Tag: Robin Brownlee

Claim allegations detail horrific abuse in CHL . . . WHL start date in serious jeopardy . . . WJC teams plagued by COVID-19

If you are the least bit squeamish, you may  not want to click on the link in the tweet below. There are some horrific revelations in the story by Rick Westhead of TSN. . . . Please pay attention to the WARNING that accompanies it. . . .

The WHL’s plan to open its next regular season on Jan. 8 took another hit on Tuesday when the Alberta government announced mandatory restrictions that whlinclude the shuttering of all indoor rinks and arenas. The closures take effect on Sunday at midnight and are to run for at least four weeks. . . . Also on Tuesday, Manitoba announced that its restrictions, which have shut down junior hockey in the province, were being extended into January. . . . In Saskatchewan, public health orders are in place through Dec. 17. . . . The WHL has yet to have players report to their teams. It had hoped to have players travel on Dec. 26, then open mini-training camps on Dec. 27, all with the aim of opening a regular season of up to 50 games on Jan. 8. Teams would play strictly within their own divisions during the regular season. . . . In Washington state, which is home to four WHL teams, Gov. Jay Inslee announced Tuesday that restrictions that now are in place will run at least through Jan. 4. . . . In Oregon, home to the Portland Winterhawks, indoor recreation spaces will remain closed at least through Dec. 17. . . . The OHL, which also has yet to bring in its players, has said it wants to open a regular season on Feb. 4. Perhaps the WHL will announce in a day or two that it is aiming for early February, too.

With the rosters of the American, Canadian and Swedish national junior hockey teams having already been impacted by COVID-19, Hockey Canada officials now are being asked about minimums involving the 10-team World Junior Championship that is to open in an Edmonton bubble on Dec. 25.

As in: What is the minimum number of teams needed for the tournament to be played? The answer seems to be eight.

As in: What is the minimum number of players needed for a team to be eligible to play a game? The answer seems to be 17 — 15 skaters and two goaltenders.

Team Canada is out of its two-week quarantine, forced on it when two players tested positive. But before returning to the ice on Tuesday, five players were Canadasent home, all of them for health reasons — F Ridly Greig of the Brandon Wheat Kings, D Daemon Hunt (Moose Jaw Warriors), D Mason Millman (Saginaw Spirit), D Matthew Robertson (Edmonton Oil Kings) and F Xavier Simoneau (Drummondville Voltigeurs).

Those decisions left the camp roster at 41; it will be down to 25 in a few days.

Meanwhile, the Swedish team, which went into Tuesday having had four players already test positive, found out that three coaches have tested positive, including head coach Tomas Montén. Assistant coach Anders Lundberg and video coach Adam Almqvist also have tested positive. . . . F Albin Grewe, a third-round pick by the Detroit Red Wings in the NHL’s 2019 draft, is the fourth player to have tested positive, after F William Eklund, D William Wallinder and F Karl Henriksson.

The Swedish Ice Hockey Association now is working with the IIHF to determine the alternatives. . . . What is known for sure, is that the four players and three coaches won’t be taking part in the WJC. . . . Johan Stark, the Swedish federation’s secretary general, said: “If we see that the trend is going in the wrong direction, we must consider whether participation is possible or not.” . . .

Germany also has had issues with COVID-19 and has lost three players to positive tests — G Tobias Ancicki, F Nino Kinder and F Lukas Reichel. The Chicago Blackhawks selected Reichel with the 17th overall pick of the NHL’s 2020 draft.

The Austrians haven’t escaped unscathed, either, with D Thimo Nickl, a fourth-round pick by the Anaheim Ducks in 2020, having tested positive.

And don’t forget that Team USA also lost three players to COVID-19 protocol. G Drew Commesso, F Robert Mastrosimone and D Alex Vlasic  all are from Boston University, which had to pause it’s men’s hockey program.

Rene Fasel, the longtime president of the International Ice Hockey Federation, has tested positive, as has general secretary Horst Lichtner, the IIHF’s second most-powerful man. The two had to postpone a trip to Belarus where they were to have met with Alexander Lukashenko, the country’s embattled president. . . . The 2021 men’s world championship is to be split between Latvia and Belarus, but the IIHF is under pressure to drop Belarus. The International Olympic Committee has suspended Lukashenko and wants the IIHF to honour that suspension.

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The BCHL’s Langley Rivermen announced on Tuesday that they “have decided to pause the season effective immediately.” With things on hold until at least Jan. 8, the Rivermen statement read: “We feel it is in the best interest of the Langley community, the players, the staff and billets to pause until January, pending further news” from the B.C. government. . . . Under the restrictions implemented by the B.C. government and health officials, players 19 and older are prohibited from practising, while those 18 and younger are able to skate with restrictions. . . . Steve Ewen of Postmedia takes a further look right here at the situation in which the BCHL finds itself.

COVID-19 CHRONICLES . . .

CBC News: Global cases of COVID-19 top 68M: Johns Hopkins University.

CBC News: Manitoba is reporting 13 more COVID-19 deaths and 245 new cases. That’s the lowest daily case total in 17 days and drops the 7-day average to 324.

CBC News: Saskatchewan is reporting 6 more COVID-19 deaths and 183 new cases. That brings the 7-day average down to 264, but the number of hospitalizations hits a record high of 144, with 27 people in intensive care – also a record high.

CBC News: Alberta reports 1,727 new COVID-19 infections, setting another record with 20,388 active cases. Across the province, 654 people are being treated in hospitals for COVID-19, including 112 in ICU. Another nine deaths were added to the toll, bringing the total to 640 since March.

rdnewsNOW: Red Deer with 373 active COVID-19 cases.

