and another positive step when he departed St. Louis with the team on its two-game road trip to Edmonton and Calgary.

On Saturday, when the Blues took the ice for their morning skate, Backes took a regular shift on his line with Alexander Steen and T.J. Oshie and afterwards, Blues coach Ken Hitchcock confirmed he will be in the lineup.

The Blues went 1-1 without Backes, who has 16 goals and 30 points in 32 games this season.

"It's another good player," Hitchcock said. "You saw the impact of (Jaden) Schwartz and what he brought to the team. We expect Backes to bring the same element of play. They're top-six forwards for us, really good players, and obviously it adds some more continuity to us."

If the Blues had placed Backes on IR, retroactive to the injury in Ottawa, he would have missed tonight's game and Monday in Calgary because the designation means a minimum seven days out of the lineup.

Blues general Doug Armstrong opted to keep Backes on the roster in the event that he recovered in time.

"I had a feeling that he might get this opportunity based on the information from (Blues trainer) Ray Barile and our doctors."

So the Blues appear to have dodged a scare. Just a few days after Hitchcock passed along word that Backes was "out period" and "not cleared for anything," he's back in the lineup tonight.

"If you listen to everything that big jolly man says, you're in for a whirlwind," Backes joked. "You don't know ... when you've got an injury that's unbeknownst, you don't know."

***

BLUES' PROJECTED LINEUP

Forwards

Alexander Steen-David Backes-T.J. Oshie

Brenden Morrow-Derek Roy-Chris Stewart

Jaden Schwartz-Patrik Berglund-Vladimir Tarasenko

Magnus Paajarvi-Maxim Lapierre-Chris Porter

Defensemen

Jay Bouwmeester-Alex Pietrangelo

Barret Jackman-Kevin Shattenkirk

Ian Cole-Carlo Colaiacovo

Goalie

Brian Elliott

***

OILERS' PROJECTED LINEUP

Forwards

Taylor Hall-Ryan Nugent Hopkins-Jordan Eberle

Ryan Smyth-Body Gordon-David Perron

Luke Gazdic-Sam Gagner-Nail Yakupov

Jesse Joensuu-Anton Lander-Alex Hemsky

Defensemen

Andrew Ference-Justin Schultz

Anton Belov-Jeff Petry

Nick Schultz-Corey Potter

Goalie

Ilya Bryzgalov

***

BLUES FACE PERRON

The Blues and David Perron will be facing each other tonight for the first time since last summer's trade.

On Friday night, Perron went to dinner with Backes and Blues defenseman Carlo Colaiacovo.

"It was great," Backes said. "It's good to see that he's doing well. He's really matured, I think, in the last six months that he's changed teams. I think it's a good thing to see that he's having so much success. He's trying to help build a winner and we wish him all the best ... but hopefully not tonight."

Perron has 14 goals and 27 points in 33 games for Edmonton, which is 29th in the NHL standings with 25 points and enters tonight's matchup in a five-game losing skid.

"He's been excellent," Oilers coach Dallas Eakins said. "With what we want to rub off on our whole group, he is certainly a guy I think our players look to for leadership. He leads, which is excellent.

"He's just nodded his head, which is great. I love those bobble-head players. 'What would you like me to do? Here's what I would like you to do. OK.'

"This kid has played half-wall on our power play, he's been our net-front guy. He's played the point on the power play. He's killing penalties. We've put him in a checking role, which he enjoyed. We put him with offensive players, and he's enjoyed that. He's been a great, great acquisition by (general manager) Craig MacTavish, a player that I respect greatly."

Perron had a large media contingent around him Saturday morning. He was asked how the trade from the Blues changed him.

"How did it change me? I got a new haircut," Perron joked. "Maybe one day I'll be (bald) like (Darren Pang), so I want to have fun while I can."

In all seriousness, Perron said: "I'm trying to play the same game. I think every year I was improving stats-wise except last year. I'm just trying to do the same. It's obviously not a fun situation team-wise in terms of where we are in the standings. But (the Blues) don't feel sorry for us because we have been there together. We're going to work through it and get better."

Backes noticed Perron's new hairdo at dinner.

"He has hair," Backes said. "He actually looks like a human being ready to be out in civilization."

For more on Perron's thoughts heading into his first matchup with the Blues, Dan O'Neill had this piece in today's paper.

***

ODDS & ENDS

• Earlier Saturday, the Blues announced that defenseman Roman Polak will miss at least two weeks with a lower-body injury. It's believed to be a broken ankle, which he suffered in Thursday's 5-1 win over Montreal. Click here for the full story.

• Hitchcock said today that in the final two games before the Christmas break, the coaching staff is planning to play the defensive pair of Alex Pietrangelo and Jay Bouwmeester 27-30 minutes per game.

• The Blues are 6-0-3 against Canadian teams this season.

• The Blues' power-play unit hasn't converted on its last 12 chances, which is a season-long drought.



Polak will miss at least two weeks with ankle injury

Jeremy Rutherford

EDMONTON • The Blues announced Saturday morning that defenseman Roman Polak has been placed on injured-reserve with a lower-body injury and he will be sidelined at least two weeks.

Polak suffered what is believed to be a broken ankle in a second-period spill in Thursday's 5-1 victory over Montreal.

With about 7 1/2 minutes remaining in the middle period, Polak was backskating near the Blues' net. Montreal's Michael Bournival gave Polak a shove and he appeared to get his feet tangled with teammate Barret Jackman, causing Polak to fall to the ice, clip his head on the post and crash awkwardly into the boards.

"That just happens in hockey...it's unfortunate," Blues general manager Doug Armstrong said. "He's going to be re-evaluated in two weeks. We want to get him back as quickly as possible. I know that he has our team, and I know he has the (Czech Republic) Olympic team that he's focused in on too. So we want to get him back up and running as quick as we can."

Interestingly, Polak was back up and playing after sustaining the injury in Thursday's game. He remained down for several minutes before skating to the bench under his own power. He remained in the game and finished with 15:24 of ice time.

"Just by the way he went in, first smacking his head on the post and then I could see his leg was twisted up behind him as he went into the boards...it looked bad," defenseman Ian Cole said. "So I was really worried at first, but then he came back out and started playing again. Then he was flying around and said he was feeling good. You could tell he was still hurting, but you didn't think it was anything that serious. It shows how tough that guy is."

The Blues held an optional skate Friday, so Polak's absence wasn't noticeable and his injury was not discussed by the club.

Polak has played in all 34 of the Blues' games this season. He has three goals, seven points and a plus-minus rating of plus-7.

With Polak not available, the Blues are down to seven healthy defensemen. The team doesn't have plans to call up a blueliner, so Carlo Colaiacovo is back in the lineup for tonight's game against Edmonton.

"I think we're lucky we've got Carlo," Blues coach Ken Hitchcock said. "Carlo played well the last game he played. I think it's going to increase the minutes of Ian Cole. Ian's had two great games back-to-back here, so hopefully he keeps it up."

If the Blues choose at some point to recall a defenseman from their American Hockey League affiliate in Chicago, the likely candidates would be Taylor Chorney or Cade Fairchild.

Chorney has five goals and nine points in 25 games with the Wolves, while Fairchild, who had a late start following knee surgery, has 11 assists in 14 games.


730822 Tampa Bay Lightning

Bolts notes: Malone likely to return soon

Erik Erlendsson

December 22, 2013 at 01:11 AM

TAMPA — Every year it seems Ryan Malone seeks to avoid the injury bug, only to be stricken at some point.

It found him this season when a puck went off his ankle during the Nov. 22 game in Anaheim, which resulted in a non-displaced fracture that has kept him out for a month after appearing in the first 23 games.

“I keep saying things happen for a reason and being positive,’’ Malone said. “The only good thing is that it’s not a half-season this year, we have a full season this year, so there is lots of time to get back and make an impact. It’s frustrating watching games, but it’s nice the boys are playing well and it makes it a lot easier.’’

At the time of the diagnosis, Malone was expected to miss 3-4 weeks, but he just resumed skating late in the week and the fracture is not 100 percent healed. There is some pain still involved, he said, and he has yet to begin skating with the team, which would be the next step in his recovery. Once he’s cleared to resume skating with the team, he will need some additional time to get his conditioning level back up after not being able to skate for the past four weeks.

“You can’t really lift your legs or anything like that, so (Saturday) was just kind of like, and I keep joking that it’s the first day of summer where you can’t really walk or sit down because your legs are really sore (after the first workout),’’ Malone said. “It’s been a while, so it’s nice to try to get that strength back and get that hop back sooner rather than later.’’

Tampa Bay Lightning head coach Jon Cooper said he expects Malone to be out at least one more week but indicated a return could come at some point during the four-game swing through Western Canada that begins New Year’s Day in Vancouver.

“Conditioning is going to be his biggest thing now, but he’s healing and I don’t think he’s too far off in the distant future,’’ Cooper said.

Back in the lineup

Tom Pyatt’s ice time this year in game action equals 13 minutes, 15 seconds.

His time on the ice, however, has equated to hours and hours.

After missing the past 33 games while recovering from a broken collarbone suffered Oct. 8, Pyatt was back in the lineup Saturday skating on the fourth line.

“It’s been so long, it’s felt like forever,’’ Pyatt said. “It’s nice to be out there with the guys and get back in. ... It’s almost like a first game.’’

Last season, Pyatt finished with eight goals and 16 points in 43 games, and likely would have easily exceeded his career high in both categories if not for the lockout-shortened season. This season he was on the bubble heading into training camp and was a healthy scratch the first two regular-season games before suffering the injury.

Now he will be a welcome addition back to the lineup.

“He’s a pretty versatile player. He can play in the middle, which we have been lacking since (Steven Stamkos) has gone down,’’ Cooper said. “If you need a guy to jump in on the power play, or somebody to jump in on the (penalty kill), he can do it all. He’s got some speed so he’ll help with our attack.’’

Nuts and Bolts

D Eric Brewer suffered an undisclosed upper-body injury in the second period and did not return. ... The Lightning held a video tribute for D Pavel Kubina, who announced his retirement Friday. ... D Mark Barberio, LW Pierre-Cedric Labrie and LW B.J. Crombeen were scratched.

Tampa Tribune LOADED: 12.22.2013


Gudas, Bolts rally past Carolina in OT

Erik Erlendsson


TAMPA — The Tampa Bay Lightning kept firing shots on Saturday, and Justin Peters kept turning them away.

But on Tampa Bay’s 50th shot of the game, Radko Gudas blasted a slap shot past Peters 2:16 into overtime to give Tampa Bay a 3-2 victory in front of an announced sellout crowd of 19,204 at the Forum.

Gudas’ second goal of the season gave the Lightning a fourth consecutive victory, tied for the longest winning streak this season for Tampa Bay.

“We were on a 3-on-1, I saw (Peters) was cheating on the pass, and I wasn’t 100 percent sure I could make the pass, so I decided to shoot and it went in ... awesome,’’ Gudas said.

Ben Bishop stopped 25 shots to collect his 19th victory of the season, second-most in the league, as he allowed two or fewer goals for the 22nd time in 27 starts this season.

Marty St. Louis scored his team-high 15th goal to tie the game in the third period, Valtteri Filppula had two assists, and Victor Hedman had a goal and an assist as Tampa Bay registered at least 50 shots on goal for the fifth time in franchise history, but won for the first time while hitting that mark.

For most of the game, it appeared Tampa Bay was going to skate back to its locker room shaking its collective heads at the performance Peters put on, as the Lightning never led in regulation.

Of the 18 Lightning skaters on the ice, 14 had at least two shots on goal. Many of the chances were of the high-quality variety, as well, with Peters putting on a show to keep Carolina in the game.

“I have to tip my cap to that kid,’’ Lightning head coach Jon Cooper said. “I coached against him in the American Hockey League, and he was a pain in the butt then, and now he’s become a pain in the butt in the NHL. He was outstanding tonight.

“But I thought, our guys, you couldn’t ask too much more from them tonight. Sometimes the goaltender is the best player on the ice, and he was tonight, but fortunately for us we got that extra one by him.’’

Tampa Bay was in control of the puck for almost the entire game, putting on a puck possession clinic and forcing the Hurricanes — who played at home Friday — to defend for long stretches of time.

But Carolina grabbed the lead on its first shot of the game at 4:35 of the opening period when Jiri Tlusty fired a long-range wrist shot through a screen and past Bishop.

It took until 3:48 left in the first before Hedman solved Peters to tie the game as Tampa Bay finished the opening 20 minutes with 19 shots, a season high for a period.

Carolina struck again on its first shot of the second period when Tlusty outskated Ondrej Palat and came in on a short-handed breakaway to beat Bishop five-hole at 10:11 for the Hurricanes’ league-leading seventh short-handed goal of the season — and fourth allowed by Tampa Bay.

Peters then kept Tampa Bay at bay, making several highlight-reel stops, including a glove save on Filppula that appeared to be in the net but was upheld as no goal after review with 1:04 left in the second.

TXT Body: The Lightning finally broke through with a power-play goal at 7:56 of the third when a Hedman shot/pass found the stick of St. Louis at the right post to tie the game, marking the first time Tampa Bay has scored power-play goals in consecutive games since Oct. 27-29.

Only Peters’ brilliance kept the game tied through regulation to steal Carolina a point and get the game to overtime.

“He was unbelievable tonight,’’ Hedman said of Peters. “We knew we had to keep wearing them down, keep shooting the puck and finally our (power

play) got the goal, got us into overtime and then Guddy with the blast ended it.

“But we had to just keep shooting pucks. We knew sooner or later it’s going to go in.’’



Fennelly: Bolts’ Stamkos still goal-oriented

Martin Fennelly


TAMPA — Last week, he went on his first Tampa Bay Lightning road trip since the November day in Boston when his season, and his team’s season, seemed lost.

But here are the Lightning, staying in the hunt — more than that, really, near the top of the Eastern Conference. Here is Steven Stamkos, on the ice, making progress, always that smile, back on the road with his brothers. So, the first trip, he gets to the jet center. Security wands him.

Bzzzzzz.

“That was pretty funny,” Lightning coach Jon Cooper said.

There’s the surgically inserted titanium rod in Steven Stamkos’ broken right tibia.

Then there’s the steel will that goes with it.

“The rod is in there and it’s stable,” said Stamkos, 23. “I’ve got age on my side. I’ve got motivation. ... Now you can kind of see the light at the end of the tunnel.”

His teammates have made some light themselves. Heading into Saturday’s game with Carolina, the Lightning were 9-6-2 without their all-world sharpshooter. Naturally, scoring is down. The Bolts have been shut out four times in 18 games without Stamkos. But the defense has tightened, and goaltender Ben Bishop has been exceptional.

“We’re scrapping,” captain Marty St. Louis said.

And now it doesn’t seem as improbable that the Lightning could make a real season of this — No. 91’s progress has been remarkable. In Forum halls, people are smiling over Stamkos’ smile, moving from “if” he can make it back this season to “when.” It’s another kind of buzz.

Maybe it was the first news conference after the injury. In late November, Stamkos surfaced publicly two weeks after Boston. And he walked into the room. It was a regular revival tent: he’d thrown away those crutches. He hasn’t used them since, or a protective boot.

“It was big for me,” Stamkos said.

It was big for everyone.

He was on the ice a month after the operation. Who is this, Wolverine?

“We’re waiting for him to do flips down the hall,” Cooper said.

