The Edmonton Oilers now have a defenceman. On Saturday the Oilers found out that Justin Schultz agreed to sign with the Oilers over Vancouver, Toronto, the New York Rangers and Minnesota after not coming to terms with the Anaheim Ducks.
Considered the best young defenceman not in the National Hockey League, Schultz met with Wayne Gretzky, Paul Coffey and Oilers head coach Ralph Krueger over the last few days.
Aggressive? Perhaps. But a necessary tactic because the Oilers haven’t had a great track record of luring free agents.
I am still a little skeptical because the media has completely overhyped two other players over the last five years before they played an NHL game in Jonas Gustafsson and Fabian Brunnstrom, and both of them one could argue were complete flops.
Schultz did play great at the NCAA level, but who is to say he can make a great transition to the NHL without any growing pains?
Now where does General Manager Steve Tambellini go from here? Well, there are two positions that still need upgraded– a stay at home defenceman that can play big minutes and prevent the opposition from scoring and a goaltender because at the end of the day Nikolai Khaibulin and Devan Dubnyk are not the answers.
According to multiple sources, Niklas Lidstrom of the Detroit Red Wings is set to retire. Through his 20 year NHL career, Lidstrom, a native of Vasteras, Sweden, scored 264 goals and 878 assists in 1564 games, all with Detroit. He was also a +450, which ranked him first among active players.
He won a World Championship and Olympic Gold medal for his native Sweden, in addition to four Stanley Cup Championships in 1997, 1998, 2002 and 2008. He also won seven Norris Trophies and played in 12 NHL All-Star Games.
A couple of years ago, I heard Sportsnet’s Roger Millions say that he thought Scott Niedermayer was arguably the greatest defenceman over the last twenty years. I immediately disagreed. It quite simply has to be Lidstrom. As a matter of fact, I would rank him as the third best defencemen of all-time behind Bobby Orr and Paul Coffey.
Now it is your turn. Where would you rank Lidstrom? Please comment on www.anysportanytime.ca.
The Calgary Flames are going to be starting an interesting trend later this month.
Instead of retiring the numbers of greats from the past, they are going to start honouring them through the “Forever a Flame” program. According to the Canadian Press, the sweater numbers of current Flames will be kept in circulation.
The first recipient will be Al MacInnis, the Conn Smythe Trophy Winner for the Flames when they won the Stanley Cup in 1989.
MacInnis played with the Flames from 1981-1994, recording a remarkable 103 points in the 1990-91 season. He is one of only five players in NHL history to record 100 points in a season, joining Bobby Orr, Denis Potvin, Paul Coffey and Brian Leetch.
Am I missing something here? Why are the Flames only honouring MacInnis’ number 2, and not giving him the same status as Mike Vernon who has his number 30 retired and Lanny McDonald who has his number nine retired.
MacInnis will forever be remembered by the Flames, and he definitely should be, but in my opinion deserves the same status as McDonald and Vernon. Anything less has lesser rank.
This week on 15 Minutes of Fame, we recap Super Bowl XLVI between the NY Giants and the New England Patriots, we take a look back at Sam Gagner’s eight-point night against the Blackhawks and we try to figure out if the Edmonton Oilers still have a shot at the playoffs, and who might not be on the team when the trade deadline hits.
In the GABBYs: NHL milestones, Shaun White, Rubellos, Zimbabwe soccer, John Foley and Alex Radulov. The Punchline this week is Minnesota Vikings running back Adrian Peterson.
History was made at Rexall Place on Thursday night.
To say that Edmonton Oilers forward Sam Gagner joined some elite company with his performance in an 8-4 win over the Chicago Blackhawks is quite possibly the understatement of the century. With a four goal, four assist night, Gagner becomes just the third Oiler ever, behind the likes of Wayne Gretzky and Paul Coffey, to rack up eight points in a single game.
Eight points!
