Snapshots: Boucher, Islanders, Kalinin, Predators

Ottawa head coach Guy Boucher will face his former team in Tampa Bay for the first time since they fired him back in 2013 but Bruce Garrioch of the Ottawa Sun notes that Boucher doesn’t bear any ill will towards his former organization.

Part of the reason for that is the amount of time that has passed since he was let go but a main reason is that very few players remain from Boucher’s tenure – just center Steven Stamkos and defenseman Victor Hedman.  In other words, GM Steve Yzerman has practically turned over the entire team over in the last three and a half years which Boucher believes makes this basically just another game for him:

“It’s been awhile. We’re talking almost four years and just so much has changed.  It would be a lot harder (if) it was all the guys I coached and those guys are coming in. Then I guess there would be emotion there.”

Despite all of the turnover, it’s hard to say that the changes haven’t worked as under Jon Cooper, the team has made three straight postseason appearances and has reached the third round of the playoffs in each of the last two seasons.

Other notes from around the league:

• Islanders defenseman Ryan Pulock made his season debut last night but will have to wait a while to play his second game. He left the game yesterday after just four shifts after suffering a lower body injury and Newsday’s Arthur Staple reports (via Twitter) that he will be out for the next four to six weeks.  Pulock was taking the place of Nick Leddy who missed last night’s game with an upper body issue but Staple adds that Leddy is taking part in practice today.
• The Devils are expected to activate center Sergei Kalinin (illness) off of injured reserve prior to tonight’s game against Minnesota, notes Fire and Ice’s Andrew Gross. To make room for him on the active roster, the team announced that they have sent left winger Miles Wood, their lone waiver exempt forward among their depth players, to their AHL affiliate in Albany.
• Over the years, there haven’t been many Swiss-born NHL players but as Adam Vingan of The Tennessean writes, the Predators have had success finding players from there recently. There are currently eight Swiss players in the league and Nashville has three of them – defensemen Roman Josi and Yannick Weber as well as left winger Kevin Fiala.  They’re only the second team in NHL history to have three Swiss players on their roster.