There’s still no timetable. A setback is always possible. But Stamkos’ brass rings are Olympic rings: playing for Canada in the Winter Games in Sochi in February. If that seems unrealistic, or risky, not to worry. Lightning GM Steve Yzerman also is executive director of Canada’s men’s team.

“His future is what matters,” Yzerman said. “We won’t take any chances.”

“I’m hoping (the Olympics) being out there is a good thing, motivation,” Stamkos said. “But I’m not going to rush back and be a liability for Tampa or for Canada.”

On Saturday morning, he was on the Forum ice before the Lightning’s pregame skate. He has been on the ice six times since his surgery, light skating, stick-handling, shooting one-timers. The real rehab is seven days a week, three to four hours a day.

“I’m not having any pain at all,” Stamkos said. “Obviously, we’re cautious with certain movements. We use the underwater treadmill up at the university, USF. We’re there two or three days a week. It’s great — low impact on the joints and the foot. We’re working out in the gym here, starting to do lower-body stuff ... some light body weights, some squats, holding maybe a 25-pound plate. Every two weeks we’ve been doing X-rays. Last week was the four-week X-ray. Things look great.

“Pushing off on that (right leg), full torque, we can’t. The bone isn’t completely healed. Any kind of torque (action) would obviously be a setback. I feel good, but I know I can’t push it too much.”

His teammates have pushed it just fine.

“I couldn’t be more proud of the way we’ve played,” Stamkos said. “It’s not just me. We’ve had a lot of significant injuries: Victor (Hedman), (Eric) Brewer, (Ryan) Malone. Those are world-class players. Guys have stepped up, Marty leading the way, Bish leading the way in goal. The young guys have gotten more ice time. They’re learning. They’re thriving. Coop has said it a bunch of times: We’re going to be a better team because of this.”

Every week the Lightning rack up points is one week closer to still being relevant if Stamkos should return. He might become the rough equivalent of added firepower a contender picks up at a trade deadline.

“It would be the best move I’ve made,” Yzerman said with a grin.

“I’d love to go to the Olympics,” Stamkos said. “But that’s the icing on the cake. The priority is to get back for this team. But you have to be goal-oriented. You have to be passionate. You have to be hungry and always want more.”

A man of steel, inside and out.



Bolts Beat: NHL players must police themselves

Erik Erlendsson


TAMPA — Let’s hope the players figure things out, and soon.

Because at the rate the NHL is handing out suspensions, it sure does not appear that the message is getting through.

Since the start of the season, there have been 22 suspensions handed out by the NHL Player Safety Department, adding up to 108 regular-season games, which is already more than were handed out in the 48-game shortened season last year. Nine of those suspensions came during the first 15 days of December. There were also seven suspensions handed out during preseason play.

On one hand, some of this comes as a result of the NHL cracking down on dangerous hits, specifically hits to the head, in order to curb the number of concussions plaguing the league.

The standard has certainly changed, and for the better, in order to send a message that players need to be more aware and be responsible for their actions.

But that message may not be stern enough.

Or the players simply don’t have the respect for each other on the ice to care.

And that’s where it really needs to start, from within.

The media can point it out all the time — and we do — and the league can hold hearings by telephone or in person and hand down suspensions all it wants. At the end of the day, it has to come down to the players.

There is a bit of irony involved here because of the notion that players can trade punches on the ice for 60 minutes and go out and laugh about it over an adult beverage after the game.

I recall Matthew Barnaby and Bill Guerin — good friends off the ice — trading punches off the opening face-off on at least on occasion.

So that shows there is respect among the players.

Why doesn’t it translate on the ice?

Does the win-at-all-costs mentality translate into injuring as many opposing players as you can and be the last man standing just to win?

Hockey is a tremendous game to watch, with the skill, finesse and speed these athletes display while skating with 2-inch blades of steel strapped to their feet.

And it is a physical sport. That’s always been part of the appeal, and nobody should want to see that eliminated from the game.

But when it starts to border on violence, that’s where the players need to understand where the line is and not cross it.

The players are bigger, stronger and faster than they have ever been, which means when hits occur, they inflict more damage.

Sort of like going from driving a Volkswagen Beetle to a Hummer — when an accident occurs, the larger vehicle is going to cause the bigger dent.

If that message doesn’t get across — soon — it’s going to take something truly traumatic to force a change in mentality.

Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.



Lightning beats Hurricanes in overtime

Damian Cristodero

Saturday, December 21, 2013 10:57pm

TAMPA — When considering Radko Gudas, the first thing that comes to mind probably isn't a rip-roaring slap shot.

Crunching body checks, his notable beard, yes, but a big blast? Not so much.

That might change after the defenseman let fly with a blazer that Hurricanes goaltender Justin Peters probably still hasn't seen that gave the Lightning a 3-2 overtime victory Saturday night at the Tampa Bay Times Forum.

"I haven't had the big opportunity to use my shot," Gudas said. "I've had a few, but I'm still working on it."

"He's got a rocket," Lightning coach Jon Cooper said.

Tampa Bay (22-11-3), which won its fourth straight, needed every mph to beat Peters, who put on a clinic with 47 saves on the Lightning's season-high 50 shots.

Victor Hedman had a goal and two points, and Marty St. Louis' team-best 15th goal, on the power play, tied the score 2-2 at 7:56 into the third period. Ben Bishop made 25 saves for his 19th victory.

For most of the game, though, it was the Justin Peters show.

His best moment came with 1:04 left in the second period when he lunged to his left to snag Valtteri Filppula's snap shot.

The play was reviewed to see if the puck in Peters' glove crossed the goal line. But replays were inconclusive. So the no-goal ruling could not be reversed, and Carolina maintained a 2-1 lead gained with 9:49 left in the second period on Jiri Tlusty's shorthanded breakaway goal.

"I've got to tip my hat to that kid," Cooper said of Peters, 27. "I've coached against him in the American League. He was a pain in the butt then. Now he's become a pain in the butt in the NHL. He was outstanding."

So was Gudas, who had five shots, five hits and three blocks. He also sparked the winning two-on-one when he decked Carolina's Jeff Skinner along the side boards, which allowed Nate Thompson to get the puck.

"It was just lucky he turned into me and I was right on him," Gudas said.

Skating with Thompson into the zone, Gudas decided to shoot from just above the right faceoff circle rather than pass back to his teammate wide to his left.

"I thought maybe he was faking the shot," Thompson said. "But when I saw him put his head down and wind up, I knew he was shooting."

Considering the way Gudas shoots in practice, "He made the right choice," Hedman said. "He has a very heavy shot."

That beat Peters, who seemed to be expecting the pass, on the short side for his second goal of the season.

"It's not going to be like (Steven) Stamkos or (Sami) Salo or guys like that," Gudas said of his shot. "But it's something I'm working on."

Lightning 1 0 1 1 3

Hurricanes 1 1 0 0 2

Lightning 1 0 1 1 3

Hurricanes 1 1 0 0 2

First Period—1, Carolina, Tlusty 5 (Dwyer, Nash), 4:35. 2, Tampa Bay, Hedman 7 (Filppula, Killorn), 16:12. Penalties—Dvorak, Car (hooking), 5:06; Ruutu, Car (holding), 11:01; Gudas, TB (interference), 13:29.

Second Period—3, Carolina, Tlusty 6 (E.Staal, Hainsey), 10:11 (sh). Penalties—Bellemore, Car (holding stick), 8:48; Gleason, Car (tripping), 17:53; Gudas, TB (interference), 19:02.

Third Period—4, Tampa Bay, St. Louis 15 (Hedman, Filppula), 7:56 (pp). Penalties—Jo.Staal, Car (tripping), 6:49.

Overtime—5, Tampa Bay, Gudas 2 (Thompson), 2:16. Penalties—None. Shots on Goal—Carolina 8-10-8-1—27. Tampa Bay 19-13-17-1—50. Power-play opportunities—Carolina 0 of 2; Tampa Bay 1 of 5. Goalies—Carolina, Peters 7-8-3 (50 shots-47 saves). Tampa Bay, Bishop 19-5-2 (27-25). A—19,204 (19,204).

Tampa Bay Times LOADED: 12.22.2013


Pyatt returns to Lightning after long layoff

Damien Cristodero


TAMPA — It had been so long since Tom Pyatt played, and it was such a short stint, that the Lightning forward said Saturday's game with the Hurricanes seemed like it was his first game of the season.

"It's been a while," he said before the game. "I'm just going to go out there and have fun and not overthink it; just make the reads and have fun on it."

Pyatt missed 32 games with a broken collarbone sustained Oct. 8 at Buffalo. He played just 13 minutes, 15 seconds that game, his first of the season, before getting crunched into the side boards in the third period by Marcus Foligno.

Pyatt expected to be cleared for the Dec. 3 game at Columbus, but a CT scan showed a gap where the bone had not healed. He was out more than 10 weeks.

"He can play the middle, which is something we've been lacking since (Steven Stamkos) went down, so it gives us another option there," coach Jon Cooper said. "You need a guy to jump in the power play. You need a guy to jump in the PK. He can do it all. And he's got some speed out there, so he's going to help out with our attack."

In 8:32 of ice time Saturday (including 34 seconds on the penalty kill), he was minus-1 with four shots and went 2-of-8 on faceoffs.

For Pyatt, who had eight goals, 16 points in 43 games last season, the key was keeping his enthusiasm in check — "I'll have to tell myself to slow down the first couple of shifts," he said — and be aware of his conditioning.

"After a few games, I'll be right where I want to be," he said. "I just want to come in and help the team out.

"The guys have been playing unreal. It's been fun to watch. I want to join in and be a big part of it."

BREWER HURT: D Eric Brewer left Saturday's game in the second period with an upper-body injury. Cooper said he does not believe it is serious.

MORE MEDICAL MATTERS: Of the Lightning's other injured players — Stamkos (broken leg), D Keith Aulie (broken hand), LW Ryan Malone (ankle) and D Brian Lee (knee) — Malone is closest to returning, though Cooper said that is not expected until after the new year.

SHOTS APLENTY: The Lightning registered 50 shots on goal for the fifth time in its history. The record is 52 set at the Tampa Bay Times Forum on Nov. 18, 2011, in a 4-3 shootout loss to the Panthers. Tampa Bay's 19 first-period shots were the most in a period this season.

GOOD DEEDS: The Lightning named its 100th Community Hero: Patricia McGuigan of North Tampa, who received a $50,000 grant from the Lightning Foundation and Community Heros Program. She will donate the money to The Spring and LifePath Hospice, the team said.

Tampa Bay owner Jeff Vinik and wife Penny began the Community Heroes Program last season to distribute $10 million over five years. So far, $5 million has been distributed.

ODDS AND ENDS: The Lightning is 14-3-1 at home and 9-2-1 in overtime or shootout games. … Tampa Bay is 10-3-3 in one-goal games. … The Hurricanes scored their league-best seventh shorthanded goal, all on the road. … The Lightning played with 11 forwards and seven defensemen. … Forwards B.J. Crombeen and Pierre-Cedric Labrie and D Mark Barberio were scratched.Tampa Bay Times LOADED: 12.22.2013


Lightning Nuts & Bolts

Damian Cristodero


On an island

Lightning coach Jon Cooper became an Islanders fan during his four years at Hofstra University, which sits across the street from the Nassau Coliseum.

It wasn't just proximity. Cooper's high school buddy Brad Lauer played for New York at the time and used to provide free tickets.

"Back in those college days, when you couldn't squeeze two pennies together, it was nice to have an in to get free tickets," said Cooper, who graduated from Hofstra in 1989. "I got to know quite a few of the (Islanders): Derek King, Mick Vukota, all the way down the line."

Cooper played lacrosse for Hofstra, but he also played club hockey on a team that played at the Coliseum.

"Hockey was always a passion," Cooper said. "I just happened to be a bit better lacrosse player than I was a hockey player."

Moment to remember

J.T. Brown's goal on Dec. 15 against the Red Wings wasn't his first but in a way might be just as memorable for the way he outmaneuvered and out-muscled at the net Pavel Datsyuk, one of the league's premier defensive players.

"It gives you more confidence," Brown said. "No matter who it was, I'm still going to try to get to the front of the net to the areas where you score those goals. So, yeah, he's one of the best defensive players in the league, so it's pretty cool."

Stat of the day

According to the Elias Sports Bureau, Tampa Bay's 3-2 shootout victory over the Islanders on Tuesday — which featured Valtteri Filppula's tying goal with 3.8 seconds left — was the first time in team history the Lightning won after trailing by two goals in the final three minutes.

The last time Tampa Bay scored a tying goal in the final five seconds of regulation was Nov. 18, 1995, when Alex Selivanov tied the Canucks 4-4 with three seconds left. The Lightning won that game 5-4 in overtime.

"I'm really proud of the fact that I'm here, but I don't see that as the end of the road. I want to hold on to that chance they gave me. Whatever I can bring on the ice, off the ice, I'll give it all for the organization."

D Jean-Philippe Cote, called up last week from AHL Syracuse after 2,875 days in the minors



Lightning's fond farewell for Kubina

Damian Cristodero


Ask Lightning captain Marty St. Louis about former teammate Pavel Kubina, and you get an arm's-length list of reasons he was so effective on the ice.

"He played the game hard," St. Louis said. "He blocked a lot of shots, and he had a pretty good offensive flair that was probably underrated."

But there also was this: "He was a good soul," St. Louis said. "He was a good human being."

It is worth remembering as Kubina, 36, officially announced his retirement Friday after 13 seasons, including 10 in two stints with Tampa Bay.

Kubina was a funny guy. He made fun of you but never mocked and did it in such a way you could laugh at yourself.

He was sensitive, too. During the 2003 playoffs, a Kubina slap shot gashed the face of Devils defenseman Scott Stevens. Several New Jersey players accused Kubina of deliberately shooting at Stevens in an attempt to injure.

Kubina answered the charge the next day, so upset at its nature that his voice quivered. The next season, New Jersey goalie Martin Brodeur admitted it was all a ploy to try to unnerve the big Czech.

That was difficult to do on the ice. At 6 feet 4, 258 pounds, Kubina, a seventh-round draft choice in 1996 (179th overall), was a horse. He played his best in the biggest moments and relished facing the game's biggest stars. The picture of him looming over a fallen Jaromir Jagr during the 2003 playoffs against the Capitals is a classic.

Kubina still holds the Lightning record for defensemen with 72 goals. He was part of Tampa Bay's 2003-04 Stanley Cup team. He is a three-time Olympian (bronze in 2006) and won three world championships.

An argument can be made that, given his career, Kubina was Tampa Bay's most savvy draft choice.

But as former Lightning captain Vinny Lecavalier said of his former teammate, who also played for the Thrashers, Maple Leafs and Flyers: "He's a guy who you always liked to be around. He was always laughing. He always had fun with his teammates. I was his roommate for a year when we first started. Just a great guy."

And that is a great way to be remembered.


730830 Toronto Maple Leafs

Shoalts: Consistency eludes exasperating Leafs in shootout loss to Wings

DAVID SHOALTS

Sunday, Dec. 22 2013, 12:09 AM EST

Consistency continues to elude the Toronto Maple Leafs, as they let a third-period lead and a chance to catch the Detroit Red Wings slip away.

More lapses in their own end saw the game wind up in a shootout, where the Red Wings won for the first time in seven attempts this year, 5-4 at the Air Canada Centre. That made it two wins in a row for Detroit, who are saddled with a long list of injuries, after a winless stretch of six games.

