“What I didn’t know about him was that he was such a competitive person,” Murray said.  “I saw him play, I knew he had a great shot and a good skill level, but watching him in practice as well as games, this guy is a real competitive person.”

   The reason I am writing about Corvo is because he has stepped onto his new team—a team loaded with talent and potential—and he set a Senators scoring record for defenseman with five points (1 goal-4 assists) in their 7-2 trouncing of the Toronto Maple Leafs on Thursday.

   Corvo came into the Canadian capital replacing a former Norris Trophy finalist in Zdeno Chara but he has made fans forget that the six-foot-nine defenseman is now in Boston.  (Tonight Corvo gets to face Chara for the first time this season when they meet in Beantown.)

   Add into the equation the fact that Corvo has played in only four games due to injury and that the team has come alive since his return.  They scored only 10 goals in the five games he missed but have scored 22 in the four he has played, including 21 in the last three contests.   Maybe Corvo is the spark that Ottawa needs to carry the team until Wade Redden gets his game back on track.

    This is where the business side of sports kicks in and makes one wonder how decisions are really made.

    Rookie Jordan Staal will learn his fate on Monday—will he stay in Pittsburgh and continue to show that he belongs on the big stage or will he be sent down and given another year “to mature” and to allow the Penguins to breathe easier when it comes to their financial health.  Confused about all this?  Here’s the deal…..

   If Jordan Staal plays in 10 games this season then his entry level contract will kick in and his tenure in the league (at least as it relates to salary cap and free agent issues) starts.  What this means right now is that if he stays in the league in the summer of 2009 the Pens will have both Staal and fellow rookie Evgeni Malkin eligible for restricted free agency.   That could screw hard with Pittsburgh’s salary cap situation. 

   Another thing to consider is that he must play in 40 games (which he will hit in early January) to start the clock ticking on the number of seasons required for unrestricted free agency.  If they assign Staal to Peterborough before he hits 40 games then Malkin will be unrestricted in 2013 while Staal would have another year before he is unrestricted.

   If this sounds confusing…it is.  But the bottom line is this:  With Marc-Andre Fleury in net and Sidney Crosby on the ice the Penguins have two very talented young players.  Add Staal and Malkin to the mix and this team has the chance to be good for a long time.

  “I have a hard time believing it's even a question," said Mark Recchi, Staal’s 38-year old linemate. "I'm not the GM and I don't know about the business side. But I do know he makes our hockey team better."

   In Staal and Malkin the Penguins have the two leading candidates (at least in my mind) for the Rookie-of-the Year honors.  Only time will tell what happens but I side with Recchi—I want to see some good hockey now and I say keep Staal in Pittsburgh.

What I learned about the NHL on Opening Night and a couple of other things

By Jason Reed

OCT 5, 2006 -- LA, CA -- The past few weeks at the Reed household have been spent studying. I have been preparing for the NHL season while my oldest daughter (9th grade) has been adjusting to high school and her younger sister (4th grade) has been, well, just a fourth grader. I have also learned from the older one that a couple of the Ducks are “hot” (so is Sidney Crosby) but that most of the guys are just “whatever”. And, some guy in Washington apparently has a monobrow, but we’re not really sure who that is.

I had been laying low on hockey for most of the summer then one warn evening I was summoned to the home of one Josh Brewster for a birthday party (his) and there assembled on the couch were some of the great hockey journalists in Southern California. We spent a while talking about this guy and that team and who was going where and why. That got me pumped for the new season.

Then came my wedding a couple of weeks later. The new wife is really cool and actually decorated hockey pucks as wedding favors. But she did appreciate it when I promised that Josh, Charles Smith and I would not be found sitting in the back of the reception talking about the Ducks chances and what Mark Crawford had to do to turn LA around quickly. I didn’t promise that we wouldn’t do it, only that we wouldn’t get caught.

So, the family and I curled up on the couch to watch the first games of the year on OLN—I mean VS. (Is there a period after the “S” or not? I’m not really sure.) and waited for the pizza guy to arrive. I looked down at my notes and before the puck even dropped I had the answer to my first question.

That question was: “Can the Buffalo Sabres jerseys really be as hideous as Josh says they are?” Answer: Damn right they are! What were these people thinking? I was told that “considerable polling” was done before the decision was made to use this logo.

