The Hockey News has been providing the most comprehensive coverage of the world of hockey since 1947. In each issue, you'll find news, features and opinions about the NHL and leagues across North America and the world.

April 12, 1996

The Hockey News April 12, 1996

<div class="byline">By Roy Cummings</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0019-07229/6293286-1-eng-US/f0019-072.jpg" title="f0019-07" width="571" height="977"><figcaption class="caption-body">Patrick Poulin</figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0019-06261/6293293-1-eng-US/f0019-062.jpg" title="f0019-06" width="161" height="161"></div>A lot of Tampa Bay Lightning fans probably didn&rsquo;t realize it, but when Patrick Poulin came to the team in a trading deadline deal, they already had a vision of him etched into their minds.Poulin, you see, was the Chicago Blackhawks&rsquo; player who had to be carried off the ThunderDome ice March 5 after an awkward crash into the boards temporarily left his body an immobile heap of twisted muscle and misaligned vertebrae.He was the one around whom trainers and teammates hovered, waiting nervously to see if he&rsquo;d move again.&lsquo;I was pretty lucky,&rdquo; Poulin said. &ldquo;But for a while that night, I couldn&rsquo;t move my back at all. It was pretty scary. I&rsquo;d never been hurt like that before.&rdquo;The injury occurred in the comer of the ThunderDome ice that leads to the visitors&rsquo; dressing room.&ldquo;I just fell bad,&rdquo; said Poulin, who has missed a number of games this year with that back injury, an ankle injury and the flu. &ldquo;It has just been that kind of year. But maybe my luck is starting to change.&rdquo;In his first game with the Lightning, he helped set up Brian Bradley for the game-winning goal in a 4-2 victory over the Florida Panthers March 23.The assist gave him seven goals and 16 points for the season, but as importantly, at least in Poulin&rsquo;s mind, it made him plus-8.&ldquo;I&rsquo;ve really worked hard on playing better defense,&rdquo; Poulin said. &ldquo;I was plus-12 last year, so I think I&rsquo;m doing a good job of it.&rdquo;NOTEBOOK: Defenseman Igor Ulanov, one of the players acquired from Chicago for defenseman and Lightning fan favorite Enrico Ciccone, made many forget about the traded hero in a hurry. Along with playing steadily on the blueline, Ulanov delivered a couple of crunching open-ice body checks in a victory over Florida and got the better of Bill Lindsay in a second-period fight. Following the fight, Ulanov was escorted to the penalty box to chants of, &ldquo;Igor, Igor, Igor.&rdquo;&hellip;The victory over the Panthers was only the second for the Lightning in 12 tries. It is now 2-9-2 against its cross-state rival&hellip;The Lightning had a 7-0-1 home unbeaten streak snapped when it lost to New Jersey March 26. &#9632;

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NHL TEAMS

Poulin hopes luck changing

<div class="image-hero"><img title="f0011-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0011-011420/6292462-1-eng-US/f0011-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Adam Oates is an outstanding playoff player, but how far will the Boston Bruins go?</figcaption></div>Going into your playoff pool draft armed and prepared can make the difference between winning and an early round exit. Here, are some guides to point you in the right direction. Player rankings on this page include career playoff games (G) and points per game average (PPG), plus 1995-96 regular season first half points (1st), second hall points (2nd), overall power play points (PP) and overall points per game average (PPG). Our top 10 recommendations from each of the 22 teams either in the playoffs or still in playoff contention as of March 29 are listed. &#9632;

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IN THIS ISSUE

YOUR GUIDE TO PLAYOFF POOLS

<div class="byline">By Larry Starks</div>They didn&rsquo;t need formal introductions because they already had met 12 times during the regular season. And apparently, they got tired of exchanging pleasantries.The San Antonio Iguanas and Memphis RiverKings, who finished second and third during the regular season, engaged in one of the most contemptuous semifinal playoff series in Central League history.During the first game of the best-of-seven series, the Iguanas complained the RiverKings were taking cheap shots. Then the second game spilled out of control.Referee Scott Hughes was forced to call the game with 23 seconds remaining after five fights erupted in the final two minutes. The Iguanas didn&rsquo;t have the minimum three skaters required to finish the game. The RiverKings, leading 4-1 at the time, were awarded the win.The ugly affair worsened when CHL two-time leading scorer Brian Shantz took a swing at hit RiverKings&rsquo; coach Herb Boxer with his stick.Shantz missed but was suspended for Game 3 of the series and fined an undisclosed sum.Shantz said the incident was a misunderstanding and he thought the penalty was too hard.&ldquo;We were arguing and he wouldn&rsquo;t (respond),&rdquo; Shantz said. &ldquo;I swung the stick to get his attention. I didn&rsquo;t intend to hit him.&rdquo;A CHL playoff record 59 penalties were called, including 10 for fighting and 28 for roughing.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s a bitter rivalry,&rdquo; said RiverKings&rsquo; goalie Scott Brower. &ldquo;They showed that everything is going to have to be fought for tooth and nail.&rdquo;NOTEBOOK: The league has offered two-year contract extensions to Memphis coach Herb Boxer and San Antonio coach John Torchetti. &#9632;

Stick swinging caps ugly game

Number of teams which have retired the jersey No. 9 (two teams each for Gordie Howe and Bobby Hull): 7Number of goaltenders in the NHL this season who have once been property of the Toronto Maple Leafs: 11U.S. dollar value of most valuable hockey card: a centered, near-mint Gordie Howe rookie card, 1951-52 Parkhurst: 3,500 &#9632;

BY THE NUMBERS

<div class="image-hero"><img title="Cover-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/cover-01919/6294343-1-eng-US/cover-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Rick TocchetRon FrancisGoalie chris Osgood is just one reason why Detroit&rsquo;s so good</figcaption></div>LEY JOINS FIRING LINEKID HUE: FIT TO BE A FLYER<h2>Bruisin&rsquo; Bruin</h2>Feisty forward provides Boston spring scoring<h2>NHL pool tips</h2>The statistics you need to win your playoff pool &#9632;

Cover-01

WHITE HOT RED WINGS

<h2>Murphy joins elite quartet</h2>1. Scoring machine Toronto defenseman Larry Murphy becomes fourth defenseman to reach 1,000-point plateau.2. Felicitations, Quebec Quebec wins Canadian women&rsquo;s hockey championship for third consecutive year.3. Bank on it Buffalo coach Ted Nolan ends wasteful rookie dinner, has freshmen donate money to food bank instead.4. Powerful Pens Jaromir Jagr sets Euro points mark with 140, Mario Lemieux nets five goals against St. Louis.5. Player of week Philadelphia goalie Ron Hextall backstops Flyers to 130 minutes, 55 seconds of shutout hockey.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0002-021139/6291911-1-eng-US/f0002-022.jpg" title="f0002-02" width="330" height="464"><figcaption class="caption-body">Larry Murphy</figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0002-03829/6291904-1-eng-US/f0002-032.jpg" title="f0002-03" width="329" height="464"><figcaption class="caption-body">Jaromir Jagr</figcaption></div><h2>Montreal duo in hot water</h2>1. Bad Hab-it I Vincent Damphousse suspended for crosschecking Washington&rsquo;s Sergei Gonchar in mouth.2. Bad Hab-it II Coach Mario Tremblay fires water bottle at referee-for second time in a month.3. Use stick for goals Central League&rsquo;s top scorer Brian Shantz swings stick at opposing coach.4. Hey GMs, only one team can win Vancouver&rsquo;s Rick Ley becomes eighth NHL coach fired this season.5. Sit &rsquo;em Coach Bryan Maxwell, assistant Reid Williams, player Mike Josephson suspended for confronting WHL ref.<h2>UPCOMING IN THN</h2>Who has the inside track on winning Ithe Stanley Cup? We&rsquo;ll reveal that, plus give championship odds for all teams in our April 19 issue.<div class="figure-block image-bleed"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0002-011396/6291897-1-eng-US/f0002-012.jpg" title="f0002-01" width="1722" height="2372"><figcaption class="caption-body">Flyer Mikael Renberg is one of a number of star players injured as the playoffs approach. Pg. 9</figcaption></div> &#9632;

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PLUS MINUS

<div class="byline">By Steve Dryden Etlitar-in-Chief</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0002-04605/6291942-1-eng-US/f0002-042.jpg" title="f0002-04" width="352" height="435"></div>Team Canada at the 1996 World Championship may be handicapped by Team Canada at the 1996 World Cup.GM Pierre Gauthier says the likelihood of a player being chosen in next fall&rsquo;s event could have a bearing on whether he is invited to this spring&rsquo;s event in Vienna. &ldquo;You&rsquo;ve got to understand that I don&rsquo;t think players will play both the World Championship and the World Cup,&rdquo; Gauthier said. &ldquo;There&rsquo;s a chance that might limit a couple of guys.&rdquo;Tlirte players come to mind: Brendan Shanahan, Jason Amott and Paul Kariya. All three were picked by The Hockey News for the Canadian World Cup entry. All thrice could be available for the World Championship. provided the Hartford Whalers, Mighty Ducks and Anaheim and Edmonton Oilers don&rsquo;t make the playoffs. Coincidentally, the trio played together as a first-rate unit on Canada&rsquo;s first gold medal team since 1961 at the 1994 World Championship.Gauthier, who has had discussions with Canadian World Cup GM Glen Sather on this subject, said no players have been asked to join the team and none would be until the playoff picture was clearer. &ldquo;The fact of the matter is we&rsquo;ve got to respect those (elite) players and the organizations that pay those players.&rdquo; he said. Gauthier didn&rsquo;t rule out inviting likely World Cup piayers-nordid he suggest World Championship playeis would not be candidates for the World Cup-and he added, &ldquo;You could leave it to the players&rsquo; choice.&rdquo;That&rsquo;s what Gauthier should do. Il&rsquo;s hard to believe, for example, Shanahan would mm down Canada if invited. He has represented it several times internationally and is a better player for the experience. If Shanahan and company weren&rsquo;t at the World Championship, they&rsquo;d be in the playoffs, a far more gruelling experience than the 15-day tournament. A small question: Arc the demands of stardom such that players need to store up energy for next fall&rsquo;s World Cup? The larger question: What future expectations will there be on players to participate in a newly crowded international calendar?In time, limits may be imposed on the number of times non-playoff players will be asked to compete at the World Championship and, perhaps, the airlifting of early playoff casualties will be banned. But in the meantime, the best players should be invited to compete in both major events and the decision left to them. Barring extrao-dinary circumstances, most will, and should, feel obliged to accept. &#9632;

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Elite players should play in both Worlds

<div class="byline">By Steve Dryden and Mark Brender</div>The U.S. hockey program has a unique opportunity to capture world attention this spring. The Americans are in a position to win their first World Championship since 1933. It has been 63 years since the U.S. last won gold at the global tournament. This year&rsquo;s event is in Vienna (April 21-May 5). Newly named American GM Mike Milbury should have an abundance of talent at his disposal.Among players from non-playoff NHL teams or near non-playoff teams are Pat LaFontaine, Mike Modano. Kevin and Derian Hatcher. Scott Lachance and goalies Damian Rhodes and Guy Hebert. The U.S. lineup promises to be comprised of speed merchants who can excel on the larger international ice surface. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a chance for us to make a mark in international competition for the first time,&rdquo; Milbury said, &ldquo;and with the World Cup on the horizon, it would be an unbelievable catalyst for promoting hockey in the States. If things fall into line, even if they don&rsquo;t all fall into line, we have a good chance to be successful.&rdquo; Muddying the pre-toumament picture, however, was the hiring of Milbury. Ex-Winnipeg Jets&rsquo; GM Mike Smith was under the impression he would be the GM after filling the role well last year when the Americans went undefeated during the round-robin and finished tied for fifth. But Smith said after spending time evaluating players and discussing issues related to running the team, he was told Milbury had the job. USA Hockey executive director Dave Ogrean said the position was never offered to Smith, nor finalized until recently. &ldquo;That decision was not made until last week,&rdquo; Ogrean said March 28. Smith said he was &ldquo;asked,&rdquo; &ldquo;unasked&rdquo; and then, &ldquo;non-asked,&rdquo; to fill the role. Milbury wanted Smith to join him as an assistant, but the ex-NHL executive declined, saying he had no interest in being &ldquo;a bump on a log.&rdquo; Ogrean said the key consideration in naming Milbury was that the NHL told the governing body it wanted an active GM running the team. The league logic is sound, but if USA Hockey had, at the very least, an implied obligation to Smith, it truly got itself into a pickle. Was there no way out? It&rsquo;s hard to believe the NHL would object to an experienced hand who is still very much in the loop-Smith does some pro scouting for the Chicago Blackhawks-running the team again&hellip;Fox Sports president David Hill predicted March 28 changes to FoxTrax would meet with approval-even by fans disgruntled with the technological TV innovation first showcased at the NHL All-Star Game Jan. 20. At that time, a blue halo circled the puck when it appeared on television and a red comet tail materialized on high-velocity shots. Fox Sports spent two months refining the compu-puck. It was scheduled to be re-introduced March 31 during the Detroit Red Wings-St. Louis Blues game, this time with a white halo, thinner red comet tail (triggered at 75-80 miles per hour rather than 70), more stable tracking and an X-ray effect. The X-ray effect provides for a simulated puck at the center of the white glow when play close to the boards makes it impossible for the real puck to be visible on the camera side. An overwhelming majority of respondents (1,813 to 180) to a survey by The Hockey News said they didn&rsquo;t like their first exposure to FoxTrax. &ldquo;I saw the survey,&rdquo; Hill said, &ldquo;and I wasn&rsquo;t surprised at all, because generally any change that is made in the way a sport is presented isn&rsquo;t accepted wholeheartedly.&rdquo; Hill said the network will keep FoxTrax on one of its weekly broadcasts the rest of the season and into the playoffs&hellip;This much we know for sure: the Stanley Cup playoffs begin Tue., Apr. 16 and will end no later than Mon.. June 17. How they get from &lsquo;A&rsquo; to &lsquo;B,&rsquo; however, will be determined along the way. Fans accustomed to tuning in for Western Conference playoff games one night and Eastern Conference the next will have to re-orient themselves. Series schedules will follow &lsquo;A&rsquo; or &lsquo;B&rsquo; formats as determined by the league. (See pg. 34 for playoff schedule formats.) That means Eastern and Western teams could play on the same night. The upside is fans could see more of their own conference match-ups because they could be played on alternating nights; the downside is fans will be missing the sense of orderliness provided by separate scheduling for Western and Eastern Conference games. The criteria for determining which schedule will be followed are: individual matchup, building availability, travel considerations and TV commitments. Teams played on consecutive nights five times during the playoffs last spring. If all goes well this spring, the number of back-to-back games will be reduced&hellip;This real estate ad has appeared in Montreal-based Les Affaires, a Frenchlanguage business publication: &ldquo;An event one Saturday night in 1995 made a magnificent property available. For more information, you don&rsquo;t need to call Colorado.&rdquo; The realtor&rsquo;s name is Barbara Miller-Roy. The house is located in one of Montreal&rsquo;s most affluent suburbs. The owner of the house is now most familiarly located at McNichols Arena in Colorado. Miller-Roy is Patrick Roy&rsquo;s mother and a longtime realtor. Faced with the task of selling the goalie&rsquo;s $1.5-million home after Roy forced the Montreal Canadi-ens to trade him, she opted for an innovative approach. So much so, her son asked, &ldquo;Are you sure you didn&rsquo;t go too hard?&rdquo; Miller-Roy said, &ldquo;Have confidence in mother.&rdquo;<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0003-011547/6291980-1-eng-US/f0003-012.jpg" title="f0003-01" width="368" height="369"></div><div class="figure-block image-bleed"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0003-021252/6291973-1-eng-US/f0003-022.jpg" title="f0003-02" width="1143" height="1666"><figcaption class="caption-body">Patrick Roy&rsquo;s mother has taken a unique approach to selling her son&rsquo;s home in suburban Montreal.</figcaption></div> &#9632;

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Will 63-year drought end?

<div class="byline">By Mike Brophy</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0003-03831/6292011-1-eng-US/f0003-032.jpg" title="f0003-03" width="354" height="424"></div>If Brett Lindros is forced to retire from the New York Islanders for health reasons, it will be a blow for hockey.Even if I am in a minority, I have always had faith Eric&rsquo;s little brother would rise to prominence in the NHL as a physical force and consistent 20-plus goal-scorer. At 20, he already is regarded as one of the NHL&rsquo;s most dangerous body checkers.Lindros has been out of the Islanders&rsquo; lineup since Nov. 24 when he suffered his second concussion in two days. What is most disconcerting is the second one didn&rsquo;t occur due to a blow to the head; it was caused by a whiplash motion when he attempted to deliver a hit.Lindros was home in Toronto and was not granting interviews. His father, Carl, who also serves as his agent, was tight-lipped about his son&rsquo;s future. The family has sought medical opinions and was evaluating the results.The word in the hockey community is that Lindros will probably have to retire and take at least two or three years off before it can be determined whether or not he can play again.&ldquo;I have heard no such thing,&rdquo; Carl said. &ldquo;However, if doctors determine Brett couldn&rsquo;t play because of health reasons. I don&rsquo;t know if that would be termed retirement; it would be more a termination.&rdquo;Call it what you will, but the fact remains the hockey world would be deprived of a talented, colorful and entertaining individual.It&rsquo;s no secret Lindros is not the most graceful skater, but his wheels aren&rsquo;t that bad. His scoring totals-two goals and seven points in 51 career games-are nothing special, but his offensive skills were bound to improve. After all, Lindros had 24 goals and 47 points in 26 games with the Kingston Frontenacs of the Ontario League before the lockout.&ldquo;He definitely has the potential to be an impact player,&rdquo; said Islanders&rsquo; captain Patrick Flatley. &ldquo;He came in last year and did all the right things a young player should do to develop. He worked hard and kept his mouth shut. If he is healthy, he can be a star in the league.&rdquo;The problem is, he too often sees stars. It&rsquo;s too bad because when the Islanders signed Lindros to a big contract last year, they thought he would be a force for them for years to come. Here&rsquo;s hoping he gets a chance to prove he belongs. &#9632;

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COLUMNISTS

Loss of Lindros would be shame

A weekly compendium of significant events and developments (March 22-29).March 23: Lethbridge coach Bryan Maxwell, assistant Reid Williams and player Mike Josephson accused of attacking referee Brent Reiber, suspended by WHL indefinitely.March 24: Michigan&rsquo;s Mike Legg makes highlight reels all over North America by scooping puck up on stick behind Minnesota net and tossing it in net with lacrosse-style shot in college playoff game.University of Alberta player Mark Goodkey killed after being hit in neck by puck.March 26: Ottawa GM Pierre Gauthier named GM of Canada&rsquo;s entry at 1996 World Championship.Mario Lemieux scores five goals, two assists in Pittsburgh&rsquo;s 8-4 win over St. Louis. Winnipeg&rsquo;s Keith Tkachuk scores four goals in 8-2 win over Dallas.March 27: Toronto defenseman Larry Murphy registers 1,000th career point in 6-2 win over Vancouver.Ray Ferraro of Los Angeles scores 300th career goal in 3-3 tie with Edmonton.March 28: Pittsburgh&rsquo;s Jaromir Jagr sets single-season mark for points by a European, 140, with 60th goal of season. &#9632;

Super Mario, Mario Jr. continue to light it up for Pens

<div class="byline">By Matt Carlson</div>Bill H. Armstrong is the pioneer, but Mike Legg is getting credit for the patent.Both players recently scored on what is best described as a lacrossetype maneuver by cradling the puck on the stick blade and flicking it past the goalie from behind the net.Armstrong, a 29-year-old center with the Detroit Vipers of the International League, scored that way against the Cleveland Lumberjacks March 23. He claims to have scored that way five previous times.The next day in a National Collegiate Athletic Association playoff game against Minnesota, Michigan center Legg did the same thing and the media went wild.The unusual and spectacular goal was on just about every sports highlight reel in Canada and the U.S.&ldquo;I called our publicity guy and told him to start sending out (the videotape of) my goal,&rdquo; Armstrong joked. &ldquo;When I heard a college guy did it, I knew it had to be Mike.&rdquo;Legg, 20, learned the move a few years ago from Armstrong in a pickup game in London, Ont. Now it&rsquo;s the shot heard around the world, even though Armstrong is the pioneer.To set up the shot, Legg and Armstrong lower their hands to the ice and flatten the blade of the stick over the puck. Then, twirling the stick in one quick motion, they pick up the puck, reach forward and tuck the puck behind the unsuspecting goalie.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0005-011479/6292104-1-eng-US/f0005-012.jpg" title="f0005-01" width="383" height="485"><figcaption class="caption-body">Mike Legg</figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0005-021069/6292097-1-eng-US/f0005-022.jpg" title="f0005-02" width="385" height="489"><figcaption class="caption-body">Bill Armstrong</figcaption></div>Legg beat goalie Steve DeBus in the second period to tie the score 2-2. Michigan went on to win the game 43. (See pg. 26 for NCAA roundup.)&ldquo;He hit the paddle of my stick and kept going,&rdquo; DeBus said. &ldquo;I couldn&rsquo;t stretch out far enough.&rdquo;&ldquo;There was a pause and everyone looked around,&rdquo; said Michigan coach Red Berenson. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s as though everyone was asking &lsquo;Did I really see that?&rsquo; &ldquo;&ldquo;It&rsquo;s like making a C-cut with your stick,&rdquo; said Legg, an 11th-round draft pick of the New Jersey Devils in 1993. &ldquo;As you pull the stick, the puck pops up and you roll your wrists.&ldquo;I tried to do it against Michigan State last year, but (goalie Mike) Buzak stopped it.&rdquo;Now that the secret weapon has hit millions of TV screens, it&rsquo;s bound to surface at all levels of the sport. &ldquo;A lot of players will try it,&rdquo; Berenson said. &ldquo;Others will perfect it.&rdquo;And currently, there&rsquo;s nothing on the rulebooks to stop it.&ldquo;There&rsquo;s nothing illegal about it,&rdquo; said Dave Fisher, coordinator of officials for the Central Collegiate Hockey Association. &ldquo;The stick never goes above the shoulder. I&rsquo;m sure they&rsquo;ll talk about it at our rules meeting, though. Knowing the NCAA, they may try to pass a rule against it.&rdquo; &#9632;

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DEPARTMENTS

Armstrong does Legg work on magnificent college goal

<div class="byline">Compiled by THN staff</div>A University of Alberta player was killed when he was hit in the neck by a slapshot while trying to block a shot in a tournament game.Third-year Golden Bears&rsquo; defenseman Mark Goodkey was taken off life support and pronounced dead March 25, about 12 hours after the accident in Stettler, Alta.Goodkey was playing for the Edmonton Young Offenders Centre in a correction officers&rsquo; tournament game against the Calgary Young Offenders Centre.The Edmonton team was leading 7-4 with less than five minutes remaining when Goodkey dropped to the ice to block a shot from about five feet away.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0005-03712/6292135-1-eng-US/f0005-032.jpg" title="f0005-03" width="384" height="492"><figcaption class="caption-body">Mark Goodkey</figcaption></div>Goodkey was airlifted to Edmonton. Golden Bears&rsquo; coach Rob Daum and six University of Alberta teammates were with the player at the university hospital.&ldquo;We were told he had a severed artery, broke his neck and fractured his skull,&rdquo; Daum said. &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t find the words to describe being there and seeing him there. We&rsquo;re very shaken.&ldquo;He was a real solid person. He was an academic all-Canadian. And he was just blossoming as a player.&rdquo;&ldquo;We&rsquo;re devastated,&rdquo; said Jim Fleming of the EYOC team. &ldquo;Our team is trying to be there for his family.&rdquo;Goodkey, 22, had been the star of the game for the Edmonton team, scoring three goals. The game wasn&rsquo;t completed.A 6-foot-2, 215-pound rearguard, Goodkey played for the Fort Saskatchewan Traders in the Alberta Junior League before joining the Bears.AJHL president Marty Knack told the Edmonton Sun the accident might have been unavoidable, but he plans to raise the issue of making neck guards mandatory.Goodkey was one of five Bears to win a $1,000 bursary, presented by the Edmonton Oilers to players with excellent academic records.&ldquo;We&rsquo;re all shaken up,&rdquo; said Oilers&rsquo; assistant GM Bruce MacGregor. &ldquo;We can&rsquo;t remember anything like this happening in hockey ever before.&rdquo;MYSTERY LETTER: Russian president Boris Yeltsin is the latest to be drawn into the soap opera surrounding the Russian entry to the World Cup of Hockey.The Moscow-based newspaper Sport Express published an open letter March 22 from Russian NHLers to the Russian president, asking him to intervene in their dispute with the Russian Ice Hockey Federation about this summer&rsquo;s World Cup.The players warned they may boycott the tournament if their demands are not met. They want a say in who will coach the team, where they will train and a split of proceeds.The letter now appears at worst, bogus, and at best, premature.Igor Larionov of the Detroit Red Wings says the players haven&rsquo;t signed a letter, although one is planned.&ldquo;I heard about it, but nobody signed it,&rdquo; Larionov said. &ldquo;The letter was prepared and sent to some players.&rdquo;But Larionov says Yeltsin will soon hear from the players.&ldquo;We hope he will help us resolve the situation between the players and the federation,&rdquo; Larionov said.&ndash;With files from Terry Jones and Alan Adams &#9632;