The Detroit Red Wings practised outdoors Wednesday, hoping it will help them re-focus amid a six-game losing streak. Players say practising at the home stadium of baseball's Detroit Tigers was a great way to have some fun.

Those exasperating Leafs – decent one minute and awful the next - were on display again Saturday night. They managed to fight their way back to take a 4-3 third-period lead on David Clarkson’s third goal of the season – a dirty jam-in from the crease the Leafs have been looking for all season from him - but could not get out of regulation time with the win.

Goaltender Jonathan Bernier, who replaced James Reimer after the first period, tried his best, stopping Pavel Datsyuk on a shorthanded breakaway in the third period, but could not overcome his teammates’ defensive deficiencies. After Toronto forward Phil Kessel failed to clear the puck, the Wings were able to get it to Tomas Tatar at the net and he scored at 13:44 to set up overtime.

If the Maple Leafs could somehow cut blocks of time out of their games and then stretch them over a full contest they would be one heck of a hockey team indeed. Such as the first seven minutes and 15 seconds of the first period and the last eight minutes and 15 seconds of the second period.

During that stretch, they kept their legs moving for the most part at both ends of the ice and gave the Red Wings fits. They also looked good for parts of the third period except for yet another slip on the tying goal.

“We didn’t start the way we wanted,” Leafs forward Joffrey Lupul, who finished with a goal and an assist, said. “[The Red Wings] got some goals we’d like to have back. We didn’t get any offence going in the first period but we fought back in the second.”

The Leafs did managed to take a 1-0 lead in the first period and then tied the score 3-3 with two goals in closing out the second period.

Peter Holland set up the first Leaf goal with some tenacious fore-checking behind the Detroit net. That saw the puck get to the slot and then to defenceman Cody Franson at the point for his second goal of the season.

The trouble was, the Leafs went back to standing around in their own end again, watching the Wings take the puck to the net. And this time Reimer was not able to perform any heroics to keep them in the game.

Reimer, who was not entirely at fault, allowed three goals in a span of nine minutes and 11 seconds in the first period to let the visitors take a 3-1 lead into the second. It also resulted in the hook, the fourth time this season Reimer was pulled from a game.

This one was seen by about two million people, as the Hockey Night In Canada cameras caught Leafs head coach Randy Carlyle going over to goaltender Jonathan Bernier as the Leafs left the ice at the horn. The camera shot was so close and clear no one had trouble reading Carlyle’s lips: “You’re going in.”

If you could read Carlyle’s mind as easily, it would have been no surprise to discover the coach would have liked to similarly give the hook to three or four of his defencemen as well, if such a thing were possible. While Reimer did not look good on a wraparound goal by Joakim Andersson, he was also left to fend for himself on the other two goals.

On the first one, Wings centre Pavel Datsyuk was allowed to come out of the corner untouched by either of the Leaf defencemen, John-Michael Liles and Morgan Rielly – and get to the front of the net where he beat Reimer

with a backhand. That made short work of the Leafs’ early lead, coming one minute and 42 seconds later.

“Not happy,” was Reimer’s initial reaction to getting pulled. “I don’t think there’s a goaltender in the league that’s happy when they get pulled.”

While Reimer admitted he was at fault on the wraparound goal and could have had the third goal by Tomas Jurco “on some nights,” he wanted to stay in the game.

“Yeah, I think that’s what any goalie wants,” he said. “You want that chance to get in there, battle for your teammates and try and get a win. Obviously, Randy [Carlyle] had other thoughts. He’s the coach and he’s the one who makes the decisions. I just try and stop pucks.”

The coach did not offer an explanation to Reimer (“No, at the moment there was no explanation it was just a switch,” the goalie said.), but Carlyle told reporters it was not long after the opening faceoff he started having doubts about his starter.

“I thought with Reimer the very first shot that he took went in his glove and out of his glove,” Carlyle said. “I thought the rebounds were bouncing away from him. When a goaltender is in the zone, the pucks don’t usually go through him. Their third goal went through him. I felt the wraparound goal was a stoppable wraparound.”

The Leafs managed to regain control of the game at the midway mark of the second period, although for a while it looked as their former teammate Jonas Gustavsson was unbeatable. He came into the game with a 9-3-2 record and .920 save percentage, mostly in relief of No. 1 goaltender Jimmy Howard, who is one of many injured Red Wings.

Shortly after Leaf captain Dion Phaneuf scored at 11:45 on a one-timer off a beautiful feed from Lupul, Gustavsson made what some immediately nominated as the save of the year. Phaneuf wired a shot from the point at the open net with Gustavsson seemingly down and out. But he managed to dive back toward the right side of the net, throw out his stick and stop the shot.

Phaneuf called it “the best save ever made on me, that’s for sure. I started to put my arms up.”

However, Lupul scored a power-play goal at 18:24 to send the teams to the third period tied 3-3. That gave him a goal and an assist after going three games without a point following a four-point night against the Chicago Blackhawks on Dec. 14.

Globe And Mail LOADED: 12.22.2013


Maple Leafs: Bernier in penthouse, Reimer in doghouse after loss

Mark Zwolinski

Sat Dec 21 2013

Interesting night on Saturday, in a tilt that saw the Leafs lose 5-4 in the shootout. A great comeback by the Leafs, who were down 3-1 after one and took a 4-3 lead in the third before eventually falling.

Not so great for goalie James Reimer. He was pulled after allowing three goals in the first; after the game, much was made of the yank, which looked like a short leash with coach Randy Carlyle tugging it. Consider that a little hint as to who’ll be in the doghouse on this occasion. But first…

Penthouse

Jay McClement and Nik Kulemin have been part of Carlyle’s go-to line to start periods and defend tight situations. Those two have been poster boys for what Carlyle has been preaching all season long, working extremely hard at both ends of the ice.

But Jonathan Bernier was the one who came to the rescue on Saturday night, setting up a roadblock long enough for the Leafs to tie the game, and go ahead in the third.

Bernier made two 10-bell saves to keep his team in it, at a time when any additional Detroit goals would have deflated the Leafs and likely seen them leave without even a single point to show for the evening.

Doghouse

Reimer gets in there for allowing one soft goal, and a second goal that even he admitted he would have gotten to on other nights.

Reimer is also the centre of controversy on this night — the short-leash theory was all the rage after the game, and will no doubt be debated for the next two days (after which the Leafs break for Christmas).

Should Reimer have been pulled? Or should Carlyle have given him the chance to at least start the second, to try and rescue his poor performance? Certainly, Reimer has done more than enough this season to warrant a second chance.

Toronto Star LOADED: 12.22.2013


Marlies beat Checkers back-to-back

Staff Writer

Sat Dec 21 2013

CHARLOTTE, N.C.—Carter Ashton had a pair of goals and added an assist as the Toronto Marlies downed the Charlotte Checkers 5-2 on Saturday.

Greg McKegg scored and assisted on both of Ashton’s goals as Toronto (16-9-2) swept the season series with Charlotte. Tyler Biggs and Kenny Ryan rounded out the Marlies’ offence, while Drew MacIntyre made 36 saves for the win.

Chris Terry and captain Brett Sutter replied for Charlotte (12-16-1). John Muse stopped 32 of 26 shots.

Toronto did not score on its two power plays, while the Checkers went 1 for 3 with the man advantage.

The Marlies are first in the North Division and on a five-game point streak — four wins and one shootout loss.



Maple Leafs fall short in Winter Classic preview: DiManno

Rosie DiManno

Sat Dec 21 2013

One Leaf felt the love, if only fleetingly. That would be David Clarkson, hero of the moment — or at least for the five minutes and 12 seconds that Toronto held a hard-earned 4-3 lead over Detroit.

One Leaf felt the bile and it left bitterness in his mouth. That would be James Reimer, yanked at the end of the first period in a nitty-gritty game that went to overtime and a shootout, with the Red Wings 5-4 victors at the Air Canada Centre, no Leaf scoring on ex-Leaf Jonas Gustavsson in that silly shooting exercise.

But the most intriguing drama on the evening was Reimer versus Randy Carlyle.

TV cameras caught the usually mild-mannered and endlessly buoyant Toronto netminder glaring at Carlyle after co-goalie Jonathan Bernier was informed, at the end of the first period, that he would start the second. Reimer saw the lean-in, if perhaps not knowing the exact words. Impossible to misinterpret, though.

It was the third time this season that Reimer has been given the hook and ... let’s just say most observers have doubts that Bernier — admittedly playing hot Saturday where the starter had indisputably been cold — would ever be treated in a similarly embarrassing manner. Toronto was trailing 3-1 but Reimer was not allowed the chance to backstop his teammates into the rally that ensued.

You still think the Leafs are a team with 1 and 1A goaltending, as Carlyle has been claiming for months? Because, on this night, Carlyle mothballed Reimer somewhere in the No. 2 range in the coach’s heart.

Afterwards, Carlyle explained his actions thusly: “The very first shot he took went into his glove and out of his goal.”

That sent alarm bells clanging, in a game that came as close to must-win as Toronto has played this season, Detroit two points ahead in the standings and two years since these clubs last met.

“I thought the rebounds were bouncing away from him,” Carlyle continued. “I thought that when a goaltender is in the zone, pucks usually don’t go through him. And their third goal went through him.”

That was off the stick of fourth-liner Tomas Jurco, executing a quasi spin-o-rama in front of the Toronto net and sliding the puck under Reimer. The previous Detroit goal, at 2-1, was a wraparound by Joakim Andersson and, frankly, should have never found the back of the net.

“I felt the wraparound goal was a stoppable wraparound. (Reimer’s) stick was extended, it hit the heel of his stick, went in the net. The goal that I thought went through him was the one that came out of the corner. (Jurco) stops in front of the net and backhands the puck and it went through either his arm or the seven-hole or whatever the new terminology is.”

Carlyle was not second-guessing himself, particularly since Bernier put in a fine effort and very nearly vaulted his team over the Wings, stoning the sublime Pavel Datsyuk — who had Detroit’s first marker — on a short-handed breakaway late in regulation.

“I made the decision, if we got through the (first) period that I was going to put Bernier in. When you do that, you do it based upon not specifically the individual that’s getting pulled, but you do it for your team. Somehow you’ve got to get a spark for your team.

“I thought Bernier came in and did that.”

Clearly the Leafs fed off Bernier’s confident aura, though perhaps they were also playing to absolve Reimer, with their two-goal second period, from Dion Phaneuf and Joffrey Lupul.

But the cost to Reimer’s mental equilibrium may not have been worth the single point Toronto took out of the night, after Clarkson’s 4-3 goal at 8:32

of the third was subsequently rendered moot, Tomas Tatar knotting it 4-4 about five minutes later.

Most reporters were already at Carlyle’s post-game press conference when Reimer stepped into the outer Leaf dressing room. “Obviously, it’s the last thing I wanted, those goals going in,” he said. “But I respect what (Carlyle) decides. I may not like it but he’s the one who makes those decisions.”

When pressed about being pulled, a subject Reimer had just said he didn’t want to discuss — and his feelings had earlier been evident by facial expression — he did admit: “I’m not happy. I don’t know of a goalie in the league who’d be happy when he’s pulled. You want the chance to get in there and fight for your teammates and help them win the game. But Randy is the coach and he makes those decisions.”

Further, Reimer agreed with Carlyle’s assessment on two soft goals.

“They scored a couple too many goals and obviously the second one is my fault, it can’t go in. The third one they made a nice play on, but I get to that on most days.”

You know, Carlyle made an error on the night too, having his fourth line out there when Mike Babcock sent Datsyuk over the boards with his fourth line, which makes it instantly not a fourth line anymore. Datsyuk ended up scoring, and it was 1-1. Carlyle did not adjust for the gerrymandered fourth line and that’s a coaching mistake, though he didn’t see it that way.

“Datsyuk was the only player that came out with the fourth line. I was matching the lines and that was the play. We had opportunities to defend, even though the goal was scored. But Pavel’s a special player.”

Precisely.

Which brings us ’round to where we came in on this column, with Clarkson — who’s truly in danger of becoming the reincarnation of Larry Murphy with a disgruntled fan base — finally triggering wild cheering instead of jeering, putting the Leafs up after a couple of bangs at the puck amidst a pile in the crease.

It was his 100th NHL goal, third as a Leaf and first in a dozen games. To no avail, since no Leaf could score in the shootout while the Wings were two-for-two against Bernier.

Yet Clarkson stood there at his locker afterwards, pretending all has been fine, just fine, no displeasure sensed from a Leaf Nation that is clearly thinking it got sold a bill of goods on this guy, with his two suspensions so far and wheels spinning.

“I haven’t not felt (the love) in the time I’ve been here,” he insisted. “So I don’t know what you mean by the question.”

Duh.

Carlyle, at least, was more forthright.

“The way the game developed, I think we’re fortunate to get a point.”



Maple Leafs: Kulemin thrills boys’ team visiting from Kazakhstan

Curtis Rush

Sat Dec 21 2013

A boys’ hockey team from Kazakhstan travelled 6,000 miles to play a hockey tournament in the GTA, and got an unexpected bonus: They got to meet their Maple Leaf hero, Nikolai Kulemin, on Saturday.

Through an arrangement with the Leafs’ public relations department, the 12-year-old boys were bussed in to attend the team’s morning skate at the Air Canada Centre.

However, the adventure hit a snag when the team bus became stuck after all-night rain turned the parking lot south of Orangeville into a skating rink.

A tractor was summoned to put a layer of sand down to get the bus moving off the parking lot at Teen Ranch, an elite sports camp, where the trip originated.

Two of the boys are from the same industrial town (Magnitogorsk) as Kulemin, who also shares his hometown with Pittsburgh Penguins forward Evgeni Malkin.

The town has a professional hockey team, Metallurg Magnitogorsk, which plays in the Kontinental Hockey League. Kazakhstan, a former Soviet republic that borders Russia, also has a KHL team, called Barys Astana.

Before being drafted by the Maple Leafs in 2006, Kulemin played several seasons for Metallurg.

The day was even more special because the Leafs surprised the 21-member team by having Kulemin come from the dressing room after the skate and meet the players in the stands.

They were originally told they could watch the skate only. The boys’ eyes lit up when Kulemin emerged from the dressing room and walked up into the stands. He didn’t say much. He didn’t need to.

The boys gathered around him and snapped photos with Kulemin, and the Maple Leaf star signed autographs for several minutes.

“It was great to meet him,” 12-year-old Igor Buloshikin said through an interpreter.

The coach said the boys were very impressed with Kulemin and the size of the Air Canada Centre.

“The closest we’ve seen a player has been on TV, so seeing him in real life is like seeing a legend,” their coach, Vitali Kitvinov, said through an interpreter.

Kulemin, who missed 12 games due to an ankle injury earlier in the season, has four goals and five assists.

The boys team, named the Kazakhstand Torpedos, also stayed to watch the Red Wings practice.

The boys are here for a Christmas hockey tournament in the GTA called the Burlington Horseshoe Tournament.

The only disappointment was that the youths could not attend the game between the Leafs and the Red Wings because they had an exhibition game scheduled late Saturday afternoon.



Toronto teams are many things — but boring's not one of them

Raju Mudhar

Sat Dec 21 2013

The weirdest thing about the first episode of 24/7 being boring is that in this town, that’s one thing the Leafs rarely are.

