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Snapshots: Lundqvist, Rantanen, Crosby

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In a shocking turn of events, Henrik Lundqvist has been scratched from today’s matchup with Russia at the World Cup. As of this morning, Lundqvist was the expected starter, but came down with an illness that is making him unable to play in the game.  Jacob Markstrom will take his place in net, while the backup will be Jhonas Enroth.

For Sweden, it’s a huge blow to their chances against the high-powered Russians who will ice a top line of Nikita Kucherov, Pavel Datsyuk and Alex Ovechkin. That trio had 96 goals between them last season, even with Datsyuk obviously in the tail end of his career. While the Russian defense isn’t nearly as strong, their top two lines can play with anyone in the world, and probably outscore the majority of them.  Lundqvist would have been a huge part in any Swedish victory.

This Day In Hockey History: Scotty Bowman

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September 18th is an important day in hockey history for a few reasons. Not only will it mark the first time a ’young guns’ team has hit the ice at an international competition of this magnitude, it was also the day one of the greatest coaches of all-time was born.

September 18th, 1933 in Verdun, Quebec a boy was born who would change the hockey world. As most boys did in Canada, Scotty Bowman quickly took to hockey and was a talented winger, even making it into the Montreal Canadiens minor league system, until March 6th, 1952 when he was struck in the head with a stick and suffered a fractured skull. Bowman remembers having blurry vision and headaches that made him unable to play to the level he was used to. He missed only one game with the head injury, a stark contrast to the brain injury protections that our now in the game.

He’d turn his attention to coaching, and led the Montreal Junior Canadiens soon after. In 30 years of NHL coaching, Bowman would amass over 1200 wins, 28 playoff appearances and 9 Stanley Cups.  He’d raise the cup for three different teams, and go down as clearly one of the top few coaches in all of hockey history, if not the single greatest.

As Bowman tweeted out himself this morning, this would have been his 50th NHL training camp, should he have attended one this year. At 83, he’s been a force in hockey for longer than many coaches have been alive, and is an inspiration to young players and front office types alike. Happy Birthday William Scott Bowman, and thank you.

World Cup Notes: Matthews, Team USA, Canada B

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Team North America hits the ice for the first time in Toronto today, as they prepare for their opening match against Finland. While many eyes are drawn to Oilers’ superstar Connor McDavid or the reunion of Jonathan Drouin and Nathan MacKinnon – the two starred together for the Halifax Mooseheads before being drafted – it was Auston Matthews that got much of the attention at this morning’s presser.

Matthews will be skating on the top line alongside McDavid and Mark Scheifele, despite never having played a professional game on North American soil. He’ll be in front of his new team’s fans, trying to make an impression on Leaf Nation before the season even begins. According to Craig Custance of ESPN, Head coach Todd McLellan spoke highly of Matthews when asked, saying he is hockey’s version of a 5-tool player (a term in baseball that means a player who can do everything well), and saying “he’s got better every day.”

As we wrote yesterday, Matthews is a big part of the Maple Leafs rebuild, and he’s showing why he was the first overall pick and most talked about prospect during the season. If he can keep up with the best in the world, at just 19 years old, he’ll be well positioned to have a long and successful career in the NHL.

  • Team USA head coach John Tortorella is still taking a lot of heat today over his decision to bench Kyle Palmieri and Dustin Byfuglien prior to last night’s loss to Team Europe, and as the team hit the ice for practice the lines had already been mixed up. According to Terry Koshan of the Toronto Sun, Palmieri was back among the first 12 forwards, skating with Max Pacioretty and Brandon Dubinsky on the fourth line. Stephen Whyno adds that Byfuglien – widely expected to be a big part of the top pairing – is back skating with the powerplay unit (though the second group).
  • James Mirtle of the Globe and Mail revealed an interesting couple of tidbits that had been just rumored so far regarding the structure of the World Cup. First, he reported that an original idea for the tournament was to have two Canadian teams, because of the strong depth the country has; he goes on to list P.K. Subban, Kris Letang, Mark Giordano, Taylor Hall and many others as examples of the talent “Canada B” would have. Second, he says that it’s widely believed that the tournament will return to an eight-country format in 2020, meaning that teams like Slovakia, Switzerland and Germany will all have chances. He doesn’t, however, mention if Team Europe or North America will return, though with good showings from both thus far, it would be surprising to see them removed.

