I am a liar...for an hour, at least

Eh, hiatus schmiatus. I'm bored and there's too much interesting stuff happening to not write anything.

So, here's a quick recap of this week in the NHL:

- Wearing black apparently means you're a thief. Tuomo Ruutu of the Blackhawks was arrested earlier this week after he was spotted jogging a mile away from the scene of an armed robbery, and he fit the description of the criminal. No worries though, as the Chicago PD realized they had their wrong man when they started questioning him. Kinda hard to miss that Finnish accent...Luckily, Ruutu thinks the whole ordeal is hilarious.

- The NHL's superstar goalies began the season on a sour note (think Brodeur and Luongo), but now they are playing like superstars again. Luongo has three shutouts in three games (whaaa??) and Brodeur's Devils are on a roll, blanking the Habs tonight. I guess they call these guys franchise goalies because they always rebound from a shaky game - or a shaky stretch of games.

- Speaking of Brodeur, his shutout against the Canadiens was his 94th career shutout and, when added to his 22 shutouts in playoff games, he is the all-time record holder for shutouts. Sweet.

- Pens win tonight, beating the Stars 4-1. I guess their little break did them good. Three-game winning streak, back at .500, Leafs game tomorrow night on HNIC...good times.

- Speaking of the Leafs - JFJ is still kickin' in Toronto. I'm a little surprised, as I thought Peddie's comments, although unprofessional, signaled a change to come. Sure, that change could come tomorrow, but I figured it would come earlier in the week.

- Ottawa's in a free fall. Five-game losing streak, Alfie out with a groin injury, and now Volchenkov is out for a month with a broken finger. Nothing like losing one of your top D-men to make a bad situation worse. The Sens better hope that Alfredsson's groin heals itself quickly.
Update (01 Dec): Ottawa lost to the Rangers. Alfie came back, but was the invisible man - except for a couple of secondary assists. That would be 6 straight losses, my friends...bad times.

- Party's over in Phoenix. The Coyotes had a great stretch of games when they got their hands on Bryzgalov, but the Russian goalie showed his human side tonight when he allowed 5 goals on 7 shots in the first ten minutes in a game against the 'Hawks. Chicago went on to win 6-1.

- Caps are still the worst team in the NHL. Twenty-five games, 8-15-2 = 18 points. Their closest 'rivals' for basement dwellers are the Kings and the Oilers, with 21 points a piece. I shouldn't bash them too much, though, since the Pens aren't all that far ahead..

- Gary Bettman, commish extraordinaire of the NHL, announced this week that the League may not allow players to play in the 2014 Olympic Games. His reason? Those Games are in Sochi, Russia, so it won't really benefit the NHL (like the Vancouver-Whistler Games), and the time change might be too rough on the players...funny, isn't this the professional sports league that is starting to play regular season games in Europe and is thinking of expanding across the pond?

I know a lot of people don't like seeing professional athletes compete at the Games, but I like to see the best of the best compete for the gold - if they happen to be pro, so be it.

- In probably the only 'real' change in the NHL this year, the League has decided to change the schedule for next season. Now, each team will play every other team. Here's the breakdown: 6 games against division teams (24 games total), 4 games against conference rivals (40 games), 15 games against the 15 teams in the other conference, and three 'wildcard' games. I am dubbing this the 'Sidney Crosby Schedule Change,' because Western teams have been complaining about only seeing Crosby in their respective cities only once every three years, and I agree with their reasoning and actually think that the schedule could divided so that each team plays in every other city. Oh well...

Enough from me...hiatus, continue.

Ilya Bryzgalov - a Russian goalie who does not like cold weather

Bryzgalov, the brand new goalie for the Phoenix Coyotes, must be glad that he's staying in the 'Sun Belt' of the US...Who knows what he would've done if Kevin Lowe had a chance to snatch him up. Probably run away like Pronger, Nylander, and everyone else.

Random stuff

The Vancouver Canucks finally found their offence and broke through Minnesota's defensive system to win Friday night's game 6-2. This was only the third win at home (in 10 attempts) for Vancouver.

The great thing about Vancouver's game was that the offence was spread out among the players - 6 goals by 6 players - rather than having the Sedin twins do most of the offensive work.

Defenceman Luc Bourdon, former Moncton Wildcat who was recently called up from the AHL, scored his first NHL goal - a power play tally late in the third.

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As the entire hockey world must know by now, the Anaheim Ducks placed backup goalie Ilya Bryzgalov on waivers yesterday. Apparently GM Brian Burke tried to trade Bryzgalov, but there were no takers.