Here’s what I want to know—where was the polling done? My guess is that it was nowhere near Buffalo! In fact, I would bet money that the polling was done in Ottawa, Montreal, Toronto and Boston (all the Sabres Northeast Division rivals). People in those cities loved the new logo because it makes it really easy to poke fun of the Sabres whenever they come to town. Even that Calgary jersey with the horse sneezing fire is better than this one.

It was nice to see the ‘Canes raise their banner although I think people in the Tar Heel State are still trying to figure out why the team didn’t cut out the net after they won the Stanley Cup.

Martin Gerber, who won 38 games in Carolina last year looked good between the pipes for the Senators as they trounced the Maple Leafs in Toronto. Ottawa coach Bryan Murray had Gerber on his bench when he coached in Anaheim and he knew what the Euro goalie was capable of. This should be a good fit for Gerber and he will get another chance for a W when the Leafs visit Ottawa tomorrow night.

Friday night is the first game for the new Anaheim Ducks and if ever there was a Ducks team that represented the word “Mighty” this is it. They have a new name, new jerseys, a new arena moniker (the Honda Center replaces the Arrowhead Pond of Anaheim) and a legitimate shot at hoisting Lord Stanley’s Cup next June. Anaheim fans will easily remember their newest star, Chris Pronger. He was the 6-6 215 lb wall that shut them down last year in the playoffs. Sophomore coach Randy Carlyle has to be salivating at the thought of a power play unit consisting of Pronger, Scott Niedermayer, Teemu Sellane, Rob Niedermayer and Andy McDonald.

Up the 5 to the 110 is the Staples Center and the LA Kings who are strolling down an altogether different path. It’s true that they brought in Dan Cloutier to be the number one guy in net but they will need him at his absolute best along with an “in-his-prime” version of Rob Blake on the blueline to have any chance this season.

Give new GM Dean Lombardi and head coach Marc Crawford a year to get the team that they want assembled and you should see LA and Anaheim fighting for dominance in the West.

Friday night’s contest in Anaheim should be interesting to watch as former Canucks coach Crawford meets his former boss in Vancouver, Anaheim’s Bryan Burke.

There are some great games scheduled for early in the season and I am looking forward to seeing Sid the Kid play in So. Cal. The ‘Isles and their backup-goalie-turned-GM along with Rick DiPietro, the goalie whose contract expires three years after my 9-year old graduates from college, will also tour the Left Coast this winter.

Since the family is already in bed I think I will grab another slice—OK, two—and check to make sure that I have enough Cheetos on hand for tomorrow night's nine games!

PACIFIC DIVISION SHOOTOUT:
LA KINGS HOST ROOKIE TOURNEY

SEPT 12, 2006 -- EL SEGUNDO, CA --    Things were howling at the Toyota Center (practice home of the LA Kings) Tuesday night as Wayne Gretzky’s Phoenix Coyotes’ rookies defeated the Los Angeles Kings’ rookies 1-0 in an extra 10 minute “playoff” period to win the Pacific Division Shootout.

   After the Kings and Coyotes posted identical 2-0 records in their first two games and a scheduled game three meeting on Monday night, the two clubs opted for a two game “playoff” for the championship.  If the teams split the two games it would go to an extra playoff period.

   The Coyotes rookies lost game three of the tournament to the Kings by a score of 4-3 and finished the tournament with a 3-1 record. With the Phoenix win Tuesday night Los Angeles also finished with an identical 3-1 record.

   With under a minute remaining in the extra playoff period, Coyotes’ first round draft choice (8th overall) Peter Mueller struck gold when he scored the game-winner at 9:05.

   After a Coyotes timeout, the teams lined up for the face-off in the left circle of the Kings zone. Ryan Garlock won the draw and sent the puck to Coyotes defenseman Keith Yandle. Yandle then moved the puck over to Mueller who moved in and fired a crisp shot on Kings’ goaltender Jonathan Bernier, creating a rebound. As play continued, the rebound bounced back to Mueller who fired the puck into the right top corner of the net for the 1-0 win.

    “Garlock did a good job winning the draw,” said Mueller. “I curled around for the one-timer, shot it and the puck went into the goaltender’s pads. It ended up coming back to me. I didn’t expect it would be coming back, but once I saw it, my eyes lit up and I took the shot to bury it.”

   The playoff win gave the Coyotes their second Pacific Division Title in the last four years. Ironically, when the Kings hosted the first-ever Pacific Division Rookie Tournament back in 2003, it was Phoenix who skated away with the championship.

   The teams returned to their home rinks for the beginning of training camp opening this week.

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