Mikko Rantanen Suffers Apparent Right Leg Injury

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5:51pm: Mike Chambers reports that the injury is an ankle sprain and nothing serious.

5:16pm: According to Mike Chambers of the Denver Post, Colorado Avalanche prospect Mikko Rantanen was helped off the ice in today’s rookie tournament game with a right-leg injury. Chambers calls it “trouble”, and if Rantanen is seriously injured it would be for the Avalanche.

Drafted 10th overall in 2015, Rantanen made his NHL debut last season after dominating the AHL. 60 points in 52 games at the lower level, he was one of the best scoring threats in the league, and was expected to contribute to the NHL level this year.

Still just 19-years old, Rantanen is already 6’4″, 211 pounds, and is one of the best power forward prospects in the league, a position that often develops slower than others.  While not a lock to break camp with the team, he’ll be a big part of the top-six for the Avalanche for years to come, pairing with their smaller skilled players to make a balanced, effective line in all three zones.

Rebuilding A Franchise: Toronto Maple Leafs

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When a team has a rich history of success followed by decades of disappointment, they become the league’s punchline. A joke so easy to make, some even start to sympathize with their plight – just see the pre-2004 Boston Red Sox, who fans cheered for to dethrone the mighty Yankees and get back to their previous glory.

The Toronto Maple Leafs are one of these teams. Almost universally hated at one point, they’re now just one of the bottom-feeders, and an afterthought in many fan’s minds. But since Brendan Shanahan took over in April of 2014, the team has had a clear (if sometimes ineffective) plan to tear down the culture and history of the last fifty years, and replace it with a new mentality.

The Leafs ended up at the very bottom of the standings last year, but many believe this was part of the plan. Auston Matthews was the prize, and the team can now start to head back in the right direction, with an ultimate goal of raising the Stanley Cup for the first time since 1967, and 14th in team history.

Now, as they head into their centennial season and celebrate the past greats that have donned the blue and white, the team will look for even a modicum of improvement. Matthews will help, as he looks like a lock to be a star forward in the NHL as soon as next year. He’s already playing on team North America despite never hitting the ice as a professional in NA.

They’ve built an elite prospect pool, that includes Mitch Marner and William Nylander, two blue-chippers that can support Matthews and fellow star Morgan Rielly in the resurrection of one of the leagues worst current franchises.

But in what might be their greatest accomplishment, the Shanahan-led front office has convinced a Toronto market – that is usually one of the harshest in the league – to buy into a rebuild in a way never seen before. When nine players made their debut all at once for the Maple Leafs last year, instead of disgust, fans embraced the rookie mistakes and pointed out the encouraging moments.

One of the problems, however, is that they’re not the only team in the Atlantic division to be “doing it the right way”. Buffalo, one of Toronto’s biggest rivals due to their geographic proximity, is following almost the same blueprint to turn around a once proud franchise. Their team has just as many (if not more) elite level prospects/young players, and is trying to create the same winning mentality.

For the Maple Leafs, this may sound like a broken record. They’ve tried rebuilds before, at least for a little while. What they haven’t had, since the Pat Quinn-led, pre-salary cap powerhouses (that still never got all that close to a Stanley Cup), is this level of talent. Matthews, Rielly, Marner, Nazem Kadri and James van Riemsdyk all represent all-star level talent. It’ll be up to Shanahan, Lou Lamoriello and head coach Mike Babcock to keep the team on this path, and really complete the rebuild.

Rookie Notes: Shmaltz, Puljujarvi, Erne

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Rookie tournaments around the league are underway, with various teams putting their youngesters up against each other to determine readiness and sometimes NHL futures. For Chicago, today is the second of back-to-back matchups, and one of the notable names isn’t participating in the game. Nick Schmaltz, the recently signed NCAA standout was a late scratch from today’s matchup, as Scott Powers of The Athletic reports. Schmaltz was a big part of the game last night against the Blues, and is expected to make his NHL debut at some point this season.

