The Sheet Blog: Expect a ‘cattle auction’ if Sam Bennett reaches free agency July 1
4 Nations Face-Off
The NHL and NHL Players’ Association owe a major thank you to the Tkachuk brothers after last Saturday’s scraps in Montreal. Nobody understands a moment better than those two. The start of that game will be talked about for decades and helped propel the 4 Nations Face-Off tournament to a whole new stratosphere…I don’t think he’ll ever win a Norris Trophy, but now everybody should understand how great Jaccob Slavin is and where he fits among the top blueliners in the game. And for me he was the best player in the tournament, just consistently great shift after shift after shift…hard not to believe that Thomas Harley and Jake Sanderson, who both came in as pinch hitters, won’t get major consideration for the Olympics. Both were excellent after getting put in tough spots…as one person said to me recently, there will be a ‘cattle-auction’ for Sam Bennett if/when he hits free agency July 1…commenting on the Connor McDavid game-winner, one defenseman texted me, “Somewhere, Rod Brind’Amour is like ‘see, no confusion with man-on-man. Guys might get beat but we won’t lose on a misread’ “… I hope when we look back at the tournament, we remember Brayden Point outskating Jack Hughes to get the icing call that led to the GWG. As Troy Smith of HockeyIQ points out, how many forwards would have just relied on Thomas Harley to get to the puck before Hughes?…I did enjoy the numerous “I can’t believe I’m cheering for Brad Marchand” tweets…I never thought I’d live to see the day where naming Wayne Gretzky as honorary captain of Team Canada would be controversial, but here we are.
NHL
Make what you want out of this, but there sure have been a lot of Vegas Golden Knights scouts at the last five Buffalo Sabres games. Two more again Saturday for Buffalo’s game against the New York Rangers…if the Boston Bruins fall out of this and decide on to take a small step back, I wonder if they’d entertain moving defenceman Mason Lohrei? I know with the injuries to the back end he’s extremely valuable, playing more than 20 minutes a night, and a deal is unlikely, but he’d fetch a nice return to help hasten any kind of reload…Curious what the Washington Capitals do come trade deadline. Pretty sure they don’t want to touch the roster, but after the season they’ve had, GM Chris Patrick probably owes the team something here. Could they move Hendrix Lapierre to get it?…the Capitals just wrecked teams this weekend, putting up an eight spot against the Pittsburgh Penguins, then ambushing the Edmonton Oilers for seven. Alex Ovechkin with a hat trick yesterday and is now 13 away from Gretzky’s record…you can be sure there’s no NHL goaltender wants to surrender the record-breaking goal to Ovechkin, but what about an EBUG? You go from beer league to your picture in the Hockey Hall of Fame…how much of what the Calgary Flames decide to do at trade deadline depends on how the Vancouver Canucks perform?…Trevor Zegras’ hit on Michael Rasmussen feels like Andrew Cogliano on Adrian Kempe, no? That hit cost Cogliano two games, his iron man streak and a friendship with long time buddy George Parros.
CHL
I wonder if the three leagues in the CHL all looking at losing high-end players to college hockey next season consider changing their import regulations. Teams are currently allowed two, but it sounds like there is some conversation about bumping that to three…it’s only a matter of time until (North American) pro hockey comes calling for Kitchener Rangers head coach Jussi Ahokas. What he and his staff of Jeff Kyrzakos and Brad Flynn have done with the Rangers is one of the best stories in the OHL.
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