Whatever you want to call Toronto’s teams — frustrating, amusing and heartbreaking come to mind — they tend to find a way to keep things interesting, as much off the playing field as on. It may not be the stuff of championships, but at the very least it’s intriguing.

Maple Leafs: A win on Thursday provided some light while all eyes are watching HBO’s premier showcase, 24/7 — but please let this weekend’s episode highlight be better than coach Randy Carlyle versus a toaster, round two. The show has made even bad Leaf hockey look great, but has not found a way to make the team appear interesting in any way.

Off the ice, though, Leafs fans — and we should use the term loosely — had some fun on Tuesday with an epic social media snafu. The Leafs have been trying to get #SeaofBlue trending on Twitter, while also turning their home page into a virtual billboard with tweets running there.

Well, the company either forgot to set up a filter or didn’t bother with a moderator. In no time, people starting testing the boundaries, found none, and the team’s home page wound up with some gems including “Hitler wasn’t all bad” and “#Seaofpoo”.

Judging from web ads, the company isn’t abandoning the promotion, but we doubt it will ever be as fun. That said, social media gaffes happen all the time, and in this case it might not be a bad thing. After all, if it had worked perfectly, no one would care. But now I’ll be sure to stop in just to check out if the jokers get a chance to run the roost again.

As for 24/7, let’s chalk that first episode up to setting the stage. There’s still Phil Kessel and Toronto’s goalie situation to look at. As well, Pavel Datsyuk was set up by his teammates, but didn’t have a word in the first episode for the Detroit side.

Raptors Tank Watch: The race to the bottom of the standings and potentially to the top of the NBA draft is clearly becoming an obsession for many of basketball’s middling franchises. Here in Toronto, it’s as though every win is a bad thing, and now there is a perverse feeling that, hey, this team can’t even lose right.

But to put things in a little perspective, the Raps aren’t the only ones wanting to bottom out. It literally is a race. They’re having the same discussions in the Boston media, although their issue is that new coach Brad Stevens is doing too good of a job with their flawed squad.

No one wants to be in the NBA’s maddening middle tier of teams, and this is a story that will dominate the rest of the season until that supposed pot of gold of a draft happens.

Blue Jays: Can Alex Anthopoulos do it again? The wheeler dealer general manager is likely the closest he’s ever been to the hot seat after generally seeming to fleece other teams in big deals on a yearly basis.

Sure, he might be losing a little bit of lustre after last year’s high hopes were dashed, but due to his track record, don’t you just assume there’s another rabbit he’s going to pull out of his hat before next year? As always, there were rumours out of the winter meetings, but nothing has come to fruition yet.

Toronto FC: It’s been a busy off-season for the beleaguered Major League Soccer franchise. Ex-captain Dwayne De Rosario was selected third in the re-entry draft and now the team has a few days left to sign him — and make nice with a hometown hero-turned-heel who left under a black cloud in 2011.

As well, the mystery surrounding Jermain Defoe continues. There have been numerous reports that the Tottenham striker is on his way to Toronto — and that a call from Drake was what convinced him to come — but there has yet to be any sort of confirmation. While Defoe is a goal scorer who

could improve the team’s dismal prospects, this is beginning to feel like it has taken too long to get to a happy ending. But we’ll see.

Argonauts: No biggie. They just need a new place to play after the 2017 season. Best get cracking.

What else? TSN has unveiled its new set, a sign that the always-simmering competition between Bell and Rogers could be heating up once again. The world juniors are about to captivate Canadians, as always, during this holiday break. After that, it’s a luge slide to the Winter Olympics. There is always something.

Say what you want about this city’s sports teams and their affairs but, thankfully, boring is not a term that comes to mind often



Maple Leafs: James Reimer looks to start tonight against Detroit Red Wings

Curtis Rush

Sat Dec 21 2013

Maple Leafs goalie James Reimer will get his third straight start in goal Saturday night against the Detroit Red Wings at the Air Canada Centre in a prelude to the Winter Classic on Jan. 1.

Jonathan Bernier has missed the last two starts against the Florida Panthers and the Phoenix Coyotes due to a lower-body injury.

“I feel pretty good. I’m getting there,” Bernier said after the morning skate. “Obviously, he went with Reims, but I felt pretty good to play tonight. I’m sure the coaching staff and training staff discussed this and made their decision.”

Reimer did not attend the optional skate.

Bernier was shaken up in last Monday’s 3-1 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins when he collided with Pittsburgh forward Jayson Megna after a race for a lose puck.

Bernier is good enough to go as backup tonight.

“I didn’t feel anything pop, but I felt it when I skated back to my net,” Bernier said.

Reimer has an 8-5-1 record and is ranked No. 28 in the NHL with a 2.69 goals-against average.

Reimer faced 35 shots in the Phoenix win and coach Randy Carlyle has said that both Reimer and Bernier are having career years.

The offence, on the other hand, has not been good enough.

The focus of attention for Saturday night has shifted to Nazem Kadri, who has been filling in as the No. 1 centre in the absence of the injured Tyler Bozak.

Kadri as been struggling, particularly on the faceoffs where he has won only 42.7 per cent of the draws.

Coach Randy Carlyle defended his young centre, who is “cutting his teeth” as a player who is trying to reach a higher level.

“We’re asking a lot of a young player now,” the coach said.

Kadri could find himself against one of the best faceoff men in the league in Detroit’s Pavel Datsyuk, who has won 53.4 per cent of his faceoffs.

“Obviously faceoffs are a concern for our hockey club,” Carlyle said.

Kadri said there is quite a challenge in facing Datsyuk, who is “strong on the stick and he’s very smart in the faceoff circle.”

Winning draws, however, is not all power, the 23-year-old Kadri said.

“A lot of times it’s very strategic. You’ve got to find out different ways to beat guys,” he said, adding he had an “off-game” in the faceoff circle against the Phoenix Coyotes.

Defenceman Morgan Rielly was asked how he is looking forward to facing Datsyuk and sniper Daniel Alfredsson.

“I’m not looking forward to it, actually,” Rielly said. “They’re two pretty good players who are pretty hard to play against.”

The Leafs are coming off a 2-1 shootout victory over the Coyotes, but some Leafs are still feeling the heat from criticism in the media and from fans.

David Clarkson, who has missed 12 games through suspensions this year, is one of those forwards getting criticized.

He has only two goals and four assists in 25 games.

“The chances are there,” he said. “They’re just not going in. It’s an 82-game season.”

Clarkson said he doesn’t let the criticism get to him.

“When I leave, I go home to a wonderful family. I really don’t read it (criticism), I don’t pay attention to it. I’ve got a 2-1/2-year old that I love being around. When I come to work, I try to work my hardest.”

Clarkson said he is not pressing any harder to get his next goal, which would be the 100th of his career.

The Red Wings and Leafs are both struggling coming into the game.

The Leafs are 4-6-0 in their last 10 while the Red Wings are 3-5-2.

The Red Wings needed a 3-2 overtime victory over the Calgary Flames on Thursday to end a six-game losing streak, with Alfredsson scoring twice, including the winner, and adding an assist.

Over those six games, the Wings scored a total of only seven goals.

The Red Wings have several injured players, including their leading scorer Henrik Zetterberg (back). Zetterberg, who has 11 goals and 19 assists for 30 points, has not played since Dec. 1.

This is the first of a four-game series with the Red Wings.

Carlyle was asked if it’s important to build a rivalry with their new Atlantic Division opponents.

“I’m more concerned with winning hockey games,” the Leaf coach said. “There’s a long history between Toronto and Detroit, but with this coaching staff we’re just trying to make sure we’re can provide a consistent brand of hockey, which we haven’t been able to do.”



NHL: Cherry backs P.K. Subban for Canada on Coach’s Corner

Mark Zwolinski

Sat Dec 21 2013

How Coach’s Corner with Don Cherry, the Christmas edition, played out Saturday night:

WHAT CHERRY WORE

A red velvet suit with a yellow rose, nicely accented yellow tie — he looked good.

KEY POINTS

This one started off with a view of a squeaky toy beaver, and a pic of Cherry for the 25th season of his Rock ’em Sock ’em videos … Cherry pointed out Leafs coach Randy Carlyle telling Jonathan Bernier he’d start the second period for the Leafs; Cherry says Carlyle did it the right way, pulling James Reimer after the period ended … Cherry summarizes his thoughts on those who doubt whether P.K. Subban should make Canada’s Olympic squad: “what are they, nuts?” … he also re-embraces his long-time argument about taking the centre red line away and clamping down on obstruction, noting that it’s allowed forwards to come in “like kamikazes” and nail defencemen. He shows Tom Wilson’s hit on Brayden Schenn as an example — point taken … he hits on the feel-good story of the moment, Martin Jones’ incredible run as a rookie goalie in Los Angeles, noting that veteran D-men Matt Greene and Willie Mitchell have helped Jones along the way … next, Cherry lauds former Leaf Alex Steen, who has 24 goals with the Blues, for not showboating after scoring … lastly, Cherry shows a pic of a young boy sleeping next to his hockey stick; it was apparently shown to him by the guy who fixes his cars — nice touch there.

BEST QUOTE

“That’s Canada at its best,” in reference to the little guy sleeping. Can’t argue with that.

WHAT SOCIAL MEDIA SAYS

Folks love Cherry’s suit, but don’t have much else to say.

Grade

B+ ... Liked everything Cherry had to say. Don’t agree on Subban, but it was all hockey and Canadian culture, and that’s when Cherry is at his best



'24/7' airs dramatic second episode just after Alfredsson buries Leafs

Mike Zeisberger

Sunday, December 22, 2013 02:12 AM EST

It was an HBO 24/7 moment if ever there was one, with Public Enemy No. 1 Daniel Alfredsson primed to steal the show.

Here was Alfie, the most despised opponent of the past two decades among Maple Leafs fans, making his first Air Canada Centre appearance in Detroit red and white instead of the similar Ottawa Senators colours.

With the game knotted at 4-4, Wings coach Mike Babcock chose Alfredsson to lead off the shootout for the visitors on Saturday night. As his name was announced by P.A. voice Andy Frost, the explosion of boos was deafening.

As Alfredsson waited for the officials to give him the green light to skate in on Leafs goalie Jonathan Bernier, Wings assistant Bill Peters leaned over to Babcock and said: “He’s going to go bar down, then ride his stick. Watch this.””

Much like Peters predicted, Alfredsson did shoot high. And he did beat Bernier high for the decisive goal which, coupled with a Pavel Datsyuk marker right after his own, gave the Red Wings a 2-0 margin in the shootout and a 5-4 victory in the game,

What he didn’t do was ride the stick like former Leafs tough guy Dave (Tiger) Williams used to when he scored.

Can you imagine the uproar such a gesture from Alfredsson would have caused in Toronto? Leaf supporters still haven’t forgiven Alfie for pretending to throw his stick into the ACC stands nine years ago, a move they thought was his attempt to mock then-Leafs captain Mats Sundin who had been suspended just days earlier for chucking his broken twig into the platinums.

It would have made for some great drama for the HBO folks. Not that Alfredsson’s on-ice heroics weren’t spicy enough.

“I have to admit, (being booed) fires you up,” Alfredsson said afterward, HBO’s boom microphone hanging over the handful of reporters talking to him in the Wings dressing room. “It was a big win. It was a great feeling.”

You can bet, behind closed doors, Leafs coach Randy Carlyle didn’t feel the same way. In fact, given some of the emotional, expletive-filled outbursts by both coaches in the second episode of 24/7 that aired in the U.S. on Saturday night, don’t be surprised if the Maple Leafs bench boss dropped a few f-bombs while addressing his players after the game.

While the opening segment of 24/7 a week ago was criticized in some circles as being too soft and lacking bite, Episode 2 certainly offered up some zing.

Some of the highlights included:

The Pens’ Sidney Crosby, during the Leafs 3-1 loss in Pittsburgh Monday, telling Leafs captain Dion Phaneuf during a break in the action that “Kadri’s a (bleepin’) joke.”

Nazem Kadri responding the next day while talking to his dad on the phone. “You’ve got to try to get under (Crosby’s) skin. He’s the best player in the world.”

Carlyle tearing into his team during the first intermission of that Pittsburgh game, growling at his team that “we’re not moving our feet. It’s not my responsibility to get you going. It’s your responsibility. It’s (bleeping) bull----!”

Carlyle during an intermission of the game against the Florida Panthers on Tuesday, one in which his Leafs fell behind 3-0. “We’re (bleeping) lousy. We suck!’

Detroit defenceman Kyle Quincey, who received a five-minute major and game misconduct for shoving Anaheim Ducks forward Ryan Getzlaf into the boards face-first during a 5-2 loss said: “The blood (on the face of Getzlaf) f----- me.”

Quincey figured he would only have received a minor had Getzlaf not started to bleed.

Indeed, HBO 24/7 is really starting to heat up.

Just like the Leafs-Wings rivalry heading into the Jan. 1 Winter Classic, thanks in part to Daniel Alfredsson.

Even if he didn’t do a Tiger Williams and ride his stick.

BABCOCK BOOTS OUT 24/7 CREW

Mike Babcock simply had enough.

With his team down 4-1 after one period to the Anaheim Ducks at Joe Louis Arena on Tuesday, the angry Detroit coach booted the HBO crew out of the Red Wings dressing room, a moment that was captured by the 24/7 cameras and shown in Episode 2.

“Get the (bleep) out of here!” Babcock said, obviously upset that his team was en route to its seventh consecutive loss at the time.

Who says pro hockey coaches are a calm cool and collected bunch?

Episode 2 of HBO’s 24/7, which aired in the U.S. on Saturday night, will be shown in Canada on Sunday.

Toronto Sun LOADED: 12.22.2013


Maple Leafs goalie James Reimer pulled after giving up three goals vs. Red Wings

Rob Longley


For most NHL goaltenders, there isn’t a leash long enough.

For Maple Leafs coach Randy Carlyle on Saturday night, James Reimer’s ended at three goals.

Reimer got the hook after the first period in Saturday’s 5-4 shootout loss against the Detroit Red Wings after letting in three goals on 12 shots.

“I don’t know if I really want to get into that,” Reimer said when asked about Carlyle’s hook. “It’s the last thing I wanted ... but that’s Randy’s decision and I respect what he decides. I may not like it, but that’s irrelevant.”

“Obviously, Randy had other thoughts and he’s the coach. He’s the one who makes those decisions, I just try to stop pucks.”

From the start, Carlyle didn’t like Reimer’s rebound control. Joakim Andersson’s wraparound goal gave the Wings a 2-1 lead. But it was Tomas Jurco’s goal later in the period that ultimately prompted the decision to put in Jonathan Bernier.

“When a goaltender is in the zone, pucks usually don’t go through him,” Carlyle said. “Their third goal went through him. I felt like the wraparound goal was a stoppable wraparound. His stick was extended and it hit the heel of his stick and went into the net.”



Maple Leafs' top guns held in check vs. Red Wings

Ian Shantz,

Sunday, December 22, 2013 02:06 AM EST

The Maple Leafs’ top forward line has hardly been setting the world on fire lately — and on Saturday they pretty much stuck to that script.

Unfortunately for the home side, despite a few other players rising to the occasion, the Leafs fell 5-4 to the Red Wings, courtesy of shootout goals from ACC whipping boy Daniel Alfredsson and Pavel Datsyuk.