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Slapshot to neck kills university defenseman

<div class="byline">By Gary Olson</div>Bill Goldsworthy, the first star of the Minnesota North Stars, died March 29 of complications from AIDS. He was 51.Goldsworthy was diagnosed with AIDS in November, 1994, and told the Saint Paul Pioneer Press in February 1995 his health problems stemmed from drinking and promiscuity.&ldquo;Our dad has made many wonderful friends in Minnesota, friends who stayed with him through this fight,&rdquo; Tammy and Sean Goldsworthy, his children, said in a statement prior to his death.Goldsworthy discovered he had AIDS while on a road trip to Memphis. He was hospitalized at the time after blood clots moved from his legs to his lungs. He was barely into his first season as coach of the Central League&rsquo;s San Antonio Iguanas.Concerned news of his illness would become the subject of rumors, he announced he had AIDS in February, 1995.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0005-04444/6292166-1-eng-US/f0005-042.jpg" title="f0005-04" width="443" height="1004"><figcaption class="caption-body">Bill Goldsworthy</figcaption></div>At that time, Dr. Emmel Golden, the doctor who broke the news to him, said five years is a long time for a person to live with AIDS.Goldsworthy had minimal setbacks until recently. He was in hospital eight days before his death.&ldquo;He was a fun-loving guy, unpredictable,&rdquo; Lou Nanne told the Associated Press. Nanne played with Goldsworthy and was later was a coach and GM of the North Stars. &ldquo;You&rsquo;d never knew what he was going to do or say. He was a very warm person, a good friend.&rdquo;Goldsworthy played 14 seasons in the NHL with the North Stars, Boston Bruins and New York Rangers.He had his No. 8 sweater retired and hung at the Met Center next to the No. 19 worn by linemate Bill Masterton, who died following an on-ice accident in their first season.He played 670 games with the North Stars from 1967 to 1977 and scored 267 goals. He was the first player from one of the the six 1967 expansion teams to score 250 goals in the NHL. In 771 career games, Goldsworthy had 283 goals and 541 points.&ldquo;He was a very colorful, charismatic guy that had great speed and strength and a great shot,&rdquo; Nanne said. &ldquo;He was one of the first real charismatic Minnesota athletes that we had.&rdquo; Funeral services will be held the first week of April, although details were not known. &#9632;

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AIDS claims Goldsworthy

<div class="byline">By Dwayne Tingley</div>Danielle Goyette knew she wasn&rsquo;t alone when she scored the winning goal for Quebec at the Canadian Women&rsquo;s Hockey Championship in Moncton.Goyette completed her hat trick in overtime March 24 to give Quebec a 3-2 win over Ontario, marking the third straight title for Quebec.&ldquo;This was extra special because I was playing for someone else,&rdquo; said Goyette, a member of Canada&rsquo;s national team since 1992. &ldquo;My mother died a week ago and I was thinking of her. She was a fan of our team and I know she was smiling in heaven today. It was hard, but I had to play for my mother.&rdquo;Laura Schuler and Amanda Benoit scored for Ontario.New Brunswick, led by Paulette Cormier&rsquo;s three goals, defeated Alberta 4-3 to win the bronze medal. It marked the first time in the 15-year history of the tournament Alberta finished out of the medals.&ldquo;Every year, there&rsquo;s more talent and all the provinces have strong teams,&rdquo; Goyette said. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s not like it used to be when only a couple provinces had strong teams.&rdquo;Awards went to Alberta&rsquo;s Hayley Wickenheiser, MVP; Goyette, best forward; Ontario&rsquo;s Geraldine Heaney, top defensive player; Ontario&rsquo;s Jennifer Dewar, top goalie; New Brunswick&rsquo;s Stacy Wilson, most sportsmanlike player. &#9632;

Quebec three-peats at women’s nationals

I would like to congratulate Richard Burke and Steven Gluckstem, the new owners of the Winnipeg Jets.Here they are moving to Phoenix, where most people don&rsquo;t understand hockey, and they traded away their most popular and marketable player in Teemu Selanne. We done.Now I hear they plan to name their team after the most inept animated character in history, the Coyote. Here&rsquo;s some free advice. Don&rsquo;t play the Phoenix Roadrunners of the International League. The Roadrunner always wins.Jeff Smyth, &nbsp;Winnipeg, Man.<h2>Future of hockey</h2>Here&rsquo;s my view of hockey, circa 2005:After a year of saving my money, I&rsquo;m taking my son to his first NHL game. I pay the $14 for parking and we make our way toward the Marlboro Sport and Entertainment Center. Once inside, I find our $80 seats are upper level, last row. Although I am disappointed, I consider myself lucky, since 70 per cent of the seating is taken up by luxury boxes.In one of the suites, I spot the new NHL commissioner, Michael Eisner. Someone should tell him his mouse ear hat doesn&rsquo;t go with his tie. But it does look better than the propelled beanie that the president of Fox is wearing.Finally, the Powerful Poodles of Sante Fe take to the ice. They&rsquo;re wearing their hot pink sweaters picturing their mascot, a muscle-bound canine cartoon character. Their opponents, the New Orleans Humidity (formerly the Montreal Canadiens), are wearing their alternate sixth sweaters tonight. It will be interesting to see whether either of them will hoist the Pepsi Stanley Cup at the end of the season.The game starts and I can&rsquo;t get used to the sight of the new puck. It was bad enough they enlarged the size of it, but the flashing lights on the side and green smoke pouring out of it make it very distracting-almost as distracting as the exploding nets when goals are scored.There are plenty of stoppages in play with the mandatory TV timeouts every three minutes and breaks between the four quarters. I hear next season the entire fourth quarter will be a shootout.After spending $35 at the snack bar for two hot dogs and drinks, we make it back just in time to see the first fight. They lower a cage from the ceiling and the combatants enter it and start swinging laser-lighted hockey sticks at one another. As Crusher and Mad Dog go at it, I think back to a time when players used their real names. Gretzky, Bossy, Orr and Howe come to mind. You can still learn about those players at the Hockey Hall of Fame in Florida, where it was moved to be part of a theme park.I think I&rsquo;ll take my son to a college game next week.Rodney A. Cox, Lancaster, Calif.<h2>Tale of two guys</h2>This season, two very good players, somewhat past their primes, but still with plenty left to give, found themselves on a rebuilding New York Islander team.It was obvious that the players&rsquo; salaries, abilities, experience and age were not a good match for the organization.One of those players chose to pout about his situation and demanded to be traded He was a poor example to the younger players around him. His attitude eventually got him suspended without pay.The other player worked hard, became a team leader and a good example to the younger players around him. Even though it was inevitable that he would soon be gone, he won the respect of his teammates, coaches and the fans.Those two players have again found themselves on a &ldquo;Stanley Cup contender.&rdquo; One will forever be scorned by Islander fans, the other revered and admired.Good luck, Wendel Clark, and thanks for your contributions.Larry Samele, &nbsp;Smithtown, N.Y.<h2>More stats, please</h2>The NHL should consider adding some new individual statistics. Keeping track of blocked shots, empty net goals, penalties drawn and fighting majors would greatly help the league.For example, separating fighting majors from other penalty minutes would distinguish a fighter from an undisciplined player who simply takes bad penalties.Chris Casseleggio, &nbsp;Ringwood, N.J.<h2>Merk scored, too</h2>I would like to add a name to your list of goaltenders who have scored goals (THN, March 22).Klaus Merk, a goalie for the Preussen Devils Berlin has scored two empty-net goals in his career. If you want see how good Merk is, just watch him in the World Cup.Alexander Brandt, &nbsp;Berlin, Ger.<h2>Come down harder</h2>In reply to Stan Fischler&rsquo;s column March 15 on Eric Lacroix&rsquo;s hit from behind on Dennis Vaske, I feel Lacroix&rsquo;s suspension of five games was not near stiff enough.If the NHL continues to tolerate this kind of action it&rsquo;s only a matter of time before someone gets seriously hurt or even paralyzed.The player at fault should be suspended as long as the injured player is out of the lineup.Sylvain Suprenant, &nbsp;Casselman, Ont.<h2>Mike that change</h2>You have to give Mike Keenan some credit. When he asks players to &ldquo;embrace change,&rdquo; he means it. He has changed the St. Louis Blues from a team that at least did well in the regular season into an embarrassment.He traded one of the best goalies in the game (plus one of the Blues&rsquo; few young prospects) for a checking forward who couldn&rsquo;t score 50 goals a season into an open net. He traded the NHL&rsquo;s best left winger for a young defenseman who has been more trouble than he has been worth. He traded Esa Tikkanen and Steve Duchesne for draft picks that he&rsquo;ll give up sometime soon.He signed three high-ticket free agents whose scoring totals are just barely higher than their ages. He has brought in 14 new players since Oct. 1.Leading up to the trade deadline, St. Louis gave up five prospects and a first-round pick in 1997 for a couple of modest wingers and Wayne Gretzky, who might not even be around next season.I guess Keenan calls this progress.So the Blues are going to get shelled in the first round of the playoffs again this year, but now they can&rsquo;t look at their young players with hope for the future because they don&rsquo;t have much of either.John Alsadek, Camp Hill, Pa.<h2>Canada shut out</h2>Why is it that Canadian teams are never on Fox telecasts?Is it possible that the executives at Fox and the NHL schedule makers in New York are of the opinion that American viewers are not only afflicted with suspect vision, but are also ignorant of extraterritorial geography?Manyu Ogale, Glastonbury, Conn.Make your feelings known. Fax us your comments at&nbsp;(416) 340-1641.&nbsp;Write to&nbsp;Letters, The Hockey News, 777 Bay St, Suite 2700, Box 148, Toronto, Ont., M5G 2C8&nbsp;in Canada. In the U.S., write to&nbsp;Letters, The Hockey News, P.O. Box 904. Buffalo, N.Y., 14240-9947.&nbsp;E-mail us at <a href="mailto:THN@transc.com">THN@transc.com</a>. Include home and business phone numbers.&nbsp;THN&nbsp;re-serves the right to edit submissions. &#9632;

Advice to Jets’ owners: Don’t play Roadrunners

<div class="image-hero"><img title="f0006-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-011655/6292245-1-eng-US/f0006-012.jpg"></div> &#9632;

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ELSTON

<div class="byline">By Mark Brender</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0007-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0007-011502/6292283-1-eng-US/f0007-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Chris Osqood is one reason the Detroit Red Wings are a Stanley Cup favorite entering the playoffs.</figcaption></div>It was another ho-hum week for the rolling Detroit Red Wings-the team as versatile as a Swiss Army knife, efficient as a surgeon&rsquo;s hands, as deep in riches as a gold mine-the team parody forgot.Wednesday, March 20 at Toronto. A Kirk Muller hit knocks Sergei Fedorov out of the game early and the Wings don&rsquo;t manage a shot on goal until 12 minutes in. They end up with just 22 shots-and a 4-3 overtime win.Friday, March 22 in Detroit. The Wings scores three shorthanded goals in a 7-0 drubbing of the Avalanche, which the standings say is the NHL&rsquo;s second-best team. A week later Colorado has 96 points, Detroit 119. No team in NHL history has ever finished in first by more than 20 points.Sunday, March 24 at St. Louis: A 2-2 tie. Detroit outshoots the Blues 42-27.Monday, March 25 in Detroit. The Wings shut down the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim 5-1, snapping Anaheim&rsquo;s franchise-record seven-game unbeaten streak and extending their own to a season-high 11-gamer, which becomes 12 two nights later after a come-from-behind 4-2 win over the Buffalo Sabres. That gives the Wings one win over each team in the league.Detroit had the Central Division championship on ice with a month to play. At 57-12-5, they were a shoo-in to reach 60 wins, which would put them alongside the 1976-77 Montreal Canadiens as the only teams ever to reach that mark, and their, 800-plus winning percentage would be the fifth in the modem era.&ldquo;Our confidence level is so high,&rdquo; said goalie Chris Osgood, &ldquo;that it&rsquo;s almost like we don&rsquo;t think we&rsquo;re going to lose.&rdquo;Yep, just how they felt last year.There&rsquo;s the rub. All the confidence from a first-place finish in &lsquo;94-95 couldn&rsquo;t save the Wings from a humiliating Stanley Cup final sweep at the hands of the New Jersey Devils.Their desire for added size and toughness, the lack of which was one of their downfalls in the Devils&rsquo; series, wasn&rsquo;t addressed at the trading deadline. Detroit is tied with Buffalo as the smallest, lightest team in the league, averaging 6-feet, 190-pounds. At forward only Keith Primeau, Darren McCarty and enforcer Stu Grimson are bigger than 6-feet, 200-pounds and the blueline, while offensively talented, still lacks a threatening bruiser.The Wings defend themselves by saying every team has a wish list going into the playoffs and the place most teams would wish to be is where Detroit is now. Moreover, there are significant differences between this Wings&rsquo; team and last year&rsquo; edition.Here are five reasons why Detroit is a favorite, again, to capture its first Stanley Cup in 41 years:Scotty&rsquo;s secret system The Wings used to be masters of the 6-4 regular season win and the 4-2 playoff loss. No more.The defensive software the Wings employed last year-and the one most people say they still do-is called the left wing lock. The left winger stays high in the offensive zone as a safety valve against odd-man breakouts. He has specific assignments about the path of retreat when Detroit&rsquo;s attack dies down.But that was the past. This year, said coach Scotty Bowman, the lock is out.&ldquo;We play a different system this year than we did last year,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;We don&rsquo;t advertise it because if people think it&rsquo;s the left-wing lock, let them think it.&rdquo;Bowman won&rsquo;t share his new secret, but left wingers still rarely get the shuffle in the Wings&rsquo; nightly game of musical lines. Vyacheslav Kozlov almost always plays left wing with Igor Larionov at center. Same goes for Bob Errey with Steve Yzerman. If Errey is hurt it&rsquo;s Tim Taylor.Whatever the variations, it works. Detroit went 13 games in February and March without allowing the opposition more than three goals per game. Vladimir Konstantinov led the league at plus-53 and Sergei Fedorov was plus-42. Kozlov, Larionov, Errey, Yzerman, Nicklas Lidstrom and Slava Fetisov were in the top 20 in plus-minus.Yzerman, a one-time 155-point man, reached his plus-27 playing most of the season against other teams&rsquo; top lines. &ldquo;He was always such a good offensive player, but now he has bought in,&rdquo; said Vancouver Canucks&rsquo; GM Pat Quinn. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s a better player today than he ever was.&rdquo;&ldquo;We&rsquo;re not a generic team,&rdquo; Bowman said. &ldquo;We don&rsquo;t have each line playing the same. We don&rsquo;t have a bunch of robots, you know.&rdquo;But they all can play defense. They&rsquo;ve committed to it. Many teams haven&rsquo;t.&ldquo;For me, Scotty Bowman, he&rsquo;s a human being,&rdquo; Larionov said. &ldquo;I never mind the discipline, hard-working practices or high discipline games. But the difference between Scotty Bowman and (former Russian coach Viktor Tikhonov), Scotty will never humiliate or insult players.&rdquo;Russian Revolution Larionov has proven the Wings knew what they were doing when they traded Ray Sheppard to the San Jose Sharks earlier this year for what many thought was just another small, skilled center.Bowman called him the biggest on-ice difference between this year and last, saying his creativity improved the Wings&rsquo; offense by 20 per cent. &ldquo;It has to do with poise, the way he changes speeds,&rdquo; said Sharks&rsquo; GM Dean Lombardi. &ldquo;He out-thinks bigger guys.&rdquo;His professionalism has improved the Wings&rsquo; character, specifically the drive of Fedorov, 26, and Kozlov, 23. Teammates could see the immense respect the young Russians had for Larionov the first time he walked in the room.&ldquo;He was their idol growing up in Russia. That was a big thing for them to play with him,&rdquo; Osgood said. &ldquo;He gives it to them sometimes if they do the wrong thing or if they get lazy. They&rsquo;re going to listen to a guy like that. It&rsquo;s like us and Paul Coffey, but those guys don&rsquo;t know Paul Coffey as well as they know Igor Larionov.&rdquo;Larionov, 35 and a veteran of the international hockey wars, has provided the jumpstart Fedorov needed to again maximize his formidable skills. One scout, comparing the Wings to the 1976-77 Montreal Canadiens, said the way Fedorov is playing, he might not have a peer on that team, not even Guy Lafleur.&ldquo;Fedorov is as good as anybody in any era skillwise,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Fedorov is one of a kind.&rdquo;Larionov brushes off questions about whether the Russians have the requisite passion to win the Stanley Cup.&ldquo;Russians have played in this league for seven years. Some of the guys have become Americans, got passports, so I don&rsquo;t think we can divide North American guys and Russians. This whole team, we&rsquo;re working together.&rdquo;Puck control When the Wings have the puck, they go a long way to avoid giving it up.In practice they focus heavily on passing skills and use the 2-on-2 as an offensive drill&mdash;a game situation far more common than the usual 3-on-2 or 2-on-1 practice drills. Players gain confidence to attack in even-manned situations during games and defensemen get more practice defending, which is what they need; defending a dump and chase is little more than a foot-race anyway.The five-man Russian unit (Kozlov, Larionov, Fedorov, Konstantinov and Fetisov) is particularly unwilling to at-tempt low percentage plays, preferring to circle back or hold onto the puck in the offensive zone rather than turn it over. The result is the Wings simply control the puck more than their foes.&ldquo;They move the puck around, they don&rsquo;t take low percentage shots,&rdquo; Bowman said. &ldquo;When you have the puck in your possession and the other team doesn&rsquo;t get any quick transition turnover plays, it helps your defense.&rdquo;The Wings have been helped by the obstruction crackdown in the neutral zone because that&rsquo;s where so much of the attacking and regrouping originates. They know they can get to full speed without getting tugged from behind.Great goaltending Osgood, with a 35-5-4 record, league-best 2.17 goals against average and .913 save percent-age-not to mention a goal and two assists-has been outstanding. His 21-game unbeaten streak (and counting) broke the club record of 16 set by Mike Vernon last season. While Wings&rsquo; management insists there is no No. 1 goalie-Bowman has alternated the two when they are healthy and even suggested in Vernon would start the playoffs-no one is denying Osgood&rsquo;s emergence into a goalie who can win against the league&rsquo;s top teams has made the Wings stronger.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0008-011568/6292276-1-eng-US/f0008-012.jpg" title="f0008-01" width="586" height="631"><figcaption class="caption-body">Igor Larionov is the only significant addition to the Wings.</figcaption></div>&ldquo;You have that calm feeling when he&rsquo;s out there because you know he can handle all situations,&rdquo; said assistant coach Barry Smith. &ldquo;The reason you have confidence is because the guy gets results.&rdquo;After a slow start, Vernon has picked up his game and had compiled a 19-7-1 record and .904 save percentage.Four-line fury Kozlov scored four goals against Montreal on Patrick Roy&rsquo;s last night as a Canadien. Other than that outburst, no other Wing has as much as a hat trick this season-partly because they don&rsquo;t get enough ice time to do it. Four lines roll regularly, as do 24 players in and out of the lineup.On defense, Konstantinov&rsquo;s dramatically improved play this season has allowed him, Nicklas Lidstrom and Paul Coffey to all play on separate pairs, giving them an offensive presence from the blueline on every shift.Among forwards, Fedorov, Yzer-man and Primeau lead at about 21 minutes a game.&ldquo;Our depth,&rdquo; Yzerman said, &ldquo;has always been our biggest strength.&rdquo;The Wings see depth as an energy saver in the travel-heavy Western Conference. It has worked on the power play and the penalty killing units, which stood second (21.9 per cent) and first (89 per cent), respectively.Everyone has sacrificed individual statistics, but while point totals are down, other things are looking up. The Wings will set team records for wins and points and likely will have then-lowest GAA since 1956-57.&ldquo;I think our desire has grown. (Individual scoring) is irrelevant, it&rsquo;s not important,&rdquo; Yzerman said. &ldquo;Nothing&rsquo;s terribly important other than the fact that we&rsquo;ve got to win.&rdquo;<div class="sidebar">Detroit&rsquo;s depth has opponents digging way out of deep hole &#9632;</div>

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WHY WINGS FLY

<div class="byline">&#x2013;Mark Brender</div>Just imagine, they actually used to feel sorry for Chris Osgood.In 1991, before the NHL entry draft in Buffalo, Osgood got caught in traffic and showed up late for his interview with the Detroit Red Wings. When he finally arrived, looking about five years too early with his boyish face and physique, Wings&rsquo; management felt uncomfortable.&ldquo;He did very well, but he looked like he was 12,&rdquo; said Phil Myre, formerly with Detroit and now a scout for the Ottawa Senators. &ldquo;You kind of felt for him, how intimidating this must be. You just felt like you wanted to help him.&rdquo;They did, by picking him in the third round, 54th overall. Now the 23-year-old from Peace River, Alta., is returning the favor.Osgood&rsquo;s steady performance is one reason everyone points to for the Wings&rsquo; success.Osgood&rsquo;s play has put him in line for a substantial raise on his $225,000 salary this summer when he becomes a restricted free agent. And it has put painful memories of early playoff experiences behind him.The plan was for Osgood to spend two full seasons with the Adirondack Red Wings, Detroit&rsquo;s Wings&rsquo; American League farm team, but injuries and inconsistent goalie play in Detroit conspired to put Osgood in the net for much of the 1993-94 season and playoffs.The meteoric rise came crashing down when, in Game 7 of the opening round against the San Jose Sharks, Osgood&rsquo;s poor clearing attempt landed on the stick of Shark forward Jamie Baker, who scored the goal that eliminated the Wings.&ldquo;I think the memories of past have been not forgotten, but we&rsquo;ve learned from them,&rdquo; Osgood said. &ldquo;We&rsquo;re a more mature team now. We&rsquo;ve all been together. Our team chemistry is probably the best it has ever been here.&rdquo;Osgood said he has no problem splitting playoff playing time with close friend Mike Vernon.&ldquo;I&rsquo;m sure (coach Scotty Bowman) is going to use the both of us. The bottom line is that we win the Stanley Cup. Everybody wants to be involved. It&rsquo;s going to take everybody.&rdquo; &#9632;

Osgood gaffe gone, but not forgotten

<div class="byline">By Mike Brophy</div>The only thing that hurts more than Mikael Renberg&rsquo;s stomach when he plays is his heart when he doesn&rsquo;t.Renberg has been in and out of the Philadelphia Flyers&rsquo; lineup (mostly out) since straining an abdominal muscle Jan. 22. He was definitely not enjoying his March break.Four times the high-scoring right winger tried to return and four times he went back to sick bay. He was listed as day-to-day, but the Flyers were coming to the realization he could be done for the year.&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t feel great,&rdquo; Renberg said. &ldquo;I keep trying to come back and I just don&rsquo;t feel comfortable. It hurts. I was depressed when they told me I would probably miss two weeks. Now it has been two months and I still can&rsquo;t play.&rdquo;Renberg was just one of a galaxy of NHL stars out with injuries as the schedule made its final turn toward the playoffs. Here are other high-profile players who were watching from the sidelines, along with the date they left the lineup:&#9633; Cam Neely, RW. Boston Bruins, sore right hip, Jan. 31.&#9633; Uwe Krupp, D, Colorado Avalanche, tom anterior cruciate ligament in left knee, Oct. 6.&#9633; Jeremy Roenick, C, Chicago Blackhawks, sprained right ankle, March 17.&#9633; Vladimir Malakhov, D, Montreal Canadiens, tom left knee ligaments, March 18.&#9633; Neal Broten, C, New Jersey Devils, sprained left ankle, Feb. 16.&#9633; Pat Verbeek, RW, New York Rangers, separated right shoulder, March 1.&#9633; Tomas Sandstrom, RW, Pittsburgh Penguins, bruised left shoulder, March 13.&#9633; Brett Hull. RW, St. Louis Blues, pulled leg muscle, March 28.&#9633; Shayne Corson, LW, St. Louis Blues, broken jaw, March 26.&#9633; Pavel Bure, RW, Vancouver Canucks, tom anterior cruciate ligament in right knee, Nov. 9.&#9633; Alexei Zhamnov, C, Winnipeg Jets, back spasms, March 22.All but Neely were expected back at some point this season, though for some, it may depend upon how far their teams go in the playoffs.If Bure returns, he will have beaten the odds having suffered a tom anterior cruciate ligament. ACL injuries usually put a player out for 10 months. Likewise, Krupp-who suffered a similar injury Oct. 6-was expected back for Colorado&rsquo;s final regular season games.For the second straight year, Roenick has been lost to the Blackhawks in the stretch. The gritty center sprained his right ankle and was advised not to rush back to make sure he was sound for the playoffs. He returned from a broken ankle in last season&rsquo;s playoffs, but was not effective.Then there is Boston defenseman Al lafrate, who has missed the past two years with knee injuries. He appeared ready to test his knees in game action when he began suffering back pain and remained sidelined. &#9632;