Don Martin, CTV: Sad but necessary. A desperate Alberta Premier Jason Kenney has waved the white flag and imposed Canada’s most restrictive regime of shutdowns to fight a horrific COVID surge hitting its hospitals.

Richard Zussman, Global BC: There are 566 news cases of COVID-19 in the province. There have been 38,718 cases of the virus in BC. . . . There have been an additional 16 deaths due to COVID-19. There have been a total of 543 deaths in BC due to the virus. . . . There have been 265 deaths in the province from COVID in the last month. That is nearly half of all of the deaths due to the virus. . . . There are 352 people in hospital with COVID-19 in BC. There are 74 in ICU.

CBC News: Ontario has 1,676 new COVID-19 cases, lowest daily total since November 26. It sends the province’s 7-day average down slightly, from 1,820 to 1,816. Toronto has 588 cases, while Peel Region has 349 and York Region has 141. There are 10 additional deaths. . . . There are 794 people hospitalized with COVID-19 in Ontario; 219 in ICU and 132 on a ventilator. 39,200 more tests were completed in the province with a 5% positivity rate.

CBC News: 36 additional deaths and 1,564 new COVID-19 cases reported in Quebec. That sends the 7-day case average to 1,598 from 1,544.

KGW: 36 COVID-19 deaths in Oregon, most reported in a single day. . . The Oregon Health Authority also announced 1,341 new coronavirus cases on Tuesday.

KOMO News: The Washington State Department of Health reported 2,923 new COVID-19 cases, 145 additional hospitalizations and 26 more deaths in the past 24 hours.

The New York Times: North Carolina’s governor imposed a 10 p.m. curfew on Tuesday in the hope of slowing the spread of the coronavirus. The number of people hospitalized with Covid-19 in the state has nearly doubled in the past month.

CNN: America surpasses 15 million confirmed Covid-19 cases. At least 284,887 in US have died from the virus since the pandemic began.

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The NFL revealed on Tuesday that it had 18 players and 27 other personnel test positive during the week of Nov. 29 to Dec. 5. Since Aug. 1, it has had 173 players and 297 other personnel confirmed positive. . . .

WR Dez Bryant, now with the Baltimore Ravens, tested positive while taking warmups shortly before Tuesday’s game against his own club, the Dallas Cowboys. Prior to the game, Bryant was seen on the field hugging some of the Cowboys. . . . The game went on as scheduled, but without Bryant. . . .

The Green Bay Packers said Tuesday that only employees and players’ household families will be allowed to attend games at Lambeau Field for the remainder of this NFL season. . . .

The football game scheduled for Saturday between the Ohio State Buckeyes and Michigan Wolverines won’t happen for the first time since 1917. The Wolverines have had an outbreak of COVID-19. . . . The Cincinnati Bearcats won’t be visiting the Tulsa Golden Hurricane on Saturday. The Bearcats have been hit by the virus. The two teams will meet Dec. 19 in the AAC championship game, but only if the virus allows it, of course. . . . No. 8 Indiana and Purdue are supposed to meet on Saturday. However, Indiana cancelled practice on Tuesday and has paused all football-related activities because of positive tests. Purdue also cancelled Tuesday’s practice to “evaluate the results of recent COVID-19 testing.” . . .

The ECHL will open its 33rd regular season with five games on Friday and five more on Saturday. Eleven of the league’s 26 teams have opted out, at least for this season. . . . The Fort Wayne Komets and Toledo Walleye had said they would start in mid-January, but now say it will be in mid-February. . . .

Jairo Castillo, a scout with the Los Angeles Dodgers, has died of complications from COVID-19. He died Sunday in the Dominican Republic at the age of 31. . . . Castillo once scouted for the Toronto Blue Jays.

Husband

If you are interested in being a living kidney donor, more information is available here:

Living Kidney Donor Program

St. Paul’s Hospital

6A Providence Building

1081 Burrard Street

Vancouver, BC V6Z 1Y6

Tel: 604-806-9027

Toll free: 1-877-922-9822

Fax: 604-806-9873

Email: donornurse@providencehealth.bc.ca

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Vancouver General Hospital Living Donor Program – Kidney 

Gordon and Leslie Diamond Health Care Centre

Level 5, 2775 Laurel Street

Vancouver, BC V5Z 1M9

604-875-5182 or 1-855-875-5182

kidneydonornurse@vch.ca

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Or, for more information, visit right here.

MiddleAges

Scattershooting on a Sunday while thinking about Canada Day and great gobs of money, and watching Audrey Hepburn smoke her way through Charade . . .

Scattershooting

Murcer

Happy Canada Day, aka the one day a year in which NHL general managers hand out bad contracts — you get one, you get one, and you over there, you get one, too — knowing that they probably won’t be around when the time comes to clean up the mess.

It’s also a day that always has me, for whatever reason, thinking of the cover on the August 1973 issue of the long-gone Sport Magazine that showed New York Yankees outfielder Bobby Murcer on an outfield of greenbacks.

Murcer was the third Yankees player to sign a contract calling for at least $100,000 a season. The other two were Joe DiMaggio and Mickey Mantle.

Yes, $100,000. Think about that today when you were reading about the money being tossed around in the NHL.

At the same, ask yourself this: What do NHL players think when they look at the money that started being thrown around like so much confetti in the NBA when free agency arrived on Sunday? NBA teams announced more than $2.1 billion — that’s BILLION — worth of contracts in a couple of hours.

BTW, Murcer was traded to the San Francisco Giants for outfielder Bobby Bonds on Oct. 22, 1974. It was the first time in MLB history that two $100,000 players had been swapped for each other. Yes, think about that for a moment or two.