After two seasons at the University of North Dakota, Schmaltz (the Hawks’ first round pick from 2014) is set to make an impact for a Chicago team that has seen many home grown talents leave due to salary cap restraints over the past few years. If he can slide into a scoring role like he did with North Dakota – the 20-year old put up 46 points in his sophomore year in only 37 games – he’ll help to replace the offense that Teuvo Teravainen and Andrew Shaw will be taking with them.

  • After surprisingly dropping to fourth overall in this year’s entry draft, Jesse Puljujarvi is already making an impact for the Oilers at their rookie camp.  After a three point outburst last night against Vancouver, Puljujarvi is one of the hottest topics in the city of champions. He’ll sit out today though against Calgary, though it’s believed he’s not out with an injury. If the Finnish winger develops as most expect him to, Edmonton may have another franchise forward on their team to step into the shoes of the recently departed Taylor Hall.
  • As Bryan Burns of NHL.com writes, Adam Erne will be heading into his fourth rookie camp with the Lightning, after injuries have derailed the early part of the former second-round pick’s career. This time, the winger isn’t just trying to make an impact on the NHL club, but stay healthy enough to compete in a full professional season. An elite scoring threat at the junior level, Erne put up 29 points in 59 games last season with the Syracuse Crunch of the AHL.

World Cup Notes: Team USA, Seguin, Olympics

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The World Cup of Hockey starts today in Toronto, and Team USA will take on Team Europe in the first game of the revamped tournament. While the American team has one of the strongest teams in their history, head coach John Tortorella has made some interesting decisions going into the opener.  As Dan Rosen of NHL.com tweets, the infamous head coach has scratched Kyle Palmieri, Dustin Byfuglien and Cory Schneider for the afternoon matchup.

Byfuglien, part of the team’s original 16 named players, was expected to be a big part of the top pairing on this team and a weapon on the powerplay. As Tom Gulitti adds, Tortorella said just this week that he was excited about the Jets’ blueliner’s big shot. Instead, Erik Johnson will suit up as the team’s sixth defenseman.

  • Tyler Seguin, who injured his foot this week in a pre-tournament match, is not expected to miss any training camp, as Mike Leslie of WFAA in Dallas reports. The hairline fracture that the Stars’ forward suffered is not serious enough to warrant him missing much time, and did not come as a surprise to the Dallas medical staff.  Seguin was replaced by Ryan O’Reilly on Team Canada’s roster.
  • In a new column from Helene Elliott of the LA Times, she examines how any success at the World Cup will give the NHL leverage in any Olympic negotiations down the road. With players and fans getting their international fix from the pre-season tournament, the league is not necessarily obligated to send players to the Winter Games, which usually causes an ugly stoppage mid-season, and prevents the league from hosting their all-star events. With the build up for the tournament being mixed, but overall fairly positive, it seems the league and NHLPA will have a strong bargaining chip to play to try and get a pay structure put in place for any player headed to the Olympics.

Snapshots: Ovechkin, Cleary, World Cup Predictions

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If the NHL won’t send players to the 2018 Olympics, it won’t stop Alex Ovechkin from representing Team Russia. ESPN’s Pierre LeBrun reports that the superstar simply said “I will go there,” and elaborated a bit more on his wording:

“My decision is the same,” Ovechkin said. “So, I don’t know what’s going to happen right now, but we just have to wait what they say and we’ll see. …It’s a situation where you don’t know what’s going to happen. But obviously I said I’m going to play.”

The major hangup over participation is 2018 is insurance costs for players should they play in South Korea. The IOC, according to LeBrun, have expressed hesitancy over covering travel and insurance costs for those playing in the Olympics.