FEATURES

Key players feel pain as injury bug strikes

<div class="byline">By Elliott Pop</div>After teetering on the gangplank all season, Vancouver Canucks&rsquo; coach Rick Ley was finally shoved into the deep blue sea by a team that was drowning in mediocrity.GM Pat Quinn dumped Ley and took over himself following a 2-8-0 slide in which the Canucks were outscored 44-22 and dropped two slots in the Western Conference.With the dismissal, Ley became the eighth NHL coach to be replaced this season.Ley&rsquo;s fate was sealed by two dismal performances on home ice against the Calgary Flames and Toronto Maple Leafs, the two teams pursuing Vancouver in the west. The Canucks lost 4-0 to the Flames and then were humiliated 6-2 by the Maple Leafs, again giving up four first-period goals.&ldquo;Three weeks ago I was pretty happy with the way we were playing,&rdquo; Quinn said. &ldquo;We were the second-best team on the road and we were the fourth-highest scoring team in the league. Then we seemed to disintegrate. I think the bottom line is what appeared to be the acceptance by the players of what was happening. Since the loss in Washington (90 March 12), I didn&rsquo;t see any trend that was reversing.&rdquo;The move came with the Canucks at 29-32-15 and 13-18-7 in their new home, GM Place. Under Ley, who took over from Quinn at the start of 1994-95, the Canucks were 47-5027.&ldquo;Ricky tried everything he could to get us going,&rdquo; said team captain Trevor Linden. &ldquo;He sat guys down, he yelled at guys, he benched guys. There was no way we intended this to happen. Rick was a good guy and he worked hard. We should be ashamed we let him down.&rdquo;&ldquo;Hopefully this will be a wake-up call and we&rsquo;ll respond.&rdquo;Ley did not immediately surface to discuss his firing and told one reporter who went to his house he had nothing to say. Quinn said Ley took it hard. Quinn also said Ley would be offered some sort of position within the organization. Ley, whose two-year contract is up, is expected to seek a coaching job elsewhere.Quinn, meanwhile, is not expected to coach beyond the end of this season, although he admits it is one of the great loves of his life. The Canucks reached their greatest heights under the 53-year-old Hamilton, Ont., native, finishing first twice before extending the New York Rangers to Game 7 in the 1994 Stanley Cup final.&ldquo;Pat is a student of the game, a good communicator and an excellent teacher,&rdquo; Linden said. &ldquo;He gets things across in the right way. Maybe that will help.&rdquo;One thing is certain, there won&rsquo;t be a lot of time to find out.<h2>COACHING CHANGES</h2>Pat Quinn&rsquo;s displacement and replacement of Rick Ley March 28 made the Vancouver Canucks the seventh team to change coaches this season. Listed are each team&rsquo;s coaches, the number of games coached (G) and winning percentage (Pct.). Not included are fill-in coaches. Quinn had yet to coach a game.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0009-011496/6292362-1-eng-US/f0009-012.jpg" title="f0009-01" width="506" height="669"></div> &#9632;

f0009-01

Canuck freefall leads to firing of coach Ley

<div class="byline">By Jay Greenberg</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0009-021063/6292393-1-eng-US/f0009-022.jpg" title="f0009-02" width="388" height="541"></div>For better and increasingly worse, in sickness and anxiety over Mike Richter&rsquo;s health, Neil Smith remains married to the New York Rangers&rsquo; team he put together.Not quite &lsquo;til death-although Mark Messier&rsquo;s strong living will notwithstanding, extraordinary means would have been needed to keep the Rangers breathing in an 8-2 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins March 24-but certainly until the Ranger GM is or isn&rsquo;t rewarded with the expensive contract he has been looking for ever since he won the Stanley Cup.In a lot of ways, it&rsquo;s good to be King of the Rangers. The Madison Square Garden boss, Dave Checketts, is strictly a basketball guy, which keeps challenges and second guesses of the type Smith&rsquo;s fragile ego absolutely cannot withstand to a bare minimum.The Ranger throne only becomes lonely when the new owners-and we write this at the risk the Garden may have been sold three more times before you read this-cannot tell Brian Leetch from Sergei Nemchinov. All the suits currently in charge know is how much those players cost, which is why Wayne Gretzky is playing for the St. Louis Blues and why Smith is still working for about $500,000, way under the burgeoning industry rate, two years after putting together a champion.The sense of self-preservation Smith may feel probably does not completely explain his home run strategy to fit Luc Robitaille, Pat Verbeek, Jari Kurri, Bruce Driver, Marty McSorley and Ulf Samuelsson around Messier. Fact is, New York has never tolerated long rebuilding projects by any GM. It remains a now kind of place, even two years after everybody swore they could finally die in peace.Still, Smith put his own welfare above that of the organization when he schemed to get Mike Keenan out and is presumably capable of doing so again. Such is the nature of the corporate jungle and the people who swing from vine to vine trying to survive-or in Keenan&rsquo;s and former New York Knicks&rsquo; coach Pat Riley&rsquo;s cases, to get out while the getting is good. The sense of betrayal felt by New York fans as bright and successful people leave is understandable. It&rsquo;s just unfortunate the loyalists ignore the history and usually side with the survivor.Now, this doesn&rsquo;t mean Smith is necessarily leading the Rangers to ruin, anymore that Keenan is on a disaster&rsquo;s path with his greybeards in St. Louis. The current collective bargaining agreement will put accomplished 31-year-old players on sale every year, leaving franchises rich in luxury box revenue in position to open their wallets, trade their draft choices and take their yearly shots. And as bad as the Rangers looked in winning two of 11 games recently, we don&rsquo;t think they are gonzo for this year, anyway.Last year&rsquo;s victory of the no-star New Jersey Devils was the aberration. The teams with the most bigplay players-assuming, of course, they are well-surrounded by a capable coach and competent role players-usually go the farthest. And Messier, Leetch, Richter and Alexei Kovalev, the guys who won it all for the Rangers two years ago, are still here.The Rangers needed to get bigger and grittier in their pre-deadline deals and they&rsquo;ve done that. The big chance they take is counting on Kurri, who last played center with the Colville brothers, to anchor the second line. But this defense, whether McSorley can still play or not, is still the best the Rangers have had in at least 20 years.So, it is not hopeless, just awfully fragile. A Ranger fan winces every time Messier has to give-or worse, take-the body, and jumps every time he hears a car backfiring, fearing it&rsquo;s Richter&rsquo;s groin blowing out for good. Adam Graves, who has chronic back problems, is skating with all the dexterity of Herman Munster and Pat Verbeek, who supplies shoulder for the Rangers, is coming back from a separated shoulder.Still, neither the Devils nor Philadelphia Flyers are exactly looking like a juggernaut these days. Pittsburgh&rsquo;s defense is terrible. And while any of the remaining Eastern Conference playoff teams could be a tough first-round out, none have enough to be a tough third-round out.Messier is a wondrous leader and Richter, if healthy, a marvelously athletic and fundamentally excellent goaltender. Most importantly, Leetch is the most controlling defenseman in the game. Old and brittle as the Rangers looked last year against the Flyers, he almost won the first two games in Philadelphia by himself, which easily could have brought about a different result.Late as it may be getting for the greying Rangers, it is still too early to count them out. &#9632;

f0009-02

Rangers fragile, but don’t count them out

<div class="byline">By Murray Townsend</div>Can you imagine an NHL GM showing up at the entry draft without a selection list of players? No way.Yet some poolsters show up to their drafts with nothing more than a statistics package. Unless those people have already called a psychic hotline, they have little chance of winning.If you&rsquo;re going to enter a playoff pool, you need a list and you must do some planning. We&rsquo;re not talking about weeks of preparation-we&rsquo;ve already put years into it for you. Less than an hour is all that&rsquo;s necessary.The main thing you need to understand is that it is teams that win playoff hockey pools, not individual players. Pick the right teams and the rest will fall into place.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0010-011560/6292431-1-eng-US/f0010-012.jpg" title="f0010-01" width="516" height="765"><figcaption class="caption-body">Patrick Roy</figcaption></div>To begin, list all the playoff matchups and go through them, picking winners all the way to the Stanley Cup final. Assign an average of six games for each series a team is expected to play.When you&rsquo;re finished, you&rsquo;ll have two teams playing 24 games, two al 18, four at 12 and eight at six.Now, get out the calculator and multiply each player&rsquo;s points per game in the accompanying table by the number of games you&rsquo;ve predicted his team will play. Then simply lisl them in order and your work is done. Almost.There are a couple things to keep in mind. When selecting your series winners, be wary of the information most commonly available this time of year. Much of it is misleading. We&rsquo;ve been telling and showing you for years that momentum, season series records and home-ice advantage aren&rsquo;t good indicators of who will win playoff rounds.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0010-021167/6292424-1-eng-US/f0010-022.jpg" title="f0010-02" width="516" height="765"><figcaption class="caption-body">Stephane Richer</figcaption></div>What we haven&rsquo;t been telling you is what does win. It&rsquo;s not for lack of trying, but there hasn&rsquo;t been anything statistical that consistently stands out.A hot goalie-remember Patrick Roy in 1993?&mdash;is always important, but there&rsquo;s no way of predicting that.Often, the better defensive team has an advantage, but maybe not so much this year with obstruction fouls being called more strictly. Or will they be in the playoffs?Teams that have their first big regular season in a number of years are often good bets to exit early. Last season&rsquo;s Quebec Nordiques are a good example of that. Teams new to the upper echelon usually play their best during the season and have nothing more to give during the playoffs.Underachievers, such as Stephane Richer and the New Jersey Devils, should be watched because they&rsquo;resaving their goals for when they count most.We&rsquo;ve prepared tables on the following page as a guide for your playoff pool. There are a couple of things to keep in mind when using the team by team charts.First, players are ranked on their teams in the order we suggest you draft them. You&rsquo;ll notice in some instances players who have fewer points are ranked ahead of more prolific teammates. That&rsquo;s because new factors come into play during the playoffs, such as power play time and ice time.Second, we&rsquo;ve listed first and second half points, power play points, games and points per game in previous playoffs and points per game this year to help you identify trends.Since we supply points per game, we recommend crossing the names as they&rsquo;re selected off a master list of each team&rsquo;s scoring stats. Most poolsters pick in the order they show on that list. That gives you an advantage because you can take the players who have fewer points, but higher points per game (sleepers), later in the draft.During the draft, don&rsquo;t panic when most of your players are concentrated on three or four teams. That&rsquo;s the whole idea. The poolster with the most players left at the end is the likely winner, so spreading them out over too many teams won&rsquo;t allow you to stay in the hunt. &#9632;

f0010-01

Preparation still the key

<div class="byline">By Mike Brophy</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0012-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0012-011521/6292493-1-eng-US/f0012-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Rick Tocchet has provided the Bruins with goals and inspired play.</figcaption></div>Rick Tocchet is with a new team, he&rsquo;s being asked to play a new role and the combination has the old competitive juices flowing again.The 6-foot, 205-pound right winger, who turns 32 April 9, was traded to the Boston Bruins by the Los Angeles Kings Jan. 25 and is caught up in the excitement of being in a playoff race.In L.A. all he ever got caught up in was traffic jams on the way to the Great Western Forum.&ldquo;It feels so good to be back in a hockey town where people wake up in the morning and rush to their morning paper to see the standings,&rdquo; Tocchet said. &ldquo;Los Angeles is a good city to play in, but there is no hockey atmosphere until you get to the rink.&rdquo;The arrival of Tocchet and goalie Bill Ranford from the Edmonton Oilers 14 days earlier raised the hopes of the Bruins, who remained in danger of missing the playoffs for the first time since 1966-67. It didn&rsquo;t help matters when Tocchet was shelved with back spasms March 23 and sat out three straight games. (For more on injuries to key players see pg. 9)Tocchet&rsquo;s influence and enthusiasm were a welcome addition to a team mired in controversy most of the season. The Bruins, once big and bad, were simply bad.They were dragged down by poor goaltending prior to Ranford&rsquo;s arrival, injuries to key players (sniper Cam Neely is probably gone for the season with a hip injury; defenseman Al lafrate remained on the shelf where he has been for two years) as well as bad feelings stemming from rookie coach Steve Kasper&rsquo;s decision to leave veterans Neely and Kevin Stevens on the bench for an entire game Jan. 3 against the Toronto Maple Leafs.&ldquo;When I first got here, they wanted me to use my experience to influence the guys in the dressing room,&rdquo; Tocchet said. &ldquo;Everybody was so tight, they wanted me to be a calming influence. The Bruins seemed to be sleepwalking all year.&rdquo;Tocchet was nursing a sore back when he was traded to Boston for Stevens and couldn&rsquo;t dress for a few games. Once he got into the lineup, it took a few games to adjust to his new surroundings, but he returned to being one of the NHL&rsquo;s grittiest forecheckers who has the rare ability to score goals and inflict pain on the opposition.Through 44 games with the Kings, Tocchet was a shadow of his former self because of his back that acts up occasionally and because he didn&rsquo;t enjoy playing for new coach Larry Robinson. He had 13 goals and 36 points.&ldquo;I just wish (Robinson) was a little more honest with the veterans from the beginning,&rdquo; Tocchet said. &ldquo;He was determined to go with four lines. If he had just given us a chance to prove ourselves, given the veterans a chance to take a run at the Stanley Cup. it would have been different. If we had failed, then go with four lines.&rdquo;Robinson said he was up front with the players from the outset telling them he would usually employ four lines.&ldquo;Perhaps these guys don&rsquo;t know what it&rsquo;s like to go a whole season and then enter a two-month gruelling playoff,&rdquo; Robinson said. &ldquo;I do. That&rsquo;s my coaching philosophy.&rdquo;Boston was 20-18-6 at the time of the deal and went 15-12-3 in their next 30 games including 13-8-2 with Tocchet in the lineup.The man who has skated alongside Mario Lemieux with the Pittsburgh Penguins and Wayne Gretzky of the Kings now enjoys the luxury of playing on a line with Adam Oates, one of the best set-up men ever, and left winger Todd Elik.&ldquo;He brings a dimension that a lot of skilled players don&rsquo;t bring,&rdquo; Oates said. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s one thing for the other team to have to be aware of a tough guy who gets one or two shifts a period and quite another for them to have to keep their heads up for a guy who plays it tough and gets lots of playing time. He&rsquo;s definitely the toughest guy on our team.&rdquo;In 21 games with the Bruins, Tocchet scored 13 goals-including a hat tricks against the Penguins and Ottawa Senators-and 20 points. He had three game-winning goals for Boston and was plus-10.Tocchet has always been a player who worked the comers and fed others. Indeed, through 12 NHL seasons Tocchet has developed into a prototype power forward. Oates likes Tocchet as a power forward, but doesn&rsquo;t think Tocchet has that good a shot that he can score from the comers.&ldquo;I told Rick I want him to camp out in front where he can be a sniper,&rdquo; Oates said. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m a set-up guy and I&rsquo;m too old to change my game.&rdquo; &#9632;

f0012-01

Tocchet revival puts Bruins back in race

<div class="byline">By Helene Elliott</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0012-021238/6292524-1-eng-US/f0012-022.jpg" title="f0012-02" width="386" height="503"></div>The Mighty Ducks of Anaheim probably don&rsquo;t even know it, but they&rsquo;re carrying a heavy responsibility in the final weeks of the season: they&rsquo;re attempting to uphold the honor of California&rsquo;s hockey teams and become the state&rsquo;s only representative in the playoffs.Don&rsquo;t laugh. There is a tradition to uphold. In each of the past three years, a California team made a splash at the NHL&rsquo;s post-season party.In 1993, the Los Angeles Kings advanced to the final. Their success had fans believing the Kings had something to build on and would be a Stanley Cup contender for years to come.Two sets of owners, one bankruptcy and two playoff-less seasons later, the Kings are starting over. They began sliding toward oblivion this season in early-January, when goalie Byron Dafoe forgot how to stop shots, the defense turned to mush and the Wayne Gretzky trade rumors began.Gretzky was gone before the trading deadline, as were Jari Kurri and Marty McSorley. A flurry of trades had players introducing themselves to each other in late-March. Someone should have stuck those &ldquo;Hi, I&rsquo;m (fill in the name)&rdquo; tags onto the players&rsquo; helmets.Their northern California cousins, the San Jose Sharks, were the darlings of the NHL each of the past two springs. In 1994, they upset the Detroit Red Wings in the first round and took the Toronto Maple Leafs to seven games before bowing out, stamping themselves as a team worth watching.They were spoilers again last year, when they upset the Calgary Flames in the opening round. Although they were swept out of the playoffs in the second round by the Red Wings, the Sharks&rsquo; future also seemed promising.This season, however, the Sharks were eliminated by Christmas. Done in by atrocious goaltending and a turbulent atmosphere, they had a 3-18-4 start that cost coach Kevin Constantine his job and resulted in massive turnovers on the ice and in the front office. Suddenly, their future doesn&rsquo;t seem so bright.That leaves the Mighty Ducks, a third-year franchise whose brightest star, left winger Paul Kariya, looks like he walked right out of a Disney movie. If he didn&rsquo;t exist, Disney animators would have invented him: polite, clean-cut, cute enough to send teenage girls into spasms of giggles, but a good enough player to entertain serious fans.Although he was spectacular at times, he couldn&rsquo;t win games alone and empty seats were evident at the previously sold-out Pond. To the rescue came right winger Teemu Selanne, acquired from the Winnipeg Jets for Chad Kilger and Oleg Tverdovsky. Selanne and Kariya have become a dynamic duo, performing the superhuman feat of lifting the Ducks toward respectability and playoff contention.We&rsquo;ll know better a year from now, but the Ducks appear to be making major strides. They have two young superstars, stability in their coaching and management-coach Ron Wilson and GM Jack Ferreira have been in place since the beginning-and a fair amount of guts, as evidenced by their decision to trade first-round picks Kilger and Tverdovsky for Selanne.Throughout their existence, the Ducks have dutifully upheld the Disney tradition of presenting lively, family-oriented entertainment-and of making piles of money. Now, it&rsquo;s time for them to keep alive the California tradition of making a major impact on the NHL playoffs. They&rsquo;re our only hope. &#9632;

f0012-02

California pride riding with Ducks

<div class="byline">By Stan Flschler</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0013-011432/6292555-1-eng-US/f0013-012.jpg" title="f0013-01" width="387" height="508"></div>Impertinent thoughts on pertinent topics:&#9633; Why should Mike Keenan worry about the Blues exiting in the first playoff round again? His franchise-attention span already is waning in St. Louis and he appears ready for another jump. Besides, he has never been coach-GM in Phoenix before and the Scorpions/Coyotes may just be looking for a coach-GM for a year and a headline.&#9633; The NHL can deliver all the rhetoric it wants about not playing favorites, but when Mark Messier escapes the bashing of David Roberts without a suspension, you can only conclude league policy holds that all players are equals, but Messier is more equal than others.&#9633; Chicago Blackhawk Jeff Hackett is the finest testimonial to goalie-maker Vladislav Tretiak&rsquo;s teaching genius.&#9633; Nicklas Lidstrom is the best unheralded Swede since Stefan Persson.&#9633; I like Theo Fleury&rsquo;s chances of making The Hall of Fame a dozen-and-a-half years from today.&#9633; Wasn&rsquo;t Brian Savage once a star for Les Canadiens?&#9633; It&rsquo;s nice of the Sabres to invite Pat LaFontaine and Dominik Hasek back to Buffalo next season. Who did they think would put people in the new building, Matthew Barnaby?&#9633; Bryan Murray made the best two trade deadline pickups in Martin Straka (obtained on waivers) and Ray Sheppard. They&rsquo;re good enough to get the Florida Panthers into the second round.&#9633; If one acquisition could mean the difference between making and missing the playoffs, it&rsquo;s Ron Sutter who should put the Boston Bruins into a post-season spot.&#9633; Want a synonym for bad attitude? Craig Janney.&#9633; Over a full season, Wendel Clark inevitably will return to his modus operandi; two good games out of seven. But that doesn&rsquo;t mean he won&rsquo;t be good seven out of seven in the dressing room.&#9633; Forget about any Red Wings&rsquo; winning record. The Canadiens of 1976-77 had only eight losses in an 80-game season. Nobody can top that.&#9633; Prospective NHL coaches to be interviewed this summer (listed alphabetically): Pat Bums, Jacques Demers, Robbie Ftorek, Butch GorI ing, Tom McVie, Barry Melrose and Brian Sutter.&#9633; How come hardly anybody talks about Sergei Gonchar, a prime reason why the Washington Capitals were still in the playoff hunt?&#9633; Heaven help Marc Crawford if the Colorado Avalanche meets the Calgary Flames in the playoffs. It will be good-bye Avalanche faster than you can say Joe Sakic.&#9633; Here&rsquo;s a debate that&rsquo;s unwinnable: who&rsquo;s better, Mario Lemieux or Jaromir Jagr? It says here the former is still ahead of the latter whenever he&rsquo;s in good health.&#9633; The saying, &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t know what you&rsquo;ve got &lsquo;til it&rsquo;s gone,&rdquo; applies well to the Devils and injured defenseman Shawn Chambers.&#9633; The Panthers&rsquo; Doug MacLean gets mad better than any rookie coach in the league.&#9633; Bernie Nicholls is the most persistent advocate of honesty being the best policy whether Bob Pulford likes it or not.&#9633; If Terry Crisp isn&rsquo;t rehired by the Tampa Bay Lightning it will be a miscarriage of justice.&#9633; No team and player will miss each other more at playoff time than the New York Rangers and Ray Ferraro. &#9632;

f0013-01

Could Keenan be on move again?