I will save you the trouble of watching TV today.

The Toronto Maple Leafs are going to trade F Connor Brown and D Nikita Zaitsev to the Ottawa Senators for D Cody Ceci. . . . The Leafs also have signed F Kenny Agostino. . . .

The Columbus Blue Jackets will re-sign F Artemi Panarin. . . . Or maybe the New York Islanders will sign Panarin, along with G Semyon Varlamov. . . .

The Florida Panthers will sign G Sergei Bobrovsky and F Brett Connolly. . . .

The Vancouver Canucks will sign D Jordie Benn and D Tyler Myers. . . .

The Calgary Flames will sign G Cam Talbot. . . .

The Dallas Stars will sign F Corey Perry and F Joe Pavelski. . . .

The Detroit Red Wings will sign G Calvin Pickard. . . .

The Nashville Predators will sign F Matt Duchene. . . .

The Edmonton Oilers will end up with G Mike Smith. . . .

The Tampa Bay Lightning will sign D Luke Schenn. . . .

The Minnesota Wild will sign F Mats Zuccarello and F Ryan Hartman. . . .

The Washington Capitals will sign F Richard Panik. . . .

The Colorado Avalanche will sign F Joonas Donskoi. . . .

Speculation on these signings, with most of them including money and term, have been reported by various ‘insiders’ in advance of the NHL’s free-agent signing period opening today. Many of those same insiders will be twiddling their thumbs on TV today.

So . . . go out and cut the grass, or take the family to the nearest DQ for a Canada Day Blizzard. You’re welcome!

While we are on the subject of money, let’s not forget that today is payday for Bobby Bonilla, who last played in the bigs in 2001 when he was with the St. Louis Cardinals. . . . The New York Mets will pay Bonilla $1,193,248.20 today, as they have on every July 1 since 2011 and will on every July 1 through 2035. . . . There’s more on that deal right here in a story by Darren Rovell that first appeared on ESPN’s website three years ago.

Dorothy, my wife of more than 47 years, is preparing to take part in her sixth straight Kamloops Kidney Walk on Sept. 22; she also is one of the Walk’s organizers. If you’re new here, she had a kidney transplant on Sept. 23, 2013. . . . If you would like to help her out, you are able to make a donation right here.

A note from Dwight Perry of the Seattle Times: “According to Le’Veon Bell’s 911 call, the last time the New York Jets running back saw those two ‘girlfriends’ who allegedly stole $500,000 of his stuff, he was leaving for the gym and they were still naked in his bed. . . . In other words: Bares 2, Jet 0.”

“LeBron James is giving up his Los Angeles Lakers jersey No. 23 for Anthony Davis, who has worn the number since high school, which is a nice gesture” notes Janice Hough, aka The Left Coast Sports Babe. “And whether James goes back to the No. 6 he wore with the Miami Heat or another number, I am sure the thought of new jersey sales never entered his mind.”

Headline at TheOnion.com: Norfolk Tides third baseman sent down to Baltimore Orioles.

Buried in Patti Dawn Swansson’s latest collection of gems is this one:

“The Chicago Cubs recruited good, ol’ Cookie Monster from Sesame Street to warble Take Me Out to the Ball Game during the seventh-inning stretch at Wrigley Field on Thursday. It’s believed that Cookie is the first Muppet to perform the ritual since Don Cherry.”

The complete piece — featuring lots of goals and yellow and red cards — is right here.

Hey, Sportsnet and TSN, it’s time you stopped blocking off three hours for MLB games, especially when you have a doubleheader scheduled. The day is long gone when you could count on a big league game being completed in fewer than three hours. . . . I have a particular bone to pick with Sportsnet, which scheduled a game involving the Minnesota Twins and the Tampa Bay Rays the other day. When that game had an early 57-minute rain delay, the network switched to a game featuring the Philadelphia Phillies and Washington Nationals, and never did go back to the Twins and Rays. Hey, Sportsnet, when you schedule a game, it is taken off the menu for those of us who subscribe to MLB Extra Innings. Your decision to show Twins-Rays and then not show it meant that viewers were cheated out of watching those two teams play 18 innings.

Is Lamb ticketed for NHL’s Oilers? . . . Is Gustafson Blazers’ next head coach? . . . They want how much for Memorial Cup tickets?

ThisThat

All signs are pointing to the NHL’s Edmonton Oilers introducing Dave Tippett as their next head coach, perhaps as early as today (Friday).

In fact, it could be that Ken Holland, the Oilers’ new general manager, and Tippett finalized things in Vancouver on Thursday prior to Holland’s induction into the B.C. Sports Hall of Fame.

Tippett, 57, has been working as senior advisor to the group that owns the NHL expansion franchise in Seattle. He has ample NHL coaching experience, although he hasn’t been behind an NHL bench since 2016-17 when he was with the Arizona Coyotes.

What impact might Tippett’s return to coaching have in the WHL? There is speculation, PrinceGeorgeas you can see from Robin Brownlee’s tweet, that Tippett might bring Mark Lamb on board as an assistant coach in Edmonton.

Lamb is preparing for his second season as the general manager of the WHL’s Prince George Cougars.

Tippett spent six seasons (2002-09) as the head coach of the NHL’s Dallas Stars, and Lamb was an assistant coach for each of those seasons. Also, Lamb was the head coach of the Tucson Roadrunners, the Coyotes’ AHL affiliate, in 2016-17 when Tippett was the Coyotes’ head coach.

The Cougars also are one of two WHL teams — the Kamloops Blazers are the other — without a head coach at the present time.

