Boston Bruins announcer Jack Edwards equates Matt Cooke with Sirhan Sirhan: Jack Edwards states that Matt Cooke basically assassinated Marc Savard, also that...nominating Cooke for the Masterton Trophy last season was equal to "nominating Sirhan Sirhan as the prisoner of the year."

posted by tommytrump to hockey at 08:27 PM - 11 comments

Boston Bruins Fans Take Over the National Anthem: Last night at the first Boston Bruins game since the marathon bombing, National Anthem singer Rene Rancourt let the crowd take over the singing.

posted by rcade to hockey at 10:23 AM - 2 comments

Iggy!! Part deux?: After 16 seasons, two Rocket Richard Trophies, one trip to the Stanley Cup final, two Olympic gold medals....Jarome Iginla is a Pittsburgh Penguin. The Calgary Flames announced late Wednesday that Iginla is headed to Pittsburgh for forwards Kenneth Agostino and Ben Hankowski and Pittsburgh’s 2013 first-round pick.

posted by tommytrump to hockey at 04:21 AM - 9 comments

Greg Jamison asks for extension on Phoenix Coyotes deal:: In the most clear sign yet of the fragility of Jamison’s efforts to buy the Coyotes, Glendale Mayor Jerry Weiers said an attorney representing Jamison called him late Wednesday night to ask for an extension on a lucrative arena-management deal. The city previously offered Jamison a 20-year deal that pays him an average of $15 million a year to manage Jobing.com Arena. However, the deal mandates that Jamison has to purchase the Coyotes from the NHL by 11:59 p.m. Arizona time today. If Jamison misses the deadline, the deal evaporates. Weiers said of extending the deadline: “Obviously, we’re not going to do that.”

posted by tommytrump to hockey at 01:03 PM - 2 comments

Maple Leafs fire G.M. Brian Burke : The Toronto Maple Leafs new ownership conglomerate of Bell, Rogers and Larry Tanenbaum pulled the plug on Burke on Wednesday morning, shocking the hockey world on a day when most of the game’s owners – included Tanenbaum – are set to vote on the collective agreement. Burke’s firing comes just 4 days before training camps are expected to open and a week and a half before an abbreviated 48-game schedule will start for the Leafs in Montreal on Jan. 19. The curious timing of the decision came after months of soul searching by new ownership, according to MLSE president Tom Anselmi.

posted by tommytrump to hockey at 03:14 PM - 5 comments

Game On!: After 6 long months of negotiations, it took one extremely long night to get the NHL out of the boardroom and back on the ice. A tentative deal to end the 113-day NHL lockout was reached Sunday morning at the end of a marathon 16-hour negotiating session. “We have reached an agreement on the framework of a new collective bargaining agreement, the details of which need to be put to paper,” NHL commissioner Gary Bettman told a news conference. “We’ve got to dot a lot of i’s and cross a lot of t’s. There’s still a lot of work to be done but the basic framework of the deal has been agreed upon.” “Hopefully within a very few days the fans can get back to watching people who are skating, not the two of us,” said Donald Fehr, executive director of the NHL Players’ Association.

posted by tommytrump to hockey at 07:35 AM - 8 comments

How The Greed Stole Hockey: A christmas tale.

posted by Ying Yang Mafia to hockey at 08:52 AM - 3 comments

Reebok signs 15-year-old hockey phenom to huge endorsement deal: The "next Sidney Crosby", only the third 15 year old allowed to play in the OHL, signs a multi-year, multi-million dollar deal with the Reeb. Hopefully there will be an NHL for him to play in before the contract term finishes.

posted by billsaysthis to hockey at 06:36 PM - 1 comment

Charles Pierce on Donald Fehr and the NHL lockout: So, when the NHL players turned to [Fehr], everyone on both sides knew they were hiring a wartime consigliere. The players came out of the last lockout with such impeccably clean clocks that it's a wonder they didn't hire someone with an RPG launcher this time around. Fehr's hiring should have come as a surprise to approximately nobody, since a lockout is always a deliberate tactic by management aimed at achieving a precise goal — in this case, clawing back what little was left after the last time Bettman fastened on this strategy.

posted by rumple to hockey at 03:43 PM - 3 comments

Josh Harding diagnosed with muscular dystrophy: Minnesota Wild goaltender Josh Harding said he will continue to play as an inspiration to others with the disease.

posted by jjzucal to hockey at 06:08 PM - 5 comments

Islanders head west: by 21 miles. The New York Islanders, winners of four consecutive Stanley Cups in the early '80s but no playoff series since 1993, have signed a 25-year lease with Brooklyn's new Barclays Center, home of the NBA's Nets. They have two more years at the moribund Nassau Coliseum.