<div class="byline">By Robyn Norwood</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0014-021155/6292586-1-eng-US/f0014-022.jpg" title="f0014-02" width="573" height="974"><figcaption class="caption-body">Guy Hebert</figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0014-011512/6292593-1-eng-US/f0014-012.jpg" title="f0014-01" width="161" height="159"></div>Guy Hebert&rsquo;s season has been up and down, but the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim goalie was at the peak of his game just when it mattered most.Anaheim went on a club-record seven-game unbeaten streak in March to pull into playoff contention. The dazzling play of Teemu Selanne and Paul Kariya was in the spotlight, but Hebert was the backbone of the Ducks&rsquo; streak with a 1.28 goals-against average and a 96.4 save percentage during a 6-0-1 run that was ended by the Detroit Red Wings on March 25.&ldquo;You can&rsquo;t forget, our goaltending has been impeccable for about a month,&rdquo; said Ducks&rsquo; coach Ron Wilson.&ldquo;Guy has been playing unbelievable,&rdquo; said winger Garry Valk. &ldquo;He went those two or three weeks when he wasn&rsquo;t playing and he has really beared down.&rdquo;Hebert, benched in favor of Mikhail Shtalenkov for seven of eight games in late-February and early-March, has struggled with nagging injuries and Wilson&rsquo;s flagging confidence in him, but he&rsquo;s certainly back on top of things now.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s like anything,&rdquo; Hebert said. &ldquo;You&rsquo;re feeling good, things are going right, you seem to get the breaks and you end up making big saves. Maybe you&rsquo;re a little more alert than usual because you&rsquo;re so energized by the way things are going. Things seem easier. You&rsquo;re in that zone, or whatever you want to call it.&rdquo;NOTEBOOK: Left winger Garry Valk recorded only the fourth hat trick in Ducks&rsquo; history March 22 in a 5-1 victory at St. Louis. His first three-goal game came in the 354th game of his career. I&rsquo;m happy when I go out there and don&rsquo;t get scored against on the power play. I&rsquo;m a penaltykiller,&rdquo; Valk said. &ldquo;You could play your whole career without getting a hat trick.&rdquo; Teemu Selanne already has two hat tricks as a Duck. The other was by Terry Yake&hellip;Defenseman Randy Ladouceur, the Ducks&rsquo; captain, was a healthy scratch eight consecutive games and counting, but he drew praise from teammates for his attitude. &ldquo;I think Laddy has done a great job staying positive,&rdquo; said goalie Guy Hebert. &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t say enough about Laddy.&rdquo; &#9632;

f0014-02

Hebert peaks at right time

<div class="byline">By Mike Loftus</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0014-03793/6292624-1-eng-US/f0014-032.jpg" title="f0014-03" width="163" height="160"></div>The Boston Bruins were fighting for their playoff lives, but Bill Ranford wasn&rsquo;t discouraged. The Bruins&rsquo; goalie was thrilled just to be on a road headed in the direction of the playoffs for a change.&ldquo;If you look at my record for the last few years, you&rsquo;ll see I haven&rsquo;t had many streaks like this,&rdquo; said Ranford, who was in goal for all but the first game of Boston&rsquo;s eight-game unbeaten streak, which ended with a 5-4 loss to the New York Rangers March 23. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m enjoying it.&rdquo;Ranford, who came to the Bruins from the Edmonton Oilers Jan. 11, was 16-11-3 in his first 30 decisions with Boston through March 28. The Bruins, by no coincidence, got five games above .500 for the first time all year.&ldquo;He boosts our confidence,&rdquo; said rookie defenseman Kyle McLaren. &ldquo;With him back there, we can go at teams right from the start.&rdquo;&ldquo;He has played unbelievable,&rdquo; said captain Ray Bourque. &ldquo;He has really been the difference for us.&rdquo;Having been with the Oilers through the glory years and the lean years, Ranford had found it increasingly difficult to enjoy the game.&ldquo;It was a situation where you&rsquo;re doing what you want to do, but it&rsquo;s not fun,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;How easy is it to go to work every day when you&rsquo;re not having fun?&rdquo;Ranford quietly set a personal regular-season mark with 29 victories and appeared certain to surpass the 71 appearances he made in 1993-94.NOTEBOOK: Rick Tocchet missed three games because of back spasms after scoring a hat trick March 21 against Ottawa, but Boston&rsquo;s offense didn&rsquo;t suffer as much as expected: Steve Heinze, pulled off the fourth line to play in Tocchet&rsquo;s spot, scored four goals in three games, including a hat trick in a 5-4 loss to the Rangers March 23&hellip;There was no improvement in either Cam Neely&rsquo;s aching hip or Al lafrate&rsquo;s back, increasing the probability that neither one will be back by the end of the regular season&hellip;The Bruins, whose road record at one point was 2-9-2, improved to 15-16-5 by winning four straight and seven of eight&hellip;A 4-3 loss to Montreal March 28 was Boston&rsquo;s sixth in overtime-most in the NHL. &#9632;

f0014-03

Ranford in playoff race, loving every minute of it

<div class="byline">By Jim Kelley</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0014-04532/6292655-1-eng-US/f0014-042.jpg" title="f0014-04" width="160" height="161"></div>In a season of small successes for the Buffalo Sabres, Derek Plante is one of them.The diminutive center scored his 20th goal of the season March 27 against the Detroit Red Wings and needed one more to match the career-best figure he posted in his rookie season.&ldquo;Obviously you want to set some goals for yourself,&rdquo; Plante said. &ldquo;I got to 21 my rookie season (1993-94). I wanted to get better this year. I&rsquo;ve got a couple more to get.&rdquo;That&rsquo;s a realistic goal for Plante who has worked himself into a solid second-line center position. That&rsquo;s another ac-complishment.Buffalo&rsquo;s seventh choice (161st overall) in the 1989 entry draft, Plante led the Western Collegiate Hockey As-sociation in goals (36), assists (56) and points (92) in 1992-93. He was named an all-America that season.Plante finished fourth in rookie scoring and tied for third in assists among freshmen players. He also led all rookies in power play assists and seemed well on his way to making an impact with the Sabres.That all came apart when Plante struggled with just three goals and 22 points in 47 games last season and played himself right out of the lineup.Plante was on the outs at training camp as well, but a new attitude, a new coach and Brian Holzinger&rsquo;s inability to hold onto the job of No. 2 pivot that was handed to him in training camp, led to Plante making a comeback.&ldquo;He worked his way back,&rdquo; said coach Ted Nolan. &ldquo;We had a couple of talks at the beginning of the season and he just went out and worked his way into more playing time.&rdquo;A 20-goal season isn&rsquo;t the stuff that of which hockey legends are made, but considering where Plante was when the season started, it&rsquo;s a comeback of meaningful proportions.&ldquo;He&rsquo;s a smart player and he knows how to score goals,&rdquo; said Pat LaFontaine, Plante&rsquo;s roommate on the road. &ldquo;He just needed to get his confidence back and I think this season he did that.&rdquo;NOTEBOOK: Coach Ted Nolan put an end to the traditional team meal-where rookies pick up the tab of a ridiculously expensive team dinner-and had the players donate the money they would have spent to a local food bank&hellip;Defenseman Richard Smehlik resumed skating and was expected to play a game or two before the end of the season. Smehlik is recovering from surgery to repair a tom anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee, the result of a pre-season training mishap&hellip;Defenseman Bob Boughner was even or plus in 20 of his first 22 games after joining the Sabres. Defenseman Darryl Shannon was plus-12 in his first 18 games with the club&hellip;The Sabres were headed for just their sixth losing season in 26 years. &#9632;

f0014-04

Third year good one for Plante

<div class="byline">By Eric Duhatschek</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0014-05361/6292686-1-eng-US/f0014-052.jpg" title="f0014-05" width="164" height="163"></div>It is the question on every body&rsquo;s mind as the playoffs approach: Who will the Calgary Flames start in goal when they open the playoffs?Will it be Trevor Kidd, the nominal No. 1 man, or Rick Tabaracci, who has actually won more games with less playing time?The Flames have been one of the few teams this season to employ a two-goalie system by choice. Tabarac-ci&rsquo;s playing time inched up in November after the team&rsquo;s poor start and in the past four months, coach Pierre Page generally goes with whichever goaltender holds the hot hand.&ldquo;We do better when we hand the ball to someone,&rdquo; Page said. &ldquo;All year, if we go by the book, it hasn&rsquo;t worked as well as saying to someone, &lsquo;It&rsquo;s your tum. You go with it.&rsquo; &ldquo;Tabaracci and Kidd provide completely different looks for the Flames. Kidd is bigger and covers more net. Tabaracci possesses better puckhandling skills and as a result, takes some pressure off the defense.So who starts?&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think the decision has been made yet,&rdquo; Tabaracci said. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s going to be a tough call for them. All we can do is play as well as we can. We&rsquo;re very different goaltenders. Right now, I&rsquo;ve got a great amount of confidence and chemistry going with the defense. They know what I&rsquo;m going to do with the puck and I know where they&rsquo;re going to be. It really helps us with our breakouts. I&rsquo;d like to think that part of it is going to be to our advantage.&rdquo;NOTEBOOK: Center Bob Sweeney scored a goal in his first game with the Eames, a 2-1 loss to San Jose, and then spent the next three matches watching from the press box. Sweeney was asked if there was a reason. &ldquo;Yeah,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;but I don&rsquo;t know what it is.&rdquo;&hellip;Defenseman Kevin Dahl found out the hard way he was on his way to the minors for the second time this season&ndash;by reading it in the newspaper. It happened the day after the NHL trading deadline while the team was in Chicago. The Eames wanted to wait until Dahl returned to Calgary so interim GM Al Coates could give him the news face-to-face. Dahl, the seventh defenseman, was sent down to Saint John of the American League to get in some playing time before the playoffs. &#9632;

f0014-05

Burning question for Flames: Who’s No. 1 in post-season?

<div class="byline">By Tim Sassone</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0014-07232/6292717-1-eng-US/f0014-072.jpg" title="f0014-07" width="568" height="969"><figcaption class="caption-body">Steve Smith</figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0014-06288/6292724-1-eng-US/f0014-062.jpg" title="f0014-06" width="160" height="157"></div>A good sign for the Chicago Blackhawks approaching playoffs was the health of defenseman Steve Smith, who missed most of the first four months of the season with a disc problem in his back.Smith played in his 19th straight game March 29 against the Vancouver Canucks and was answering the question of whether his back could hold up through the playoff grind.&ldquo;I&rsquo;m feeling 100 per cent now,&rdquo; Smith said. &ldquo;I have my timing back and if I&rsquo;m making mistakes it&rsquo;s not because of my back, it&rsquo;s because of various other reasons.&rdquo;Getting to the point where he feels 100 per cent again has taken countless hours of work by Smith, who is the Blackhawks&rsquo; Masterton Trophy nominee for the second straight season because of that dedication.Smith calls himself as a 9-to-5 worker, referring to the hours he reports to the United Center on non-game days and when he leaves for home. Some days Smith starts with a 7 a.m. visit to the chiropractor for a back adjustment.&ldquo;That&rsquo;s my new work day,&rdquo; he said.&rdquo;But it&rsquo;s something I know I have to do to stay in the league.&rdquo;Smith, who turns 33 in late April, wants to play at least four more seasons in the NHL. He admits there were times in his rehabilitation that he didn&rsquo;t think he&rsquo;d make it through four more days.Even when the season ends, Smith plans to spend a month in California after the playoffs working with noted back specialist, Dr. Robert Watkins.NOTEBOOK: Steve Smith called for an investigation into the use of hometown video judges after a call went against the Blackhawks in a 1-0 loss at Calgary March 27. The Hawks claim Gary Roberts batted the puck in with his glove, but replay official Doug Young of Calgary ruled it hit Smith. &ldquo;Plain and simple, the guy upstairs cheated us,&rdquo; Smith said. &ldquo;I think the NHL has to review the type of people they have up there.&rdquo; Replied Jim Gregory, the NHL&rsquo;s vice-president of operations: &ldquo;This is the fifth or sixth season we&rsquo;ve been hiring people to review instant replay and if there was any partiality or bias shown, we&rsquo;d have taken care of it by now.&rdquo;&hellip;With the acquisition of defenseman Enrico Ciccone. Cam Russell was moved to left wing. &#9632;

f0014-07

Smith back in fine form

<div class="byline">By Adrian Dater</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0015-011399/6292755-1-eng-US/f0015-012.jpg" title="f0015-01" width="161" height="160"></div>If jealousy and the con troversy such emotions can produce are your thing, don&rsquo;t look toward the on-ice rivalry between Peter Forsberg and Joe Sakic to find it.Theirs is a friendly one. You won&rsquo;t find either player pouting over the other receiving a little more ice time or who&rsquo;s ahead of whom in league scoring.That&rsquo;s because the dynamic duo for the Colorado Avalanche are team-first guys who would easily trade a goal here or assist there if it meant a few more victories.Forsberg and Sakic have been running neck-and-neck all season long for the team scoring title. The pair has been a somewhat smaller version of Pittsburgh&rsquo;s incredible duo of Mario Lemieux and Jaromir Jagr.While Lemieux and Jagr have been 1-2 all season in the scoring chase, Forsberg and Sakic have alternated spots in the top five in the league. After Colorado&rsquo;s 8-3 victory over the San Jose Sharks March 28, Forsberg was tied for third with Ron Francis in league points (112), while Sakic had 111.Both are exceedingly quiet and modest off the ice, and each roots hard for the other.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s a healthy rivalry. It has been good for both of us and we&rsquo;ve both had our successes,&rdquo; said Sakic, whose 111 points represents a career high. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s really no competition because we get along really well.&rdquo;Colorado coach Marc Crawford just smiles when asked about his two superstar centers.&ldquo;I think they&rsquo;ve both had dynamite years,&rdquo; Crawford said. &ldquo;They both benefited from playing on the same team. That natural rivalry, a silent one, is there and they really want to show that they&rsquo;re two great players, not just one overshadowing the other.&rdquo;Sakic did concede to one personal goal, however. The desire to reach 50 goals-something he has never done.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s something I&rsquo;ve never had,&rdquo; Sakic said, &ldquo;so obviously it would be nice to get.&rdquo;NOTEBOOK: The Avalanche was held to a season-low 15 shots in a 7-0 loss in Detroit March 22. When its bus got stuck in traffic after the game, the players were ordered to walk the final two blocks to the hotel by coach Marc Crawford. &ldquo;A hundred feet or a hundred yards, that&rsquo;s a part of town you don&rsquo;t want to be out walking around in,&rdquo; said defenseman Craig Wolanin, a Michigan native. Center Mike Ricci added, &ldquo;There was a lot of anger and frustration on the bus, maybe it was good to get some fresh air.&rdquo;&hellip;Defenseman Sandis Ozolinsh set a career-high with four assists March 28 against his old team, San Jose&hellip;Defenseman Uwe Krupp continues to make good progress rehabilitating from knee surgery Oct. 21. &#9632;

f0015-01

Forsberg, Sakic push each other

<div class="byline">By Mike Heika</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0015-02975/6292786-1-eng-US/f0015-022.jpg" title="f0015-02" width="160" height="160"></div>The last two weeks in March may have been the lowest in Kevin Hatcher&rsquo;s career. And whether he stays with the Dallas Stars could be decided by the first two weeks in April.Hatcher was rumored to be going to one of three teams leading up to the March 20 trade deadline. But when the witching hour struck, no move had been made.It was a tense time for the Stars&rsquo; second-highest paid player at $2.2 million this season (with three more years on his contract), but one he said he was glad to see pass.&ldquo;They had me going to every team in North America there,&rdquo; Hatcher said. &ldquo;But I&rsquo;m happy to be here, I want to stay here.&rdquo;Not so much that he showed it on the ice. Hatcher made several defensive mistakes in the Stars&rsquo; spiral from playoff contender to afterthought and was one of many key culprits in a critical 8-2 loss to the Winnipeg Jets March 26. The following game, Hatcher was a healthy scratch. It was only the second time in his 798-game career.&ldquo;Kevin hasn&rsquo;t played nearly as well as we expected,&rdquo; said Stars&rsquo; coach Ken Hitchcock. &ldquo;We talked about it (to him) and there was no change, so we had to send a further message.&rdquo;The Stars got the message, beating the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim 3-1 March 28. The entire defense responded with a big game, including Kevin&rsquo;s brother, captain Derian Hatcher, who likewise had been struggling.NOTEBOOK: With University of Michigan&rsquo;s Jason Botterill (the 20th pick in the 1994 entry draft) having an outstanding junior season, the Stars may step up talks this summer to lure him out of school. GM Bob Gainey said the team will leave the decision to Botterill, but Botterill will definitely talk to them in the off-season&hellip;Center Greg Adams (fractured right hand) had missed 12 games and right winger Jere Lehtinen (sprained right ankle) four&hellip;After scoring his 500th career point in his 489th game, Mike Modano said, &ldquo;I think I&rsquo;ll get the next 500 a lot quicker, I won&rsquo;t wait 500 games.&rdquo;&hellip;The Stars went on a 0-for-40 run on their power play and went 1-6-1 in that span, virtually ending any hopes for the playoffs. &#9632;

f0015-02

Hatcher spared from trade, rough days ahead in Dallas

<div class="byline">By Cynthia Lambert</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0015-04515/6292817-1-eng-US/f0015-042.jpg" title="f0015-04" width="566" height="968"><figcaption class="caption-body">Greg Johnson</figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0015-03704/6292824-1-eng-US/f0015-032.jpg" title="f0015-03" width="160" height="161"></div>The Detroit Red Wings were relatively injury free all season.That is, until trading deadline time. The Wings lost three players to injury around the March 20 deadline.Although they aren&rsquo;t considered premier contributors, their absence is being felt.First is Greg Johnson, who suffered tom ligaments in his right knee March 19.The versatile forward has excelled after watching from the sidelines for most of last season. Though he is considered a center, he also can play either wing. And in 59 games this season, he had 18 goals and 40 points.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s the nature of the sport that you&rsquo;re bound to get injured,&rdquo; Johnson said. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m aiming to return a couple of games before the playoffs actually.&rdquo;A return before the playoffs would serve Johnson well. He is in the final year of his contract and negotiations on a new deal have stalled. The main point of contention is exactly what kind of player Johnson is now and can be for a team.&ldquo;As it stands now we&rsquo;ve agreed to disagree,&rdquo; said Wings&rsquo; assistant GM Ken Holland. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s not as though we&rsquo;re miles apart. We&rsquo;ll just leave it alone for a while.&rdquo;Entering the final two weeks of the regular season, the Wings were also without role-playing forwards Bob Errey (broken bone in his left foot) and Kris Draper (charley horse).&ldquo;You win games with those guys,&rdquo; said defenseman Mike Ramsey.NOTEBOOK: With 57 victories and eight games remaining, the Red Wings were closing in on the 1976-77 Montreal Canadiens&rsquo; record of 60 victories in the season. &ldquo;Our first priority is to play well defensively,&rdquo; said coach Scotty Bowman. &ldquo;The 60 wins is not an issue&rdquo;&hellip;With the 42 victory over Buffalo March 27, goalie Chris Osgood ran his unbeaten streak to 21 games (19-0-2)&hellip;Right winger Kirk Maltby said wearing a visor goes against his beliefs, but an eye injury suffered earlier this season-a scratched cornea and slight tear in the retina of his left eye-is forcing him to accept it. &ldquo;I really have to wear it,&rdquo; Maltby said. &ldquo;Another blow to the eye at this point and it wouldn&rsquo;t be good. It&rsquo;s a pain just because of the way I like to play.&rdquo; &#9632;

f0015-04

Injuries hit at bad time

<div class="byline">By Dan Barnes</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0016-021011/6292855-1-eng-US/f0016-022.jpg" title="f0016-02" width="574" height="978"><figcaption class="caption-body">Mariusz Czerkawski</figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0016-011296/6292862-1-eng-US/f0016-012.jpg" title="f0016-01" width="161" height="159"></div>Back in Poland, ice time was rarely a problem for young Mariusz Czerkawski.&ldquo;Sometimes I played the whole period when I was young,&rdquo; Czerkawski said. &ldquo;I think that&rsquo;s where it started.&rdquo;It is his frustrating penchant for hanging onto the puck long after most players would have dished to an eagerly awaiting teammate. Edmonton Oilers&rsquo; linemate Dean McAmmond summed it up perfectly in a football analogy.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s like a quarterback who stays in the pocket,&rdquo; McAmmond said. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a matter of us trying to read off him when he&rsquo;s working his magic with the puck.&rdquo;Oilers&rsquo; coach Ron Low would like to see him use his linemates better.&ldquo;He has got an awful lot of the tools. I think at some point in his life he played hockey and was the best player by a country mile and could go through five guys and score,&rdquo; Low said. &ldquo;Those things change when you hit the NHL. He has only been here over a year and he&rsquo;s still learning the game at this level, but I&rsquo;d really like to see him use other people more.&rdquo;Czerkawski has had a turbulent season. After a promising rookie season last year, he didn&rsquo;t record a point until his 11th game or a goal until his 17th. After a trade from the Boston Bruins, he took a vicious slash from Chris Tamer of the Pittsburgh Penguins which sliced the end of his pinky finger and had his nose and some teeth broken when he was punched in the face by Sean O&rsquo;Donnell of the Los Angeles Kings.NOTEBOOK: Jason Arnott recorded a single-game high five points as the Oilers became the first opponent to win in Molson Centre with a 6-5 win over Montreal March 23&hellip;The Oilers finished a gruelling 14-day, seven-game, cross-continent road trip with a 5-2-0 record&hellip;Center Doug Weight needed just four points to become the seventh Oiler to hit the 100-point plateau. The first six were: Wayne Gretzky, Mark Messier. Glenn Anderson. Paul Coffey, Jari Kurri and Jimmy Carson&hellip;A Bryan Marchment knee-check put Janne Lauk-kanen of Ottawa out for the season with a sprained knee. The NHL looked at the incident. but didn&rsquo;t suspend Marchment because it was determined he was trying to hit another player, Michel Picard. &#9632;

f0016-02

Czerkawski hanging on

<div class="byline">By Dave Joseph</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0016-03752/6292893-1-eng-US/f0016-032.jpg" title="f0016-03" width="160" height="159"></div>Does the shoe still fit?After being the Cinderella team for most of the season, the Florida Panthers suddenly found themselves on hard times entering the final month and slipping down the standings in the Eastern Conference.During one 15-game stretch, the Panthers were 3-10-2 with two of their victories coming against the New York Islanders and Ottawa Senators. The offense was suddenly AWOL, scoring only 30 goals during their 15-game downfall.Leading goal scorer Scott Mellanby (one goal in 11 games), Rob Nieder-mayer (two goals in 12 games) and rookie Radek Dvorak (one goal in 14 games) were struggling. And defenseman Gord Murphy, usually a stalwart on the blueline and power play, hadn&rsquo;t scored a point since returning from a sprained ankle Feb. 21.&ldquo;We&rsquo;re all frustrated right now to say the least,&rdquo; said coach Doug MacLean.The Panthers&rsquo; offensive problems were never more evident than in a 3-2 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins March 28. The power play went 0-for-10 and was even outshot during a five-minute man advantage.&ldquo;It seems like when you&rsquo;re on a roll you can play a few bad games and get away with it,&rdquo; Mellanby said. &ldquo;In the first 30 games, we didn&rsquo;t play that well every night, but we seemed to keep winning (21-7-2). Now, some nights you work your tail off and you can&rsquo;t seem to get the puck in the net.&rdquo;NOTEBOOK: Left winger Mike Hough set the team record for fastest goal from the start of a game when he scored 15 seconds into the March 28 contest against Pittsburgh&hellip;The Panthers signed a letter of intent to play 25 years in a new arena in Broward County. If a new owner is not found. H. Wayne Huizenga said he&rsquo;d keep the team. The county must now decide whether to build the arena with just one tenant The National Basketball Association&rsquo;s Miami Heat was still negotiating with Dade County for a new arena&hellip;The Panthers&rsquo; winless streak on the road stretched to eight games (0-7-1) when they lost 3-0 to the Rangers at Madison Square Garden March 27. It was the second time they&rsquo;d been shut out by the Rangers this season. &#9632;

f0016-03

Lengthy scoring drought greases downward slide

<div class="byline">By Michael Arace</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0016-04547/6292924-1-eng-US/f0016-042.jpg" title="f0016-04" width="161" height="159"></div>There was a time when Frank Sinatra couldn&rsquo;t sing. Ernest Hemingway hit some wicked writer&rsquo;s blocks.Although Adam Burt is no artist, he can relate. Burt forgot how to skate. No kidding. Oh, it&rsquo;s not like he was falling down or anything, but the Hartford Whalers&rsquo; defenseman felt something was different.&ldquo;Usually, when things weren&rsquo;t going well for me in the past, I could always fall back and play sound defense,&rdquo; Burt said. &ldquo;But I was skating so terribly, I was taking dumb minors all over the place. Skating had always been my strength. I lost it.&rdquo;How does this happen? &ldquo;I have no idea,&rdquo; Burt said. &ldquo;It sounds crazy, but you look at the tapes before and after and it was apparent what the problem was for me earlier this season. I couldn&rsquo;t skate.&rdquo;Through the first 35 games. Burt was minus-17. The next 38 games, Burt was plus or even player 30 times. He was a a plus-21 in the latter stretch before settling in at minus-3 overall.And although he hasn&rsquo;t changed the mechanics of his game, his skating came back just as quickly and mysteriously as it left.&ldquo;When you take a look at what Adam has gone through, you really have to give him a lot of credit,&rdquo; said Whalers&rsquo; coach Paul Maurice. &ldquo;He has overcome a lot. He was probably bothered by that shoulder injury (which forced him to miss three games in late November) more than anybody realized and more than he let on. Since midDecember, he has slowly built his game back. Lately, he has just been outstanding.&rdquo;Burt said a mid-season pairing with 36-year-old Brad McCrimmon helped him strip his game to the point where he could rebuild it. McCrimmon was plus-16 this season, plus-445 on his career.&ldquo;I&rsquo;ll never forget something Beast (McCrimmon) said years ago: &lsquo;Hockey is a simple game,&rsquo;&rdquo; Burt said. &ldquo;He really helped me get my game down to its simplest elements.&rdquo;NOTEBOOK: A &ldquo;Save the Whale&rdquo; campaign, the goal of which is to double the season ticket base to 11,000, is under way. The results will be announced sometime around the first week of May. If it is successful, the state will redo the team&rsquo;s Civic Center lease, offering additional revenue streams as an enticement for the Whalers to remain in Hartford. One new wrinkle: The Whalers have told state officials that if they are to remain, a new arena will have to be in their future plans&hellip;The Whalers concluded an 0-3-2 stretch, which could kill their playoff hopes, with a 6-5 overtime loss to Boston March 27. &ldquo;It makes me sick, nauseous,&rdquo; said Whalers&rsquo; goalie Sean Burke. &ldquo;I could literally puke. That&rsquo;s the way I feel right now.&rdquo; &#9632;

f0016-04

Burt better after awful start to year

<div class="byline">By Lisa Dillman</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0016-05413/6292955-1-eng-US/f0016-052.jpg" title="f0016-05" width="160" height="160"></div>Los Angeles Kings&rsquo; GM Sam McMaster was delivering the news-most of it bad-and there appeared to be no end in sight.He was detailing the fast-growing Kings&rsquo; injury list in the aftermath of a 4-1 loss to the Vancouver Canucks March 25 and thought of a solution.&ldquo;We&rsquo;ll just pray,&rdquo; McMaster said, with a laugh.The Kings may not have led the league in many categories this season, but they are making a run at man games lost to injury. The Kings were approaching 350 man games lost at the end of March, second most in the league to the New York Islanders.Against the Canucks, five more players were injured, including veteran defenseman Steven Finn, who blocked a shot and suffered a broken left foot.Left winger Barry Potomski suffered a strained left shoulder and sat out the next game against the Edmonton Oilers. Although center Ray Ferraro was slashed in the face and center Ian Laperriere blocked a shot and injured his left foot, they played against the Oilers.With all the injuries and upheaval-eight new players in the lineup since the Wayne Gretzky trade to the St. Louis Blues Feb. 27-one major obstacle is achieving team chemistry so late in the season.&ldquo;Our biggest problem is that literally nobody knows each other in this dressing room,&rdquo; Ferraro said. &ldquo;This is the most fragmented dressing room I&rsquo;ve seen because nobody knows anybody.&rdquo;NOTEBOOK: Team chairman Robert Sanderman. who is the Kings&rsquo; representative on the board of governors, gave GM Sam McMaster a vote of confidence on the day Wayne Gretzky was traded back on Feb. 27 and said the owners intend to give him a new contract. As a result, McMaster, who has been the team&rsquo;s GM for almost two seasons, said the final details were being worked out and a signed deal could be completed before the end of the season&hellip;Kings&rsquo; left winger Kevin Stevens, who missed 10 games because of a fractured left fibula, returned to action on March 27 at Edmonton&hellip;Although defenseman Rob Blake is out for the season because of knee surgery, he has resumed skating. &#9632;