In other hockey news:

  • The Detroit Red Wings have offered Dan Cleary a professional tryout tweets Ansar Khan. Cleary spent the season in Grand Rapids, and was not re-signed by the organization. However, this news will certainly rankle many Detroit fans who point to Cleary as one of the many reasons the Red Wings have continued to slide. Cleary had a hand shake deal with general manager Ken Holland to return following the 2013-14 season, a season where his decline began. Since then, he played sparingly and was relegated to the AHL after the emergence of Dylan Larkin and Andreas Athanasiou.
  • With the World Cup of Hockey beginning its first slate of tournament games today, analysts have started releasing their predictions. NHL.com had a slew of analysts picking their favorites and there were three analysts (Amalie Benjamin, Michael Langr and Dave Stubbs) to reach the championship round. Langr believes that Team USA will win Group A. As for the champions, it was either Team Canada or Team Sweden from the handful of analysts. Puck Daddy’s crew of Greg Wyshynski, Sean Leahy, Josh Cooper and Jen Neale all have Canada being crowned as champions. The runner ups varied from the US (Wyshynski and Neale) to Sweden (Cooper and Leahy). Neale adds that the matchup the NHL desires is USA-Canada, but Sweden–or possibly Team North America, could certainly prevent that.
  • Puck Daddy’s writers also conducted a roundtable where they discussed what must happen for the World Cup to be considered a success. Wyshysnki is conflicted because the success of the World Cup–which he calls a negotiating tool against the IOC–may encourage the lack of NHL participation in the Olympics. This is less about national pride, Wyshynski writes, and more about showing the viability of international hockey outside of the Olympics. WCOH gear is selling well and advertisers are aplenty. Josh Cooper writes that North America, USA, and Canada all need to be successful because it was placed in the North America timezone to cement its support. Neale adds that every game needs to be competitive in order to keep the casual fan interested. Ryan Lambert just hopes for more entertainment than an NHL exhibition game, calling that a moral victory for the NHL.

Atlantic Notes: Marner, Red Wings Trades, Bruins Rookies

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Mitch Marner is ready for the spotlight of Toronto hockey writes Sportsnet’s Michael Grange. The fourth overall pick from the 2014 NHL Draft is ready to prove he belongs in Toronto as he attends his third prospect camp since being selected by the Leafs. Marner has played well with the Ontario Hockey League’s London Knights, registering 59 points (13-46) in 2013-14, 126 points (44-82) in 2014-15,  and 116 points (39-77) in 2015-16. His monstrous production over the past two seasons has the Leafs’ brass attention and Grange writes that should he produce the wizardry he did in London, he’ll absolutely be playing in Toronto this fall. During the Leafs 2-1 victory over the Senators Friday night during the Leafs Rookie Tournament, Marner played well in the Leafs 2-1 victory over the Senators, and also demonstrated some physicality in the Leafs’ win.

In other Atlantic Division notes:

  • Puck Daddy’s Ryan Lambert writes that the Red Wings lack of trades indicate some deeper issues in Hockeytown. The Wings wanted to move Jimmy Howard but failed to do so. They are trying to acquire a top four defenseman but haven’t been able to do that either. Lambert reports that the problem is all the money tied up in older veterans like Henrik Zetterberg and goes as far to say that the Red Wings made a number of poor contract choices this summer. This has been levied by many analysts regarding general manager Ken Holland’s decisions and has contributed to the Red Wings current situation of cap hell. Lambert further writes that the forward core had its struggles last season and that the defense is leaky. Lambert sees the Wings not making any trades due to this situation–unless they find themselves on the outside looking in at the trade deadline. And at that point, the Wings may be sacrificing the future for another playoff run that may end as quickly as the last three have.
  • Joe Haggerty reports via CSNNE that a number of Bruins’ rookies have a real shot at cracking the Bruins roster this fall. Haggerty quotes Boston general manager Don Sweeney as saying that the “door is wide open” for younger players to make their mark. Brandon Carlo, Jakub Zboril and Jeremy Lauzon are three players to watch, and Haggerty says that Carlo has the inside track to make the team out of camp. He does believe that some extra time in the AHL may be a more realistic start for Carlo. Danton Heinen and Jake DeBrusk are also other young Bruins to watch as the Bruins start their analysis of their young talent.