Though originally planned to be NHL-compatible, Barclays Center was built as an NBA arena. It holds 14,500 for hockey -- fewest in the NHL (Winnipeg's MTS Centre holds 15,004; Hartford's XL Center, formerly the Civic Center, holds 15,365) and 1,750 fewer than the Nassau Coliseum. The proposed seating layout is that of a horseshoe, with no seats behind one goal.

The team is to keep its name (Brooklyn is, after all, part of Long Island), thus avoiding such possible travesties as this.

posted by Mookieproof to hockey at 09:43 PM - 4 comments

One-on-One With Jim Devellano, Detroit Red Wings Senior VP : "It's very complicated and way too much for the average Joe to understand, but having said that, I will tell you this: The owners can basically be viewed as the Ranch, and the players, and me included, are the cattle. The owners own the Ranch and allow the players to eat there. That's the way its always been and that the way it will be forever. And the owners simply aren't going to let a union push them around. It's not going to happen."

posted by tommytrump to hockey at 04:49 PM - 2 comments

The story of the '72 Summit Series, as it's never been told before: An oral history of what really transpired in September of 1972, with material from nearly 100 interviews.

posted by tommytrump to hockey at 09:15 AM - 0 comments

One Year Ago, Yaroslavl Lokomotiv Died: One year ago at this hour, 36 players, team officials and eight crew members of the Kontinental Hockey League hockey team Yaroslavl Lokomotiv died in a plane crash leaving for a game in Minsk. The new team returned to KHL play with a victory Thursday night in Siberia. The director of the now-defunct airline that flew the plane has been criminally charged because the flight's captain was using forged qualification documents and the co-pilot had not completed a requalification exam. New Lokomotiv players include the former NHLers Viktor Kozlov, Niklas Hagman, Sami Lepisto, Vitaly Visnevsky and Curtis Sanford.

posted by rcade to hockey at 08:59 AM - 3 comments

Gary Bettman: Players locked out September 15th if no deal is reached: Would a second lockout in a decade be disastrous for hockey or for Bettman?

posted by dfleming to hockey at 03:23 PM - 7 comments

New Jersey Devils' Cam Janssen telling us how he really feels NSFW: On his Devils losing to the Los Angeles Kings in the Stanley Cup finals: Host: "The first time I did a fat chick, a buddy picked me up from a party and I was hung over and he goes, 'Do you realize what you just did?' ... I would imagine it's something like that. It's like you had a chance, and then it's like ..."Janssen: "Damn fat broads, man." Host: "So the L.A. Kings are the fat broads?"Janssen: "They are. They're the fat broads that you regret bangin', and I've been there and done that." ... Janssen: "There's some shit-talkin' that goes down that pisses some people off. There's a lot of personal shit, man, like, guys know personal shit. ... You wanna get in people's heads to get them off their fuckin' game and don't get me wrong, you don't wanna go too deep with shit because we all have our issues here. Let's be honest."

posted by tommytrump to hockey at 09:06 PM - 5 comments

Minnesota Wild agrees to terms with Parise and Suter: The Wild scored a major coup, agreeing to terms Wednesday with Zach Parise and Ryan Suter, considered the two biggest prizes in this year's free-agent class. Parise, a forward who is a Minnesota native, and Suter, a defenseman, each received 13-year, $98 million deals according to people familiar with the terms. Parise and Suter will form a star-studded tandem that will be expected to alter the fortunes of a franchise that has missed the playoffs four consecutive seasons.

posted by tommytrump to hockey at 01:04 PM - 7 comments

Hockey HoF Selects 4: Pavel Bure, Adam Oates, Joe Sakic, and Matts Sundin are the newest members of the Hockey Hall of Fame. Sakic and Sundin were in their first year of eligibility, while Bure waited 6 years. For Oates, who was in his 5th year of eligibility, it was quite a day, as he was named head coach of the Washington Capitols shortly before his selection to the Hall.

posted by Howard_T to hockey at 09:03 PM - 14 comments

What is the greatest NHL first round draft of all time?:
1979 or 2003?

