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April 24, 2007
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.
Rookie rampage
When Colton Fretter fractured his ankle during a Valentine’s Day game in Florida, the thought of earning an award wasn’t exactly a priority. The Gwinnett Gladiators forward missed seven weeks and 21 games. But amazingly, a day after Fretter’s return to the Gladiators lineup April 6, he was named ECHL rookie of the year. Even after nearly two months out of the lineup, Fretter still led all rookies with 66 points in 50 games. “The thing that’s kind of glaring is he’s out for seven weeks and still was the leading rookie scorer,” Gladiators coach Jeff Pyle told The Gwinnett Daily Post. “He’s the best prospect in this league. That’s the best way I can put it.” Fretter isn’t Pyle’s only weapon, either. The Gladiators had a “Schell and Awe” campaign en route to a 41-win,…
SNAPSHOTS FROM AROUND THE NHL
Sidney Crosby won his first Art Ross Trophy, but it’s nothing new in Pittsburgh. His NHL-leading 120 points marked the 12th time in 19 seasons a Penguin has captured the award. Mario Lemieux did it six times, Jaromir Jagr five. The NHL is a tough place to score. Even top rookie candidate Evgeni Malkin found that out. After scoring seven goals in his first six big-league games, Malkin managed just 26 over the next 72. The best take on Ed Belfour’s arrest belongs to former THN correspondent David J. Neal of the Miami Herald. He wrote: “Belfour’s face recognition is minimal. He’s more likely to be mistaken for someone who just awakened from a 20-year nap in the Everglades than a professional athlete.” Cheap shot of the Women’s World Championship…
Isles’ fan base needs to grow
Read Adam’s blog daily on thehockeynews.com DEAR AREA LONG ISLANDERS: Don’t take this the wrong way, but smarten up and haul butt aboard your NHL team’s bandwagon already. You remember your NHL team, don’t you? They’re called the Islanders and they went from fearsomely dynastic in the early 1980s to gruesomely spastic in recent years. Now, in the past, you folks could’ve been forgiven for wanting to forget about them. They had fraud artists for owners – figuratively and literally – and fraud artists for players. They employed a GM who was as adept at drafting future stars as he was at trading those same stars away for little in return. For two years, they wore Captain Highliner on the front of their chests. For that fact alone, it’s understandable why you’d be shy…
Walk the line and he’ll be fine
“WE’D RATHER tame a tiger than paint stripes on a kitty.” That was assistant coach Steve Spott’s take after the Kitchener Rangers acquired Steve Downie from the Peterborough Petes midway through this season. Taming a tiger isn’t always easy, as the Rangers were to learn late in the regular season when Downie drew an eight-game suspension for bullying. “We paid a heavy price to have him available at this time of the year,” said Rangers coach-GM Pete DeBoer as Kitchener began Round 2 with Downie and Oshawa’s John Tavares tied at 17 points atop the OHL playoff scoring race. “The fact he missed some regular season games is a non-issue with us. “He’s very intelligent and I’d say 99 per cent of the time he knows exactly what he’s doing. It’s those incidents in…
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