Snapshots: Sedins, Gaudreau, Strome, Dvorak

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They may turn 36-years-old later this month and certainly they are in the twilight of their tremendous careers, but that doesn’t mean the Sedin twins, Daniel and Henrik, are thinking about retiring any time soon. Still with two years remaining on the matching deals they have with the Canucks – at an AAV of $7MM – the Sedins are adamant that there will be one more contract in their shared future, according to Mark Spector of Sportsnet. Whether that contract is with the Canucks or not remains to be seen. As Henrik said:

“If they don’t want us there, then we’ve got to make a decision. We’re not going to retire because we don’t want to play for another team.”

The likelihood the twins retire as Canucks likely depends on a couple of factors. First, how effective will they be at age 38 and two, will Vancouver have embraced a full rebuild by that point. Not many players remain particularly effective into their late 30’s but the Sedins have shown to be an exception. Last year, each twin tallied an average of 0.74 points-per-game, which prorates to roughly 60 over an 82-game schedule. For their careers, Henrik has slightly outproduced his brother, 0.83 to 0.82 points-per-game. The Sedins are still producing reasonably close to their career scoring rates.

Still, in two seasons, Henrik could have more than 1,300 NHL games under his belt and Daniel can reach that plateau if he plays virtually game over the next couple of years. That’s a lot of hockey and doesn’t even count postseason or international contests.

It’s also quite possible the Canucks will have little interest in keeping the Sedins beyond the 2017-18 campaign, as Spector points out. Vancouver doesn’t look to be a playoff team this season and many of their better players are also in the later stages of their careers. The club does have some high-end prospects coming – Brock Boeser and Olli Juolevi, for example – but their system isn’t particularly deep in quality talent. It’s likely their top prospects will just be breaking into the league by 2018-19 and while it’s never a bad thing to have veteran mentors the caliber of the Sedins, the organization may simply want to move in another direction by that point.

The Sedins may well be among the most interesting free agents on the 2018 open market.

More from around the NHL:

  • Perhaps the top remaining unsigned restricted free agent, Johnny Gaudreau, is still no closer to a resolution of his status, and as Eric Francis reports, the contract situation has been “painful,” for the Flames young star. “Honestly, throughout the whole summer and contract situation it’s been so painful because every day it’s something that’s on my mind.” Fortunately for Gaudreau, the World Cup has provided the Team North America participant with a distraction from the situation. “So this tourney has helped me not worry about that. I can just play hockey, have fun, be part of the team and hang out with teammates. It’s been the easiest part of my summer without the contract situation there.” It would be shocking if a new accord between the two sides wasn’t reached soon after the World Cup. Both sides clearly want to get a deal done; it’s just a matter of closing the remaining gap and finding common ground. At least playing in the World Cup will help keep Gaudreau sharp and ready for the regular season, assuming he misses all or part of training camp.
  • John Chayka made a number of moves this summer designed to help the Coyotes get back to the playoffs after a four year absence. However, two players drafted before the league’s youngest GM assumed his position may play critical roles if the team is to qualify for the postseason tournament. Writing for the Coyotes team website, Dave Vest reports that while Chayka is pleased with the overall depth of the team’s prospect pool, expectations are specifically high for 2015 first-round pick Dylan Strome and 2014 second-round choice Christian Dvorak. Strome could position himself to earn one of the team’s top two center positions with a good training camp. In fact, their current depth chart on Roster Resource already lists him as the top center, although he’d likely be best suited playing more protected minutes. Still, Chayka has made it clear to Strome and the other prospects what he expects to see at the team’s prospect camp. “He’s just a real smart, cerebral player who does a lot of good things. It’s not like he has to be hitting the scoresheet every night to make an impact. We want him to play a 200-foot game and look after all the details that we know he learned from last year’s camp. We’re looking for consistency. It’s one thing to have one good game but you have to come in each day and follow that up consistently. For Dylan, and for all of our players, it’s a matter of making an impact in the game consistently. That’s what we’re looking for.” 

 

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