Down the Frozen River

Tag: Tampa Bay Lightning

  • Tortorella and Watson, Wednesday’s News

    download

    Columbus Blue Jackets head coach, John Tortorella, received a two-year extension with the club and will now be under contract through the 2020-21 season. Since being hired by the Blue Jackets on October 21, 2015, Columbus has made the Stanley Cup Playoffs the past two seasons– a franchise first for consecutive playoff berths.

    The Blue Jackets have a 129-87-23 record with Tortorella in 239 games. He currently holds the franchise’s all-time records in wins (129) and points percentage (.588).

    A native of Boston, Massachusetts, the 60-year-old head coach doesn’t show any signs of slowing down and is looking to win his second Stanley Cup from behind the bench. His first came at the helm of the Tampa Bay Lightning in 2004.

    Tortorella’s career as a head coach in the NHL spans stints with four clubs including the Lightning (2000-08), New York Rangers (2008-13), Vancouver Canucks (2013-14) and Blue Jackets (2015-present). He’s a two-time Jack Adams Award winner as the NHL coach of the year and has the most all-time NHL victories among U.S.-born head coaches. He’s also coached the U.S. national team twice in his career– once at the 2008 IIHF Men’s World Championship and again in the 2016 World Cup of Hockey.

    The extension comes at a crucial time for the Blue Jackets as the roster is stacked with talent in the likes of Artemi Panarin, Pierre-Luc Dubois, Seth Jones, Zach Werenski and Sergei Bobrovsky. Panarin and Bobrovsky are both pending-unrestricted free agents at the end of the season and Panarin’s already indicated he doesn’t intend on re-signing with Columbus.

    Unknown

    Wednesday evening, the National Hockey League announced Nashville Predators forward, Austin Watson, would be suspended for all preseason and the first 27 games of the regular season for “unacceptable off-ice conduct”. His suspension is without pay and the NHLPA will be filing an appeal.

    NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman referenced Rule 18-A of the Collective Bargaining Agreement and his ruling came following an investigation by the NHL and an in-person hearing in New York City on Friday, September 7th.

    Watson was arrested on June 16, 2018 in Tennessee relating to an incident with his domestic partner. He pled no contest to a charge of domestic assault on July 24, 2018.

    Per the League’s Public Relations department, Bettman released the following statement, “I have determined that Nashville Player Austin Watson engaged in a physical confrontation with his domestic partner. Today’s ruling, while tailored to the specific facts of this case and the individuals involved, is necessary and consistent with the NHL’s strongly held view that it cannot and will not tolerate this and similar types of conduct.”

    There is no standard length for the suspension of a player involved in domestic violence, but Watson was suspended for seven more games than Vegas Golden Knights defender, Nate Schmidt, received for seven billionths of a performance enhancing drug found in his urine.

  • DTFR Podcast #123- 2018-19 Atlantic Division Season Preview

    DTFR Podcast #123- 2018-19 Atlantic Division Season Preview

    Nick, Colby and Connor talk the Max Pacioretty trade, Eugene Melnyk’s latest antics, John Tortorella’s extension, Adam McQuaid and Steve Yzerman stepping down in Tampa. Also in this episode– DTFR’s official 2018-19 Atlantic Division preview.

    Subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts (iTunes), Stitcher and/or on Spotify.

  • Yzerman Steps Down as Lightning GM, BriseBois Takes Over

    Unknown-3

    There’s a new General Manager in town as Julien BriseBois was named to the position of Vice President, General Manager and Alternate Governor of the Tampa Bay Lightning on Tuesday afternoon. Steve Yzerman stepped aside to become Senior Advisor to the General Manager in the final year of his contract with the franchise’s front office.

    Yzerman cited wanting to spend more time with his family as the 53-year-old former NHLer has been commuting from Detroit to Tampa, The Athletic‘s Pierre LeBrun noted in a tweet.

    BriseBois becomes the seventh General Manager in Lightning history, inheriting a team loaded with talent stockpiled over the tenure of Yzerman at the reins.