"Ilya Bryzgalovhas won three playoff rounds for us and has played very well. But we've committed ourselves to two other goaltenders in Jean-Sebastien Giguere and Jonas Hiller. I told him if I couldn't find a place to play, I would put him on waivers. I gave his agent Don Meehan a time frame, and we're keeping our word to a player. As an organization, we find that to be important. He's a good kid, we know he'll get picked up and he'll play well wherever he goes. He's done his part for us over the last two seasons, and it's time we kept our word," said Burke.

That being said, I'd be absolutely shocked if Bryzgalov went unclaimed. He has a career GAA of 2.48, a 0.908 SV%, and a 26-23-7 record. He definitely helped the Ducks win the Cup last season when Giguere took time off to be with his family. Bryzgalov would be an asset to any organization looking for a goalie - and there are a few teams looking for a bit of an upgrade.

I could see Atlanta GM/Coach Don Waddell making a phone call or two. Perhaps Ray Shero? I guess we must wait and see what happens.

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Tonight: Pens and Rangers. There's only one player (that I can think of) that I truly dislike and that would be Sean Avery. I hope Laraque suits up and teaches Avery a lesson. Punk...

I'll be watching the Ottawa/Toronto game on HNIC. The "Battle of Ontario" has the potential of being a funny game...good times.

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Update: And Bryzgalov goes to......drum roll please......the Phoenix Coyotes! Alex Auld and Mikael Tellqvist have been splitting goaltending duties for Gretz, but Bryzgalov will likely become the number one goalie in Phoenix. Good on ya, Ilya. Just don't play like you did in knob hockey. Time to shut door, time to close 5-hole...

Pre-Season Predictions: Pacific Division

The Anaheim Ducks celebrated their first Stanley Cup win this June, and it will be interesting to see what kind of roster changes happen before training camp. They already lost Penner to the Oilers and picked up Bertuzzi from the Red Wings (though I’d rather take Penner than Bertuzzi for $4M). Schneider also decided to leave Detroit for sunny California. The big question, though, is if Scott Niedermayer and Teemu Selanne retire. If they do, the Ducks will certainly miss them – but their play won’t really suffer. It says a lot about a team when they can lose two of their top players and still have the potential of going deep into the playoffs.

The Dallas Stars is a quiet team, at least in this part of the world, but that doesn’t mean that they’re not good. They have a lot of good players, starting with Mike Modano, but the guy I really like is Marty Turco. I felt really bad for Turco this spring in the playoff series against Vancouver because he had to prove himself by getting the Stars to the second round, but his teammates in front of him let him down. Turco played 7 outstanding games with 3 shutouts and a ridiculous GAA; I hope he doesn’t get any flack because the Stars lost in the first round. In my opinion, all of that blame lies with the forwards who couldn’t score.

I think the Stars will land themselves in the playoffs once again. I expect that they’ll find a little more success in the post-season.

The San Jose Sharks have what’s looking like a crazy good team. Rivet’s looking better in California than in Montreal, ‘Pickles’ is developing into something good, and then you have the forwards: Thornton, Michalek, Cheechoo, Marleau, and so on. If Nabokov can stay solid in net, and if Thornton can push through the playoffs with consistency, then there won’t be much slowing this ‘big’ team down.

The Los Angeles Kings have been hanging around the basement of the League standings for awhile, and I think they’re finally on the upswing. If Cammalleri, Frolov and Kopitar can keep up the good work, and the new guys (like Stuart and Nagy) can contribute, then the Kings might get closer to the playoffs this year. They definitely got a good deal when they acquired Jack Johnson in a trade – something tells me that Carolina will be smacking their heads over this one. The Kings won’t be in the playoffs this season, but they won’t be at the bottom of the League.

That’s because the Phoenix Coyotes will be bringing up the rear come April. The GM may have lost his job this year, but new guy Maloney didn’t do anything to improve the team. Their biggest free agent signing was probably David Aebischer, and that’s not a good thing considering how he finished his season in Montreal.

Jeff Mackie put it best when he wrote, “Who’s going to score goals?” When your team has only one player who scored more than 20 goals in the previous season, something is desperately wrong. Kyle Turris may be able to help the team on the scoring front, but he won’t be available for duty for at least a year. And does anyone else think it’s a little ironic that this score-less team is coached by Wayne Gretzky?

The only bright spot that I can see (and it’s really just a dim ‘light bulb moment’) is that Gretzky acknowledged this spring that the Coyotes have to start building their team through the draft. It certainly is better than loading up on veterans who can’t sign elsewhere. I guess Phoenix fans will be spending the next several years getting their biggest thrill from the Entry Draft.