f0016-05

McMaster turns to prayer as injuries, losses pile up

<div class="byline">By Herb Zurkowsky</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0016-07320/6292986-1-eng-US/f0016-072.jpg" title="f0016-07" width="571" height="971"><figcaption class="caption-body">Robert Dirk</figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0016-06347/6292993-1-eng-US/f0016-062.jpg" title="f0016-06" width="159" height="158"></div>Dirk&rsquo;s work is finished in Montreal-almost before it began.Veteran defenseman Robert Dirk was placed on waivers and sent home by the Canadiens March 24 after refusing the organization&rsquo;s offer to remain with the team as an extra body.The Canadiens continued paying Dirk&rsquo;s $450,000 (U.S.) salary. He becomes an unrestricted free agent this summer.&ldquo;If you force a guy to be there with the team when he&rsquo;s not happy, you&rsquo;re no better off,&rdquo; said GM Rejean Houle.Dirk, 29, was acquired from the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim Jan. 21 for minor league forward Jim Campbell. Dirk was supposed to be the tough defenseman the Canadiens lacked, but it didn&rsquo;t work out.In his first game, he fractured a bone in his shoulder and was out for a month. He didn&rsquo;t play well in his first game back and was scratched from the next four games before returning March 9. It was the final time he donned a Canadiens&rsquo; uniform.Even following knee injuries to Vladimir Malakhov and Stephane Quintal, coach Mario Tremblay refused to play Dirk, opting instead for rookies David Wilkie, Rory Fitzpatrick and Craig Rivet.The coach suggested Dirk was &ldquo;sulking,&rdquo; but Dirk refused to wage a war of words.&ldquo;I&rsquo;d love to tell you my side, but my hands are tied,&rdquo; Dirk said. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t want to say anything to get myself in trouble.&rdquo;NOTEBOOK: Center Vincent Damphousse served an automatic one-game suspension and faced possible supplementary discipline for crosschecking Washington defenseman Sergei Gonchar to the face. Gonchar lost a tooth and required stitches. Canadiens&rsquo; coach Mario Tremblay also faced disciplinary action for throwing a water bottle at referee Paul Stewart in the same game&hellip;Defenseman Peter Popovic is the Canadiens&rsquo; nominee for the Masterton Trophy. The towering 6-foot-6, 252-pound Swede had a tough time cracking the lineup his first two seasons under former coach Jacques Demers. But under Tremblay, Popovic plays regularly and kills penalties. If he isn&rsquo;t the Canadiens&rsquo; best rearguard, he has developed into their most consistent one. &#9632;

f0016-07

Dirk and Habs part company

<div class="byline">By Rich Chere</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0017-011149/6293024-1-eng-US/f0017-012.jpg" title="f0017-01" width="162" height="163"></div>Throughout most of this season, the rookie center injecting life into the New Jersey Devils&rsquo; veteran lineup was Petr Sykora.But as Sykora ran out of gas and the faith of coach Jacques Lemaire, it was another rookie center who stepped in to spark the Devils on their run for the playoffs-Steve Sullivan.The 21-year-old contributed the first game-winning goal of his NHL career in a crucial victory over the Tampa Bay Lightning March 26.&ldquo;This is just a thrill for me to help this team hopefully make the playoffs,&rdquo; Sullivan said. &ldquo;Just to make the NHL was a thrill. I&rsquo;m still on Cloud Nine.&rdquo;Thrills are what Sullivan brought after his recall from the Albany River Rats of the American League Feb. 22. Sullivan scored a goal in his NHL debut against the Montreal Canadiens the next night, then was returned to the minors three days later. But the Devils decided to recall him almost immediately and he proceeded to record five goals and nine points in 13 games.&ldquo;He has so much talent, it&rsquo;s unbelievable,&rdquo; said Stephane Richer, who went on a spree with five goals in three games as Sullivan&rsquo;s right winger.Sullivan, who at age 10 attended a camp in Quebec where he received some shooting tips from a Canadiens&rsquo; rookie named Stephane Richer, isn&rsquo;t much bigger than he was 11 years ago. Generously listed at 5-foot-9, he&rsquo;s one of the smallest players in the league.&ldquo;What he brings is a little life,&rdquo; Lemaire said. &ldquo;The guys on the team are even excited to see him play.&rdquo;NOTEBOOK: Right winger Stephane Richer fulfilled a promise to himself when he reached the 20-goal plateau March 28 in St. Louis&hellip;Coach Jacques Lemaire&rsquo;s claim captain Scott Stevens wasn&rsquo;t playing well and was making poor passing decisions created a stir in the Devils&rsquo; dressing room and a reminder from the defenseman that his role has been to face all the top opposing lines&hellip;The Devils held their opponents to three goals or fewer 55 times in 74 games&hellip;Right winger John MacLean returned to the lineup March 26, 13 days after having arthroscopic surgery to remove debris from his right knee&hellip;After scoring once in his first six games as a Devil, left winger Dave Andreychuk had two goals against St. Louis March 28. &#9632;

f0017-01

Small-package Sullivan provides big-time spark

<div class="byline">By Jim Smith</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0017-03635/6293055-1-eng-US/f0017-032.jpg" title="f0017-03" width="572" height="973"><figcaption class="caption-body">Dennis Vaske</figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0017-02871/6293062-1-eng-US/f0017-022.jpg" title="f0017-02" width="161" height="162"></div>New York Islanders&rsquo; GM Mike Milbury announced he will continue coaching next season, although he may leave associate coach Rick Bowness in charge from time to time when he goes scouting.Milbury told Bowness the news March 25 after a 4-1 loss to the Montreal Canadiens.&ldquo;I&rsquo;m the coach,&rdquo; Milbury said. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m set. Our management and owners are set. They know what I&rsquo;m doing and have endorsed it.&rdquo;Of the Islanders&rsquo; 73 games this season, Milbury had coached 68 and left Bowness in charge for the other five. Bowness had a 2-3-0 record behind the Islanders&rsquo; bench. Scouting has taken on added importance for Milbury this season because the Islanders are guaranteed a top-four pick in the draft.Milbury left Bowness in charge for a 7-1 home loss to the Capitals March 26 to continue scouting and was expected to leave the team in Bowness&rsquo; hands for two games to go to Sweden on a scouting trip April 1-5.&ldquo;We have a draft pick that we can&rsquo;t miss on,&rdquo; Milbury said. &ldquo;We know we&rsquo;ve really left ourselves short offensively. We&rsquo;re going to have to address that. We&rsquo;ve got to be more than a one-line team.&rdquo;After Milbury traded Wendel Clark and Mathieu Schneider to the Toronto Maple Leafs, the Islanders lost seven straight games, scoring 10 goals in that span. Bowness said the Islanders will try to sign free agent forwards on termination contracts between June 1 and 30.NOTEBOOK: Defenseman Dennis Vaske announced March 28 that after consulting with a neurologist he has elected to sit out the rest of the season. Vaske, 28, suffered a concussion and a 20-stitch forehead gash when checked from behind by Eric Lacroix of Los Angeles in a Nov. 22 game. Vaske tried to return several times, but experienced dizziness, headaches and blurred vision. He had been practising symptom-free since March 4, but said he will miss the rest of the season as a precaution. Vaske was limited to just 19 games this season and had a goal and seven points&hellip;Over 73 games, the Islanders were outscored 100-50 in the third period going into their game against the Hartford Whalers March 30. &#9632;

f0017-03

Milbury will coach again

<div class="byline">By Rick Carpiniello</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0018-011189/6293093-1-eng-US/f0018-012.jpg" title="f0018-01" width="159" height="158"></div>The slumping New York Rangers needed a jolt following an 8-2 loss at Madison Square Garden to the Mario Lemieux-less Pittsburgh Penguins.They got it the next morning when coach Colin Campbell had his team doing blowout wind sprints after a tough practice. The gruelling 15-minute session had some players close to collapsing or vomiting. Remarkably, 35-year-old captain Mark Messier was way out in front of his teammates during the sprints. And he was smiling throughout.When the session ended, as if on cue, Messier went to one end of the rink and began taking passes from assistant coach Dick Todd and firing pucks into an empty net. The message was if Messier could stay on the ice and work extra, everybody could. And most did.&ldquo;If the embarrassment of (the Pittsburgh game) and the potential of future embarrassments don&rsquo;t loom large, then we picked the wrong group of guys,&rdquo; Campbell said.The Rangers responded with one of their most solid victories of the season, 3-0 against the Florida Panthers, and averted the dubious honor of tying the franchise record 10-game home winless streak.NOTEBOOK: Goalie Mike Richter got his third shutout of the season and 14th of his career against Florida March 27. It was his third start since coming back from a groin injury&hellip;Jari Kurri scored his first goal as a Ranger in the Florida game after being switched from No. 2 center to the right wing on Mark Messier&rsquo;s line&hellip;Right winger Pat Verbeek, out since March 1 with a separated shoulder, was on the verge of returning to the lineup. &#9632;

f0018-01

Campbell puts wind up sails

<div class="byline">By Chris Stevenson</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0018-02875/6293124-1-eng-US/f0018-022.jpg" title="f0018-02" width="160" height="159"></div>After 3 1/2 years of frus-tration and futility, most of the bitterness and frustration of the Ottawa Senators&rsquo; first three seasons has been largely forgotten.There&rsquo;s an air of respect surrounding the team, despite the fact it is headed for yet another last-place finish.&ldquo;The soap opera is over,&rdquo; said GM Pierre Gauthier.Gauthier had two players come up to him and thank him for not dealing them at the trading deadline.This is the same organization which once had an opposing player, upon finding out the Senators were interested in him, tell an Ottawa player: &ldquo;Tell (Senators&rsquo; management) I have a drug problem.&rdquo;The Senators&rsquo; reversal of misfortune can be directly traced to three men who, three months ago, were an assistant GM (Gauthier), an assistant coach (Jacques Martin) and a backup goaltender (Damian Rhodes).Gauthier, named GM of the Canadian team for the World Championship, was the catalyst. Hired in January to replace Randy Sexton, Gauthier has a strong background in player evaluation. In Rhodes, Gauthier saw a No. 1 goaltender where most people, including Rhodes himself, saw a backup.The GM&rsquo;s decision to hang onto veteran defensemen Frank Musil and Steve Duchesne at the trading deadline sent a signal to Ottawa fans the team was intent on playing for the present.It would have been difficult to believe three months ago such a dramatic a turnaround in attitude in the organization would be possible in so short a period in time.NOTEBOOK: Defenseman Frank Musil is the Senators&rsquo; candidate for the Masterton Trophy. Musil, whose father passed away in mid-season, has had more stitches than a baseball this year and was most recently hobbled by a deep bruise on his right foot&hellip;Defenseman Janne Lauk-kanen was lost for the season when he sprained the medial collateral ligament in his left knee on a knee-to-knee hit from Edmonton&rsquo;s Bryan Marchment. The Senators sent a tape of the hit to the league, but no supplemental disciplinary action was taken&hellip;Goaltender Damian Rhodes, who will be a restricted free agent this summer, is expected to turn down an invitation to play for the United States at the World Championship. &#9632;

f0018-02

Sens finally earn respect

<div class="byline">By Wayne Fish</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0019-02798/6293155-1-eng-US/f0019-022.jpg" title="f0019-02" width="576" height="985"><figcaption class="caption-body">Ron Hextall</figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0019-011105/6293162-1-eng-US/f0019-012.jpg" title="f0019-01" width="159" height="160"></div>Those who see the glass half full say the Philadelphia Flyers will go as far as center Eric Lindros takes them.Those who see the glass half empty say the Flyers will go as far as goalie Ron Hextail takes them.Despite the fact he&rsquo;s enjoying the best regular season of his 10-year NHL career, Hextall still isn&rsquo;t getting the respect he deserves.After recording back-to-back shutouts over the Toronto Maple Leafs and Hartford Whalers in late-March, Hextall&rsquo;s goals against average stood at 2.21, second in the league only to Detroit Red Wings&rsquo; goalie Chris Osgood&rsquo;s 2.17.Hextall&rsquo;s 27-11-7 mark wasn&rsquo;t impressing many people either. His name seldom comes up in conversations about World Cup rosters or Vezina Trophy candidates.Fortunately, the people who count most-Hextall&rsquo;s coaches and team-mates-have faith in the 31-year-old goalie.&ldquo;He&rsquo;s calm, he&rsquo;s poised and square to the puck,&rdquo; said coach Terry Murray. &ldquo;When he&rsquo;s in that kind of zone, you just want to stay with him.&rdquo;Hextall, meanwhile, likes to share credit with his teammates for making his job easier. In the game against the Leafs, for example, he faced just 13 shots.&ldquo;They&rsquo;re keeping the shots outside, they&rsquo;re keeping the numbers down,&rdquo; Hextall said. &ldquo;The big thing is just keeping the high-quality scoring chances down to a minimum.&rdquo;NOTEBOOK: Center Rod Brind&rsquo;Amour is the Flyers&rsquo; nominee for the Masterton Trophy. Brind&rsquo;Amour played in his 230th consecutive game in a 4-2 win at Ottawa March 27. The team record for consecutive starts is 287, established by Rick MacLeish.Left winger John LeClair&rsquo;s goal in the Ottawa game gave him 10 in seven games and tied him for the team lead with center Eric Lindros (43). In a 3-0 win over Hartford, Lindros ended his longest goal-scoring drought of the season (six games). Also that night, Lindros and LeClair scored in the same game for the first time in a month&hellip;Goalie Ron Hextall&rsquo;s back-to-back shutouts against Toronto and Hartford were the first for a Flyers&rsquo; netminder since 1973-74 (Bernie Parent). &#9632;

f0019-02

Hextail shines despite cynics

<div class="byline">By Dave Molinari</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0019-03527/6293193-1-eng-US/f0019-032.jpg" title="f0019-03" width="160" height="161"></div>Some guys hand out cigars when their wives have a baby. Mario Lemieux gave away memories.Two days after Lemieux&rsquo;s wife, Nathalie, gave birth to the couple&rsquo;s first son, Lemieux welcomed the boy with one of the most spectacular performances of his career-a five-goal, seven-point effort in an 8-4 victory against the St. Louis Blues March 26.&ldquo;He&rsquo;s a pretty scary player when he gets going,&rdquo; said center Petr Nedved. &ldquo;There&rsquo;s nobody out there who&rsquo;s going to stop him.&rdquo;Not on that night, anyway. Lemieux had too much adrenaline-and too much relief-to produce anything less against the Blues.The previous few months had been excruciatingly stressful, as his wife endured a difficult pregnancy. Nathalie had not been scheduled to give birth until June, but Lemieux&rsquo;s son, Austin Nicholas, arrived March 24.&ldquo;It has been very difficult for myself and my family the last couple of months,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;By the way I was playing, I think everybody knew something was up. I think my head was somewhere else.&rdquo;Lemieux didn&rsquo;t need long to regain his focus, even though his wife and son-who weighed just two-pounds, five ounces when he was bom-both figured to be facing extended recoveries.&ldquo;The baby is doing great, and my wife is doing great,&rdquo; Lemieux said. &ldquo;So I can go back and think about hockey now and do my job.&rdquo;NOTEBOOK: Right winger Jaromir Jagr set an NHL record for points by a European player when he recorded his 60th goal and 140th point of the season against Florida March 28. The previous mark of 139 was set by Quebec Nordiques&rsquo; center Peter Stastny in 1981-82. Jagr&rsquo;s goal against the Panthers was also his 11th game-winner of the season, a franchise record&hellip;Right winger Alek Stojanov, who did not have a goal in 62 career games with Vancouver, netted one in his second game after joining Pittsburgh, an 8-2 win over the Rangers March 24&hellip;Buffalo&rsquo;s Dominik Hasek stopped Mario Lemieux on a penalty shot March 23, only the second time in seven tries Lemieux has failed to convert a penalty shot. &#9632;

f0019-03

Papa Lemieux focused again now that Austin has arrived

<div class="byline">By Dave Luecklng</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0019-04414/6293224-1-eng-US/f0019-042.jpg" title="f0019-04" width="160" height="159"></div>It would be unfair to call the St. Louis Blues&rsquo; soap opera, As Wayne&rsquo;s World Turns, mainly because Wayne Gretzky isn&rsquo;t a direct participant in the head butting involving coach Mike Keenan and Brett Hull.However, Gretzky is part of the tug of war. He&rsquo;s caught in the middle between the Blues&rsquo; most outspoken principals.Keenan yanked Hull off Gretzky&rsquo;s line during an 8-4 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins March 26. Mario Lemieux intercepted a Hull pass at the blueline en route to a shorthanded goal, one of five goals he scored in a seven-point night.&ldquo;Brett hasn&rsquo;t done much,&rdquo; Keenan said. &ldquo;It hasn&rsquo;t worked very well. Brett says he&rsquo;s confused. Maybe we&rsquo;ll try him with (Peter) Zezel.&rdquo;Before Gretzky arrived this season, Hull campaigned to play with Zezel, but Keenan never paired them.As far as being confused, Hull said he was caught &ldquo;in-between&rdquo; two styles; the laid-back one he played when Adam Oates was his center and the hard-driving one he adopted after Oates left.&ldquo;Who came up with confused?&rdquo; Hull asked. &ldquo;In-between came out of my mouth. I&rsquo;m in between a style of play that was totally offensive to a style where I did everything.&rdquo;Before suffering a pulled hamstring March 28, Hull had seven goals and 12 points in 13 games after Gretzky arrived. Gretzky had seven goals and 19 points.Still, Keenan said, &ldquo;Brett hasn&rsquo;t played very well since Wayne arrived. He hasn&rsquo;t played with the same deter-mination. Brett&rsquo;s our most important goal-scorer as a forward and he&rsquo;s not getting it done.&rdquo;Hull questioned the wisdom of breaking up him and The Great One.&ldquo;If we&rsquo;re going to have success, he&rsquo;ll have to have us together,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Besides us, there&rsquo;s not a whole bunch of offense.&rdquo;Keenan shot back once more, saying that injured winger Shayne Corson, out for two weeks with a broken jaw, was the Blues&rsquo; &ldquo;most important forward after Wayne.&rdquo;NOTEBOOK: Left winger Shayne Corson suffered a broken jaw on an open-ice hit by former Blue J.J. Daigneault in the loss to Pittsburgh. Coach-GM Mike Keenan called the hit, &ldquo;retribution for being traded,&rdquo; saying Daigneault should have been grateful to be traded because the Blues could have &ldquo;buried him&rdquo; in the minors&hellip;Goalie Grant Fuhr started his 75th game of the season in the Blues&rsquo; 4A tie with New Jersey March 28, tying his record for most games in a season. However, because he had been pulled 16 times, he was still 153 minutes short of his league record of 4,304 minutes&hellip;Veteran Basil McRae returned to the lineup against New Jersey, playing his first game since Nov. 7. He had undergone surgery to repair a dislocated shoulder. &#9632;

f0019-04

Blues still looking for harmony

<div class="byline">By Dan Wood</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0019-05335/6293255-1-eng-US/f0019-052.jpg" title="f0019-05" width="161" height="163"></div>The San Jose Sharks weren&rsquo;t about to get too excited, but they couldn&rsquo;t help but be enthused about the splashy NHL debut of right winger Jan Caloun.Caloun, San Jose&rsquo;s fourth-round pick in the 1992 entry draft, scored four goals in his first three games-and did it on his first four shots.Before being summoned from the Kansas City Blades of the International League March 18, Caloun was the Blades&rsquo; leader with 36 goals and 64 points. A native of the Czech Republic, Caloun led IHL rookies with 34 goals in 1994-95, his first season in North America.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s not a surprise he scored four goals (in three games),&rdquo; said Sharks&rsquo; interim coach Jim Wiley. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s a good feat for anybody, but (goal scoring is) Jan Caloun&rsquo;s attribute.&rdquo;What was somewhat unexpected was Caloun&rsquo;s relatively strong work in the defensive zone. He was plus-4 in his first four NHL games.&ldquo;His defensive play has been quite solid,&rdquo; said Wiley, who coached Caloun in Kansas City last season. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s not to say there weren&rsquo;t any mistakes, but there were no major breakdowns like I saw (last year).&rdquo;The 5-foot-11, 185-pound Caloun-never considered one of the Sharks&rsquo; premier prospects-expected to be returned to the Blades for the IHL playoffs, but was beginning to think maybe he belongs in the NHL.&ldquo;When I scored my first goal in Boston (March 18), I started believing in my mind,&rdquo; Caloun said.NOTEBOOK: Goalie Arturs Irbe was hoping to strike a deal with management that would allow him to leave the team before its final two games. Irbe wants to compete for his native Latvia in the World Championship B pool tournament, which begins April 10 in Rotterdam, Netherlands. The Sharks play at Los Angeles April 10 and host Calgary in their regular season finale April 12&hellip;Goalie Chris Terreri, who suffered a strained muscle in his arm during a 4-2 loss to St. Louis March 15, likely will not play again this season, GM Dean Lombardi said&hellip;Terreri has been invited to play for Team USA at the World Championship. Canada has expressed interest in defenseman Doug Bodger and right winger Owen Nolan. &#9632;

f0019-05

Caloun’s late season spark brightens dim Shark season

<div class="byline">By Damien Cox</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0020-01985/6293324-1-eng-US/f0020-012.jpg" title="f0020-01" width="160" height="158"></div>It was a high-skill play few defensemen make, a perfect demonstration of the talent that has made Larry Murphy one of the highest-scoring defensemen in NHL history.In the first period of a March 27 contest against the Vancouver Canucks, Murphy pinched from the right point during a power play and accepted pass from Mats Sundin on his backhand. Murphy then flipped the puck across his body with a backhanded motion and the puck bounced off Canucks&rsquo; goalie Kirk McLean&rsquo;s catching glove and dribbled just across the goal line.It was the kind of play the 35-year-old Murphy has made consistently throughout his NHL career, but this one was special since it made him the fourth NHL blueliner ever to hit the 1,000-point mark.Murphy joined Paul Coffey, Ray Bourque, Denis Potvin and 41 forwards in that exclusive group.&ldquo;I&rsquo;m glad it&rsquo;s over with,&rdquo; Murphy said. &ldquo;For a while there, points weren&rsquo;t coming very often.&rdquo;Murphy, who didn&rsquo;t score between Jan. 11 and March 17, is the fourth player to reach 1,000 points in a Leafs&rsquo; uniform. The others are Doug Gilmour, Glenn Anderson and Norm Ullman.NOTEBOOK: Left winger Wendel Clark had six goals in his first seven games as a born-again Leaf&hellip;Goalie Felix Potvin picked up his 100th career victory March 27 in Calgary&hellip;Center Brandon Convery registered his first NHL assist against the Flames&hellip;In two months as a Leaf, left winger Kirk Muller had been cut for more than 40 stitches&hellip;The Leafs recorded 13 shots in a 4-0 loss to Philadelphia March 23, just two more than the all-time franchise low. &#9632;

f0020-01

Murphy hits magical 1,000

<div class="byline">By Elliott Pap</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0020-02655/6293355-1-eng-US/f0020-022.jpg" title="f0020-02" width="576" height="727"><figcaption class="caption-body">Pavel Bure</figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0020-03441/6293362-1-eng-US/f0020-032.jpg" title="f0020-03" width="160" height="159"></div>Russian Rocket Pavel Bure may soon be rushin&rsquo; back into the Vancouver Canucks&rsquo; lineup.The two-time 60-goal man is making remarkable progress from a tom anterior cruciate ligament and was expected to begin practising with his teammates in early-April.Bure, who had reconstructive knee surgery Nov. 14, began skating lightly Feb. 6 and donned equipment March 26. Barring setbacks, he may get into a regular season game and is looking possible for the playoffs.&ldquo;Now is the most difficult part,&rdquo; Bure said. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s dangerous. I want to play, but if I rush it, I could reinjure it&rdquo; The Canucks&rsquo; medical staff insists it will take no chances with the star forward, but it is also saying he could be back soon.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s exciting,&rdquo; said trainer Mike Bumstein. &ldquo;If you had asked me two years ago about a torn ACL, the answer would have been the player will be out for a year. It seems the time line has changed.&rdquo;NOTEBOOK: When the Canucks lost 6-2 to Toronto March 27 at GM Place, it guaranteed the team a losing record on home ice for the first time since 1989-90. The Canucks last missed the playoffs that season&hellip;Center Jesse Belanger made an immediate impact with the Canucks, scoring a goal in his first game-March 22 against Dallas-and netting the winner against Los Angeles March 25 in his third game&hellip;Right winger Alexander Mogilny became only the second Canuck (and second Russian Canuck) to crack the 100-point plateau when he assisted twice against the Kings&hellip;Vancouver was unde-feated in 11 straight games against Los Angeles (8-0-3), and 10-0-1 in its past 11 at home against the Kings. &#9632;