Prince George fired head coach Richard Matvichuk late this season, with Lamb taking over. However, Lamb has said that he isn’t interested in continuing as head coach.

While speculation about a new head coach has been quiet out of Prince George, it is believed that Lamb has been planning to do a lot of work on filling the vacancy during the NHL draft, which is scheduled for Vancouver, June 21 and 22. By then the Cougars might be looking for a general manager, too.

After all, would you rather be the general manager of a WHL team or an assistant coach with the Edmonton Oilers?

Meanwhile, Marty Hastings of Kamloops This Week has reported that the Blazers have Kamloops1“about five candidates” on their short list as they look to replace Serge Lajoie, whose stint as head coach lasted one season. Lajoie now is the head coach of the midget prep team at OHA Edmonton.

At the moment, I would suggest that Kyle Gustafson, who has been on the coaching staff of the Portland Winterhawks since 2003-04, is the favourite to be the Blazers’ next head coach. Gustafson was in Kamloops last week and, no, he wasn’t here on a shopping trip.

Matt Bardsley, who just completed his first season and his first bantam draft as Kamloops’ general manager, joined the Blazers after a long run with the Winterhawks, so he is quite familiar with Gustafson.

Furthermore, Gustafson came awfully close to getting a contract as the Blazers’ head coach last summer. He lost out when ownership chose to go in a different direction, deciding to go with Lajoie, who hadn’t coached previously in the WHL, over Gustafson, who had all that WHL experience and is especially familiar with the Western Conference.

Obviously, that didn’t work out, but now Gustafson finally may be about to get his first shot at being a WHL head coach. He certainly has paid his dues.

At one time, Darryl Sydor, one of the Blazers’ co-owners and an assistant coach with the team, was believed to be a favourite to be the next head coach. Taking Note has been told that Sydor will remain part of the team’s coaching staff, but that he won’t be the head guy.

If the Blazers haven’t signed Gustafson by mid-June, you have to think that he will visit Vancouver during the NHL draft and look up Lamb, or whomever is conducting the Cougars’ coaching search at that point.

It may be major junior hockey, but that hasn’t kept tickets for Sunday’s Memorial Cup final in Halifax from going into the pricing stratosphere. . . . The host Mooseheads will be in the final, playing either the OHL-champion Guelph Storm or QMJHL-champion Rouyn-Noranda Huskies, who will meet in tonight’s semifinal game. . . . Tickets for the final carried an original price of $50 to $75. On Thursday, in places like StubHub and kijiji, sellers were looking for as much as $1,000 per ticket. Surely, no one is paying those prices, or are they? . . . There is more right here from Jon Tattrie of CBC News.

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The Calgary Hitmen have signed D Grayden Siepmann and F Brandon Whynott to WHL Calgarycontracts. . . . Siepmann is the fourth first-round selection from the May 2 bantam draft to sign a WHL contract. Calgary selected him with the 13th overall pick. . . . From Abbotsford, B.C., Siepmann played this season with the Yale Hockey Academy bantam prep team, scoring eight goals and adding 21 assists in 29 regular-season games. He had two goals and two assists in five playoff games. . . . Whynott, from Langley, B.C., also played for the bantam prep team at Yale Academy, which is in Abbotsford. Whynott had 17 goals and 15 assists in 30 games, and had one goal and one assist in the playoffs. Whynott was taken in the second round of the 2019 bantam draft.

Stephen Whyno, a hockey writer with The Associated Press, has written a piece that carries this headline — Faces of concussions: NHL’s head-on battle with an epidemic. . . . This is devastating stuff, especially when former NHLer Daniel Carcillo says: “I’m going to choose when I’m going to go. I’ll make that decision of how much pain I’m going to put my loved ones through that are around me.” . . . Carcillo is 34 years of age and wonders what the future holds as he tries to live with the after-effects of at least seven concussions. . . . There is more to this story than Carcillo, though, and as you read it you come to the realization, again, that hockey at all levels needs to do everything it can to get rid of headshots. Yes, the WHL absolutely must ban fighting. . . . Whyno’s piece is right here. Give it 10 minutes of your time.

Tweetoftheday

 

Will McCrimmon stay, or will he go? . . . Another hall beckons Ridley. . . . Broncos explain broadcast plans

ThisThat

It seems most likely that Bob Nicholson, the Edmonton Oilers’ CEO who is searching for a general manager, will chat with Kelly McCrimmon one of these days.

McCrimmon, who owns the WHL’s Brandon Wheat Kings, is in his third season as the Oilersassistant general manager of the NHL’s Vegas Golden Knights.

Here’s Robin Brownlee of oilersnation.com: “The bottom line in job interviews has the prospective employer asking candidates — either directly or by nibbling around the edges — ‘Tell me why we should hire you?’ If I was in McCrimmon’s shoes and staring across the table at Nicholson, I’d be asking, ‘So, tell me why I should work for you?’ If it goes like that, and I suspect that it will, Nicholson had better have his fastball ready.” (Brownlee’s latest is right here.)

So, if this scenario plays out, will McCrimmon end up in Edmonton? Or will he move on to the expansion franchise in Seattle? Or will he stay put?

Time, of course, will tell, but history tells me that McCrimmon may just stay in Vegas and continue to work alongside general manager George McPhee.

Why do I lean that way?

Because McCrimmon, now 58, has a history of wanting to see things through. And after the way the Golden Knights’ season ended on Tuesday night, he may just want to stay there and play it out, something he has done a time or two.

As the 1980s turned into the ’90s, McCrimmon was the Wheat Kings’ general manager and head coach, having taken over as the latter when Doug Sauter took ill during the 1989-90 season.