    A native of Greenland Park, Quebec, BriseBois, 41, had served as Tampa’s Assistant General Manager under Yzerman since the 2010-11 season after previously working for the Montreal Canadiens as their Vice President of Hockey Operations. He also had been the General Manager of the Syracuse Crunch– Tampa’s current AHL affiliate– during his role under Yzerman.

    Rumors have swirled before that the Detroit Red Wings are looking to shake up their front office during their ongoing rebuild, but the earliest the Red Wings could begin to interview Yzerman– should he be interested– wouldn’t be until his contract runs out with Tampa. Additionally, current Detroit GM Ken Holland, 62, signed a two-year extension last season through the end of 2019-20.

    That’s right about the time the prospective expansion team in Seattle would be courting potential candidates for their General Manager position too.

    For now, let the speculation run wild if you must, but The Athletic‘s Craig Custance has already laid out all the facts.

    Yzerman’s tenure with the Lightning will go down as a memorable one– including a 2015 Stanley Cup Final appearance– despite not winning a Cup.

    On a roster that already included Steven Stamkos and Victor Hedman, Yzerman added players like Ryan Callahan in the Martin St. Louis trade with the New York Rangers, J.T. Miller and Ryan McDonagh in the Vladislav Namestnikov deal with New York and Mikhail Sergachev from the Montreal Canadiens in exchange for Jonathan Drouin over the years while drafting Nikita Kucherov in 2011 and Andrei Vasilevskiy in 2012.

    He also was responsible for signing an undrafted Tyler Johnson in 2011.

    Tampa had a 340-222-60 record with Yzerman as their General Manager (2010-18). During that time, the Lightning’s best season record (54-23-5, 113 points) in franchise history was just last season (2017-18).

  • New York Rangers 2018-19 Season Preview

    download

    New York Rangers

    34-39-9, 77 points, 8th (last) in the Metropolitan Division

    Additions: D Fredrik Claesson, G Dustin Tokarski

    Subtractions: F John Albert (signed, DEL), F Paul Carey (signed with OTT), F Daniel Catenacci (signed, Austria), F David Desharnais (signed, KHL), F Carl Klingberg (signed, Switzerland), F Adam Tambellini (signed with OTT)

    Still Unsigned: G Ondrej Pavelec, D Ryan Sproul

    Re-signed: D Chris Bigras, F Steven Fogarty, D John Gilmour, F Kevin Hayes, F Cody McLeod, F Vladislav Namestnikov,  F Boo Nieves, D Rob O’Gara, D Brady Skjei, F Ryan Spooner, F Jimmy Vesey

    Offseason Analysis: New York Rangers General Manager Jeff Gorton had a plethora of restricted free agents to re-sign this offseason and he successfully pulled off every single one.

    Both Ryan Spooner and Vladislav Namestnikov are signed to matching two-year contracts worth $4.000 million per season. Kevin Hayes has a bridge deal that’s not too shabby either.

    At 26, Hayes signed a one-year, $5.175 million extension with a lot to prove– to himself and to the watchful eye of diehard Rangers fans. At least he’s ahead of Jimmy Vesey in the depth chart– who only managed one-point better than his rookie campaign in his sophomore season (28 points in 79 games last season versus 27 points in 80 GP in 2016-17).

    Gorton has bigger fish to fry this season as the Rangers re-tool on-the-fly.

    New York’s defense is young and susceptible to making errors as Brady Skjei, Rob O’Gara and perhaps even Ryan Lindgren in the near future come into their own. Of those three defenders, Skjei’s been in the Rangers system the longest– given both O’Gara and Lindgren were acquired from the Boston Bruins in separate trades last season.

    One season removed from the shutdown pairing of Marc Methot and Erik Karlsson in Ottawa, the Senators had another underrated good thing going in the pairing of Karlsson and Fredrik Claesson. But Sens GM Pierre Dorion moved on from the 25-year-old Claesson.

    That’s where Gorton and crew swooped in on a make or break one-year, $700,000 offer.

    Claesson has the potential to grow as an anchor in the defensive end while his teammates work the puck out of the zone. If nothing else, he has a lot to prove– along with his peers looking to follow the Bruins model of “rebuilding on-the-fly”.