It means the Leafs collected three of a possible six points to close out the three-game homestand and, while it’s progress, all things considered, the clouds of doubt will continue to linger.

Coming into the Winter Classic preview, centre Nazem Kadri and wingers Phil Kessel and James van Riemsdyk — all so strong in flashes this season — had combined for a modest four points in Toronto’s previous five contests.

Van Riemsdyk and Kessel picked up assists on Joffrey Lupul’s power-play goal in the second period, but JVR fanned in the shootout and the line was not nearly as dominant as it needs to be.

“We dug ourselves a hole and it takes a toll when you’re trying to dig out of a two-goal hole like that,” Lupul said of his team’s 3-1 deficit after 20 minutes. “If we take one thing (from this), it’s probably to get off to a better start.”

While a top-line role at centre is perhaps putting Kadri over his head at this stage in his young career — a move made necessary by Tyler Bozak’s injury woes — the inconsistent point production from the Leafs’ best players is starting to become as worrisome as everything else on the growing list of problems with this team, which continues to take one step forward and another five or so back.

All three players had their chances last night — Kessel sailing one just wide in the opening minutes — but when your top line is not finishing, there are clearly problems.

“You’re pleased when you win,” said forward David Clarkson a secondary-role bright spot lately, who potted an equalizer goal in the third period. “(But) it’s not an individual effort.”

Bozak hopes to return about a week from now, not that he’ll be expected to light it up.

But somebody called on to score regularly had better show up soon.

ALL TOO FAMILIAR

The first period might have been as indicative as any in relation to where the Leafs stand today.

There was promise — a quick start, an early lead at home, momentum on their side — but then, as they’ve done so often in this woeful stretch of losses, the Leafs simply let off the gas and made too many individual gaffes.

Two of Detroit’s first-period goals came courtesy of defensive miscues. Meanwhile, captain Dion Phaneuf failed to get a shot off on the power play as time ticked away to end the period, seemingly unaware the period was about to end.

No sustained pressure. Too many breakdowns. No answer against a Wings team that had dropped six of its previous seven games.



Maple Leafs forward David Clarkson grew up cheering for Brendan Shanahan

Dave Hilson


It seems a little ironic now, but Maple Leafs winger David Clarkson was a big fan of Brendan Shanahan when the retired forward was giving opposing teams fits as a member of the Detroit Red Wings.

“I think from Shanahan playing there, I grew up a big Shanny fan,” Clarkson said when asked about his memories of the Maple Leafs-Red Wings rivalry from their days in the Norris Division.

Seems a little strange now considering Clarkson has been suspended twice by Shanahan, the NHL’s head disciplinarian, since joining the Leafs as a high-profile off-season acquisition. But, of course, Clarkson and the high-scoring left winger are both natives of Mimico, in Toronto, so it’s only natural.

Detroit was in town Saturday night for the first time this season and the first time since moving back to the Eastern Conference. All the talk at the Air Canada Centre in the morning revolved around the renewal of the rivalry, especially with the Winter Classic just around the corner.

“I’m raised in this area so (it’s exciting). I think that rivalry is there and it will continue to grow and grow over the next couple of years,” Clarkson said. “I just remember how good a team (the Wings) were. But the Leafs were hardnosed. It’s just like Montreal and Ottawa, you have those teams that when you play it feels like a playoff game, and that’s how it feels (against Detroit). I think the (Winter Classic) adds to it and it’s great for the fans.”



Leafs-Red Wings rivalry will need time

Dave Hilson


TORONTO - Everyone was trying to make much of a renewed rivalry between the Maple Leafs and the Detroit Red Wings on Saturday morning after the game-day skate. And there's certainly plenty of history there from the days when the two teams were Norris Division rivals and battled in the playoffs.

But Maple Leafs coach Randy Carlyle wasn't having any of it during his post-skate press conference.

"I'm more concerned about winning hockey games than building a rivalry," he said. "The rivalry is something that develops when you have competitive teams and you play a number of times against one another."

Neither team has been very competitive of late.

Detroit had gone 1-4-2 in its previous seven games. Lack of scoring was the Wings' biggest problem, recording just 12 goals in that span. The Leafs hadn't been much better, losing five of seven and, if you exclude their 7-3 victory over the Blackhawks on Dec. 14, had managed just 13 regulation goals in their past nine home games.

The Leafs and Wings met Saturday for the first time since Detroit returned to the Eastern Conference. Whether the rivalry climbs to its old heights remains to be seen.

"I think you need to play each other in the playoffs to really create that heated rivalry again," said former Ottawa Senators captain and now-Red Wing Daniel Alfredsson, who knows a little something about rivalry with the Leafs.

CIRCLE WORK

Leafs centre Nazem Kadri hasn't exactly been tearing it up in the faceoff circle this season. Coming into play Saturday, he had a 42.7% success rate, fifth-best on the team.

He was going to have his hands full with Red Wings centre Pavel Datsyuk, who is one of the best two-way players in the game and had a 53.4% success rate in the circles.

"He's strong on his stick; he's very smart in the faceoff circle. A lot of times it's very strategic, it's just not all power," Kadri said of Datsyuk. "You have to find different ways to beat guys."

Kadri said he has been working hard to get better at the draw.

"For myself, a bit of an off game last game," he said of his work in the circles against the Coyotes on Thursday. "But this is a response game and a chance to get back on the map."

WORLD OF HIS OWN

David Clarkson isn't too concerned what the media has to say about his play.

"I really don't care, to be honest with you," Clarkson said. "You guys are able to write what you want. You're doing your job; I try to go out here and do mine. When I leave (the rink) I go home to a wonderful family. I don't read it; I don't pay attention to it."

The high-profile off-season acquisition has taken a lot of heat in the media recently and the term "bust" has even been tossed round. But Clarkson had one of his best outings in the blue and white against the Coyotes and was hoping to carrying it through against the Wings.

"It's an 82-game season and a lot of athletes go through a lot of ups and downs, no matter what sport it is," Clarkson said.

RED BLOODED?

Obviously his allegiance now lays with the Leafs, but there was a time when Kadri might not have been so sure. Growing in up in London, Ont., Detroit wasn't too far for Kadri to catch a Red Wings game.

"I went to a couple of games at the Joe growing up," Kadri said. "It was just a little bit easier to get tickets (to a Detroit game than to a Leafs game). I always enjoyed it. A few times we had hockey tournaments in Detroit and the Michigan area and we'd see if the Red Wings were playing so we could catch a game. Those are pretty fond memories."

Kadri didn't exactly grow up in a pro-Leafs home. It's well-known that his father was a big Canadiens fan.

QUCK HITS

Leafs goalie Jonathan Bernier, who could not start Thursday against the Coyotes after suffering a lower-body injury earlier in the week against Pittsburgh, said he is ready to go whenever he gets the call ... Coach Carlyle says tough guy Colton Orr "will be an option shortly." Orr has missed 10 games with an elbow injury ... The second episode of 24/7, focussing on the Leafs and Wings in the run-up to the Winter Classic, airs Sunday on Sportsnet at 7:30. Saturday's game will be featured in the Episode 3 of the series ... Wings injured No. 1 goalie Jimmy Howard skated Saturday morning and told reporters he is "75-25" to play in the Winter Classic ... Leafs rookie defenceman Morgan Rielly on facing Datsyuk and Alfredsson for this first time: "I'm not looking forward to it, actually. They're two pretty good players that are pretty hard to play against."



Detroit Red Wings take Winter Classic preview in shootout over Toronto Maple Leafs

Eric Koreen

Dec 21 10:47 PM ET

TORONTO — The Toronto Maple Leafs’ recent past has been a bit unglamourous, as you might have heard. They have made the playoffs just once since the lockout, and even that ended in a nightmare scenario.

2013 in Sport: Toronto Maple Leafs’ long-awaited playoff return ends in ‘perfect storm’ of heartbreak

So, it makes total sense why Leafs fans would want to re-kindle a rivalry with the Detroit Red Wings. While the Maple Leafs made the conference final four times over the span of 10 seasons in the 1990s and early 2000s, the first-round victory over Detroit — the one that ended with an overtime goal from Nikolai Borschevsky — still feels like the last Leafs moment that belongs in the franchise’s pantheon.

Now, after 15 years separated by a conference, the two teams are back in the same division. So, presto: a rivalry again, right?

“To have a rivalry, what you do is you meet in the playoffs, you have two really good teams, you have a hard series and you build up some animosity for one another,” Detroit coach Mike Babcock before the two teams met for the first time in nearly two calendar years. “That hasn’t been possible.”

Perhaps that will change in time. In the teams’ first matchup this year, the Red Wings took out the Maple Leafs 5-4 in a shootout. That long-time Ottawa villain Daniel Alfredsson scored in the shoot-out helped make things a little meatier. Like old times, Alfredsson was booed every time he touched the puck on Saturday night, if not with the same ferocity as when he captained the Senators.

Of course, the teams are also playing in the Winter Classic in Ann Arbor, Mich., on New Year’s Day, and are the subjects of the 24/7 series on HBO leading up to the event. (Although, Hockey Night in Canada’s Elliotte Friedman reported both teams have denied HBO access at various points in the lead-up to the game.) And, if the teams do eventually meet in the playoffs, then a rivalry could blossom again. This could turn into something worth remembering.

Right now, though, the Leafs and Wings are just two rather average hockey teams.

“I see a lot of similarities in where we’re at and where they are,” Toronto coach Randy Carlyle said. “We’ve got inconsistency, and it started with injuries. It’s not the personnel, I’m sure, on their white board that they had in the summer months. They hadn’t envisioned their lineup to be what it is today. Us, likewise. Ours has been a little different. We’ve had quite a few suspensions that has taken people away from us.”

A rivalry is something that develops when you have competitive teams and you play a number of times against one another. Obviously there’s a long history between Toronto and Detroit

To that end, the teams took turns struggling on Saturday.

The Leafs scored first, with a Cody Franson shot finding its way through traffic to score. They gave up the lead frightfully quickly, however, on a play that resembled their season-long struggles. The Red Wings kept the Leafs pinned in their zone for about 40 seconds. Eventually, Pavel Datsyuk came out from the net unmanned, and stuffed the puck passed James Reimer, just 102 seconds after Toronto had taken the initial lead.

It only got worse from there. Joakim Andersson did a half-decent Datsyuk impression, scoring a wrap-around goal after virtually carrying Leafs winger Joffrey Lupul on his back. Reimer blamed himself for that goal. Before the first period was out, Thomas Jurco scored on a spin-o-rama, following Jake Gardiner failing to clear the puck. Jurco was left completely unattended in front of the net, and his shot wiggled its way through Reimer’s pads. The goaltender conceded that he could have made that save, too. Reimer was done after the first period, pulled for Jonathan Bernier. Carlyle was worried

about the Reimer’s rebound control, while the goaltender wanted the chance to steady himself and his team.

“Obviously, I didn’t want to get pulled,” Reimer said.

“I respect what he decides. I may not like it, but that’s irrelevant.”

Bernier was excellent the rest of the way, with several huge saves, including a stop of Datsyuk on a breakaway in the third period. He stopped 25 of the 26 shots he saw in his 45 minutes of ice time.

Chris Young/The Canadian Press

Chris Young/The Canadian PressDetroit Red Wings' Luke Glendening, left, battles for the puck with Toronto Maple Leafs' Morgan Rielly during the first period in Toronto on Saturday.

The Red Wings lost the plot after that, though. Toronto slowly started to eat up more and more possession. Lupul first set up Dion Phaneuf for a beautiful one-timer goal, and then tied the game before the end of the second period by beating Detroit goaltender Jonas Gustavsson over his shoulder.

David Clarkson and Tomas Tatar traded goals in the third period, when the game finally evened out. A frenetic overtime, then, possibly served as the start of something real.

“I think this rivalry is growing and growing, and it’s going to continue to grow,” Clarkson said. “I think this game had [some edge] tonight, once we started to play.”

“A rivalry is something that develops when you have competitive teams and you play a number of times against one another,” Carlyle added. “Obviously there’s a long history between Toronto and Detroit.”

Maybe there is a future, too.

National Post LOADED: 12.22.2013

730844 Washington Capitals

One-shot wonders of 2013

By Neil Greenberg

Scoring in the NHL is not easy, and it usually requires putting a ton of rubber on net. Unless you are a sniper like Colorado Avalanche forward Alex Tanguay.

Since the 2005-06 season, Tanguay, currently out indefinitely after suffering a knee injury on Nov. 2, put himself on the scoresheet 28 times with his only point secured by one goal-scoring shot. That’s an NHL best over that time frame. Washington’s superstar right wing Alex Ovechkin, by comparison, leads the league in goals (399) and shots (3217) during that span, giving him just three one-shot, one-goal, one-point games for his resume.

There have been 13 players who have just one point from a lone shot on net that lit the lamp over the last nine seasons. Seven are still active, but none has played more than seven games. Both Ben Smith (2012-13) and Jeremy Williams (2005-06) are part of that group, but each saw just one game of action. One game, one shot, one goal, one point. Talk about efficiency.

If we limit our search to the calendar year of 2013 — the new year is upon us after all — the league leader is Chris Higgins of the Vancouver Canucks, with seven one-shot, one-goal, one-point games. Higgins combines speed and quickness to unleash a wicked wrist shot upon unsuspecting netminders, like this one on December 14 against Boston netminder Tukka Rask:

Close behind Higgins are three players tied with six “sniper” games for 2013: Bruins blueliner Zdeno Chara, Nashville’s Nick Spaling and reigning rookie of the year, Jonathan Huberdeau of the Florida Panthers.

That tremendous lone wrister hitting paydirt has accounted for five of Huberdeau’s “sniper” goals this season, which is a league best for the current campaign. Those tallies also account for the panther’s lion’s share of his seven goals scored. Perhaps they will also be the building blocks in a career that sets him apart as one of the league’s best snipers.

Washington Post LOADED: 12.22.2013


Five thoughts on the Capitals’ 4-2 win in Carolina

By Katie Carrera

December 21 at 9:57 am

The Capitals finally solved the Carolina Hurricanes, capturing a 4-2 win in the teams’ third meeting of the season Friday night in Raleigh after dropping the first two. Alex Ovechkin recorded his 400th career goal in the victory as Washington improved to 41 points and 19-13-3 on the season.

1. Grubi-doobie-do. Philipp Grubauer faced significant work Friday night as the Hurricanes put 41 shots on goal racked up 86 total attempts, several of which were of the Grade-A variety. Jeff Skinner had a breakaway and then a point-blank backhander in the first and Jordan Staal also had a handful of opportunities from splitting the Capitals’ defense, springing ice on stretch passes that Carolina uses well.

But Grubauer withstood the push in the first period to keep the game close – Carolina managed only a 1-0 lead through the first 20 minutes but could have had a few more if it wasn’t for the 22-year-old’s effort. In the second his teammates provided some long-awaited support and in the third Grubauer stood tall once again as Washington protected its one-goal lead, making arguably his best save of the night against Hurricanes captain Eric Staal on a breakaway.

“After my last game, it was a terrible game,” Grubauer said, referring to when he gave up four goals on 28 shots to the Flyers in a win on Dec. 15. “I wanted to make sure I come back the way I’m capable of playing and that’s what I tried to show today.”

In every start the young netminder has made, Grubauer consistently gives the Capitals a chance to win. Some nights he gets more help in front than others but such is life of a goaltender and in a season where Washington’s defense is still struggling to find consistency, having a goaltender steady the ship on a nightly basis is all the team can ask for.