posted by grum@work to hockey at 02:44 PM - 1 comment

Kings of the NHL: The Los Angeles Kings crushed the New Jersey Devils 6-1 to claim Lord Stanley's Cup for the first time in franchise history, taking the series four games to two. The Kings' first three goals were scored during a five-minute major penalty in the first period. Steve Bernier hit Rob Scuderi behind the Kings' net and was assessed a major penalty for boarding and a game misconduct. Kings Goaltender Jonathan Quick won the Conn Smythe trophy as the playoff MVP.

posted by rcade to hockey at 11:04 PM - 20 comments

Devils nip Kings to force Game 6: New Jersey danced down a tightrope during a wild final minute Saturday to stay alive in the Stanley Cup final. They held on as Los Angeles stormed their net with an extra skater to get a 2-1 win and cut the Kings’ lead in the NHL championship series to 3-2. Game 6 goes Monday in L. A. Now it is the Kings who finally have to sweat a little, although they brushed aside the question of pressure, 25 times in NHL history a team took a 3-0 lead in the best-of-seven Cup final, 20 of them won in a sweep. No team has won in Game 6 after letting its lead slip to 3-2, one team (the 1945 Toronto Maple Leafs) went on to win in seven games and one, the 1942 Detroit Red Wings, blew a 3-0 lead and lost in Game 7 to the Maple Leafs, meanwhile, in the boardroom, the Devils appear to be on very thin ice.

posted by tommytrump to hockey at 10:49 AM - 3 comments

Red Wings' Nicklas Lidstrom: I don't have drive to play another season: Citing a lack of motivation and a knowledge that he no longer had the drive needed to play at the only level acceptable to himself, Lidstrom retired from hockey today after 20 seasons with the Detroit Red Wings. Lidstrom, 42, retires with four Stanley Cups, seven Norris Trophies and a Conn Smythe Trophy. Mike Ilitch ~ “I hate to say this, but we’re not going to see anybody like him again,” the Detroit Red Wings' owner said at Lidstrom’s news conference today at Joe Louis Arena. “We’re going to get some good players, we’ll have good teams, but there won’t be another Nick Lidstrom.” Ilitch called today “one of the most emotional days in Red Wing history.” He called Lidstrom “a Rock of Gibraltar” and marveled that, for 20 years, there never was an off-ice misstep, never an embarrassment and he always was the epitome of class. “There were no variations.”

posted by tommytrump to hockey at 01:37 PM - 16 comments

An Anatomy of Three Hits: Hall of Fame goalie Ken Dryden pens an essay at Grantland about hits and their consequences in the NHL of today and yesteryear.

posted by holden to hockey at 02:30 PM - 1 comment

Power (Dis)Play? Teams In Black Draw More Penalties : Hockey teams wearing darker-colored jerseys are more likely to be penalized for aggressive fouls than teams wearing white jerseys, according to new research. Teams wearing black jerseys in particular get penalized the most, according to an analysis that may offer a window into the hidden psychological dynamics of the ongoing NHL playoffs.

"Teams that wore black jerseys were penalized more, significantly more, than teams wearing other colored jerseys," said researcher Gregory Webster of the University of Florida, Gainesville.

posted by Wensink to hockey at 04:54 PM - 16 comments

Some Bruins Fans Took the Loss in a Classy Way: Reactions on Twitter after Joel Ward scored the game-winning goal for the Washington Capitals over the Boston Bruins in game 7. NSFW. Not safe for anyone who hoped we're better than this in 2012.

posted by yerfatma to hockey at 11:21 AM - 29 comments

Panthers President Too Important for Twitter Critic: After a New Jersey Devils fan told him on Twitter he was "making an ass of himself and the organization," Florida Panthers president Michael Yormark said this in response: "You have 70 followers. No one cares what you think." Now Devils fan Lauren Ashley Rufino has 1,900 followers and was given sweet suite tickets to Tuesday's playoff game between the teams.

posted by rcade to hockey at 01:04 PM - 14 comments

Phoenix Coyotes' Raffi Torres Suspended 25 games: There is throwing the book, and then there is launching the entire library, which is what the NHL has done at the Phoenix Coyotes' Raffi Torres.

posted by tommytrump to hockey at 12:51 PM - 20 comments

Working for the clampdown: Asham gets 4, Neal and Backstrom get 1, Shaw got 3 yesterday. Is Torres next? Shanahan strikes back.

posted by kokaku to hockey at 09:41 AM - 23 comments

Nicklas Lidstrom is ahead of the game: An exploration of what make Lidstrom, Lidstrom.