He later gave up — temporarily, as it turned out — coaching duties to focus on reshaping the organization’s way of doing business. Back then, the Wheat Kings often scrambled just to get into the playoffs, only to be bounced early. By 1992-93, McCrimmon, the GM, owned one-third of the franchise and the reshaping was in high gear. A team that had won only 11 games in 1991-92 put up 43 victories in 1993-94. That was the start of seven straight seasons with at least 39 victories and included three trips to the WHL final and one championship. McCrimmon had surrounded himself with good people and they had turned a once-faltering franchise into one of the best in all of the CHL.

Fast forward to the summer of 2015. The Wheat Kings, with McCrimmon now owner, GM and head coach, were coming off a season in which they went 53-11-8, only to lose out in the WHL final. Then, in May, the Toronto Maple Leafs came calling as they searched for an assistant GM.

By early June there were reports that the Leafs had made an offer to McCrimmon, who had become the Wheat Kings’ sole owner in 2000. As tempted as McCrimmon was to join the Leafs, he chose to stay in Brandon. Why? Because he had overseen the building of the Wheat Kings into a championship contender and he felt he owed it to the players he had drafted and recruited to see it through.

In 2015-16, the Wheat Kings were 48-18-6, and then went on a 16-5 run as they won the Ed Chynoweth Cup as WHL champs.

On Aug. 2, 2016, the Golden Knights announced that they had hired McCrimmon as assistant GM. His fingerprints are all over the organization, including the hirings of Vaughn Karpan as director of player personnel, Bob Lowes as assistant director of player personnel and scouts like Kelly Kisio, Bruno Campese and Erin Ginnell.

You can bet that McCrimmon had a lot to do with the February acquisition and subsequent signing of forward Mark Stone, too. He had played four seasons in Brandon after being a fifth-round pick in the WHL’s 2007 bantam draft.

For all of those reasons, then, McCrimmon just may choose to stay with the Golden Knights, who were in the Stanley Cup final as an expansion team just one year ago.

He has had a hand in all of it and just may want to be an active part of wherever it goes.

Or . . . maybe not!

The semifinals are set at the IIHF U-18 World Championship that is being played in CanadaOrnskoldsvik and Umea, Sweden. . . . Team Canada got past Latvia, 3-1, in Umea on Thursday, and now will travel to Ornskoldsvik to play the host Swedes on Saturday. . . . D Braden Schneider (Brandon Wheat Kings) gave Canada a 1-0 first-period lead, with F Peyton Krebs (Winnipeg Ice) being credited with the 2-0 goal after a Latvian defender scored an own goal on an attempted clearance. . . . Krebs later added an empty-netter. . . . Schneider added an assist to his goal, with F Connor Zary (Kamloops Blazers) and F Brayden Tracey (Moose Jaw Warriors) each earning one assist. . . . G Taylor Gauthier (Prince George Cougars) recorded the victory. . . . Sweden advanced with a 4-2 victory over Czech Republic. . . .

On the other side of the draw, Russia blanked Belarus, 6-0, and Team USA, behind three goals from F Jack Hughes and one from F Cole Caufield, dumped Finland, 6-0. Hughes now has eight goals and eight assists, while Caufield has scored 12 times. . . . Team USA and Russia will meet in a semifinal game on Saturday, also in Ornskoldsvik.

In Game 1 of the best-of-three relegation round, Switzerland dumped Slovakia, 4-1.

The tournament is scheduled to end on Sunday.

Just call him Bob (Hall of Fame) Ridley. . . . Ridley, the only play-by-play voice the Medicine Hat Tigers have had, will be inducted into the Western Association of Broadcasters Hall of Fame in Banff on June 6. The WAB made that announcement on Thursday. . . . Earlier, it was announced that Ridley will be going into the Alberta Hockey Hall of Fame during an induction ceremony in Canmore on July 21. . . . He already is a member of the Alberta Sports Hall of Fame. . . . Ridley has been with CHAT in Medicine Hat since 1968 and has been the voice of the Tigers since they entered the WHL for the 1970-71 season. . . . In all that time, he has missed only one game; legend has it that he was assigned to cover a women’s curling event in which the boss’s wife was playing. . . . Including regular-season and playoffs, he has called the play of 3,931 games involving the Tigers. . . . Ridley also drove the team’s bus until a couple of seasons ago. For some reason, he hasn’t yet been inducted into a bus drivers’ hall of fame. . . . There is more right here on the WAB honour, including ticket information.

If you have ever wanted to own a hockey team, well, this just might be your lucky day. . . . A tip of the Taking Note fedora to a regular reader for sending this along and, yes, it’s legit. . . . And, no, this isn’t a paid advertisement. . . .

 

ForSale

Games involving the Tri-City Americans will be heard on NewsTalk 870 KFLD for two more seasons after the WHL team and Townsquare Media announced a new two-year deal on Thursday. . . . Tri-City’s home-and-away games have been on the station since the 2000-01 season. . . . Craig West, the American’s vice-president of sponsorship sales/broadcasting, is the team’s radio voice.

The Swift Current Broncos revealed earlier this month that they are abandoning the SCBroncostraditional role of having their games on conventional radio, and moving to a model that includes streaming broadcasts. . . . On Thursday, they issued a lengthy news release explaining their new approach. . . . When the news broke earlier in the month, someone familiar with the situation told Taking Note that a “major hang up is broadcast rights/revenue sharing.” In other words, the Broncos were wanting Golden West Radio, the rights holder, to cough up some money, something that apparently wasn’t going to happen. . . . The Broncos’ news release that was issued on Thursday includes this: “The previous model of broadcasting did not provide the Broncos organization with the positive economic impact that sports broadcast rights at our level is expected to provide. By managing our own broadcasting and establishing a business model that leverages our full-time employees’ skill sets and abilities, we will be able to generate a positive financial benefit that will contribute to the long-term financial strength of our organization.” . . . That pretty much explains it all. . . . The complete news release is right here.