“He’s gained our confidence absolutely in the last few weeks that he’s been here,” Troy Brouwer said. “He looks like he’s making a break for the No.1 spot, which is a good battle to have — goalies playing well. Ultimately he gave us a chance to win [Friday] and pretty much got us a win.”

With his performance since being recalled on Nov. 30 Grubauer has been making a strong case that he belongs in the NHL, helping Washington to rack up wins. The better he plays the more interesting the Capitals’ decisions with the three goaltenders, all of whom are on the active roster, become.

“I want to give the guys in front of me confidence. I don’t want to be known as ‘Oh no the rookie goalie’s back in the net again’,” Grubauer said. “I want to give the guys confidence in front so they can make the plays so that we’re not just playing defense all the time because it’s not how we play. It was a good game, a good bounce back game for me.”

2. Four is a charm. Nicklas Backstrom recorded an assist on each of Washington’s four goals against the Hurricanes, including three primary helpers. With that quartet the Capitals’ reserved star has taken over the league-lead in assists with 33 in 35 games, passing Pittsburgh’s Sidney Crosby by 1. It’s the second time in 10 days he’s recorded four assists in a single contest and the fifth time this season he’s posted three or more in any individual outing.

When Backstrom is making smart reads and set ups with this type of efficiency, the goals always seem to follow for the Capitals. On this particular occasion, it was Backstrom’s vision on the power play that helped Washington take advantage of the space created by the Hurricanes’ desire to take away Ovechkin on the man advantage. Speaking of which….

3. Take away Ovi? No problem. Hurricanes Coach Kirk Muller said earlier this season after a win at Verizon Center that they’ve opted to limit and isolate Ovechkin on the power play because they’d rather contend with the chances from the point and in the slot. They’re far from the only team to make that choice, and on Friday night the Capitals adapted well to take advantage of that better than they have all season.

When teams shadow the star winger so that he can’t fire one-timers at will on the power play, the Capitals look to overload the middle of the ice. They used point shots through traffic to score two of the three power play goals – Cam Ward never saw John Carlson’s blast from the point and Brouwer deflected a shot by Mike Green when the defenseman’s stick broke — and had a solid effort by Marcus Johansson in front to record another on a rebound.

They weren’t pretty tic-tac-toe plays but when opponents remove Ovechkin from the equation all that matters is that the Capitals man-advantage can still find a way to convert.

Brouwer’s goal was particularly fortuitous as the winger was able to adjust to the changing direction of the puck after Green’s stick broke and still manage to redirect the shot in the high slot.

“When it comes slower obviously I get a better touch on it, I had my stick half way up my body thinking it was going to be a higher shot because that’s where he usually likes to shoot,” Brouwer said. “That’s almost a weird adjustment that you don’t ever practice having to put your stick back down on the ice for a broken stick.”

4. Ward’s quietly effective night. Joel Ward didn’t record a single point in his 18:14 of ice time in Carolina, he didn’t even get a shot on goal. But the winger played a solid game, drawing two penalties – including the one on Tuomo Ruutu for holding that led to Carlson’s goal – and helping to create a forecheck that ate up time on the clock both on penalty kills and late in the game as Washington held on to its one-goal lead.

That’s the type of game that doesn’t show up on a scoresheet but is the type of play the Capitals need throughout the lineup. Even at the beginning of the game when the Hurricanes dominated the pace of the contest, Ward and his linemates Jason Chimera and Martin Erat were most able to escape their own zone.

5. Johansson. The winger scored a goal unlike the ones he usually tallies when he followed up on a loose puck in front when Cam Ward couldn’t handle the rebound and stuffed the puck past the goaltender’s left skate to start Washington’s power play party. But he suffered what the team would only describe as a lower-body injury and didn’t take a shift after being on the ice for Brouwer’s goal at 15:29 of the second period.

The Capitals appear close to regaining the health of their forwards this weekend with Brooks Laich skating frequently and encouraged that he will be able to return to the lineup either on Dec. 23, the first day he is eligible to come off LTIR, or soon after. Losing Johansson would be a blow to that depth once again because no one has found the chemistry with Ovechkin and Backstrom that he has. While he does receive third-billing on that line, he’s proven to be the most adept at playing with Washington’s two stars.

If he’s out for any length of time, Coach Adam Oates will have some interesting decisions to make. Does he risk breaking up the second line to move Eric Fehr up? Perhaps put disgruntled winger Martin Erat up top, where he played for five games earlier in the season?



Martin Erat still waiting for trade

By Katie Carrera

December 21 at 11:25 am

It’s been nearly a month since he went public with his trade request, but Martin Erat remains a Washington Capital. And now that the NHL’s holiday roster freeze is in effect, the veteran winger is guaranteed to stay through 12:01 a.m. on Dec. 28 at least.

Nothing has changed for Erat over these past few weeks. He still wants to be traded but knows there’s little he can do but wait and try to make the best of an odd situation until a deal is struck.

“It’s only [seven] days. Right now I’m just focusing on the next few games. That’s all I can do,” Erat said. “I’m a professional. I have to play hockey and that’s the bottom line.”

Since he let the league know he is looking to leave Washington on Nov. 25, Erat was a healthy scratch twice but has played in the past nine games, recording four assists and seeing anywhere from 10 minutes to over 19 of ice time. He’s suited up most often at third-line center during this stretch with Brooks Laich sidelined by a groin injury.

Laich’s injury likely made the Capitals more hesitant to part ways with the disgruntled winger, so that they wouldn’t find themselves suddenly lacking in forward depth. But Laich has skated five consecutive days now and appears to be on track to return on Dec. 23, when he is first eligible to come off the long-term injured reserve list, or soon after.

If Laich does make it back in the lineup soon and can stay healthy for an extended period of time, it may bring about the long-awaited change for Erat.



Morning skate: Grubauer again? Neuvirth unhappy

By Barry Svrluga

December 21 at 12:49 pm

The Capitals held an optional morning skate at Kettler Capitals IcePlex in advance of Saturday night’s game against the New Jersey Devils. Two of the team’s three active goalies – Braden Holtby and Michal Neuvirth – skated. Philipp Grubauer, who was outstanding in Friday night’s 4-2 victory at Carolina, did not skate, and Coach Adam Oates said the team is still deciding who will face the Devils.

But Oates knows what the Capitals have in Grubauer for the time being: A confident young goalie who has been able to steal Washington games. Grubauer is 4-0-1 with a 2.05 goals against average in six appearances.

“Right away, he gave the team some confidence,” Oates said Saturday morning. “And every night he’s gone in so far, he’s been able to build on that.”

This, though, leaves the other two goalies a bit restless. Neuvirth, who missed time with a right ankle injury, hasn’t played for the Capitals since Nov. 22.

“It’s going day by day,” Neuvirth said Saturday morning. “I don’t know what’s the plan. I haven’t really talked to anyone, so just going day by day and working in practice.”

Clearly, though, he is frustrated.

“I want to be a No. 1 goalie in this league,” he said. “If not here, maybe somewhere else.”

Other notes from the morning skate:

Oates said forward Marcus Johansson will be a game-time decision after he suffered a lower body injury against Carolina. Johansson suffered the injury on a first-period hit but played into the second period. “Just a little sore,” Oates said. “More precautionary.” Johansson was one of the few Capitals who skated.

In the final minute of Friday’s win, with the Capitals protecting a 3-2 lead and the Hurricanes’ net empty, forward Joel Ward was preparing to go onto the ice to relieve Alex Ovechkin. “I thought he was coming to the bench,” Ward said. “And he decided he didn’t, and I decided to go back.” Ovechkin, of course, changed course because the puck came his way, and he buried it into the empty net for his 400th career goal.

Forward Brooks Laich, who hasn’t played since Nov. 27 because of a groin injury, skated again Saturday morning and said he now doesn’t think about the injury while he’s on the ice. He’s eligible to come off injured reserve for Monday’s game against Anaheim – when Bruce Boudreau will return to Verizon Center. But Oates reiterated that he wants to see more from Laich before he plays him. “I know he’s feeling a lot better,” Oates said. “We haven’t really had a team practice. Like I said, until I see him in a team practice, with contact, I’m not getting my hopes up.” That might mean Laich won’t play until Dec. 29 in Buffalo. The Capitals will be off Sunday, then off Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday for the Christmas break, and won’t have a full practice in advance of Friday’s game against the New York Rangers. A week from Saturday would be the first chance for a full workout.



Capitals lose lead, fall to Devils in OT

AP

Andy Greene scored 43 seconds into overtime, Marek Zidlicky had two goals and the New Jersey Devils rallied past the Washington Capitals 5-4 Saturday night.

Greene knocked the rebound of a shot by Jaromir Jagr past Braden Holtby for the game-winner. Greene also had two assists.

Jagr scored his 13th goal and added two assists. Dainius Zubrus had a goal and an assist for New Jersey, which trailed 3-1 after two periods.





New Jersey tied it when Travis Zajac intercepted Holtby’s clearing attempt and fed in front to Zubrus, who poked it home at 11:47.

Both teams were playing the second of back-to-back games and there was little action early on.


Less than a minute later GreenefedZidlicky in the left circle and Zidlicky one-timed a drive past Holtby on the short side to make it 1-0. It was New Jersey’s first shot on goal.





NOTES: Ovechkin has scored 30 or more goals in nine straight seasons. … Jagr extended his points streak to seven games with a first period assist. … The Devils were without C Andrei Loktionov (illness) and RW Damien Brunner (knee), who was injured Friday against Anaheim. … Olympic swimming gold medalist Michael Phelps was in attendance.

Washington Times LOADED: 12.22.2013

730849 Winnipeg Jets

Physical play key to beating shifty Canucks

By: Melissa Martin

Posted: 12/22/2013 1:00 AM

Trevor Hagan / the canadian press files The trade that brought Michael Frolik to the Jets is the gift that keeps on giving.

Enlarge Image

Trevor Hagan / the canadian press files The trade that brought Michael Frolik to the Jets is the gift that keeps on giving. (CP)

THE Winnipeg Jets haven't seen much of the Vancouver Canucks, and they've only been to Rogers Arena once since taking flight in Winnipeg. That game, in March 2012, ended in a 3-2 loss.

Vancouver maybe isn't quite as daunting as they were that season, but they're playing a tenacious game under coach John Tortorella -- and of course, they still have the twins, among other weapons.

Zach Bogosian, after a solid effort back from injury on Friday, said his group is well aware of the challenges the Canuck pose.

"We have to be physical against them," Bogosian said after practice Saturday. "There's a lot of skilled guys that can make some plays if you give them some time. I think any time you can eliminate their time and space, and make sure that they can't make those tic-tac-toe plays that they're capable of, that'd be a good thing... for us."

Michael Frolik doesn't tend to razzle-dazzle, but he's quietly continued to be one of the most effective players on the squad. His five points in the last five tilts are swell, and his 21 on the season -- sixth on the team and 106th in the NHL -- is a very solid figure for a second-line winger.

Best of all, he's making hay while the sun shines: Frolik's point-production rate per 60 minutes of ice time sits third on the team, just a hair behind Bryan Little and Blake Wheeler.

Meanwhile, the 25-year-old is still a restricted free agent after this season. And all of that came at the bargain price of a third- and fifth-round draft pick, both statistically unlikely to net an NHL player.

If we were Kevin Cheveldayoff, we'd relax this holiday season by taking a nice hot bath, pouring a glass of wine and reliving the Frolik trade over and over again. He's the gift from Chicago that just keeps on giving.

Mark Scheifele climbed into the top 10 in rookie scoring, mostly by capitalizing on the offensive opportunities he's had in December: As of Saturday he was tied with Los Angeles Kings forward Tyler Toffoli for second in rookie scoring over the month. Worth noting: Of the eight rookies above Scheifele in the top 10 scoring conversation, only Dallas Stars scorer Valeri Nichushkin, 2013 first-overall pick Nathan MacKinnon and San Jose phenom Tomas Hertl are younger.

On that note, Scheifele is now tied with Toby Enstrom for the Jets' longest point streak so far this season, as Enstrom started the year with a five-game flurry of assists.

Winnipeg Free Press LOADED 12.22.2013


No rest for training staff

By: Melissa Martin

Posted: 12/22/2013 1:00 AM

The Jets wrapped up a short homestand on Saturday with a round of drills on the ice, their bags already packed for Vancouver where they face the Canucks tonight.

Captain Andrew Ladd didn't skate, as he rested some bumps, and defenceman Grant Clitsome also missed practice; he's a little banged up.

Head coach Claude Noel hears that a lot lately, with the Jets sitting at 16-16-5 and the season's midway pole fast approaching.

"We could probably keep a lot of guys off the ice," Noel said, after putting his squad through their paces. "It's just the workload... you're always playing it seems. It's an Olympic year, they condensed the schedule, and the people that know it are our training staff. There are guys (getting worked on) all the time. They got a lot of work to do in there all the time."

Surely, the solid 5-2 win over Florida on Friday night helped the Jets shake the soreness off their bodies. The win wasn't perfect, and Noel thought the first period especially was a bit of a mess, and not just because of the parade to the penalty box. To the coach's eye, the new defence pairings -- including Zach Bogosian next to Tobias Enstrom, and Dustin Byfuglien with Adam Pardy -- also looked unsettled that frame.

"It was a little bit of an adjustment for us," Noel said. "Our puck management wasn't great with the forwards in our D-zone. But I thought as the game went on, we were quite a bit better. I thought that they were good. I thought that everyone was aligned pretty well in that game."

It showed on the back end, it showed in the front. While the more experienced Ladd-Little-Wheeler line shouldered much of the load of busting out of the Jets' own end, the line of Evander Kane, Mark Scheifele and Michael Frolik gobbled up tasty minutes on the attack -- not counting changes on the fly, Kane started just over 87 per cent of his even-strength shifts in the opponent's zone and Frolik close to the same -- and they thrived.

Kane potted a goal and an assist -- as did Frolik -- and Scheifele kept his now five-game point streak alive. Those are the numbers, while the eye test suggests that trio had fun on Friday, often confounding defenders and driving the net. They look, these days, like they're finding the joy of the game.

"I don't use 'joy' as my word, I'll leave that to Claude," quipped Kane before hopping the plane to his Vancouver hometown. "But when the puck goes in the net, everybody's happy."

But that's enough looking back. The win on Friday snapped a six-game home losing streak, but Noel said the team doesn't get caught up in streaks.

"We try to focus on the game, or the task, and try to keep a balance of things," he said. "We move off of games. We don't drag games with us, six games or five games or these things. We don't get too involved in these numbers."

On Saturday, that meant moving past the euphoria of a win, letting go of the Panthers and getting ready for the Vancouver test ahead, and the Edmonton Oilers on Monday after that. No, the coach didn't need to remind his team the win was in the past.

"I don't say too much," Noel said.

"We all have responsibilities. Winning is just a byproduct of playing well as a group of 20, and if you can produce and play well as a group of 20, and work hard, perform and do well, then the results will follow that. We haven't had that kind of game that much... I'm not gonna sit there and motivate them from one game to the next. That's all our responsibilities."



Tonight: Jets @ Canucks

Ed Tait

Posted: 12/22/2013 1:00 AM

Former Manitoba Moose netminder Eddie Lack was solid in picking up the win over the Hawks, kicking out 24 shots in 65 minutes. Lack is now 5-2 this season with a .927 save percentage and 1.98 GAA.