f0020-02

Rocket poised for comeback

<div class="byline">By Dave Fay</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0021-01752/6293393-1-eng-US/f0021-012.jpg" title="f0021-01" width="161" height="162"></div>Washington Capitals&rsquo; coach Jim Schoenfeld took it upon himself to do something his players weren&rsquo;t doing. He got tough.After disappointing ties with the Hartford Whalers and Tampa Bay Lightning in late-March that dropped the Capitals out of the Eastern Conference&rsquo;s top eight, Schoenfeld laid it on the line for his players.&ldquo;They get paid to perform, not to try hard, but to get results,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;And if the pressure is too great for them, they should give some of that money back because they&rsquo;re not earning it.&ldquo;(Obstacles) are all things that have to be overcome. And if the player can&rsquo;t overcome it, he&rsquo;s stealing money and he&rsquo;s cheating himself and he&rsquo;s cheating his teammates.&rdquo;After the Hartford tie, Schoenfeld put the team through extra skating drills, 20 minutes of dryland stretching, 2 1/2 hours of criticism with the game videos, then had them write essays-presumably on their mediocre play.What followed were strong performances against the New York Islanders (a 7-1 win) and Montreal Canadiens (10 win). The victories moved the Capitals back into the thick of the tight race for playoff berths.NOTEBOOK: Left winger Steve Kono-walchuk, the Capitals&rsquo; second-leading goal scorer, was lost until at least mid-April when he sustained a broken bone in his left hand March 27 in Montreal&hellip;Defenseman Sergei Gonchar lost two teeth and needed several stitches to close a wound on his mouth after he was cross-checked by Montreal&rsquo;s Vincent Damphousse&hellip;Left winger Todd Krygier had five goals and 10 points and was plus-7 in nine games after rejoining the Capitals. &#9632;

f0021-01

Angry coach gets results

<div class="byline">By Tim Campbell</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0021-02406/6293424-1-eng-US/f0021-022.jpg" title="f0021-02" width="159" height="163"></div>The new combination of center Craig Janney, left winger Keith Tkachuk and right winger Dallas Drake has become the Winnipeg Jets&rsquo; Quick Fix line.The trio led the Jets out of a tailspin by spearheading a three-win-in-four-game run that kept the team in strong playoff contention.In those four games, Janney, Tkachuk and Drake recorded a combined 34 points.&ldquo;I think Keith has been the catalyst for the whole thing,&rdquo; said coach Terry Simpson. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s solid stock. I think he&rsquo;s going to continue to do this (in his career) because he&rsquo;s such a competitor. He&rsquo;s just going to get better and better. That&rsquo;s the mark of a good player. The guy who does it every night is the superstar in this league, not the guys who can do it when they want to.&rdquo;Tkachuk scored six goals and 14 points in the four-game stretch, including a four-goal night against the Dallas Stars March 26. The surge took Tkachuk to 48 goals on the season and he had already bettered his career high by seven.&ldquo;I&rsquo;d really like to get 50,&rdquo; Tkachuk said. &ldquo;I&rsquo;d be lying if I said it wasn&rsquo;t important to me, but right now I&rsquo;m most concerned that we&rsquo;ve been out of the playoffs for two years and that&rsquo;s not going to happen again.&rdquo;Janney had four goals and 11 points and Drake four goals and nine points during the run.&ldquo;We all bring something different to it,&rdquo; Janney said. &ldquo;The chemistry has been there. Dallas works real hard in the comers and I&rsquo;m just passing them both the puck. They&rsquo;re both finishing right now. It&rsquo;s working out pretty well.&rdquo;NOTEBOOK: Owner Richard Burke killed speculation GM John Paddock would not fill that role when the team moves to Phoenix next season. &lsquo;To set the record straight, I&rsquo;m telling you that John will be back as GM of the hockey team next year.&rdquo; Burke said a decision on the Jets&rsquo; coaching staff will be left to the offseason&hellip;Center Alexei Zhamnov paid a visit to Dr. Robert Watkins in Los Angeles March 25 and was diagnosed with an inflamed nerve in his lower back. It&rsquo;s unrelated to a previous back injury and Zhamnov was likely to be out until early-April&hellip;The average crowd at the Arena this season stood at 11,075 with three home games to play. That figure was as low as 9,522 in November. &#9632;

f0021-02

Tkachuk line takes control

<div class="byline">By Kevin Oklobzija</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0022-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0022-01877/6293455-1-eng-US/f0022-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Rochester&rsquo;s David Cooper has re-established himself as a prospect.</figcaption></div>Now you see him, now you don&rsquo;t. And now you do again.That&rsquo;s the synopsis of Dave Cooper&rsquo;s pro career, which until February had been a completely uneventful three seasons of disappointment, digression and wasted ability.Cooper went from being the best prospect in the 1992 NHL entry draft to an underachieving East Coast Leaguer the Buffalo Sabres couldn&rsquo;t give away. His career has been one colossal free-fall on a bungee cord.Luckily for Cooper, the cord is still attached. But he&rsquo;ll have to climb up. The Sabres may be pulling for him, but they&rsquo;re not pulling him up.&ldquo;He was a prospect, then he wasn&rsquo;t, now he is,&rdquo; says Don Luce, the Sabres&rsquo; director of player personnel. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s not a matter of can he do it, it&rsquo;s him willing himself and getting prepared to want to do it every night.&rdquo;Cooper, 22, says he now understands what it takes to play pro hockey, that he has matured and is willing to make a commitment to intensity and desperation with the American League&rsquo;s Rochester Americans.He has never played an NHL game and last year couldn&rsquo;t even play in the AHL. He was shipped to the ECHL midway through the season after scoring six points and being minus-6 in 21 games for the Americans. This year, he had eight goals, 22 points and was minus-3 in 60 games in Rochester.&ldquo;This is a big time in my life, for me to further my career,&rdquo; the 6-foot-2, 205-pound Cooper says. &ldquo;One day you wake up and realize where you&rsquo;re at and what you have to do. If you stop still, you&rsquo;ll get run over.&rdquo;Since February, after Americans&rsquo; coach John Tortorella sat out Cooper for six games because of indifferent play, the third-year veteran has been in high gear. He strung together the best 18-game stretch of his career.&ldquo;The way Coop is playing now, if I didn&rsquo;t know the background and know what he has gone through, I&rsquo;d say that&rsquo;s one helluva prospect you&rsquo;ve got there,&rdquo; Tortorella says.&ldquo;But the question for Coop now is, where does he go from here? He has been at this point before.&rdquo;He was four years ago. Midway through the 1991-92 season, Cooper was the NHL&rsquo;s Central Scouting Bureau&rsquo;s top-rated prospect for the 1992 draft. That&rsquo;s No. I. Overall.When he dashed up the ice with the puck, the smooth-skating defenseman reminded scouts of Chris Chelios.But for some scouts, there were too many nights when a lack of drive made him just another player. By draft day, Cooper slipped to a mid-to late-round pick in the rankings.&ldquo;That&rsquo;s one of the intangibles you put up with in scouting,&rdquo; says CSB director Frank Bonello. &ldquo;There is no perfect measuring stick to know how a player will take the jump from junior to pro. You get a guy in the sixth round that makes the NHL. You get a first-round who can&rsquo;t get to first base.&rdquo;The Sabres, under ex-GM Gerry Meehan, chose Cooper 11th overall.&ldquo;If anybody tells you they weren&rsquo;t high on him, they&rsquo;re a liar,&rdquo; says Kevin Prendergast, director of hockey operations for the Edmonton Oilers. &ldquo;He did everything from a projection standpoint that you want.&rdquo;It was that scenario of Cooper developing into another Chelios that intrigued the Sabres.&ldquo;We took a player with the biggest upside,&rdquo; Luce recalls. &ldquo;He was the most talented player at that point.&rdquo;But for Cooper, hockey was a game, not a life. He&rsquo;ll need another life if he doesn&rsquo;t continue to impress the Sabres the rest of the season because his contract is up for renewal.&ldquo;Coop asked me about the NHL,&rdquo; Tortorella recalls. &ldquo;I said, &lsquo;You can&rsquo;t talk about the NHL until you solidify yourself in the AHL. They don&rsquo;t know who the hell you are because you&rsquo;re not even in the lineup down here.&rsquo; &ldquo;&ldquo;That&rsquo;s my whole life, that&rsquo;s the most important thing to me,&rdquo; Cooper says of the NHL dream. &ldquo;When you&rsquo;re threatened by losing something, you wake up and grow.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s a matter of maturing. Maybe I&rsquo;ve taken longer than other individuals. But I&rsquo;m starting to take responsibility for where I was drafted and what Buffalo is asking of me.&rdquo;Cooper&rsquo;s game has improved greatly this season. He makes smarter, quicker decisions with the puck. He is learning to use his good size and strength in the defensive zone.The Sabres are re-evaluating a player that three months ago was out of their plans. &ldquo;We haven&rsquo;t had our meetings yet, but he has come a long way,&rdquo; Luce says. &ldquo;I would say you have to give him until 25.&rdquo; &#9632;

f0022-01

LEAGUES

What happened to Dave Cooper?

<div class="byline">By Kevin Oklobzija</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0022-02604/6293486-1-eng-US/f0022-022.jpg" title="f0022-02" width="529" height="361"></div>From the time Kevin McCarthy received his players from the Hartford Whalers and Winnipeg Jets, the Springfield Falcons&rsquo; coach stressed defense as the key to success of the American League&rsquo;s only full dual affiliation.&ldquo;We don&rsquo;t take anyone&rsquo;s creativity away, we just make them responsible when they don&rsquo;t have the puck,&rdquo; said McCarthy, a defenseman for 12 pro seasons, including 10 in the NHL.&ldquo;Offense comes and goes, but defense-if you work at it-should be consistent.&rdquo;The Falcons are playing proof. In blanking the Worcester IceCats 4-0 March 22 in their 72nd game, Springfield broke a 54-year-old AHL record for shutouts in a season with 10. The old mark of nine was set by the Cleveland Barons in 1941-42 and matched the next season by the Buffalo Bisons.Second-year goalie Manny Legace (Hartford property) had five shutouts, rookie Scott Lang-kow (Winnipeg) three, Jason Muzzatti had one during a conditioning assignment from Hartford and Legace and Sandy Allan shared one after Legace was hurt midway through a game.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s quite an accomplishment, especially in this age of offense,&rdquo; McCarthy said. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve been around long enough to know records don&rsquo;t come easy.&rdquo;The Falcons were closing in on the recognized record for | best penalty killing percentage (special teams records have been kept since 1984-85). They were at 87 per cent. The mark of 84.2 per cent was set by Moncton in 1988-89.CHASING MARK: Brad Smyth&rsquo;s recall to the Florida Panthers cost the Carolina winger a shot at the AHL single-season goals record of 70, held by Stephan Lebeau in 1988-89.Smyth missed 12 Monarchs&rsquo; games but still led the AHL with 58 goals and 110 points in 60 games. The second highest goal total in one season is 61, by Paul Gardner of the Rochester Americans in 1985-86.&ldquo;I&rsquo;m just looking at the playoffs more than anything else, I&rsquo;m not worried about any records,&rdquo; said Smyth, who scored one goal and one assist in seven NHL games.Smyth scored four goals ainst Albany River Rats&rsquo; goalie Peter Sidorkiewicz March 21, including three between 2:20 and 4:00 of the first period. Carolina won 10-1.&ldquo;I couldn&rsquo;t believe what was happening,&rdquo; he said of his 100-second barrage, which was well shy of the AHL record of 57 seconds.FRANCHISE FOR SALE: Now that the Colorado Avalanche has found a home for its prospects with the Hershey Bears, Avalanche management hopes to sell its AHL franchise before next season.The Avalanche&rsquo;s prospects currently play for the Cornwall Aces, a team owned by the Avalanche and operated by the city of Cornwall. Next season, Colorado&rsquo;s prospects will play for Hershey, which has operated a team since 1938.Among the rumored interested buyers of the Cornwall franchise are the Pittsburgh Penguins, who are exploring moving their prospects to the AHL from Cleveland of the International League. There is speculation the Penguins would place the franchise in Hartford if the Whalers leave after this season.AHL TIDBITS: Portland Pirates&rsquo; goalie Martin Brochu made 61 saves in a 6-5 overtime loss to the Binghamton Rangers March 23. The Rangers had a club-record 67 shots&hellip;PEI Senators&rsquo; goalie Frederic Cassivi posted his first pro shutout in a 10-0-pounding of the St. John&rsquo;s Maple Leafs March 22. &#9632;

f0022-02

Falcons zero in on shutout record

<div class="byline">By Dave Eminian</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0023-01779/6293517-1-eng-US/f0023-012.jpg" title="f0023-01" width="381" height="433"></div>Pity those who are voting on the International League&rsquo;s most valuable player award this season. The IHL&rsquo;s 19 head coaches face a daunting task because there are so many worthy candidates.San Francisco Spiders&rsquo; goalie Stephane Beauregard has been a warrior, logging a league-high 3,605 minutes and collecting an IHL-best 32 wins through late-March.Chicago Wolves&rsquo; right winger Rob Brown, who had eight points in a 10-3 win over the Kansas City Blades March 24, was the league&rsquo;s leading scorer with 125 points in 71 games.Defenseman Greg Hawgood was a league-high plus-44 for the IHL&rsquo;s best team, the Las Vegas Thunder.And Orlando Solar Bears&rsquo; center Craig Fisher had 67 goals in 72 games and was challenging the single-season record for the 51-year-old league. Former Milwaukee Admirals&rsquo; center Daniel Lecours set the standard of 75 goals in 1982-83.Fisher established an IHL record for power play goals earlier this season, bettering the mark of 27 collected by Dave Thomlinson for the Peoria Rivermen in 1990-91. Fisher had 29 power play goals.D-DAY: The IHL deadline for trading and finalizing 25-man rosters triggered a flurry of moves March 20.The Cleveland Lumberjacks, who were in danger of finishing as low as sixth in the Eastern Conference, grabbed goaltender Blaine Lacher on loan from the Boston Bruins to improve what has been a modest tandem of Patrick Lalime and Philippe DeRouville.If Lacher gets playing time over the two Pittsburgh Penguins&rsquo; prospects, it could worsen an already delicate relationship with the NHL parent club.Lumberjacks&rsquo; owner Larry Gordon, whose team has been affiliated with the Penguins since, 1987, has voiced unhappiness with some of the transactions the Penguins have made. Gordon has an out clause in his deal with Pittsburgh should the number of IHL-NHL affiliations fall to an undisclosed level and hinted he may exercise that option and make a run as an independent next season. Pittsburgh is also contemplating a move to the American League.Here&rsquo;s a look at some significant moves made around the IHL on deadline day:&#9633; Powerhouse Las Vegas got stronger by picking up offensive defenseman Jeff Serowik from the Indianapolis Ice and Paul DiPietro from the Houston Aeros.&#9633; The Peoria Rivermen traded leading goalscorer Patrice Robitaille to Indianapolis for star center Dan Gauthier and goalie Andre Racicot. The Rivermen, the least-penalized team in the IHL, also picked up enforcer Barry Nieckar from the Utah Grizzlies for future considerations.&#9633; Utah acquired veteran forward Scott Arniel from Houston and left winger Victor Gordiouk from the Los Angeles Ice Dogs.&#9633; The Detroit Vipers acquired defenseman Paul Dyck on loan from Kansas City.I-OPENERS: Cleveland veteran left winger Dave Michayhlk&rsquo;s goal against Detroit March 23 was his 532nd regular season IHL goal, tying him for the all-time lead with former Muskegon teammate Scott Gruhl. The latter, who played 13 IHL seasons, scored 46 goals in 60 games for the East Coast League&rsquo;s Richmond Renegades this season and was added to the Fort Wayne Komets&rsquo; final roster March 20. &#9632;

f0023-01

League MVP race too close to call

<div class="byline">By Dave Eminian</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0023-02494/6293555-1-eng-US/f0023-022.jpg" title="f0023-02" width="387" height="502"></div>I long for the International League-the way it was, not the way it is going to be.What will this league be like in the year 2001? Close your eyes and imagine&hellip;&#9633; With franchises in Edmonton, Ottawa, Calgary, Saskatoon, Hamilton. Winnipeg and Quebec, the IHL has more teams on Canadian soil than the NHL and announces it is officially Canada&rsquo;s game.&#9633; Bob Ufer, the skating commish, goes out for warmups on opening night at expansion New Orleans and is put out for the season on a submarine hit from behind by Cleveland Lumbeijacks&rsquo; defenseman Corey Beaulieu.&#9633; IHL owners, still trying to stay ahead of the red ink by subsidizing their operating costs with expansion money, award the 56th and 57th franchises to Cleveland, Tenn., and Paris, Tex. Big-market cities, don&rsquo;t you know. Both are owned by the Amway Corporation.&#9633; Holding out for a three-year, $9.5-million contract with Las Vegas, goalie Curtis Joseph says he will sign a 25-game deal for zero salary with an NHL team in Canada.&#9633; Amway announces it has purchased the financially struggling franchise in San Antonio.&#9633; Utah Grizzlies&rsquo; goalie Tommy Salo wins his fourth MVP award in five seasons in 19992000 posting a 0.28 goals-against average, 98.6 save percentage and 53 shutouts. In three recalls to the New York Islanders, Salo is 0-5-0, with a 7.25 GAA and 74.8 save percentage.&#9633; Cleveland, one of several IHL teams denying it issues heavy complimentary ticket totals, announces a record single-game crowd of 36,117 at Gund Arena, which holds 19,941.&#9633; Amway buys the Detroit Vipers and Houston Aeros.&#9633; Much-loaned goalie Rob Dopson sets an IHL record by playing for all 55 teams in the 2000-01 season.&#9633; Craig Fisher scores 100 goals for the livetime league champion Orlando Solar Bears, surpassing the league record of 76 he set back in 1995-96.&#9633; The IHL, having successfully placed 12 teams in Europe in 1997, announces plans to put down some ice sheets and create 12 new teams in the deserts of the Middle East.&#9633; Venice, Italy, beats Saskatoon for the 2001 Turner Cup.&#9633; The IHL changes its name to the AHL, then wins a lawsuit brought by the American League when commissioner-lawyer Bob Ufer points out his new AHL stands for Amway Hockey League.&#9633; Amway buys the Indianapolis Ice from owner Hom Chen, who throws in the Central League, which he has owned for a decade.OK, you snap out of it and realize that none of this will ever happen. This is 1996, and you choose to ignore the warning signs.The IHL pulled up one of its last remaining roots in March when the Peoria Rivermen gave up and announced a move to the East Coast League.Fort Wayne won&rsquo;t be far behind, having announced a $700,000 deficit for fiscal 1995 and pumping up ticket prices $1.50 across the board for 1996-97 in a market that has survived on ticket discounting. See ya in the ECHL in &lsquo;98.The Indianapolis Ice will die the moment the Chicago Blackhawks pull out as an affiliate.League sources say ownership may try a player signing freeze this summer in hopes of making movement in deadlocked salary cap talks with the players&rsquo; union. About 70 per cent of IHL players are free agents at season&rsquo;s end.Red ink-ridden San Francisco is likely headed for suspended operations at season&rsquo;s end. Only one of 19 IHL teams-Indianapolis-is projecting a profit right now. sources say.The Atlanta Knights will move to Nashville at season&rsquo;s end, but owner Richard Adler will move to Quebec, where he&rsquo;ll take on a new partner and co-own an expansion team next season.<div class="figure-block image-bleed"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0023-03343/6293548-1-eng-US/f0023-032.jpg" title="f0023-03" width="1509" height="1946"><figcaption class="caption-body">Tommy Salo of Utah will be a perennial MVP in the IHL, a perennial flop in the NHL.</figcaption></div>Amway executives now own three IHL teams, proving by-laws are indeed made to be broken.Second-year Minnesota Moose has been granted a move to Winnipeg despite the fact a by-law supposedly existed prohibiting a team from leaving its market in the first three years.&ldquo;I think you are going to see the IHL fall backa little bit in the next year or two,&rdquo; says outgoing Peoria Rivermen owner Bruce Saurs. &ldquo;I think the future of the league, in terms of expansion, is going to be in Canada.&rdquo;And the only place the tradition and history of the IHL will exist, as represented by small and mid-sized towns such as Peoria. Dayton, Toledo and Columbus, is in the record book. They&rsquo;ll be the ones listed under &lsquo;Defunct Teams.&rsquo; &#9632;

f0023-02

21 st century IHL may not be pretty

<div class="byline">By John Packett</div>The East Coast and Colonial Leagues are going to war over fans and the battleground will be Dayton, Ohio.Against the wishes of its commissioner, the ColHL is planning to compete with the ECHL&rsquo;s Dayton Bombers next season, moving into the same rink-Hara Arena-that is being abandoned by the Bombers after this season.Mike Ploszek, a Maine businessman who heads a management group called Campus Green, announced March 22 that the Dayton Ice Bandits of the ColHL will set up shop at Hara for 1996-97.&ldquo;We anticipate being in Dayton for a long time,&rdquo; Ploszek said. &ldquo;We think we can sustain an attendance that would be more than suitable for us. We crunched the numbers. We&rsquo;ve got a shot here.&rdquo;Dayton&rsquo;s metropolitan population is more than 950,000 in a five-county area. The Bombers averaged 3,350 this season, 16th in the 21-team ECHL.The Bombers announced earlier in March that they are moving to the Nutter Center on the campus of Wright State University next season. Bombers&rsquo; owner Bud Gingher has secured a $1.5 million loan to install an ice-making facility at the Nutter Center.&ldquo;There&rsquo;s not much we can do to stop (the ColHL),&rdquo; said Gingher, whose club has played at Hara for five seasons. &ldquo;We&rsquo;re trying to keep the established team in town and we&rsquo;re trying to protect the territory, but with two teams in town, all you do is hurt each other.&rdquo;ColHL commissioner Mike Forbes, whose owners voted 5-3 to place the inactive London Wildcats&rsquo; franchise in Dayton, was against the move.&ldquo;This is a divisive issue,&rdquo; Forbes said. &ldquo;There were a lot of things presented that were not exactly the way they are. Obviously, it&rsquo;s going to strain our relationship with the ECHL.&rdquo;One other city in the ECHL has two minor-league teams. The Jacksonville (Fla.) Lizard Kings competed against the Jacksonville Bullets of the Southern League this season. The Lizard Kings averaged 2,502, 20th in the ECHL, while the Bullets averaged 1,026, last among six teams.WILD-CARD ICECAPS: In early February, the Raleigh IceCaps were out of playoff contention with a record of 9-26-10. But the club put on a rush, going 14-8-3, including a 5-1-1 surge down the stretch, to become the 16th and final playoff team.Raleigh edged the Birmingham Bulls for the last spot on the final day of the regular season March 24, when the IceCaps defeated the Charlotte Checkers 5-3 and Birmingham lost 85 to the Knoxville Cherokees.The IceCaps finished two points ahead of Birmingham. Had the teams ended up tied in points, Birmingham would have received the berth on the basis of more wins.AND THEY&rsquo;RE OFF: The first-round, best-of five playoff matchups are as follows:Hampton Roads Admirals vs. Richmond Renegades; Charlotte vs. Roanoke Express; Toledo Storm vs. Dayton; Wheeling Thunderbirds vs. Columbus Chill; Louisiana IceGators vs. Jacksonville; Knoxville vs. Nashville Knights; Tallahassee Tiger Sharks vs. Raleigh; and South Carolina Stingrays vs. Louisville RiverFrogs.COAST LINES: Louisiana set an ECHL attendance record, attracting 342,154 fans in 35 dates, smashing South Carolina&rsquo;s old mark of 311,148 in 1993-94&hellip;Richmond claimed the Brabham Cup, symbolic of regular-season supremacy. The 46-11-13 Renegades set a league record with 105 points, while 48-14-8 Toledo set the league mark for wins&hellip;Left winger Hugo Belanger of Nashville added the scoring title to his MVP award with 54 goals and 144 points in 67 games. Belanger led the league with 90 assists. &#9632;

