Archive for May, 2010

The rumour that the NHL would schedule two outdoor games for 2010-11 – one in Canada and one in the United States – appears to have come to fruition. The league is set to announce a game between Washington and Pittsburgh on New Year’s Day at Heinz Field, while the Canadian edition will go on February 20 at McMahon Stadium, and feature the Calgary Flames and Montreal Canadiens.

It’s a strange matchup in a lot of ways. Calgary and Montreal have some history (the 1989 Stanley Cup Finals come to mind) but they aren’t natural rivals. They play in different conferences, and Montreal/Toronto or Calgary/Edmonton would seem like more logical rivalries. Mike Cammalleri aside, there really isn’t much in the way of emotion to market here. Given the kind of ratings Toronto generates for Hockey Night in Canada, it’s a little odd not to see them involved as well (although far be it for me to complain that Toronto isn’t getting enough attention).

Still, it’s nice to see the outdoor game coming back to Canada; the Oilers and Canadiens started the trend with the “Heritage Classic” and while it started a bit of a slide for the Oilers it’s a fun spectacle that normally excludes the six teams north of the border.

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Just four years ago, Riku Helenius could claim to be one of the top goaltending prospects in the entire world. He had just been drafted 15th overall by the Tampa Bay Lightning, four spots back of Kings prospect Jonathan Bernier, and ahead of players like Semyon Varlamov. Michael Neuvirth and Steve Mason. He had been brilliant as a goaltender in the Finnish junior system, and starred representing his country at the Under-18 tournament, posting a 0.942 SV% over six games for Finland. He was regarded as a future NHL starter; a superb athlete benefitting from quality coaching in Ilves.

The future looked very bright leaving the 2006 draft, but things haven’t exactly gone as planned since.

2006-07 was a write-off, as Helenius missed almost the entire season with a shoulder injury. He came over to the WHL for 2007-08 and posted decent numbers for Seattle, but struggled to hold off a much younger Jacob DeSerres, who posted superior numbers to Helenius and ended up splitting time with him in both the regular season and the playoffs. Helenius also struggled at the Under-20 World Juniors, posting a miserable 0.864 SV% through four games.

Helenius made his professional debut in 2008-09, and ended up playing a total of 39 games for five different teams, with the bulk of his time spent in the AHL with Norfolk, Tampa Bay’s farm team. Helenius was up and down during his limited time in the ECHL, but played well for Norfolk, outplaying journeyman Mike McKenna (who spent 15 games in the NHL that season) and prospect Karri Ramo (who played 24 games for the parent Lightning).

This season, Helenius found himself in a three-way battle for playing time in Norfolk, squaring off against Slovakian goaltender Jaroslav Janus, a player the Lightning took in the sixth round of the 2009 draft as an overager, and Dustin Tokarski, the Lightning’s fifth-round pick from 2008 (more on Tokarski here). Tokarski won the battle handily, Janus impressed, and Helenius found himself in the Swedish Elite League, where he’s been pretty good in limited time.

I bring all this up today because Helenius’ agent has announced that he’ll be spending next season in Sweden as well; the Lightning apparently deciding to use their Norfolk slots for their other prospects. The decline in Helenius’s stock is evident from his Hockey News prospect ranking: in 2008, he was regarded by the journal as the team’s top prospect; in 2010, he didn’t even crack their top-10 list.

It’s an indication that the club doesn’t have room for him, but while the Lightning have at least four legitimate goaltending prospects (Helenius, Tokarski, Janus and Ramo) other organizations aren’t so lucky, and Helenius is still a legitimate prospect, just one who has had the bad fortune of playing in a stocked system. He’s only 22, he’ stands 6’3” and all the strengths the scouts extol – his calm, systematic approach to the position, his tremendous athleticism – are still strengths.

I know if I were an NHL G.M. with room for an AHL goaltender in my system, I’d be calling up Steve Yzerman and finding out what it would take to acquire Helenius. The odds are that it wouldn’t take much.

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The Conference Finals are in the rear-view mirror now, but some of the most spectacular plays from them are still worth a look as we prepare for the Stanley Cup finals.

There are a lot of pretty plays here – the Asham and Leino goals come to mind, in particular – but for my money the best one is Jonathan Toews sliding the puck cross-crease to Patrick Sharp for the tap-in goal.

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According to multiple sources, the Montreal Canadiens have signed unrestricted free agent Kyle Klubertanz, a puck-moving defenceman who had a breakthrough season last year in the Swedish Elite League.

Klubertanz, who represented the United States at the 2003 U18 tournament, was initially drafted out of the USHL by the Anaheim Ducks in 2004, and went from there to the University of Wisconsin, where he played four years. He put up decent offensive numbers in his time in NCAA hockey, but never progressed to a level where the Ducks were willing to sign him; he played a grand total of five games for the Duck’s’ AHL team.

Cut lose, Klubernatz moved over to Europe, spending 2008-09 with TPS Turku in the top Finnish league. He put up 12 points in 51 games, but played well enough to attract interest from SEL team Djurgarden for this last season.