Mike Santorelli, who played 10 games for the Jets after being acquired at the trade deadline last year, has been outstanding for the Canucks after signing with his hometown team as an unrestricted free agent. He has eight goals and 18 assists and is a solid plus-14.

The Canucks have the NHL's best penalty-kill unit, having killed off 90.2 per cent. Their power-play is ranked 23rd at 14.9 per cent -- just slightly better now than the 25th-ranked Jets at 14.4.

Friday's win over Chicago means the Canucks have produced a league-leading nine wins when their opponent scored first.

Roberto Luongo ranks 15th all-time in NHL history for most shutouts (65) -- one away from tying Patrick Roy in 14th spot.

WINNIPEG JETS

31 Ondrej Pavelec

35 Al Montoya

2 Adam Pardy

5 Mark Stuart

7 Keaton Ellerby

8 Jacob Trouba

9 Evander Kane

12 Olli Jokinen

16 Andrew Ladd

17 James Wright

18 Bryan Little

22 Chris Thorburn

24 Grant Clitsome

26 Blake Wheeler

27 Eric Tangradi

33 Dustin Byfuglien

39 Toby Enstrom

40 Devin Setoguchi

44 Zach Bogosian

55 Mark Scheifele

58 Eric O'Dell

67 Michael Frolik

VANCOUVER CANUCKS

1 Roberto Luongo

31 Eddie Lack

2 Dan Hamhuis

3 Kevin Bieksa

5 Jason Garrison

6 Yannick Weber

7 David Booth

8 Christopher Tanev

9 Zack Kassian

13 Jeremy Welsh

15 Brad Richardson

17 Ryan Kesler

20 Chris Higgins

21 Zac Dalpe

22 Daniel Sedin

25 Mike Santorelli

29 Tom Sestito

32 Dale Weise

33 Henrik Sedin

36 Jannik Hansen

41 Andrew Alberts



Jets not focused on win, but next game

By: Melissa Martin

Posted: 12/21/2013 12:52 PM

Before flying off to Vancouver, the Jets hit the practice ice on Saturday morning following their first home win in over a month. But though there is surely a rise in spirits after a solid victory, head coach Claude Noel said he didn’t focus on that with his team.

"I don’t say too much," Noel said. "We all have responsibilities. Winning is just a by-product of playing well as a group of 20, and if you can produce and play well as a group of 20, and work hard and perform, the results will follow that. We haven’t had that kind of game that much. We’ve been in and out."

The Jets now head to Vancouver, where they face the Canucks on Sunday. The Jets haven’t seen much of the ’Nucks in recent years, and not since they installed John Tortorella as coach.

"Vancouver’s a good team, they have a lot of good players, we have to be physical against them," said defenceman Zach Bogosian, who made his return to the lineup on Friday after sitting out a month with a groin injury.

Captain Andrew Ladd stayed out of Saturday’s practice as a maintenance day, while defenceman Grant Clitsome didn’t skate after missing Friday’s game due to illness. The blueliner is also banged up, Noel said, and noted the team’s physical therapists have really been earning their keep as of late.

"The workload, it’s a lot of games," Noel said. "You’re always playing, it seems... it’s an Olympic year, they condensed the schedule, and the people who know it are our training staff. There’s a lot of work to do all the time."



Frolik pleasant surprise for Jets

By Ken Wiebe,Winnipeg Sun

First posted: Saturday, December 21, 2013 09:02 PM CST | Updated: Saturday, December 21, 2013 10:36 PM CST

Michael Frolik wasn't the highest-profile addition to the Winnipeg Jets during the off-season.

That distinction belongs to former 30-goal scorer Devin Setoguchi.

However, as the Jets get set to face the Vancouver Canucks on Sunday at Rogers Arena, Frolik has been one of the most consistent players on the roster to this point.

Brought in to bolster the Top-9 forwards, Frolik has worked his way onto what has been a productive second line, skating alongside Evander Kane and rookie Mark Scheifele.

Frolik, who played more of a checking-line role with the Chicago Blackhawks the past two seasons and change, has shown his versatility since his arrival.

But after easing him into the mix, Jets head coach Claude Noel has been leaning on Frolik more heavily, providing him with more ice time and responsibility.

That's led to an increase in offensive input, as Frolik has two goals and five points during his past five games to give him nine goals and 21 points in 36 games this season.

"Frolik is a guy that is defensive, but he makes plays, he's a smart player and makes some things happen," said Noel. "He just quietly goes about (his business). He's been consistent pretty much all year. He doesn't get a lot of accolades, but he's done a pretty good job."

With Matt Halischuk out of the lineup with a fractured forearm, Frolik is finally getting some substantial time with the Jets' penalty killers during the past few games and that's another area of strength for him.

Frolik partnered with Marcus Kruger on the Blackhawks and were a dominant force while playing shorthanded during Chicago's run to the Stanley Cup last spring.

With the Jets involved in so many one-goal games, it would be wise for the Jets to continue using him as part of their penalty kill.

There have also been times recently when Frolik found himself with some time on the power play as well.

That's dried up with the return of Kane from a lower-body injury, but showing he was comfortable in that role will also help Frolik moving forward.

Having an expanded role has suited Frolik just fine.

"Who doesn't, right?," said Frolik, who was uncomfortable when a reporter suggested he might be the most consistent Jet to this point of the season. "The comfort level is getting better every game. Hopefully, I can still be better. I never want to quit. I'm still trying to improve my game and work hard."

Frolik was acquired on June 30 for third and fifth round picks in the 2013 NHL Entry Draft.

And while the Jets cherish their precious draft picks, this trade is tracking to be one of the best deals general manager Kevin Cheveldayoff has made since taking over the big chair.

Frolik, 25, will be a restricted free agent this summer, but the Jets can retain his services with a qualifying offer.

However, based on his play this season, the Jets should be looking into locking him up on a multiyear deal and adding him to the core group going forward.

Frolik is a hard-working, low-maintenance player that is smart defensively and can chip in offensively, equally comfortable in a second or third-line role.

He's tracking toward the third 20-goal season of his career -- and first since leaving the Florida Panthers organization via trade in February of 2011 and is in the final year of a three-year, $7 million dollar deal he signed with the Blackhawks.

With a salary of only $1.9 million this season and a salary-cap hit of $2.33 million, Frolik is well on his way to earning himself a well-deserved raise.

The only questions left to answer are how much and for how long.

Winnipeg Sun LOADED 12.22.2013


Bogosian makes presence felt in return to Jets lineup

By Ken Wiebe,Winnipeg Sun

First posted: Saturday, December 21, 2013 09:13 PM CST | Updated: Saturday, December 21, 2013 10:35 PM CST

Zach Bogosian probably felt it was merely a coincidence that the Winnipeg Jets snapped a six-game home-ice losing streak in his return to the lineup.

But judging by the comments from his teammates in the aftermath of Friday's 5-2 win over the Florida Panthers, Bogosian certainly made his presence felt after missing the previous 15 games with a groin injury.

Bogosian didn't suffer any setbacks as his powerful stride was on display throughout the contest.

"Just the way he skates, the way he moves the puck and his physical presence he brings to the table back there is huge for our team," said Jets right-winger Blake Wheeler. "We've missed him a lot back there."

Bogosian took 25 shifts for 17 minutes and 44 seconds of ice time, chipping in an assist in his first game since Nov. 15, a 3-2 victory over Philadelphia in the Jets last home victory before Friday.

ENDING THE DROUGHT

Jets blue-liner Toby Enstrom scored an important goal on Friday, blasting home a slapshot during a 5-on-3 power play for his third goal of the season and first since Nov. 2, ending a 21-game drought.

"I haven't been a big goal-scorer my whole life, I love passing the puck," said Enstrom, who has three goals and 11 points in 37 games this season. "Anyway I can help the team, it doesn't really matter. But it's always fun to score goals, I'm not going to lie."

HAPPY HOMECOMING

Jets left-winger Evander Kane has two goals and four points in three games since returning from a lower-body injury and he's excited to play the only game in his hometown this season -- and first since 2011.

"I'm looking forward to it, I don't get to play there too often," said Kane, who played two-plus seasons with the Vancouver Giants in the Western Hockey League before turning pro. "Yeah, there will be a lot of support, so it will be good."

Kane has nine goals and 18 points in 29 games this season.

MISSING MEN

Jets captain Andrew Ladd skipped Saturday's workout for maintenance, but is expected to be in the lineup on Sunday against the Vancouver Canucks.

However, defenceman Grant Clitsome, who was sick on Friday, is expected to miss Sunday's game because he's "banged up" with an undisclosed injury.

SANTORELLI SHINING

Former Jets winger Mike Santorelli is proving to be one of the biggest bargains in the NHL this season.

Santorelli, who joined the Jets off waivers from the Florida Panthers at the NHL trade deadline last season, is currently tied for third in Canucks' scoring with Ryan Kesler.

The versatile forward and shootout specialist has eight goals (including two game-winners) and 26 points in 38 games after signing a one-year, two-way deal last summer with his hometown team that pays him $550,000 in the NHL

Santorelli, 28, will be an unrestricted free agent again this summer.

The Canucks continue to be led by Daniel and Henrik Sedin, as the twins each have 33 points in 38 games this season.

Winnipegger Dale Weise has three goals, nine points and 14 penalty minutes in 28 games this season.

The Jets are expected to see Roberto Luongo in goal on Sunday.

Luongo is 16-9-6 with three shutouts and a 2.26 goals against average in 31 starts this season.

Former Manitoba Moose netminder Eddie Lack earned the shootout victory over the Chicago Blackhawks on Friday and is 5-2 with a 1.98 goals against average in 10 appearances (seven starts) during his first full NHL season.

Winnipeg Sun LOADED 12.22.2013

730855 Vancouver Canucks

Three minutes to show what you’ve got

By Ben Kuzma, The Province December 21, 2013

Zac Dalpe gained more notoriety for a few musical minutes on the charity stage with Sarah McLachlan than he has on the ice with the Vancouver Canucks.

Singing off-key during the rookie show portion of the annual Dice and Ice gala earlier this month was easily tolerated by the celebrated songstress. Turning over the puck as a fourth-liner under the tough tutelage of John Tortorella will never be tolerated. That gets you a seat on the bench or in the press box.

It’s far from a rousing ovation for harmonizing with McLachlan and then gushing with an “I love you” to her before the large Convention Centre gathering.

Such is life of maintaining your balance on the slippery slope of being a reluctant option for Tortorella. While the past three league champions in the Chicago Blackhawks, Los Angeles Kings and Boston Bruins have thrived by maintaining familiar and formidable fourth lines, that’s never really been the case in Vancouver.

In their run to the 2011 Stanley Cup final, the Canucks used 17 players on the fourth line. Through indifferent play and injuries, it was either a dumping ground for struggling players, a place for rehabbed players to get up to speed or for budding enforcers to try and stay in the game.

In Game 7 against the Bruins in 2011, it was Manny Malhotra centring Tanner Glass and Victor Oreskovich on the fourth line.

Fast forward to today and constants in the fourth-line mix are Tom Sestito, Dale Weise, Jeremy Welsh and Dalpe. But what never changes is doing the most with limited ice time. For those who have excelled offensively do some degree in the minors — Weise, Dalpe and Welsh have had 28, 23 and 14-goal seasons respectively in the AHL — preventing goals is a tough transition to stay NHL employed.

“I’m not going to use them like a Bruins’ fourth line because I don’t think I can — and until I feel I can, I won’t,” stressed Tortorella. “Games are so close and it’s important to have the confidence of the staff. They’re improving but to find them the time, I use my stomach when I feel I can put them on the ice. If it’s just fourth line versus fourth line, they lose ice. I just haven’t been totally comfortable yet.

“Welsh is still trying to find his way, Dalpe is skating well and seems to be quicker on pucks. Weise has struggled, and it’s his concentration and staying consistent. Sestito has made good strides, and with him it comes down to conditioning. It’s hard. It’s difficult to improve when you’re playing three, four, five or six minutes. That’s the world they live in.”

Away from the rink, Dalpe can entertain with guitar and a decent voice. On the ice, entertaining means he’s doing everything to warrant less ice, not more. It’s a tough transition for a 24-year-old Paris, Ont., native who started his NHL ascension with a 27-goal season with the Penticton Vees in 2007-08 and was traded along with Welsh to the Canucks in October.

“There wasn’t an identity and we’re starting to find one because you have to defend,” said Dalpe. “That’s been a knock on me the last couple of years — running around in the D-zone. I’m getting comfortable even though you don’t get much leeway. But that’s the role and I’m not upset about it at all because you’ve got to do the little things. They matter.

“I chased the game before. I analyze things differently, I’m more efficient and it’s huge for me. I’m getting to where I don’t have to think — I just do.”

Welsh played on instinct when recalled and was instantly inserted into the lineup Oct. 20 in Columbus, and didn’t look out of place with two scoring chances in a strong first period. It’s been a steep learning curve after that outing for the 25-year-old Bayfield, Ont., native.

“Once you lose the jitters, it’s an adjustment playing four or five minutes a night,” said Welsh. “It’s a mental game trying to stay ready and not letting your mind drift when you’re sitting there. And when you do get out there in

the second or third periods, you’ve got to get your legs going. It’s almost like every shift is your first shift of the game.

“It’s a balancing act. Maybe earlier, I wanted to bust it open, but I’m learning and maturing to play my role. Getting the puck deep, is going to go further than an offensive flash.”

Not that fourth-liners don’t want to become third-liners. Weise has bounced between lines and had already hit a career high with nine points heading into weekend play.

“You know my stance, it’s nice to be involved,” said the 25-year-old Winnipeg native. “I want to contribute.”

Ditto for Dalpe, Sestito and Welsh.

Vancouver Province: LOADED: 12.22.2013


Pay Santo? Or let him prove his worth?

By Jason Botchford, The Province December 21, 2013

Pay Santo? Or let him prove his worth?

Vancouver Canucks’ Mike Santorelli celebrates after scoring his second goal against the Colorado Avalanche earlier this month at Rogers Arena.

To win, every NHL team needs a Mike Santorelli.

Every team needs a player who outruns his contract. And Santorelli is lapping his.

Every team needs a player who can put up 50 points and do it without the marquee power-play minutes generally reserved for first-liners.

Santorelli sat 16th in the NHL Friday with 24 even-strength points.

That is pretty good.

Every team needs to get lucky, and it’s been a long time since the Vancouver Canucks got as lucky as they did when they signed Santorelli to a one-year, two-way, league-minimum contract.

To find a better deal, you probably have to go back to Anson Carter who scored 33 goals for the Canucks in 2005-06 for $1 million. Then, there was Alex Burrows who signed that bargain-bin, four-year, $8 million deal.

Then, there is Santorelli.

Offering the 28-year-old, Vancouver-born Santorelli a two-way contract on the first day of free agency was the easy part for the Canucks.

There was no risk in betting they’d get a motivated player, out to prove he belongs in the NHL. They got it by offering him something money couldn’t buy — opportunity.

If he proved to be an effective, versatile forward with the Canucks, great. There was lots of room on a team with only three other NHL centres, the third being Brad Richardson, who was a fourth-liner in LA.

If things didn’t work out, that was great too. Santorelli would have been Utica bound, and it would have only cost the Canucks a $250,000 AHL salary.