The Saskatoon Blades have made some moves on the business side of their organization. Saskatoon. . . Colin Priestner, who just completed his third season as the team’s general manager, now is the president and GM. He will, according to a news release, “oversee all operations . . . in both the hockey and business departments.” . . . Steve Hogle, who had been the president, now is senior advisor. He remains as the Blades’ alternate governor. (Mike Priestner, the team’s owner, is the governor.) . . . Hogle, according to the news release, also “is taking on additional duties with the Blades’ parent company, Go Auto.” . . . Tyler Wawryk, the team’s communications manager for three seasons, has been promoted to director of business operations. . . . Cliff Mapes, who had been vice-president of business, no longer is with the Blades. . . . The complete news release is right here.

George Cochrane has been named the combines manager for the Okanagan Hockey Group, where he will work with Jason Wild, the manager of combines operations. . . . Cochrane had been the head coach of the Kamloops Minor Hockey Association from 2006-17. He left that position to join BC Hockey as manager of programs at their Okanagan Regional Centre. This season, he also was the general manager for the Kamloops-based Thompson Blazers of the B.C. Major Midget Hockey League. . . . There is a complete news release right here.

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NOTES: The Vancouver Giants get their first chance at advancing to the WHL championship final tonight when they entertain the Spokane Chiefs in Langley, B.C. The Giants hold a 3-1 edge in the Western Conference final, after F Dawson Holt scored at 7:07 of OT to give them a 4-3 victory in Spokane on Wednesday night. . . . Holt has three goals and two assists in the four games with the Chiefs. He has five goals and seven assists in 14 playoff games after totalling six goals and 13 assists in 53 regular-season games. . . . Steve Ewen of Postmedia has more on Holt and this series right here. . . . The Giants haven’t been in the WHL final since the spring of 2007 when they lost a seven-game series to the Medicine Hat Tigers. The Giants were the host team for the Memorial Cup that year and went on to win it all. . . .

The Eastern Conference final also resumes tonight as the Edmonton Oil Kings meet the Raiders in Prince Albert. . . . The series is tied, 2-2, after the Raiders skated to a 2-1 victory in Edmonton on Wednesday night. These teams will return to Edmonton for Game 6 on Sunday afternoon.

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Oilers waiting for McCrimmon? . . . Terriers win another MJHL crown. . . . WHL conference finals resume tonight

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The way Robin Brownlee of oilersnation.com sees it, “Edmonton Oilers’ CEO Bob OilersNicholson will certainly have a rooting interest in the San Jose Sharks when they host the Vegas Golden Knights in Game 7 of their opening-round series Tuesday.” . . . Nicholson is heading up the Oilers’ search for a general manager to replaced the fired Peter Chiarelli. With this in mind, Brownlee and a host of other observers feel that Kelly McCrimmon, the Golden Knights’ assistant general manager, is at or near the top of Nicholson’s list of potential general managers. Should the Golden Knights lost Game 7, one could assume that GM George McPhee would give permission to other organizations, like Edmonton and the expansion Seattle club (Totems?), to chat with McCrimmon. . . . Brownlee’s piece is right here.

From a WHL perspective, one wonders what would happen if McCrimmon were to end up signing on with the Oilers as their general manager. That would, in theory, make him responsible for two WHL teams. He owns the Brandon Wheat Kings; the Oilers own the Edmonton Oil Kings.

Remember the hue and cry a couple of seasons ago when the Prince Albert Raiders traded F Leon Draisaitl, whose NHL rights belonged to the Oilers, to the Kelowna Rockets, whose majority owner, Bruce Hamilton, is the chairman of the WHL’s board of governors and widely seen as the most powerful person in the league? Can you imagine the hullabaloo were McCrimmon to be in Edmonton and a prominent player moved from there to Brandon or vice versa?

That, of course, is a long way from happening, but . . .

Latvia beat Slovakia 2-0 on Monday in a Group B game at the IIHF U-18 World Championship in Ornskoldsvik, Sweden. That improved Latvia’s record to 1-2 and lifted it into the quarter-final round. Prior to this year, Latvia had never placed higher than ninth at this tournament. . . . Slovakia, meanwhile, slipped to 0-4 and will face the loser of today’s game between Finland and Switzerland in the best-of-three relegation round. . . . . In Group A on Monday in Umea, Switzerland gave up a 3-0 lead then came from behind to beat Belarus, 5-4 in OT. Switzerland (1-2) will finish the round-robin today against Finland, while Belarus (2-1-1) is on to the quarter-final round. . . . In other games today, Canada (3-0) will meet Czech Republic (2-1), Russia (2-1) is to play Sweden (2-1), and Team USA (3-0) is to meet Latvia. . . . The tournament concludes on Sunday.

F Reece Henry scored at 5:26 of OT to give the Portage Terriers a 3-2 victory over the Terriersvisiting Swan Valley Stampeders in Game 7 of the MJHL’s championship series. . . . The Terriers, under GM/head coach Blake Spiller, won the title, and the Turnbull Cup, for the fourth time in five seasons. They have won MJHL championships in 15 seasons. . . . This was the first MJHL final to go seven games since 1996 when the St. James Canadians beat out the Neepawa Natives. . . . Last night, the Stampeders forced extra time when F Matthew Osadick scored his second goal of the game with 7.3 seconds left in the third period. . . . D Sam Huston and F Chase Brakel also scored for the Terriers. . . . They will meet the SJHL-champion Battlefords North Stars for the ANAVET Cup with Games 1 and 2 in Portage la Prairie on Friday and Saturday nights.