posted by apoch to hockey at 12:46 PM - 6 comments

The Toughest Team in the Federal League: The movie Slap Shot, which recently turned 35, is "the only movie I trust to understand what sports is really about," writes Will Leitch. "Sports is not a series of storylines, or an Olympic clash of athletes at their peak, or some sort of allegory for how we should all live our lives, a set of role models representing the best our world has to offer. ... It's a sideshow, a carnival, and one that, at the end of the day, has enough sentiment attached that some rich owner can write it off as a tax break and it all goes away."

posted by rcade to hockey at 11:44 AM - 15 comments

Rich Pilon and Jeff Norton immortalized in bronze by Penguins!:
Oh, and there's the third guy, too.

posted by grum@work to hockey at 06:47 PM - 2 comments

Parent Aims Laser Pointer at Opposing Team's Goalie: The father of a high school girl's hockey player in Medford, Mass., was caught aiming a laser pointer at the eyes of the opposing team's goalie during a playoff game. The dad was rooting for Winthrop, which beat Medway-Ashland 3-1 and had the victory upheld after an appeal. Medway-Ashland goalie Kathryn Hamer described the effects of the laser: "It's kind of like when you look at the sun and then you look away you see that spot and you can't see for a couple of seconds. You shake your head and try to get it out of the system and just keep focusing, but it's difficult." Another coach said someone flashed a laser at his goalie's eyes during a game against Winthrop a year ago.

posted by rcade to hockey at 07:18 PM - 15 comments

Butt Ended: Mike Keenan, on coaching the Blackhawks in 1988: So I'm coaching my first exhibition game and I go into the dressing room after the first period to talk, and there's no one in there. I'm wondering what in hell is going on, and take a walk out to the other side of the hallway and the whole team is out there, smoking cigarettes." This is an interesting article on what seems almost unimaginable today - Hockey stars of the 1970s and 1980s, such as Guy Lafleur and Denis Savard, being pack a day smokers, or more.

posted by rumple to hockey at 12:21 PM - 7 comments

Jersey Fouls: Jersey Fouls don't have an expiration date. They're the stench that keeps on stinking.

posted by BoKnows to hockey at 09:37 PM - 3 comments

Sam Gagner has NHL's highest one game point total in 23 years: The Edmonton Oilers forward not only registered his 2nd NHL hat trick, he added an exclamation point by finishing with four goals and four assists in an 8-4- victory over the Chicago Blackhawks Thursday at Rexall Place. Gagner’s eye-popping night puts him in elite company. He tied Wayne Gretzky & Paul Coffey for points in a game by an Oiler.

posted by tommytrump to hockey at 12:48 AM - 4 comments

Potvin Sucks Forever: For 33 years -- and nearly a quarter-century since he retired -- Madison Square Garden faithful have chanted "[Denis] Potvin Sucks." Though Potvin's Islanders have won just two postseason series (both in 1993) since his retirement, the sentiment remains for Rangers fans. While this sort of historical memory is a feature of European (and perhaps collegiate) sports, what are some other examples in North American professional sports?

posted by Mookieproof to hockey at 10:33 PM - 7 comments

Alain Vigneault is desperately concerned about the health of Brad Marchand: but the Bruins would prefer he quiet down. Vigneault was a regular winner of the Lady Byng Trophy during his playing days, who has a tremendous memory for dirty hits like low checks. Something like that could be used to try to injure Marchand in a game.

posted by yerfatma to hockey at 01:39 PM - 28 comments

EASY Online donations to The Jack Jablonski Fund : If you have the means, please consider making a donation to the medical expense fund set up for Jack 'Jabby' Jablonski. Jack is the recently paralyzed Benilde-St. Margaret's hockey player who will very likely never walk again.

posted by NormsAndNedums to hockey at 12:57 PM - 0 comments

NHL re-alignment halted by NHLPA: "It is unfortunate that the NHLPA has unreasonably refused to approve a plan that an overwhelming majority of our clubs voted to support, and that has received such widespread support from our fans and other members of the hockey community, including players," Deputy commissioner Bill Daly said in a statement.

posted by MeatSaber to hockey at 10:10 PM - 6 comments

Florida Panthers Krys Barch Suspended One Game for 'Inappropriate Language' : "I stated my case; I know myself and what I said. It may have been inappropriate but it was nowhere near a racial slur nor that intent,'' Barch stated. Although Barch nor the Panthers will divulge what Barch said, 2 sources told The Herald that, aside from various expletives, Barch basically asked Subban if he "slipped on a banana peel" after his legs went out from under him after being punched by Gudbranson.

posted by tommytrump to hockey at 01:18 PM - 15 comments