Not only did he Gagner have one of the best offensive nights in the long history of the NHL, but the Oilers battled back from down 2-0 to blast a team that had a 22-point lead on them in the Western Conference standings coming into the game.
There was a lot to celebrate for the Oilers in this one – a 43-save night for Devan Dubnyk, Jordan Eberle scoring his 20th of the year, Ryan Whitney netting his first and Cam Barker putting one in after being out since November with an ankle injury. But seriously – eight points?! (more…)
On Thursday night Sam Gagner tied the Edmonton Oilers record for most points in a game with eight as Edmonton defeated Chicago 8-4.
Gagner had four goals and four assists. Coming into the hockey game, Gagner only had five goals all season long.
Taylor Hall added two goals while defencemen Cam Barker and Ryan Whitney added the other two.
Darryl Sittler of the Toronto Maple Leafs has the NHL record with 10 points in a game–on February 7, 1976. The last player to record 8 points in a game was Mario Lemieux of the Pittsburgh Penguins on April 25, 1989. The last player to record 8 points in a regular season game was also Lemieux on December 31, 1988.
Gretzky recorded eight points in a game twice– in 1983 against New Jersey and1984 against Minnesota. Paul Coffey recorded his eight point night against Detroit in 1986, in a game I had the highest honour of attending.
The Detroit Red Wings are still alive in the 2011 Stanley Cup Playoffs and Nicklas Lidstrom made history Friday.
Lidstrom moved into second place all-time in playoff points by a defenceman as the Detroit Red Wings defeated the San Jose Sharks 4-3. Detroit still trails San Jose 3-1 in the Western Conference Semi-Finals.
Lidstrom scored two goals Friday night and now has 182 career playoff points. He passed Ray Bourque of the Boston Bruins/Colorado Avalanche who has a career total of 180 playoff points.
Paul Coffey leads all defencemen with 196 career playoff points.
Who do you think is the best playoff defenceman of all-time? Would you take Coffey, Bourque or Lidstrom to anchor your defense during the postseason?
Meanwhile in Boston Friday night, Milan Lucic scored twice and Nathan Horton had two assists as the Boston Bruins pounded the Philadelphia Flyers 5-1 to sweep the Eastern Conference Semi-Final. Boston will now play Tampa Bay in the Eastern Conference Final.
It seems like that just isn’t the case in the NHL anymore, with the first two days of this week serving as an exclamation point to that notion. On Monday we saw an epic outing from a Duck and a Wing doing something no one else had done before him, while on Tuesday we witnessed an old Bear hitting yet another milestone!
When the current season started there were five players who were at least 40: Nick Lidstrom and Mike Modano of the Detroit Red Wings, Doug Weight of the NY Islanders, Teemu Selanne of the Anaheim Ducks and the senior of the group, Boston’s Mark Recchi who turned 43 on February 1st. Modano and Weight had their seasons cut short by injury, but for the rest of the 40+ crew it has been quite a ride. (more…)
Mario Lemieux at the 2010 Winter Classic Alumni Game (Bloomberg)
Remember when the 2003 Heritage Classic in Edmonton drew 57,ooo people (including yours truly) to watch the Edmonton Oilers play the Montreal Canadiens? It was the first ever regular-season National Hockey League game played outdoors.
It was such a magical event that it drew the likes of Guy Lafleur, Wayne Gretzky and a still-active Mark Messier to an alumni game played a few hours before the regular-season game.
The whole event was broadcast on Hockey Night in Canada – Don Cherry even showed up wearing a cowboy hat. There was fanfare, fun and the feeling that just maybe, the alumni game was a little bit more exciting than the regular-season game. (more…)
The Edmonton Oilers now have a defenceman. On Saturday the Oilers found out that Justin Schultz agreed to sign with the Oilers over Vancouver, Toronto, the New York Rangers and Minnesota after not coming to terms with the Anaheim Ducks.
History was made at Rexall Place on Thursday night.
Remember when 40 years old was old?
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