Kelvin Cech is the new head coach of the MJHL’s Winkler Flyers. Cech, 36, spent the past three seasons as an assistant coach with the U of British Columbia Thunderbirds. . . . Cech replaces Steve Mullin, whose contract wasn’t renewed when the Flyers’ season ended. . . . In Winkler, Cech, who is from Edmonton, will work alongside general manager Jeff Jeanson.

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NOTES: The WHL’s conference finals both resume tonight. . . . In the Eastern Conference final, the Oil Kings will entertain the Prince Albert Raiders. The teams split in Prince Albert, the Raiders opening with a 1-0 victory on Friday, and the Oil Kings coming back with a 4-3 OT victory on Saturday. . . . In the Western Conference, the Vancouver Giants hold a 2-0 lead over the Chiefs as they gather for two games in Spokane. The Giants won 4-1 on Friday and 4-2 on Saturday in Langley, B.C. There has been one key injury in the series as Spokane F Luc Smith, 20, left Game 1 in the opening minutes of the first period with an apparent ankle injury. He didn’t return to that game and wasn’t dressed for Game 2. Will he play tonight?

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Who’s favoured as 2020 Memorial Cup host? . . . Tigers add d-men . . . Giants get Ettinger from Wheat Kings

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The WHL’s board of governors will gather in Calgary on Wednesday and one of the things on the agenda will be to hear bids from three teams/cities wanting to play host to the 2020 Memorial Cup.

The Kamloops Blazers, Kelowna Rockets and Lethbridge Hurricanes will make their presentations in that order.

Each team will be allotted 15 minutes — five to show a video and 10 for a presentation — after which governors will have 15 minutes to ask questions.

Some thoughts as Taking Note sees it . . .

KELOWNA — The Rockets last played host to the four-team tournament in 2004 and they KelownaRocketsput on a tremendous show, icing the cake by winning the whole thing. . . . Who wouldn’t want to spend 10 days in May in Kelowna? . . . Bruce Hamilton, the Rockets’ president and general manager, is the chairman of the WHL’s board of governors. He is the most-powerful person in the WHL and don’t discount that as a factor. . . . Including standing room, Prospera Place, which opened in 1999, has room for 6,286 fans. . . . The Rockets are off to a slow start (1-4-0) but history shows that they are more likely to be a contender than a pretender come next season. . . . Odds: 1-1.

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LETHBRIDGE — Lethbridge has never been home to the Memorial Cup tournament. . . . LethbridgeThe Hurricanes, under general manager Peter Anholt and Terry Huisman, the general manager of business operations, have made a remarkable turnaround. After the 2014-15 season, the Hurricanes had missed the playoffs for six straight seasons and lost more than $1.25 million. Ron Robison, the WHL commissioner, was urging shareholders to sell the franchise to private interests. Today, the Hurricanes have reached two straight Eastern Conference finals and shown more than $1 million in profits over those two seasons. . . . On the ice, the future looks bright, led by forwards Dylan Cozens and Logan Barlage, two of the WHL’s best young players. . . . The ENMAX Centre, which opened in 1974 but has undergone recent upgrades, has a capacity of 5,479. . . . Odds: 2-1.

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KAMLOOPS — The Blazers played host to the 1995 tournament, which they won, giving Kamloops1them three Memorial Cup titles in four years. The 2020 tournament will be the 25th anniversary of the third one. . . . Tom Gaglardi and Co. are into their 11th season as the franchise’s owners and have yet to show they can build a winner. That won’t help their cause with the BoG. Neither will the ham-handed fashion in which the retirement/dismissal of Don Hay was handled in May. . . . The Blazers’ new braintrust — headed up by GM Matt Bardsley and head coach Serge Lajoie — hasn’t had time to prove itself. . . . Kamloops, the Tournament Capital of Canada, has a wonderful history of playing host to events like the Brier, the Canada Games and the IIHF World Women’s Championship, something that should hold the bid in good stead. . . . The Sandman Centre had 5,464 seats before some were removed in order to put loge seating in the upper deck on one side. That new seating, in itself, will be an attraction. Unfortunately, the Sandman Centre doesn’t include an on-site restaurant like Prospera Place and the ENMAX Centre. . . . Odds: 5-1.

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THE INTANGIBLE — At the end of the day, money talks . . . and that could be the case MemCup2020again on Wednesday in Calgary. When the WHL’s board of governors votes on a host team/city for the 2020 Memorial Cup, it could easily decide to go with the bid that includes the highest guaranteed profit — teams all get a cut of the profit. If it comes to that, Kamloops may have an edge because the Gaglardi family has more chips than the Kelowna or Lethbridge owners. . . . Earlier this year, Canadian Business estimated the net worth of the Gaglardi family, through Northland Properties, at $3.92 billion, up 10.4 per cent from 2017. . . . Tom Gaglardi owns the NHL’s Dallas Stars and is the majority owner of the Blazers. Might he be interested in attempting to buy the hosting rights for the 2020 Memorial Cup?