If there ever was a no-lose contract for a hockey team, this was close to it.

But now what?

Well, now, nearing the season’s midpoint, the Canucks are faced with one of their most difficult decisions of the year.

Santorelli hasn’t just been effective, he’s been indispensable. He’s flourished playing both centre and wing, and has helped to drive play on the Canucks’ second line, especially when paired with Chris Higgins.

The 58-point pace Santorelli was at on Friday is ridiculously good when compared to the four points he produced in 34 games last year, and the 11 in 60 he had the year before.

The underlying analytical numbers suggest it’s even more impressive, when you consider he’s producing these numbers in a shutdown-like role. He’s been facing tough competition with an offensive zone start percentage that is just 43.5 per cent.

When playing with Higgins, Santorelli’s Corsi-for percentage is 55.9 per cent at even strength. That is pretty great.

It all suggests this would be an ideal time for the Canucks to start initiating talks for a contract extension. Because the longer the Canucks wait, the worse it’s going to get if Santorelli comes close to sustaining this rate.

It’s not unreasonable to suggest the Canucks could still get Santorelli to agree to a three-year deal in the $5.25 million range if they were eager to bargain now.

The $1.75 million average salary in that scenario is more than Santorelli has ever made. The three years would give him the type of security he hasn’t had yet in his NHL career.

But this is not the Canucks’ plan.

They are not out to re-sign Santorelli, and they don’t plan to. Not anytime soon, anyway.

If that don’t deviate from that plan, it could mean, by the time they do engage in talks with Santorelli, he is worth $3 million a year. You can bank on that if he finishes this season in the 50-point range and is a pending unrestricted free agent.

Last offseason, centre Boyd Gordon got a three-year, $9-million deal out of Edmonton and he was averaging just 20 points per 82 games in his career.

So, this is a significant bet for the Canucks. But you can understand why they are making it.

A player’s success is a often a delicate balancing act, and the Canucks — for now — aren’t in a position to mess with Santorelli’s centre of gravity.

One of the key reasons they targeted him on the first day of free agency was the drive they thought they’d be getting from a player on the edge of falling out of the league.

Santorelli didn’t disappoint. He came to camp in terrific shape, winning over head coach John Tortorella from Day 1.

What if that were to change with a new contract? What if re-signing him would unconsciously cause him to ease off, taking the foot off the gas?

The Canucks can’t risk it happening even slightly, considering where they are in the standings and how difficult it’s going to be to make the playoffs in the Western Conference this season.

If part of Santorelli’s motivation is the fact he’s trying to earn his next contract, why would the Canucks want to take it away?

More accurately, the Canucks can’t afford to take that away.

And it’s not like Santorelli doesn’t have things left to prove. His success has been for just half a season. Let’s see him do it for an entire year.

More importantly, let’s see him do it in the playoffs.

His weight is under 190 pounds and he’s not six-feet tall. Let’s see him prove he can keep this level of play up in the big, tough Western Conference in April and May.

Because if the Canucks are going to lock up any player for three years, they better have a good idea he can perform in the playoffs.

If Santorelli does, he’ll get his big payday. And he’ll probably get it from the Canucks.



Tortorella will try anything to break a tie

By Jason Botchford, The Province December 21, 2013

By suggesting he’d pull his goalie in overtime if NHL rules didn’t essentially prohibit it, John Tortorella acknowledged two things.

One, the Canucks aren’t equipped to win a majority of shootouts.

And two, this coach is not shy about innovation.

Too bad the NHL has a ridiculous, little-known rule that if you hook your goalie for an extra skater and lose in overtime, your team loses the point it just earned.

Of course it does.

No one would want to see coaches respond to Tortorella if he could roll out four forwards, one defenceman and no goalie in OT, trying to get the win, right?

Instead of that kind of breakneck fun, and fascinating strategy, we get lamentable shootouts, which, in terms of engaging entertainment, jumped the shark back in 2007 or so.

But the point here is Tortorella has not been reluctant to try new things. Ryan Kesler had never played with the Sedins before this year. The Sedins hadn’t killed penalties in seven years. And Friday, in the second half of OT, Tortorella gave us his three-forwards-and-one-defenceman look.

It didn’t work. But the creativity was admirable.

But as creative as Tortorella can be in some areas, he can be equally stubborn in others.

In the “most curious decision making of the 2013-14 season” category, the team’s insistence to keep Dan Hamhuis on the first power-play unit is trumped only by Tortorella’s insistence Friday that he plans to keep tapping the Sedins for the shootout.

The Sedins are now a combined 4-for-31 in the skills competition. But, apparently, that’s not going to deter Tortorella, who said post-game Friday he plans to keep rolling the twins out there, because they told him they want him to.

Funny, watching Henrik Sedin’s feeble, half-speed attempt Friday, which had all the life of an American Idol judges’ panel, you’d think he’d rather be centring the Buffalo Sabres top line than participating in another shootout.

Maybe it will pay off at some point — it can’t get worse, can it?

But, for now, it makes for an easy decision to have some second-guessing fun with.

It’s hardly the only one.

On Saturday, Hamhuis ranked 34th among defencemen in power-play minutes played. He has just one power-play point, an assist, for the season.

That’s a remarkable run of futility.

Thing is, the Canucks’ power play should be far better than its 23rd overall ranking. They generate power-play shots at an elite level. The team ranks second overall with 210 shots on net, despite being 22nd overall for total power-play minutes played.

When a team produces those kind of shot totals with a man advantage, it means it is doing a lot right.

But its lack of production suggests it could use some tweaks. The most obvious, logical one is to stop letting Hamhuis kill both penalties and power plays every game.

Then, there is the Jannik Hansen situation.

The Canucks continue to play him on the top line, even as the Sedins have been fighting through a three-week slump. The line did produce a huge goal on Friday, so it probably means Hansen will be with the Sedins until Burrows ultimately returns.

Too bad, because the coach lost a great opportunity to experiment.

The Burrows injury provided the best chance this year to give Zack Kassian some shifts with the Sedins.

Sure, Kassian has been on the ice for five of the past six goals against, but the centre he has been playing with, Brad Richardson, has consistently been getting smoked in his matchups all season long.

On Friday, Richardson was on the ice for three shots for, and eight shots against. Out of 398 players, Richardson now ranks 396th in shot differential at 39.2 per cent.

That’s not good.

Overall, Richardson has been on the ice for 150 shots for, and 233 against.

Those numbers suggest he’s not a third-line centre in reality, and could use all the help a coach can get him while he’s pretending to be one.

Flipping Hansen to the third line and Kassian to the top line, could make two lines better.

But those ideas must be pretty far out there if the coach who wrote down Nos. 22 and 33 in the shootout Friday won’t consider them.



Gallagher: Tortorella's tactics frustrate at times

By Tony Gallagher, The Province December 21, 2013

There is just something that feels right about having the Winnipeg Jets in the Western Conference again and back playing in Vancouver on some kind of a regular basis.

It’s where they belong if you’re any kind of Canuck fan that’s been around since the early ‘90s when Pat Quinn first introduced good teams to Vancouver. If you’ve followed the team longer than that and remember the WHA Jets, you know how good this feels.

From Ulf Nilsson, Bobby Hull and Anders Hedberg of those years through the likes of Dale Hawerchuk and Teemu Selanne, the Jets have always belonged in the west and when the NHL and CFL declare them otherwise they are like King Canute raging against the waves lapping against the shore. And while none of the players on the roster of the Jets at the moment will have the slightest idea of what is being discussed here, they don’t need to. One day soon the Canucks and Jets will meet again in the playoffs and there will be new memories made between these cities to match those of Greg Adams, Cliff Ronning and Sergio Momesso, Kirk McLean and Dave Babych.

In the meantime, the present Canucks will have to come back down off their Eddie Lack-induced high and get back to work one more day before their extended Christmas break. And as they approach the midway mark of their first season under this curious coach, John Tortorella, you see some things you really like in this team.

This is a team that seemingly really wants to compete again, something that you certainly questioned after the last two playoff exits.

They seem stimulated by Tortorella’s drive and, for the most part, welcome his pushes. When they work and come out strong the system allows them to dominate even good teams for extended periods.

That said, the win over Chicago was mere illusion. The Hawks’ speed overwhelmed the Canucks at times Friday, indicating that any series between the teams is apt to be short unless Lack plays like that in every game.

So many things seem to work under Torts that you can’t wait until the playoffs to see if it can take them anywhere. But then there are some things that drive you nuts.

The obsession with Dan Hamhuis on the point of the first power play unit in Alex Edler’s absence is just plain stubborn stupid.

It puts Henrik Sedin on the left side of the ice where the power play has rarely been successful and the only hope of a goal is if Jason Garrison rockets one in from the right point, or they bang in one of his rebounds.

But no matter how unsuccessful it is, they just keep doing the same thing over and over, which is why they’re 23rd and fading in the power play standings.

The use of the Sedins on the shootout Friday surely had NHL security scrambling to send an investigation team out to Vancouver.

After all, why would any sane person use players who are a combined 4-46 career in the shootout, even if they are your two top scorers? Tortorella’s reasoning may — repeat may — make some sense with Daniel.

But Henrik has never been much of a goal scorer save for 2009-10 when he got 29 as the twins dominated virtually every game they played. Most of those goals came on shots into an empty net after a series of jaw-dropping passes.

But even though it didn’t work, give him credit for trying something different, at least different from recent history. Because just as in Hamhuis on the first unit power play and the similar obsession with Jannik Hansen on the Sedins’ line (despite the fact the twins have combined for just 27 goals in 38 games total, including the PP this season), to keep doing the same thing in this arena doesn’t make sense either.

With luck, the return of Edler and Alex Burrows will eventually prevent Canuck fans from rending their garments in frustration and allow them to fully enjoy this team’s rediscovered joy in competing.



Willes: Gino Odjick needs to be ready to ask for help, no matter how tough and determined he is

By ED WILLES, The Province December 21, 2013

Former Canucks player Gino Odjick, standing, with Pat Quinn and the mom and wife of Pavel Bure during Bure's jersey retirement ceremony at Rogers Arena on Nov. 2, 2013. News broke soon after that he'd checked in for psychiatric treatment at a hospital in Gatineau, Que., as he battles post-career concussion and depression issues.

He starts with a joke.

“That’s the thing with headaches,” Gino Odjick says. “At least you know you still have a head.”

And during a 30-minute phone conversation, there are long stretches when he’s funny and coherent and to the point. At these moments, it’s hard to reconcile the man you’re talking to with the man who’s fighting mental illness; the man so many people care for and so many are worried about.

But isn’t that the way with this disease? Isn’t that its nature? There are no easy answers, no cut-and-dried symptoms and cures. Odjick knows there’s something wrong. He just doesn’t know how to treat it, and that is the source of anguish for the man, his family and his friends.

“I don’t care what medicine heals me,” he says. “I just want to heal. I don’t want to be in pain. I don’t want to be angry.”

On that everyone agrees. The problem is how to get there.

“He thinks it’s our objective to throw him in the hospital and leave him there,” says a member of his inner circle who requested anonymity. “We just want him to get the best care possible.I love the man to death. I truly do. It hurts.

“We’re all waiting for the shoe to drop.”

What does that mean?

“Honestly, we don’t know,” says the Odjick confidante. “Mental illness goes 100 different ways.”

And it’s never in a straight line.

On this day, Odjick says he’s calling from Edmonton, where he’s getting some tests done. Why he chose this day to answer a text that was sent two weeks ago is unclear but, generally, he seemed to be in good spirits and willing to talk about a story that broke nationally in early December when he checked into the psychiatric unit of a hospital in Gatineau, Que.

“I’ve been having the headaches since I retired (from the NHL in 2002),” he says. “It’s like getting hit over the head with an axe. You learn to suppress the pain and you try to live a healthy life.

“I’m not going to function as a normal human being. There will be times when I have to go and rest. But I’ll focus, eat healthy, live healthy and stay in shape.”

And that’s the way he thinks he can beat this thing. Others aren’t as sure.

“Is it manageable?” said the Odjick source. “Yes. But it’s not manageable until he gets some help, and it has to be serious help.”

That, however, would mean slowing down, and Odjick says he has too much work to do to take a break. A great deal of the phone conversation, in fact, revolves around his involvement with First Nations causes and businesses. He said he was put on earth to “eradicate poverty among aboriginals.” To that end, he’s involved in land deals with Canucks owner Francesco Aquilini.

“When I see people on Hastings Street (in downtown Vancouver’s east side) I know how they got there. There’s no opportunity. That’s why I’m in a rush to get things done, to help my people.

“It’s expensive to keep people poor.”

Odjick says his mental-health issues date back to his hockey career and are the by-product of post-concussion syndrome. He says it wasn’t the

fighting that injured his brain but the “cheap shots, the high sticks, the elbows.” Through the NHL, he began seeing a recognized expert in this field in Toronto. But he didn’t stick with the program and that’s part of a frustrating pattern to his family and friends.

“What’s the difference between depression and concussions?” Odjick asks. “It is what it is, but I’m not going to lie down and die. I’m going to make a difference. They’re telling me one thing, but I’m going to fight with what I have. I believe I’ll live until I’m 150.”

“I think his intentions are pure, but he needs to look after himself first,” says the Odjick friend.

Still, the fighter remains. Odjick vows his condition won’t defeat him, and he’s never backed down from anything in his life or his hockey career. And maybe that’s the problem. Sometimes a different kind of toughness is needed; sometimes it has to start with the admission you’re vulnerable and need help. Serious help.

That would be the first step of a journey. You just hope he takes that step.


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ESPN / Tomas Hertl likely out a month

Updated: December 21, 2013, 3:54 PM ET

By Pierre LeBrun | ESPN.com

NHL rookie scoring leader Tomas Hertl will be out at least a month, if not longer, with a right knee injury, the San Jose Sharks confirmed Saturday.

"There's still a lot of swelling, the evaluation will continue but we know he'll be out at least a month. We'll know more in the near future," Sharks general manager Doug Wilson told ESPN.com Saturday.

Hertl was injured in a knee-on-knee collision with Los Angeles Kings captain Dustin Brown in Thursday's game. Brown was given a five-minute major for kneeing and thrown out of the game. The NHL decided the play did not warrant any supplemental discipline.

Entering Saturday's games, Hertl, 20, had a five-point lead atop the NHL rookie points race with 25 points (15-10) in 35 games. His injury could potentially hurt his chances to play in the Olympics for his native Czech Republic.

ESPN LOADED: 12.22.2013

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CNN/Sports Illustrated / Blue Jackets’ Marian Gaborik breaks collarbone against Flyers

By Erin Weaver

Blue Jackets’ Marian Gaborik suffered a broken collarbone Saturday night against the Philadelphia Flyers.

Gaborik sustained the injury in the first period, when a hard hit by the Flyers’ Zac Rinaldo sandwiched him against Braydon Coburn. Gaborik had just returned from a knee injury suffered weeks earlier, and had played in just 12 games so far while racking up five goals and seven assists for 12 points.

The speedy right wing had been out since mid-November, but it seems as if the Blue Jackets have now lost him again indefinitely; there’s no timetable for Gaborik’s recovery.

Gaborik’s injury is also a loss for Slovakia, as he was slated to play for his home country at the 2014 winter Olympics in Sochi.

CNN/Sports Illustrated LOADED: 12.22.2013

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