Bombers prepare to go to war with Colonial League

<div class="byline">By Jim Cressman</div>After being put in reverse by the Pittsburgh Penguins, Richard Park quickly shifted into drive for the Ontario League playoffs.Park was returned to the Belleville Bulls with two weeks remaining in the regular season. He wasn&rsquo;t happy with his demotion-and still isn&rsquo;t-but the pout didn&rsquo;t last long.Park was the leading playoff scorer with nine goals and 13 points in a five-game first-round victory over the Osha-wa Generals.&ldquo;I&rsquo;m here for a purpose and that purpose is to win,&rdquo; said Park, who had four goals and 10 points in 53 games with the Penguins. He had seven goals and 13 points in the six regular-season games with the Bulls.&ldquo;I&rsquo;m not happy to be back, but the important thing is to be focussed and contribute. I&rsquo;m happy to be playing for (coach Larry Mavety). He handles you like a pro. We see eye-to-eye on the situation. He understood it would take me a while to get emotionally involved again and I had to understand he wants to win. I don&rsquo;t think Mav was worried.He just knew it would take a bit of time for me.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s easier to digest, knowing I&rsquo;ll be back in Pittsburgh after this season. I think at some point I&rsquo;ll be able to look back and smile because I was teammates with Mario Lemieux, Ron Francis and Jaromir Jagr.&rdquo;But Park, 19, understands the Penguins&rsquo; decision.&ldquo;I&rsquo;m not a checker or a defensive forward and that&rsquo;s what they needed there,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;They&rsquo;ve got 30-year-old vets who play that role.Mavety said Park quickly became part of the team.&ldquo;This is not his first choice, but he&rsquo;s doing the best he can for us,&rdquo; Mavety said.ROOKIE WATCH: Joe Thornton of the Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds was named rookie of the year after winning the rookie scoring title with 30 goals and 76 points in 66 games.&ldquo;He&rsquo;s fantastic,&rdquo; one NHL scout said of Thornton, the possible No. 1 overall pick in the 1997 entry draft. &ldquo;He has the potential to be a great player. It&rsquo;s there, that internal grit to do it. Joe is sliced bread.&ldquo;When he&rsquo;s on the ice, you can&rsquo;t take your eyes off him. There&rsquo;s nothing wrong with him. He has such great vision. We already see how good he is. How good is he going to be?&rdquo;STING STAYED: OHL governors granted a three-month extension to the Sarnia Sting as the team and city council investigate a new arena. Originally there was a March 15 deadline. If there is a new arena, the Sting must move as the Sarnia Arena holds only 2,290 spectators&hellip;Bryan Berard of the Detroit Whalers was named most outstanding defenseman for the second straight year, winning the defenseman scoring title with 31 goals and 89 points in 56 games.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0025-01763/6293617-1-eng-US/f0025-012.jpg" title="f0025-01" width="588" height="679"><figcaption class="caption-body">Lethbridge assistant Reid Williams faces WHL discipline.</figcaption></div><h2>PLAYOFFS</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0025-03310/6293610-1-eng-US/f0025-032.jpg" title="f0025-03" width="918" height="331"></div>HIGHLIGHTS (MARCH 22-28): Windsor, which finished 38 points behind Detroit, gave the champions a scare by winning three after Detroit took a 3-0 series lead. Sean Haggerty scored three goals in Game 7. Barrie went the distance before losing to Kitchener. The Colts led 3-0 in Game 7&hellip;Rookie Allan Hitchen, who hadn&rsquo;t played goal in two months, led Peterborough to wins over Kingston when starter Zac Bierk had the flu. &#9632;

f0025-01

Belleville’s Park slips into gear after demotion

<div class="byline">By Rob Vanstone</div>The Lethbridge Hurricanes&rsquo; season has concluded, but the fallout will continue.The Western League and Lethbridge police are investigating the team&rsquo;s conduct following a March 23 home game.Hurricane players and coaches directed their vitriol toward referee Brent Reiber after a 6-5 playoff loss to the Regina Pats. Regina completed a first-round sweep one day later, winning 5-3 in Lethbridge.The WHL issued indefinite suspensions to Hurricanes&rsquo; coach and director of hockey operations Bryan Maxwell and his assistant, Reid Williams, due to the confrontation with Reiber.Lethbridge police also followed up the matter and considered pressing charges.&ldquo;There was an incident under the bleachers en route to the dressing room in which the referee was assaulted as well as one of the linesmen (Jeff Klik),&rdquo; Staff Sgt. Murray Mason said.&ldquo;Our investigation is continuing.&rdquo;The WHL has already targeted Maxwell and Williams for discipline.&ldquo;In the case of Maxwell, physical contact was made with Reiber and one linesman,&rdquo; said WHL vice-president Richard Doerksen. &ldquo;In the case of Reid Williams, there were some verbal threats made.&rdquo; Maxwell was adamant he did not touch Reiber.&ldquo;Between him and I, there was no contact,&rdquo; Maxwell said one day after the incident. &ldquo;It continued from the ice. It came underneath and we continued to have a yelling match. I expressed a couple of feelings. That was about it.&rdquo;Emotions boiled over at 18:41 of the third period, when Reiber penalized Lethbridge center Mark Smith for elbowing Regina defenseman Perry Johnson.Maxwell threw a water bottle at Reiber, who then assessed a bench minor. Regina&rsquo;s Rhett Gordon completed his hat trick on the ensuing power play to snap a 5-5 tie.Irate fans littered the ice and yelled at Reiber. A drink was thrown in Reiber&rsquo;s face as he left the ice. Maxwell, Williams and angry Hurricanes&rsquo; players intercepted Reiber.According to the referee&rsquo;s report, left winger Mike Josephson prevented Reiber from being able to enter the officials&rsquo; room. Josephson, a 19-year-old draft pick of the Chicago Blackhawks, got an indefinite suspension.Seven police officers were called to the scene. Reiber was escorted to police headquarters for questioning. Neither Reiber nor Klik were injured.WHL executives were uncertain as to when rulings would be made.&ldquo;Anytime you suspend anybody, nothing positive comes out of it,&rdquo; said WHL commissioner Dev Dley.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0025-02487/6293655-1-eng-US/f0025-022.jpg" title="f0025-02" width="588" height="683"><figcaption class="caption-body">Lethbridge&rsquo;s Mike Josephson was suspended by the WHL.</figcaption></div><h2>PLAYOFFS</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0025-04195/6293648-1-eng-US/f0025-042.jpg" title="f0025-04" width="909" height="241"></div>HIGHLIGHTS (MARCH 22-28): Spokane, the Canadian Hockey League&rsquo;s top-ranked team with a .722 winning percentage, trailed Portland 3-1 in a West Division quarterfinal series. Portland finished the season 41 points behind Spokane with a 438 winning percentage&hellip;Kamloops eliminated Seattle in five games to win its eighth straight WHL playoff series&hellip;Brandon and Regina engineered first-round sweeps of Saskatoon and Lethbridge Saskatoon has been swept in the first round two straight years&hellip;Prince Albert bounced Medicine Hat in five games. &#9632;

f0025-02

Police, league investigate assault on ref

<div class="byline">By Stuart Cowan</div>One of the most impressive statistics posted this season in the Quebec League was Daniel Goneau&rsquo;s league-leading plus-82 rating. But even more impressive was the fact the Granby Preda-teurs&rsquo; left winger scored 54 goals.Heading into this season, Goneau had 61 goals in 186 QMJHL games, but was regarded as one of the league&rsquo;s best two-way players. His physical defensive play and speed impressed Boston Bruins&rsquo; scouts enough to take him in the second round of the 1994 NHL entry draft.&ldquo;Goneau&rsquo;s best quality is his defensive game,&rdquo; said Granby coach Michel Therrien. &ldquo;He always plays against the other team&rsquo;s best line. He plays shorthanded and on a regular shift and sometimes I give him some candy and let him play on the power play.&ldquo;What you see usually in guys who score 50 goals, about 20 or 25 come on the power play. That&rsquo;s what&rsquo;s amazing about Dan. He scored most of his goals 5-on-5.&rdquo;In fact, Goneau scored more goals shorthanded this season (nine) than on the power play (five).Goneau&rsquo;s blazing speed makes him an offensive threat.&ldquo;He&rsquo;s one of the fastest in the league,&rdquo; Therrien said. &ldquo;And he&rsquo;s physical. Combine the two and you have a player who gets a lot of scoring chances.&rdquo;Goneau, who had 16 goals in 56 games with the Laval Titan last season, has learned how to finish his scoring chances.&ldquo;Last year I missed a lot of breakaways,&rdquo; said the 6-foot, 194-pound Goneau. &ldquo;I was hoping to get 40 or 45 goals this season, but once I got to 401 wanted 50.&rdquo;Goneau hit the 50-goal mark in fine style, scoring four times in a 12-3 win over Laval March 1.Therrien was furious Goneau didn&rsquo;t win the league MVP award. which went instead to Sherbrooke Faucons&rsquo; Christian Dube. While Goneau was disappointed not to win, he is happy with his season.&ldquo;I was injured last year (dislocated shoulder) and I wanted to have a good season this year because I haven&rsquo;t signed a contract with the Bruins yet,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m happy with my season. I was plus-82 and I scored 50 goals so I proved I&rsquo;m a good two-way player.&rdquo;HULL OF A NIGHTMARE: The Hull Olympiques&rsquo; hopes of defending the league championship took a severe blow when goalie Jose Theodore broke his finger on his left hand.Theodore was taking extra shots at the end of practice when a puck hit him under the blocker, breaking the indexfinger on his stick hand. He was operated on the following day and wasn&rsquo;t expected to be ready to play until mid-April.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s bad luck,&rdquo; Theodore said. &ldquo;I was ready for the playoffs. Now maybe it&rsquo;s the end of my junior career. I&rsquo;m sure the guys will come up big. If we get to the semifinals I should be OK.&rdquo;<h2>PLAYOFFS</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0025-05153/6293686-1-eng-US/f0025-052.jpg" title="f0025-05" width="907" height="207"></div>HIGHLIGHTS (MARCH 22-28): Defenseman Jason Doig had a hat trick as Granby demolished Drummondville 12-4 March 26 to improve its first-round playoff record to 4-0. clinching a berth in the quarterfinals&hellip;The only other team with a perfect record after tour games was Victoriaville, which also clinched a spot in the quarterfinals. The surprising Tigres finished the regular season 14 games below .500&hellip;The top three regular season teams in each division play the bottom three teams twice each in round-robin action. The top four teams in round-robin play advance to quarterfinal action. &#9632;

f0025-05

Goneau adds offense to solid defensive skills

Officially receiving the Hobey Baker Memorial Award means relief for Brian Bonin.&ldquo;Finally, I can talk about it,&rdquo; said the Minnesota senior center who faced a four-day embargo between finding out his accomplishment and being able to share his feelings. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s my career highlight. I wanted to share it with my teammates and coaches.&rdquo;The Hobey Baker is presented annually to the nation&rsquo;s outstanding college hockey player. It was presented by the Decathlon Athletic Club during the National Collegiate Athletic Association Final Four March 29 in Cincinnati.Colorado College and Michigan advanced to the March 30 final with wins over Vermont and Boston University, respectively. Chad Remackel&rsquo;s goal in double overtime gave Colorado College a 4-3 win, while Marty Turco earned a 4-0 shutout for Michigan.Bonin beat nine finalists for the award, which is voted on by an 18-member selection committee, comprised of coaches, media and scouts.Other finalists were Michigan junior center Brendan Morrison, Vermont right winger Martin St. Louis, Lake Superior State senior defenseman Keith Aldridge, Minnesota sophomore defenseman Mike Crowley, Boston University sophomore center Chris Drury, Colorado College senior right winger Peter Geronazzo, St. Lawrence senior left winger Burke Murphy, Boston University left winger Jay Pandolfo, and Vermont junior center Eric Perron.Bonin, a ninth-round draft pick of the Pittsburgh Penguins in 1992, led the nation in scoring with 34 goals and 81 points. He&rsquo;d like to follow in the footsteps of 1995 Hobey winner Brian Holzinger, who immediately jumped to the NHL with the Buffalo Sabres last April.Bonin, 22, is majoring in chemistry and carries a 3.17 overall grade point average, including a perfect 4.0 in the winter semester.He was the winner of Minnesota&rsquo;s Mr. Hockey Award in 1992 as the state&rsquo;s top high school player. Bonin is also a two-time Western Collegiate Hockey Association MVP and a threetime all-academic team member.Top seeds Boston University, Vermont, Colorado College Michigan all advanced to the NCAA Final Four tournament. Here&rsquo;s how they got there:&#9633; In the East Regional in Albany, N.Y. March 22-23, No. 2 seed Vermont&rsquo;s French Connection led the school to a spot in the Final Four for the first time in the history of the program with a 2-1 win over No. 3 Lake Superior State. Eric Perrin drew assists on each of Martin St. Louis&rsquo; goals and goalie Tim Thomas had 32 saves. Lake Superior beat No. 6 Cornell 5-4 in the qualifying game.Top-seeded Boston University advanced with a 3-2 win over No. 5 Clarkson. Clarkson advanced to the game with a 6-1 win over No. 4 Western Michigan.&#9633; In the West Regional in East Lansing, Mich., March 23-24, No. 2 Michigan reached the Final Four for the fourth time in five years with a 4-3 win over No. 3 Minnesota. The Wolverines were led by a highlight goal by Mike Legg. (See pg. 5 for more) Minnesota advanced to the game with a 5-1 win over No. 6 Providence.Freshman Defenseman Scott Swanson scored two dazzling goals as top-seeded Colorado College defeated No. 4 Massachusetts-Lowell 5-3. UMass-Lowell beat No. 5 Michigan State in the qualifying game. &#9632;

Minnesota’s Bonin wins Hobey Baker

<div class="byline">&#x2013;Matt Carlson </div><div class="byline">&#x2013;Tom Boggie</div>After 13 losing seasons in 15 years, the University of Illinois-Chicago Flames hockey program has flickered into oblivion.UIC vice-chancellor for student affairs Stanton Delaney formally cancelled hockey at the 23,500-student school March 28 after reviewing information collected by university committees over the past six months. He reported the Flames program had lost $750,000 during 1995-96 and that costs for 1996-97 were projected to increase by 10 per cent.&ldquo;The reason for the termination of hockey,&rdquo; Delaney said, &ldquo;is the cost and the mix of Division I sports we want to offer as part of our mission and in our campus setting.&rdquo;UIC, located on the edge of downtown Chicago, plans to upgrade its basketball program. Delaney, however, said the decision to drop hockey wasn&rsquo;t impacted by the school&rsquo;s basketball plans.<h2>CCHA</h2>&ldquo;We made a significant investment in hockey,&rdquo; he said, noting UIC&rsquo;s practice rink and multi-purpose, 9,000-seat Pavilion. &ldquo;We simply didn&rsquo;t turn the comer with the program like we wanted to. I was led to the conclusion there was only one way to deal with this.&rdquo;In the Feb. 23 issue of The Hockey News, UIC interim athletic director Jim Schmidt denied rumors the Flames would be extinguished, but he was overruled.If Flames players transfer to another school with a hockey program, they must do so by April 10 or lose a year of collegiate eligibility. The players also may remain at UIC where their scholarships will be honored.UIC founded its hockey program in 1966-67 and elevated it to Division I status 1981-82. The Flames joined the CCHA in 1982-83.As a Division I team, UIC&rsquo;s overall record was 185-347-31. In 1995-96, the Flames finished last in the CCHA with a 6-23-1 record and a 9-24-3 overall mark.On March 12 UIC had announced that it would not renew the contract of hockey coach Larry Pedrie. In six years at the Flames helm, Pedrie&rsquo;s coaching record was 64-140-19.<h2>ECAC</h2>Like so many Vermont hockey fans, freshman student Jennifer Vachon didn&rsquo;t want to miss the opportunity to see the Catamounts play for the Eastern College Athletic Conference championship in Lake Placid, N.Y.The only problem was she didn&rsquo;t have the money to purchase tickets.But Vachon didn&rsquo;t have to sell her soul to see the Cats in the ECAC tournament. Instead, she sold her blood.Vachon had bone marrow extracted from her spine as part of a medical study and received $90, which she used to purchase tickets to the ECAC semifinals at the Olympic Center in Lake Placid.The painful experience of donating bone marrow was followed by another painful experience as the top-seeded Catamounts were upset by Harvard 4-3 in the semifinal.Vermont responded at the National Collegiate Athletic Association tournament with a 21 win over the Lake Superior State Lakers in the East Regional at Knickerbocker Arena in Albany, N.Y.75 STRAIGHT: Clarkson sophomore Dan Murphy is college hockey&rsquo;s answer to St. Louis Blues&rsquo; goaltending ironman Grant Fuhr.Murphy extended his string of consecutive starts to 75 games before the Golden Knights were eliminated by Boston University 3-2 in the quarterfinal round of the national final.Murphy was going to be Clarkson&rsquo;s backup goalie when he arrived on campus two years ago, but when Greg Malicke left school prior to 1994-95, Murphy was in goal for Clarkson&rsquo;s opening game of the season, and has been there ever since.RECORD FOR TWO: Vermont juniors Martin St. Louis and Eric Perrin are still doing things in tandem.When Perrin assisted on both of St. Louis&rsquo; goals in the Catamounts&rsquo; 2-1 win over Lake Superior in the national quarterfinals, each player improved his season point total to 83, breaking the school record of 82, set by Tim O&rsquo;Connell in 1974-75. &#9632;

UIC hockey program falls prey to budget

<div class="byline">&#x2013;Larry Mahoney </div><div class="byline">&#x2013;Chris Miller</div>Marty Reasoner wasn&rsquo;t sure how much of an impact he&rsquo;d have in his first season in Hockey East. The answer was plenty.The Boston College center from Honeoye, N.Y., was selected Hockey East rookie of the week nine times en route to being a unanimous choice among coaches for rookie of the year.Reasoner finished with 16 goals and 29 assists in 34 games to tie linemate David Hymovitz as the team&rsquo;s scoring leader.&ldquo;I didn&rsquo;t know what to expect,&rdquo; Reasoner said. &ldquo;I felt if I had the opportunity to play a lot, I could make some pretty good things happen.&rdquo;&ldquo;He&rsquo;s a dynamic player we have in the league who attracts people to watch him play,&rdquo; said Boston College coach Jerry York. &ldquo;He has the ability to read the game. He&rsquo;s just a real field general out there. He has all the qualities necessary to be a real fine pro player.&rdquo;<h2>HOCKEY EAST</h2>St. Louis Blues&rsquo; scout Matt Keator said Reasoner was the most consistent player for the U.S. in the World Junior Championship.&ldquo;He&rsquo;s an excellent NHL prospect,&rdquo; Keator said. &ldquo;He has unique vision and puck skills. He can take a hit to make a play which is what you need to do at the next level.&rdquo;Reasoner is rated 49th by the NHL&rsquo;s Central Scouting Bureau in its mid-season ranking.&ldquo;I need to get a lot stronger and be more aware in the defensive zone,&rdquo; said the 6-foot-1, 188-pound Reasoner.INTENSE COACH: University of Maine interim coach Greg Cronin concluded the first half of his tenure with a 12-6-1 record.Cronin is filling in for Shawn Walsh, who was suspended for a year due to violations committed by the hockey program. Walsh&rsquo;s suspension ends in December.Maine goalie Blair Allison said Cronin &ldquo;is the most intense and competitive coach I&rsquo;ve ever played for.&rdquo;Cronin exhibited that intensity between periods of the 5-2 league semifinal win over UMass-Lowell. He broke his hand on a table while giving an emotional speech. His team responded with four unanswered third period goals.<h2>WCHA</h2>It has been too long.That was the feeling among Colorado College fans when the Tigers finally made it back to the Final Four after 39 seasons of frustration.For most of the current players, the frustration has only lasted a couple of years. The Tigers won the Western Collegiate Hockey Association title in 1994, but didn&rsquo;t make the nationals. They repeated their league title in 1995, but fell one step short of the Final Four.This season, they forgot about knocking and simply knocked down the door.&ldquo;Two years ago, we got snubbed (for an national bid) and our battle cry became, &lsquo;Make the (National Collegiate Athletic Association) tournament,&rsquo;&rdquo; said senior center Colin Schmidt. &ldquo;Last year we spent all our energy just getting there and we had nothing left.&rdquo;If the Tigers win the NCAA title, the school can save a little money in its sewing budget. When the WCHA playoffs started, a banner was raised at CC&rsquo;s rink proclaiming the team&rsquo;s title. But instead of saying &ldquo;WCHA Champions, 1996&rdquo; it said &ldquo;NCAA Champions, 1996.&rdquo;GOPHERS GONE: Minnesota appeared to be poised for an NCAA title. The Gophers had 10 seniors and spent most of the season atop the power ratings, which helped determine the NCAA field and seeding positions.A late-season slump cost the Gophers a first-round bye, despite the fact Minnesota won the WCHA playoff title. Minnesota beat Providence 5-1 in the first round of the national playdowns, but lost a berth in the Final Four the next day to Michigan 4-3.It was another heartbreaking end for Minnesota, which has been in the nationals in each of coach Doug Woog&rsquo;s 11 seasons, but hasn&rsquo;t won a national title since 1979.The Gophers got no sympathy from Michigan, which got three of its four goals on power plays, but Woog didn&rsquo;t complain about the officiating or his team&rsquo;s seeding.&ldquo;It was well-played, well-officiated and well-attended,&rdquo; Woog said. &ldquo;We&rsquo;d just write a different ending to it if we had a chance.&rdquo; &#9632;

Top rookie Reasoner drawing rave reviews

<div class="image-hero"><img title="f0027-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0027-01781/6293789-1-eng-US/f0027-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Veteran Boston defenseman Ray Bourque remains one of the NHL&rsquo;s best players in his 17th season.</figcaption></div>Are you feeling trapped in your own neutral zone? Is the NHL penalty crackdown an obstruction of justice? Should the league forget about a four-quarter format&hellip;period?Well, now is your chance to have your say about these topics and a variety of others in The Hockey News&rsquo; Reader Poll.We want to know how you feel about today&rsquo;s NHL, from tough issues such as fighting to more fanciful ones such as best logo.Simply circle your response or write in your answer in the space provided for each of the 15 questions. Information on where to return completed surveys appears at the bottom of the page.Twenty names will be drawn from the respondents to win an NHL Starter cap of your choice, so be sure to include your name and return address.The results will appear in the May 10 issue.1. Name your favorite NHL player.2. Name your least favorite NHL player.3. Fighting continues to be a thorny issue for the league and its image. Should it be punishable by automatic ejection from the game?4. Who is your favorite national TV personality?<h2>Canada</h2>Don CherryHarry NealeRon MacLeanBob McKenzie<h2>U.S.</h2>John DavidsonBill ClementBarry MelroseDave Maloney5. Allowing two-line passes has been suggested as a way to open up the game. Should the NHL go forward with this idea?6. Which team do you think will win the Stanley Cup?7. Who has been the most valuable player to his team this season?Ray Bourque Martin BrodeurChris Chelios Peter ForsbergGrant Fuhr Jaromir JagrPaul Kariya Mario LemieuxEric Lindros Mark MessierA. Mogilny(Or a player of your choosing)8. Who has been the NHLs best player this season?Martin Brodeur Chris CheliosPeter Forsberg Jaromir Jagr Paul Kariya Mario Lemieux Eric Lindros Mark Messier A. Mogilny Joe Sakic(Or a player of your choosing)9. The NHL instituted an enforcement this season of obstruction fouls. Has it been effective?10. A four-quarter format has been suggested as a way to speed up the game. Should this idea be implemented?11. Should the NHL adopt a shootout in which both teams would be awarded a point for a tie, while the shootout winner would be awarded an extra point?12. Which is the NHLs best logo?13. Which is the NHLs worst logo?14. If you could make one change to the NHL, what would it be? &#9632;

f0027-01

IT’S YOUR CALL

<div class="image-hero"><img title="f0028-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0028-01814/6293841-1-eng-US/f0028-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Sabres&rsquo; Dominik Hasek</figcaption></div><div class="figure-block image-bleed"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-01710/6293834-1-eng-US/f0029-012.jpg" title="f0029-01" width="3109" height="3659"><figcaption class="caption-body">Chris Chelios was on pace for his lowest full-season penalty minute total in five years.</figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0030-01808/6293827-1-eng-US/f0030-012.jpg" title="f0030-01" width="3101" height="3655"><figcaption class="caption-body">Pierre Turgeon led the Montreal Canadiens in goals, assists and points this season.</figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0031-01749/6293820-1-eng-US/f0031-012.jpg" title="f0031-01" width="3109" height="3664"></div> &#9632;

f0028-01

REVOLUTIONARY REPLACEMENT BLADE SYSTEM.

