Tag Archive for 'ted-nolan'
Gonna keep it brief this morning, headed to good ol’ Roosevelt Field this afternoon to fight the hordes finish my shopping and then headed to the Coliseum for tonight’s game.
- Nice game by the Isles last night - four freakin’ goals?!?! Nice! They played hard, traded goals with the Pens in the first and second, and then two quick goals in the third got them the win. Blake Comeau got his first NHL point on an assist on the game tying goal, and then his first NHL goal was the game winner. He also picked up his first NHL first star of the game award. Congrats Blake on an impressive night. Trent Hunter scored 37 seconds later to give the Isles a 2 goal lead. As usual - Pens get all the calls - 6 PP for the Pens, 2 for the Isles. How about that last penalty to Guerin? What a joke - it certainly looked like he might hook Crosby on the play, but Crosby skated right out of it and was barely bothered by it, while the over-protective zebras called the penalty anyways. Joke. Good to see Sid “The Thug” Crosby kept his gloves on last night.
- Isles take on the Caps tonight, losers of two straight. Check out Caps’ blog Japer’s Rink preview of tonight’s game.
Basically, there are two ways the Caps can head into the Christmas break - on a high note and no more than seven points out of eighth place in the Eastern Conference or… well… “other.” Tonight’s game on Long Island, of course, will go a long way towards determining how merry the Caps’ collective Christmas is, and while it’s never easy to win on the road in the NHL, the Caps have a lot going for them tonight.
- Ted Nolan will not be behind the Isles’ bench tonight, and no, that doesn’t mean Al Arbour is coaching again (damn!). Ted’s son Brandon will be making his NHL debut in Tampa. Ted Nolan told Greg Logan:
Now you have a sense of what fathers feel like when their sons play for the first time in the National Hockey League. Fathers are very proud, and I’m no different. My wife [Sandra] and younger son will be flying down to Tampa to watch him play tomorrow night, and we’ll all get together for a Christmas celebration.
That’s all I got this morning - check the recommended links to the right for some more reading materials. See you late tonight or tomorrow morning for the Isles/Cap recap as the Isles head into the short holiday break (Jason Blake and Toronto come into town the day after Christmas).
So much for the fast start to the season. The Islanders continue to hover just above .500 and cannot get any momentum or excessive scoring going, dropping Saturday night’s game at the Coliseum to Pittsburgh 3-2. The Isles have not won back to back games in almost a month, dating back to mid-November and consecutive wins vs. the Rangers and Devils. Ah, the good ol’ days of mid-November.
The Isles fell behind early (bad) 2-0 partial thanks to an awful giveaway by M.A.B in his own defensive zone that led to a Sydney Crosby goal - like he needs any help scoring? The Isles came back though (good) to tie the game at 2 in the second period thanks to goals from Park and Vasicek who leads the team with 10 goals now. For illustrative purposes, Kovalchuk leads the league with 26. The Isles are 2nd to last in league scoring, the only silver lining being that the one team worse than us…is the Rangers. Back to Saturday night, later in the second period there’s some pushing and shoving between Witt and Crosby, two Pens jump in to remind Witt about their “no-touch” insurance policy on Sid. Vasicek jumps in to Witt’s defense, and after the zebras sort it out, the Pens get an early Christmas powerplay (No! Not the Pens! They never catch a break.) as Witt and Vasicek are sent to the Isles box, but only Whitney for the Pens. On the ensuing powerplay, Pittsburgh scores to make it 3-2 and that’s final goal of the game. Coach Nolan’s STILL looking for the extra penalty on that scrum.
“I still can’t understand how two guys have a little pushing match, and then two guys jump one of our guys and we end up in a short-handed situation,” Nolan said.
The Isles play a decent third period, creating chances to try and find the tying goal…and then Chris Simon gets all boneheaded on us…again. Simon takes an “attempt to injure” major penalty for using his skate to stomp on Jarkko Ruutu’s foot as both of them left the ice after a shift. Ruutu fell to the ice, but was not injured. The Isles spend 5 of the last 6 minutes of the game on the penalty kill - which surprisingly produces some of their best chances to score in the period, including a Mike Sillinger breakaway, but can’t find the equalizer.
Simon has been given a leave of absence by the team in advance of his 7th career NHL suspension. Having just completed a 25-game suspension in October, Simon is likely to have the rulebook thrown at him by NHL Dean of Discipline Colin Campbell, because of his repeat offender status. While this incident wasn’t as bad as the stick swinging incident from last year, I still think Simon is looking at 20-25 games again and probably some league mandated anger-management classes. Off the ice he sounds like a great guy, but on the ice he’s shown a history of not respecting his opponents, not thinking before he acts, and not acting in the best interest of his team. It is possible his Islanders and even NHL career could be over because of this incident.