    Trade expendable pieces (Nick Holden), part with assets (Rick Nash, J.T. Miller, Ryan McDonagh), insert who you envision as the new prototypical Rangers players (Spooner, Namestnikov, Lias Andersson and other prospects) and maybe– just maybe– New York can turn things around sooner than expected.

    How much longer does Henrik Lundqvist have to wait for another chance at his first Cup? Can he win it wearing a Blueshirts sweater? This is just pure speculation, as there’s nothing else to say about the Rangers.

    Just kidding.

    Dustin Tokarski could make a push for the backup role, but all roster decisions are up to first-year NHL head coach David Quinn.

    Quinn’s coming off of a five-season tenure with Boston University as the head coach of its men’s hockey program. During his time, Quinn brought the then Jack Eichel led Terriers all the way to the NCAA championship game– only to be defeated by the Providence College Friars in 2015.

    From 2013-18, Quinn amassed a 105-67-21 overall record at Boston University.

    Like Dallas Stars head coach Jim Montgomery, one would expect an initial struggle from coaching college hockey straight to the National Hockey League, but luckily for the Rangers the timing is right as they can afford a little learning curve during their restructuring.

    Are the Rangers a playoff team in 2018-19? No.

    Can they get back into a playoff spot in 2019-20? We’ll see, but it’s certainly plausible. The pieces are there and time will tell. First things first, they have to clean up last season’s minus-37 goal differential. You can’t win games if you allow more goals than you score.

    Offseason Grade: C

    Perhaps Gorton could’ve pulled off one more signing or one more trade this offseason, but he took care of most of his work by the trade deadline last season with 2018-19 in mind.

    Other than that, it’s been an average offseason for New York. Keep the new young core intact, re-sign their RFAs to quality bridge deals that might make for some tough decision making later or wizardry like that of the Tampa Bay Lightning nature in the salary cap era.

  • DTFR Podcast #122- 2018-19 Central Division Season Preview

    DTFR Podcast #122- 2018-19 Central Division Season Preview

    It’s the DTFR Podcast’s official season preview for all things Central Division in 2018-19 as Nick and Connor embark on season five of the show…

    Subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts (iTunes), Stitcher and/or on Spotify.

  • Down the Frozen River Podcast #121- Four-Year Vets

    Down the Frozen River Podcast #121- Four-Year Vets

    Nick and Connor celebrate the conclusion of the fourth season of the podcast, talk jerseys and logos from the week, the Edmonton Oilers defense and rank the best division by goaltenders.

    Subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts (iTunes), Stitcher and/or on Spotify.

  • Down the Frozen River Podcast #119- Thread Count 101

    Down the Frozen River Podcast #119- Thread Count 101

    Nick and Connor talk Ryan Ellis and his extension with the Nashville Predators, Brady Tkachuk going pro and analyze the 2018-19 national TV schedule.

    Subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts (iTunes), Stitcher and/or on Spotify.

  • Down the Frozen River Podcast #117- Lemieux Bed and Breakfast

    Down the Frozen River Podcast #117- Lemieux Bed and Breakfast

    Nick and Connor present yet another offseason episode while just about every other hockey podcast has gone off to their cottage on the lake. This week: Tom Wilson’s extension, Mario Lemieux’s summer home, Tyler Seguin, third jerseys so far and should teams wear white at home?

    Subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts (iTunes), Stitcher and/or on Spotify.

  • Down the Frozen River Podcast #116- Welcome Back to Arby’s

    Down the Frozen River Podcast #116- Welcome Back to Arby’s

    Nick, Connor, Cap’n and Pete reveal the conclusion of their top-10 series, capping things off with the top-10 defenders in their lifetimes, as well as more arbitration and Columbus Blue Jackets talk.

    Subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts (iTunes), Stitcher and/or on Spotify.

  • Down the Frozen River Podcast #114- Mark Speed: The Mark Recchi Episode

    Down the Frozen River Podcast #114- Mark Speed: The Mark Recchi Episode

    Nick, Cap’n and Pete announce their top-10 right wingers of their lifetimes while Connor mails it in and Nick reads his list (somebody has to do work around here). Keeping with tradition, all of Thursday’s big news was announced during or shortly after recording.

    Subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts (iTunes) and/or on Stitcher.