It was Klubertanz’s performance with Djurgarden that revived dormant NHL interest; he tied for second on the team in scoring, potting 12 goals and finishing with 31 points in 55 games played. The scouting report on Klubertanz suggests he’s a power play specialist, and a quick glance through the plus/minus of Djurgarden’s defence corps seems to support that:

Andreas Holmqvist: +22
Marcus Ragnarsson: +15
Timmy Pettersson: +5
Kyle Klubertanz: –2
David Printz: –2
Alexander Deilert: –5

It’s a good bet that Klubertanz will at least start next season with the Hamilton Bulldogs, but his numbers this year in Sweden suggest he might be able to contribute at the NHL level, as long as he’s kept in a limited role for the time being. At 24 years of age, Klubertanz is a late bloomer but there is still time for him to grow as a defenceman.

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It appears as though NCAA Division I hockey is preparing to throw its hat into the video game arena. This news comes on the heels of the CHL and EA Sports’ formally announcing an agreement leading to the inclusion of both CHL teams and players in the video game developer’s upcoming NHL 11. Given the popularity of hockey video games, and the NCAA’s addition of Paul Kelly as the director of hockey marketing operations, it shouldn’t come as that much of a surprise that the two are in “talks”.

Kelly admitted on the Pipeline Show that there is no formal announcement at this point, and Electronic Arts is currently taking the ‘no comment’ stance at this time according to industry insiders.

“We, the colleges, are very interested in having that happen and we are just currently in the process of figuring out what dimensions that ought to take. [But] just as there is going to be a CHL component to the video game, there will be a college hockey component as well.” - Kelly

Now an NCAA hockey game or its addition to the NHL series is certainly cool in theory, but as with EA Sports’ other installments in their NCAA line of games it does beg the question: will anyone actually care?

Outside of the semi-popular NCAA Football series, the college sports genre has been a tough sell as evidenced by the demise of MVP College Baseball and the more recently disposed NCAA Basketball. The problem with these titles has never been the gameplay, but the lack of authenticity. NCAA Basketball 10 featured first overall NBA draft pick Blake Griffin on the cover, incredibly detailed CBS and ESPN in-game presentation, and rich stadium designs, but actual rosters in the game were filled with created players in place of real-life NCAA stars. The struggles for the NCAA gaming franchise are simply traced back to the difficulty in obtaining licensing.

It must be noted that a video game using an American university’s symbols or likenesses in a video game must go through the Collegiate Licensing Clearinghouse, and such deals are not cheap. While EA Sports already has a relationship with that authority through its NCAA Football franchise, the defunct NCAA Basketball and MVP College Baseball show the challenges of making a collegiate sport other than football sustainable.

-Kotaku

While it would presumably be neat to pick up a controller and attempt to guide Boston College to NCAA championship glory, it could quickly become inane when instead of tickling the twine with Cameron Atkinson you’re left to lead the team with make-believe players with names like ‘Sticky McJefferson’. Sorry, but I’d take a pass on that. The re-playability of next generation sports games is built upon the foundation of the likenesses of their real-life counterparts. NCAA Division I hockey has seen its popularity rising the past couple of seasons, and there’s no doubt that the addition of Paul Kelly will only help foster growth, but they might not be ready for a step into the video game market just yet.

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- The Mario Lemieux “Hot Wheels” are awesome [P.S.A.M.P.]

- Questions abound this off-season for Canadiens [Globe and Mail]

- Guillaume Latendresse’s offensive breakout in Minnesota is one of those 2010 occurrences that Canadiens’ fans easily forgot about during their pretty little march. Naturally, the question of whether he can repeat that performance is posed [From The Rink]

- Steve Yzerman’s resume left the Lightning with a simple decision to make [Don't Trade Vinny]

- Post-afterglow Yzerman hiring fallout [Puck Daddy]

- Forbes magazine determined that the Edmonton Oilers are not cost-effective, spending $1.71 million per victory in 2009-10. Dr. Patrick Rishe of Forbes.com also tagged the Oilers as the worst-run NHL franchise of the last five years. Draft day can’t come soon enough… [Edmonton Journal]

- Making a case against the Devils re-signing Ilya Kovalchuk [In Lou We Trust]

- Adam Foote to return to the Avalanche for 20th NHL season [Denver Post]

- Dale Tallon’s offseason to-do list includes “Please don’t sign any 35 year old journeyman forwards”. Don’t let him near any RFAs, either [The Rat Trick]

- Mats Zuccarello signs with New York Rangers [NewYorkRangers.com via Kukla]

- Slick moves here from Upper Deck: NHL rookie trick shots, juggling skills, and celebrations [Canada Card World]

- Habs fans: “Grateful for what was, longing for what could have been” [Cowhide and Rubber]

- Fairly unanimous reaction from the hockey minds; Stevie Y chosen wisely [M Live]

- Outdoor hockey is coming to Hartford, now if we can just bring back the Whalers [Hartford Courant]

- More greatness from JKallih, the “bitter old Flyers fan” [The Score Buzz]

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To kick off the Stanley Cup finals we’ll be doing a very special live Wednesday chat, along with Greg Wyshynski of Puck Daddy and his usual guests (including yours truly) as well as folks from The Sporting News. Join us at 1:00 EDT.

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