<div class="image-hero"><img title="f0032-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-01796/6293872-1-eng-US/f0032-012.jpg"></div><h2>KEY TO ABBREVIATIONS</h2>Statistics provided by National Hockey League; Players are listed by uniform number, name, games played (GP), minutes played (MIN), goals-against average (GAA), wins (W) losses (L) ties (T), empty-net goals (EN), shutouts (SO), goals against (GA), shots against (SA), save percentage (SP). Players indicated by an asterisk (*) are eligible for the Calder Trophy. Numbers beside teams indicate rankings for the Bill Jennings Trophy. For goalies&rsquo; individual rankings see page 28. &#9632;

f0032-01

NHL GOALTENDING STATISTICS

NOTEUnofficial game summaries provided by National Hockey League; (shots on goal/plus-minus); SA-shots against; GA-goals against; ENG-empty net goals; Dec-decision, charges to goaltenders of record when winning goal is scored.<h2>FRIDAY, MARCH 22</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-02549/6294064-1-eng-US/f0032-022.jpg" title="f0032-02" width="503" height="1912"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-03379/6294057-1-eng-US/f0032-032.jpg" title="f0032-03" width="521" height="2288"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-04255/6294050-1-eng-US/f0032-042.jpg" title="f0032-04" width="511" height="2279"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-05184/6294043-1-eng-US/f0032-052.jpg" title="f0032-05" width="515" height="2276"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-06152/6294036-1-eng-US/f0032-062.jpg" title="f0032-06" width="508" height="772"></div><h2>SATURDAY, MARCH 23</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-07127/6294029-1-eng-US/f0032-072.jpg" title="f0032-07" width="512" height="1430"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-08112/6294022-1-eng-US/f0032-082.jpg" title="f0032-08" width="503" height="2283"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-01719/6294015-1-eng-US/f0033-012.jpg" title="f0033-01" width="523" height="3512"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-02493/6294008-1-eng-US/f0033-022.jpg" title="f0033-02" width="524" height="3508"></div><h2>SUNDAY, MARCH 24</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-03362/6294001-1-eng-US/f0033-032.jpg" title="f0033-03" width="521" height="3432"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-04287/6293994-1-eng-US/f0033-042.jpg" title="f0033-04" width="505" height="2259"></div><h2>MONDAY, MARCH 25</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-05236/6293987-1-eng-US/f0033-052.jpg" title="f0033-05" width="503" height="1165"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-06203/6293980-1-eng-US/f0033-062.jpg" title="f0033-06" width="520" height="3511"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-07185/6293973-1-eng-US/f0033-072.jpg" title="f0033-07" width="499" height="832"></div><h2>TUESDAY, MARCH 26</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-08153/6293966-1-eng-US/f0033-082.jpg" title="f0033-08" width="510" height="2588"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-01807/6293959-1-eng-US/f0034-012.jpg" title="f0034-01" width="515" height="3029"></div><h2>WEDNESDAY, MARK 27</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-02573/6293952-1-eng-US/f0034-022.jpg" title="f0034-02" width="492" height="370"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-03446/6293945-1-eng-US/f0034-032.jpg" title="f0034-03" width="526" height="3488"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-04341/6293938-1-eng-US/f0034-042.jpg" title="f0034-04" width="522" height="3489"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-05271/6293931-1-eng-US/f0034-052.jpg" title="f0034-05" width="518" height="3039"></div><h2>THURSDAY, MARCH 28</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-06238/6293924-1-eng-US/f0034-062.jpg" title="f0034-06" width="493" height="366"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-07219/6293917-1-eng-US/f0034-072.jpg" title="f0034-07" width="516" height="3488"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-08204/6293910-1-eng-US/f0034-082.jpg" title="f0034-08" width="505" height="2261"></div><h2>PLAYOFF SCHEDULE</h2>Below is the complete Stanley Cup Playoff schedule released by the NHL March 25. All series are best-of-seven. The playoffs begin Tuesday, April 16. Dates are subject to change.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-09184/6293903-1-eng-US/f0034-092.jpg" title="f0034-09" width="483" height="998"></div> &#9632;

f0032-02

NHL SUMMARIES

<h2>ANAHEIM</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>None.<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Anatoli Semenov, Steve Rucchin, J.F. Jomphe, Alex Hicks, Shaun Van Allen. LW&ndash;Paul Kariya, Valeri Karpov. Garry Valk. Ken Baumgartner. RW&ndash;Teemu Selanne, Joe Sacco, Roman Oksiuta, Todd Ewen. LD&ndash;Bobby Dollas, Darren Van Impe, Jason Marshall, Randy Ladouceur. RD&ndash;Jason York, Fredrik Olausson, Davio Karpa. G&ndash;Guy Hebert, Mikhail Shtalenkov.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Peter Douris. RW. groin strain, day-to-day. Milos Holan. D, recovering from marrow transplant to treat leukemia, out for season.<h2>BOSTON</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>March 27: Ryan Hughes. LW, recalled from Providence (AHL).<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Adam Oates, Jozef Stumpel, Ron Sutter. Ted Donato. LW&ndash;Todd Elik, Shawn McEachern. Dave Reid, Ryan Hughes. RW&ndash;Steve Heinze, Marc Potvin, Sandy Moger, Tim Sweeney. LD&ndash;Kyle McLaren. Don Sweeney. Jon Rohloff. Philip Von Stefenelli. RD&ndash;Ray Bourque, Rick Zombo, Steve Staios. G&ndash;Bill Ranfora, Craig Billington.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Dean Chynoweth. D, strained left hamstring, indefinite. Al lafrate. D. torn right knee cartilage and strained back muscle, day-to-day Joe Mullen, RW, sprained ligament, left knee, indefinite. Cam Neely. RW, sore right hip, indefinite. Davis Payne. LW, separated right shoulder, indefinite. Kevin Sawyer. LW. groin strain, indefinite. Rick Tocchet. RW. back spasms, day-to-day.<h2>BUFFALO</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>March 23: Dane Jackson. LW, recalled from Rochester (AHL). Wayne Primeau, C, and Rob Conn. RW. assigned to Rochester.<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Pat LaFontaine, Derek Plante. Brian Holzinger. LW&ndash;Brad May, Randy Burridge, Dane Jackson, Brent Hughes. RW&ndash;Michal Grosek. Matthew Barnaby, Jason Dawe, Rob Ray. Scott Pearson. LD&ndash;Garry Galley, Alexei Zhitnik, Mike Wilson. RD&ndash;Darryl Shannon, Bob Boughner, Mark Astley. G&ndash;Dommik Hasek, Andrei Trefilov.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Donald Audette RW. torn anterior cruciate ligament. out for season. Mike Peca, C, sprained right knee, day-to-day Richard Smehlik, D, torn anterior cruciate ligament, day-to-day.<h2>CALGARY</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>March 22: Kevin Dahl. D, assigned to Saint John (AHL).<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Gary Roberts, Dean Evason, Cory Stillman, Michael Nylander. Bob Sweeney. LW&ndash;German Titov, Paul Kruse, Mike Sullivan, Pavel Torgajev. RW&ndash;Theo Fleury. Ron Stern, Jocelyn Lemieux, Sandy McCarthy. Sheldon Kennedy. LD&ndash;Steve Chiasson, Trent Yawney, Jamie Huscroft. RD&ndash;Zarley Zalapski, James Patrick, Tommy Albelin. G&ndash;Trevor Kidd, Rick Tabaracci.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Corey Millen, C, pulled groin, indefinite.<h2>CHICAGO</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>March 22: Ethan Moreau, LW, assigned to Indianapolis (IHL). March 26: Jimmy Waite, G. recalled from Indianapolis.<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Murray Craven. Denis Savard, Brent Sutter. Bernie Nicholls. LW&ndash;Tony Amonte, James Black, Bob Probert. Cam Russell. RW&ndash;Eric Daze, Joe Murphy, Jeff Shantz, Steve Dubinsky, Mike Prokopec. LD&ndash;Enrico Ciccone. Gary Suter, Steve Smith. RD&ndash;Chris Chelios, Keith Carney. Eric Weinrich. G&ndash;Ed Belt our, Jimmy Waite.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Jett Hackett, G. broken finger, day-to-day. Sergei Krivokrasov, RW. sprained left knee, indefinite. Jeremy Roenick, C, sprained right ankle, indefinite.<h2>COLORADO</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>None.<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Peter Forsberg. Joe Sakic, Mike Ricci, Stephane Yelle, Troy Murray, Dave Hannan. LW&ndash;Valeri Kamensky, Chris Simon. Rene Corbel, Warren Rychel. RW&ndash;Claude Lemieux, Scott Young, Adam Deadmarsh, Mike Keane. LD&ndash;Sylvain Lefebvre, Sandis Ozolinsh, Adam Foote, Jon Klemm. RD&ndash;Curtis Leschyshyn. Craig Wolanin, Alexei Gusarov. G&ndash;Patrick Roy. Stepnane Fiset.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Uwe Krupp, D. torn left knee ligaments, indefinite.<h2>DALLAS</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>None.<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Joe Nieuwendyk, Mike Modano, Brent Gilchrist, Guy Carbonneau. LW&ndash;Bob Bassen. Benoit Hogue, Randy Wood, Bill Huard, Mike Donnelly. Brent Fedyk. RW&ndash;Todd Harvey, Grant Marshall, Mark Lawrence, Mike Kennedy. LD&ndash;Craig Ludwig, Derian Hatcher, Darryl Sydor. RD&ndash;Kevin Hatcher, Grant Ledyard, Richard Matvichuk, Mike Lalor. G&ndash;Andy Moog, Darcy Wakaluk.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Greg Adams, LW. fractured right hand, early-April. Jere Lehtinen, RW, sprained ankle, early-April.<h2>DETROIT</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>March 21: Mathieu Dandenault, RW, assigned to Adirondack (AHL).<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Iqor Larionov. Steve Yzerman, Sergei Fedorov, Keith Primeau, Wes Walz. LW&ndash;Vyacheslav Kozloy, Tim Taylor, Doug Brown, Stu Grimson. RW&ndash;Martin Lapointe, Darren McCarty. Dino Ciccarelli, Kirk Maltby. LD&ndash;Slava Fetisov, Paul Coffey, Nicklas Lidstrom. RD&ndash;Vladimir Konstantinov, Marc Bergevin, Mike Ramsey, Bob Rouse. G&ndash;Chris Osgood, Mike Vernon.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Kris Draper, C, Charley horse, day-to-day. Bob Errey, LW. broken bone in left foot, indefinite. Greg Johnson, LW. twisted right knee, indefinite.<h2>EDMONTON</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>March 24: Greg de Vries, D, recalled from Cape Breton (AHL).<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Doug Weight, Jason Arnott, Todd Marchant. Scott Thornton LW&ndash;Zdeno Ciger, Dean McAmmond, Ryan Smyth. Kent Manderville, Ralph Intranuovo, Louie DeBrusk. RW&ndash;Miroslav Satan, Mariusz Czerkawski, David Oliver, Kelly Buchberger. LD&ndash;Bryan Marchment, Luke Richardson, Donald Dufresne. RD&ndash;Greg de Vries. Boris Mironov, Jiri Slegr. Bryan Muir. G&ndash;Curtis Joseph. Joaquin Gage.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Jeff Norton, D, torn left medial collateral knee ligament. out for season. David Roberts. LW, broken left cheekbone, facial nerve damage, indefinite.<h2>FLORIDA</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>None.<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Rob Niedermayer, Martin Straka, Brian Skrud-land, Tom Fitzgerald. LW&ndash;Johan Garpenlov. Bill Lindsay, Mike Hough, Dave Lowry. RW&ndash;Scott Mellanby, Ray Sheppard, Jody Hull, Radek Dvorak. LD&ndash;td Jovanovski, Terry Carkner, Jason Woolley, Geoff Smith. RD&ndash;Gord Murphy, Paul Laus, Robert Svehla, Magnus Svensson. G&ndash;John Vanbiesbrouck, Mark Fitzpatrick.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Stu Barnes, C, left knee sprain, late-April.<h2>HARTFORD</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>None.<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Jeff O&rsquo;Neill, Andrew Cassels, Andrei Nikolishin, Mark Janssens. LW&ndash;Brendan Shanahan, Geoff Sanderson, Paul Ranheim, Scott Daniels. RW&ndash;Nelson Emerson, Sami Kapanen, Steven Rice, Kelly Chase. LD&ndash;Jeff Brown, Glen Wesley, Adam Burt. RD&ndash;Glen Featherstone, Gerald Diduck, Brad McCrimmon. Brian Glynn. G&ndash;Sean Burke, Jason Muzzatti.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Kevin Dineen, RW, broken right wrist. early-April. Robert Kron, RW, pulled groin, day-to-day.<h2>LOS ANGELES</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>March 27: Rob Cowie. D, recalled from Phoenix (IHL).<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Ray Ferraro, Kevin Todd, Yanic Perreault, Robert Lang, Nathan LaFayette. LW&mdash;Dimitri Khristich, Kevin Stevens, Vladimir Tsyplakov, Eric Lacroix. RW&ndash;Vitali Yachmenev, Gary Shuchuk, Patrice Tardif. LD&ndash;Mattias Norstrom, Rob Cowie, Jaroslav Modry. RD&ndash;Philippe Boucher, Sean O&rsquo;Donnell, Jan Vopat. G&ndash;Kelly Hrudey, Byron Dafoe.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Rob Blake, D, torn left knee ligament, out for season. Steven Finn, D, broken left foot, out for season. Tony Granato. RW, intracerebral hematoma, out for season. Craig Johnson, LW, sprained left shoulder, day-to-day Ian Laperriere. C. sprained left shoulder, day-to-day. Barry Potomski, LW, left shoulder sprain, day-to-day. John Slaney, D, broken hand, out for season. Doug Zmolek, D, sprained left knee, day-to-day.<h2>MONTREAL</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>March 24: Robert Dirk, D, released. March 26: Marko Kiprusoff, D, recalled from Fredericton (AHL). March 28: Vincent Damphousse, C, suspended by NHL. Length to be determined.<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Pierre Turgeon, Marc Bureau, Saku Koivu. LW&ndash;Andrei Kovalenko, Martin Rucinsky, Brian Savage, Donald Brashear, Scott Fraser. RW&ndash;Mark Recchi, Valeri Bure, Turner Stevenson, Chris Murray. LD&ndash;Peter Popovic, Lyle Odelein, David Wilkie, Marko Kiprusoff. RD&ndash;Stephane Quintal, Rory Fitzpatrick, Craig Rivet. G&ndash;Jocelyn Thibault, Pat Jablonski.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Patrice Brisebois, D. pulled lower back muscle, day-to-day. Vladimir Malakhov, D, torn left knee ligaments, indefinite.<h2>NEW JERSEY</h2>TRANSACTIONS,None.<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Petr Sykora, Steve Sullivan, Bobby Carpenter, Bobby Holik, Sergei Brylin. LW&ndash;Steve Thomas, Brian Rolston, Reid Simpson, Dave Andreychuk. RW&ndash;Bill Guerin, Stephane Richer, Randy McKay, John MacLean. LD&ndash;Scott Stevens, Phil Housley, Kevin Dean. RD&ndash;Jason Smith, Ken Daneyko, Scott Niedermayer. G&ndash;Martin Brodeur, Corey Schwab.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Neal Broten, C. sprained left ankle, day-to-day. &ldquo;hawn Chambers, D, broken right hand, indefinite. Mike Peluso, LW, strained left knee, day-to-day. Valeri Zelepukin, LW, bruised right knee, day-to-day.<h2>N.Y. ISLANDERS</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>March 21: Bob Halkidis, D, assigned to Utah (IHL)..<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Travis Green, Alexander Semak, Derek Armstrong, Darby Hendrickson. LW&ndash;Todd Bertuzzi, Niklas Andersson, Jarrett Deuling, Pat Conacher. RW&ndash;Ziggy Palffy, Patrick Flatley, uan Plante, Mike MacWilliam. LD&ndash;Darjs Kasparaitis, Bryan McCabe, Scott Lachance RD&ndash;Kenny Jonsson, Chris Luongo, Brent Severyn.fHiir Fichaud, Tommy Soderstrom.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Ken Belanger, 1W. concussion, out for season. Brad Dalgamo. RW, sore wrist, day-to-day. Yan Kaminsky. LW, shoulder surgery, out for season. Derek King, LW, fractured jaw, out for season. Brett Lindros. RW, concussion, out&rsquo;for season. Marty McInnis. LW, bruised ribs, day-to-day. Chris Marinucci C, left knee surgery, out for season. Rich Pilon, D, hip flexor, day-to-day. Milan Tichy, D, back injury, out for season. Dennis Vaske, D, concussion, out for season. Mick Vukota. RW. thumb surgery, day-to-day.<h2>N.Y. RANGERS</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>None.<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Mark Messier. Sergei Nemchinov, Niklas Sund-strom, Daniel Lacroix, Ken Gernander. LW&ndash;Adam Graves, Luc Robitaille, Sergio Momesso, Darren Langdon. RW&ndash;Jari Kurri, Alexei Kovalev, Bill Berg, Shane Churla. LD&ndash;Brian Leetch, Ulf Samuelsson, Bruce Driver. RD&ndash;Jeff Beukeboom, Doug Lidster, Marty McSorley, Alexander Karpovtsev. G&ndash;Mike Richter, Glenn Healy.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Kevin Lowe, D, strained groin, early-April. Pat Verbeek, RW, separated shoulder, day-to-day.<h2>OTTAWA</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>None.<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Alexei Yashin, Radek Bonk, Dave Archibald. LW&ndash;Randy Cunneyworth, Tom Chorske, Pavel Demitra, Troy Mallette, Michel Picard. RW&ndash;Rob Gaudreau, Daniel Alfredsson, Trent McCleary, Pat Elynuik, Dennis Vial, Scott Levins. LD&ndash;Stan Neckar, Frank Musil, Chris Dahlquist. RD&ndash;Sean Hill. Steve Duchesne, Lance Pitlick. G&ndash;Damian Rhodes, Mike Bales.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Alexandre Daigle, C, broken right arm, out for season. Ted Drury, C, sprained left wrist, indefinite. Janne Laukkanen, D, sprained left knee, out for season.<h2>PHILADELPHIA</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>March 26: Aris Brimanis, D. recalled from Hershey (AHL).<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Eric Lindros, Rod Brind&rsquo;Amour, Bob Corkum, Dan Quinn. LW&ndash;John LeClair, Shjon Podein, Trent Klatt, Russ Romaniuk. RW&ndash;Dale Hawerchuk. Pat Fal-loon, John Druce, Rob DiMaio. LD&ndash;Chris Therien, Kevin Haller, Petr Svoboda, Kerry Huffman. RD&ndash;Eric Desjardins, Karl Dykhuis, Aris Brimanis. G&ndash;Ron Hex-tall, Garth Snow.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Shawn Antoski, LW, sprained left shoulder, day-to-day. Joel Otto, C, sprained left knee, day-to-day. Mikael Renberg, RW. strained abdomen, indefinite. Kjell Samuelsson, D, bruised ribs, day-to-day<h2>PITTSBURGH</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>None.<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Mario Lemieux. Petr Nedved, Bryan Smolinski, Chris Wells. LW&ndash;Ron Francis, Kevin Miller, Joe Dziedzic, Dave Roche, Brad Lauer. RW&ndash;Dave McLI-wain, Jaromir Jagr, Glen Murray, Alek Stojanov. LD&ndash;Chris Tamer, Francois Leroux, J.J. Daigneault. RD&ndash;Sergei Zubov, Neil Wilkinson. Chris Joseph. G&ndash;Tom Barrasso, Ken Wregget<h3>INJURIES</h3>Dmitri Mironov, D, bruised shoulder, day-to-day. Ian Moran, D, shoulder surgery, indefinite Ed Patterson, RW. disk surgery, indefinite. Tomas Sandstrom LW, separated shoulder, indefinite.<h2>ST. LOUIS</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>March 23: Ken Sutton, D, assigned to Worcester (AHL).<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Wayne Gretzky, Adam Creighton, Peter Zezel. Craig MacTavish. Lw-Geoff Courtnail, Stephane Matteau, Basil McRae. Mike Hudson. RW&ndash;Glenn Anderson, Brian Noonan, Rob Pearson, Yuri Khmylev, Stephen Leach. LD&ndash;Murray Baron, Chris Pronger, Jay Wells. RD&ndash;AI Maclnnis, Charlie Huddv, Christer Olsson. Igor Kravchuk. G&ndash;Grant Fuhr, Jon Casey.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Shayne Corson, LW, broken jaw. mid-April. Greg Gilbert, LW. back spasms, indefinite Brett Hull. RW. pulled hamstring, day-to-day. Tony Twist. LW, sprained right ankle, day-to-day.<h2>SAN JOSE</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>None.<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Jeff Friesen, Darren Turcotte, Jamie Baker, Viktor Kozlov. LW&ndash;Ulf Dahlen, Ville Peltonen, Chris Tancill, Dave Brown. RW&ndash;Owen Nolan. Jan Caloun, Jett Odgers, Shean Donovan. LD&ndash;Doug Bodger, Michal Sykora, Jim Kyte. RD&ndash;Yves Racine, Jayson More, Tom Pederson. G&ndash;Arturs Irbe, Wade Flaherty.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Marcus Ragnarsson D, strained back muscle, day-to-day. Chris Terreri. G. strained arm muscle, indefinite. Ray Whitney, LW, bruised hand, day-to-day. Dody Wood. LW, back spasms, day-to-day.<h2>TAMPA BAY</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>None.<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Brian Bradley, Chris Gratton, John Cullen, Aaron Gavey. LW&ndash;Rob Zamuner, Jason Wiemer, Shawn Burr. John Tucker. RW&ndash;Patrick Poulin, Brian Bellows. Alexander Selivanov, Paul Ysebaert, Petr Klima, Mikael Andersson. LD&ndash;Roman Hamrlik, Cory Cross, Igor Ulanov. RD&ndash;David Shaw, Bill Houlder, Rudy Poeschek, Chris LiPuma, Michel Petit. G&ndash;Oaren Puppa, Jeff Reese, Derek Wilkinson.<h3>INJURIES</h3>None.<h2>TORONTO</h2>TRANSACTONSMarch 23: Kelly Fairchild, .0, assigned to St. John&rsquo;s (AHL).<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Doug Gilmour, Kirk Miller, Brandon Convery, Mark Kolesar. LW&ndash;Wendel Clark, Dave Gagnef, Toad Warriner, Nick Kypreos. RW&ndash;Mats Sundin-. Mike Gartner, Wayne Presley Tie Domi. Mike Craig. LD&ndash;Todd Gill, Mathieu Schneider, Jamie-Macoun, Rob Zettler. RD&ndash;Larry Murphy, Dave Ellett, Dmitri Yushkevich. G&ndash;Oon Beaupre. Felix Potvin.<h3>INJURIES</h3>None.<h2>VANCOUVER</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>March 28: Rick Ley. coach, fired. Pat Quinn, GM, named coach.<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Trevor Linden, Cliff Ronning, Mike Ridley, Jesse Belanger, Josef Beranek, Jim Dowd. LW&ndash;Martin Gelinas, Esa Tikkanen, Markus Naslund, Gino Odjick. RW&ndash;Alexander Mogilny, Russ Courtnail, Mike Sillinger, Joey Kocur, Tim Hunter. LD&ndash;Bret Hedican, Dana Murzyn, Frantisek Kucera, Dean Malkoc, Jassen Cullimore RD&ndash;Jyrki Lumme, Dave Babych, Leif Rohlin. Adrian Aucoin. G&ndash;Kirk McLean. Corey Hirsch.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Pavel Bure, RW, right knee surgery, indefinite.<h2>WASHINGTON</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>March 28: Andrew Brunette, LW, recalled from Portland (AHL). March 29: Brunette assigned to Portland.<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Dale Hunter, Michal Pivonka, Joe Juneau, Jeff Nelson. LW&ndash;Stefan Ustorf, Keith Jones. Todd Krygi-er, Mike Eagles. RW&ndash;Kelly Miller, Peter Bondra, Pat Peake. Kevin Kaminski. LD&ndash;Mark Tinordi, Joe Reekie, Jim Johnson. RD&ndash;Calle Johansson, Sylvain Cote. Sergei Gonchar. G&ndash;Jim Carey, Olie Kolzig.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Craig Berube, LW, sprained right knee, indefinite. Ken Klee, D. strained groin, early-April. Steve Konowalchuk, LW, broken left hand, indefinite. Brendan Witt, D, broken left wrist, mid-April.<h2>WINNIPEG</h2><h3>TRANSACTIONS</h3>March 24: lain Fraser, C, recalled from Springfield (AHL).<h3>ROSTER</h3>C&ndash;Craig Janney, Mike Eastwood, Chad Kilger. lain Fraser. LW&ndash;Keith Tkachuk, Darrin Shannon, Kris King, Jim McKenzie. RW&ndash;lgor Korolev, Dallas Drake, Mike Stapleton. Shane Doan. Denis Chasse. LD&ndash;Teppo Numminen. Dave Manson, Craig Muni, Brent Thompson. RD&ndash;Jeff Finley, Norm Maciver, Oleg Tverdovsky. G&ndash;Nikolai Khabibulin, Dominic Roussel.<h3>INJURIES</h3>Randy Gilhen, C, arthroscopic right knee surgery, indefinite. Ed Olczyk, C, sprained left knee ligament. early-April. Alexei Zhamnov, C, nerve inflammation in the lower back, April 5. &#9632;

NHL ROSTERS AND TRANSACTIONS

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April 12, 1996

Poulin hopes luck changing

YOUR GUIDE TO PLAYOFF POOLS

Stick swinging caps ugly game

BY THE NUMBERS