The Medicine Hat Tigers have added two 20-year-olds to their roster after learning Tigers Logo OfficialMonday that they will be getting back defencemen Dylan MacPherson and Linus Nassen. Both players had been in camp with the NHL’s Florida Panthers before being assigned to the AHL’s Springfield Thunderbirds. . . . MacPherson, from Redcliff, Alta., has played two seasons with the Tigers, putting up four goals and 18 assists in 124 regular-season games. . . . Nassen, from Sweden, was a third-round pick by the Panthers in the NHL’s 2016 draft. Last season, his first in the WHL, had had one goal and 25 assists in 44 games. . . . With those two in town, the Tigers have four 20-year-olds on their roster, the other two being F Ryan Jevne and D Dalton Gally. . . . As an import, Nassen would be a two-spotter should the Tigers keep him. His arrival won’t affect the Tigers’ import situation as freshmen G Mads Sogaard is their only other European player.

The Vancouver Giants, having lost D Bailey Dhaliwal to a shoulder injury and D Matt VancouverBarberis and D Joel Sexsmith to undisclosed injuries, have acquired D Ty Ettinger from the Brandon Wheat Kings for a seventh-round selection in the WHL’s 2020 bantam draft. . . . Steve Ewen of Postmedia reports that Dhaliwal, 19, who has a history of shoulder problems, could be out for six weeks. . . . Ettinger, 18, is from Ardrossan, Alta. He was dropped from Brandon’s roster late last week. The Wheat Kings selected him in the fifth round of the 2015 bantam draft. . . . Last season, as a freshman, he had two goals and five assists in 45 games with Brandon. This season, he was pointless in one game. . . . As Ewen tweeted: “You’d think the Giants would have good intel on Ettinger, since scouting director Daryl Anning is the father of Wheat Kings head coach David Anning.” . . . Ettinger skated with the Giants on Monday afternoon and could make his debut with Vancouver on Wednesday against the Rockets in Kelowna.

With F Brad Goethals, 20, having left the Saskatoon Blades of his own accord, the club has room for a 20-year-old to join F Max Gerlach and D Dawson Davidson. . . . Goethals’ departure also leaves the Blades with 13 forwards, when they might prefer to carry 14. . . . Goethals was a prolific scorer during two seasons with the midget AAA Eastman Selects (129 points, including 73 goals, in 83 games), but wasn’t able to replicate that in the WHL. He had three goals and three assists in 23 games with the Everett Silvertips in 2016-17, and followed that up with 15 goals and 17 assists in 69 games with the Blades last season. . . . This season, he had one goal in three games with Saskatoon.

Stan Butler wasn’t behind the bench when the North Bay Battalion dropped a 7-5 OHL ohldecision to the host Oshawa Generals on Sunday night. According to the North Bay Nugget, Butler, the Battalion’s director of hockey operations and head coach since 1998-99, said before the game that he plans to take time “to try to get some things sorted out.” Butler, 62, apparently met with Oshawa’s club doctor before deciding not to go behind the bench on Sunday. . . . Butler was behind the bench on Saturday night for a 6-1 loss to the Niagara IceDogs in St. Catharines. . . . In Butler’s absence, assistant coaches Scott Wray and Adam Dennis ran the bench. . . . Butler is the fourth-winningest head coaching OHL history, his 703 victories trailing Brian Kilrea (1,194), Bert Templeton (907) and Dale Hunter (728). . . . Butler spent one season (1996-97) in the WHL, as the head coach of the Prince George Cougars.

MONDAY NIGHT NOTES:

The Prince Albert Raiders have dropped F Nikita Krivokrasov, who will turn 18 on Dec. 23, from their roster. From Westminster, Colo., he is the son of former NHLer Sergei Krivokrasov. . . . Nikita was pointless in two games with the Raiders in 2016-17, and had three goals in 34 games last season. . . . He didn’t dress for any of the Raiders’ first five games the season.

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The Regina Pats are down to two goaltenders after dropping Matthew Pesenti, 17, from their roster. He is expected to return for a third season with the midget AAA Saskatoon Blazers. . . . The Pats now are left with two 18-year-old goaltenders — returnee Max Paddock and Dean McNabb, who was acquired from the Victoria Royals on Sept. 24. . . . Paddock has started all four games as the Pats have started 0-4-0. McNabb has gotten into one game since joining Regina.

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A pair of WHLers drew three-game suspensions on Monday. . . . F Tristen Nielsen of the Calgary Hitmen was suspended after taking a boarding major and game misconduct during a game against the visiting Red Deer Rebels on Sunday. . . . F Cade McNelly was disciplined after becoming involved in what the WHL refers to as a “one-man fight” during a Saturday night game against the Winterhawks in Portland.

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Hey, Lane Lambert and Ross Mahoney . . . I can see you smiling all the way from Kamloops. Congratulations!

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The Calgary Flames revealed Monday that D Juusu Valimaki, 19, will open the NHL season on their roster. Valimaki, from Finland, will turn 20 on Oct. 6. The Flames selected him in the first round, 16th overall, of the NHL’s 2017 draft. . . . Valimaki played the past three seasons with the Tri-City Americans. Last season, he had 14 goals and 31 assists in 43 games. In 159 career regular-season games, he recorded 40 goals and 98 assists. . . . The Flames also have F Dillon Dube, 20, on their roster. Dube, from Golden, B.C., was a second-round pick in the 2016 NHL draft. He spent the past four seasons with the Kelowna Rockets, putting up 232 points, including 101 goals, in 203 regular-season games. Last season, he finished with 38 goals and 46 assists in 43 games. . . .

George Johnson of calgaryflames.com has more right here.

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If you are a WHL fan and are on Twitter, you should be following Geoffrey Brandow (@GeoffreyBrandow). He regularly tweets interesting notes and stats involving WHL teams and players, such as this one from Sunday night:

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