If you play or played organized hockey, you probably know a guy like Chris Simon. He might have even been on your team. The guy who always loses his cool, takes the extra penalty, or takes the pointless, unprovoked penalty. The guy in front of the net who always has to get the last shove in. The guy who’s slashes like he’s chopping wood. Or the absolute worst guy in men’s league - the guy who forgets it’s all for fun and everyone has to go to work in the morning. The guy with no respect for his opponents and just wants to fight and hurt people. On the ice, in the parking lot, wherever.
Now I’m not saying Chris Simon is as bad as “that guy” or that he wants to fight Ruutu in the parking lot. I’m just saying if you’ve played organized hockey, you’ve seen a guy like this who loses his temper a bit too often. Simon’s been lucky that no one has been seriously hurt from his actions, he’s going to run out of luck…or second chances, very soon.
Two days and more than 200 additional responses later, the Islanders’ “What do you want this Holiday Season?” poll results are stll amazing to me. They basically haven’t changed one bit in the last 48 hours. Currently, 34% of the 982 respondents would rather get an autographed jersey or tickets to a game than witness a successful Islanders season. I might be the only person who thinks this is crazy but I can’t help myself, I tend to obsess about unimportant things like this.
DP An All-Star?
In other Islander news, Coach Ted tells Islanders.com that he believes Rick DiPietro should make the all-star team. Always nice when a coach supports a player like that. It’s also smart.
“To be an All-Star is to be valuable to your team,” explained Nolan. “And you look at the importance of Rick. Some times we’ve had trouble scoring goals, but thankfully we have Ricky in net because he can stop a majority of the opportunities against us.”
I think DP does a bit more than stop the majority of the opportunities against the Isles. He’s a freak back there who, save for an occassional over-aggressive misstep, is the team’s rock and clearcut MVP. Still, he’s going to get a lot of competition from Boston’s Tim Thomas, Henrik Lunqvist of the Rangers, and the legend that is Martin Brodeur.
Check out the latest goalie stats here.
One more thing, how about Brendan Witt’s Fu Manchu? Best facial hair of the season. Hands down. Hope he keeps it.
Well it had to happen sooner or later, you didn’t really expect the Isles to sweep all 8 games from the Rangers this season - did you? An outplayed and outhustled Islanders team fell 4-2 to the Rangers last night at the Garden. The Isles lack of offense continues to be an issue with two or fewer goals in 11 straight games now. One of last night’s Islanders goals was actually put in the net by a Ranger player for us, thanks!
The Isles powerplay which had gotten off to a fast start has disappeared - 0/4 in the first period and 1/5 in the game. While the Rangers were 2/5 with the man advantage and outshot the Isles 31-24. The Ranger$ $tar$ decided to showed up for this game with goals from Drury, Gomez, and Jagr.
With Sean “The Pest” Avery out, Ryan Hollweg took up the role of Rangers A-Hole last night threatening to rip the stitches out of Radek Martinek’s face.
Martinek, a non-threatening defenseman, received 15 stitches Wednesday night after being cut by a skate blade during the Islanders’ 3-2 shootout win over Ottawa.
“Give Martinek credit, playing after an injury like that,” Islanders coach Ted Nolan said. “In this game, you have to have some respect. When a guy like Hollweg tries to scratch an open cut on someone’s face, that’s not professional. It’s not a classy thing to do.”
“He said he is going to take my stitches out. I think that was stupid,” said Martinek, a 5-foot-11, 200-pound defenseman.
Martinek added that no damage was done, but said he had never seen a player act in such a way.
“No, no. Never, never,” he said. “I think he could show a little bit of respect, but he didn’t. I cannot respect him.”
Stay classy NYR, stay classy. After 4 games in the first two months of the season, these teams won’t see each other again until March.
Isles head down to Atlanta Saturday night. I’ll be in VT snowboarding, hopefully Tommy can hook you guys up with a recap Sunday morning. Let it snow!!
Here’s what some of the players and coaches had to say following last night’s 3-2 Islander loss in OT at the hands of the Dallas Stars. Isles did a great job making sure they left the Coliseum with a point after it looked like the Stars would get the regulation victory.
“I don’t sense any frustration on the team yet,” Miro Satan told Newsday. “Our record is fine, and there’s enough experience and grit on this team to go through that.”
“The puck goes to one of the most skilled guys in the history of the game,” Coach Ted Nolan said to Newsday regarding Mike Modano’s game-winner. “It’s just one of those things.”
“It was one of those games where maybe we shouldn’t have gotten a point, but we found a way,” Nolan said.
“The thing you love about (Modano) is he’s getting into the battles,” Stars Coach Dave Tippett told the Dallas Morning News. “The winning goal is one in which he beat somebody to get to the space. It was a hard goal. Mo can be a real factor in games when he plays like that.”
“We took the responsibility for everyone to come ready to play in any situation they are put it in,” Modano told the Dallas newspaper. “The positive is we’re winning games, and everybody feels like they’re contributing and playing well collectively.”
“Normally I would just take him out, but I thought I still had a chance,” Stars goalie Marty Turco said to the Associated Press regarding Richard Park and his shorthanded goal. “You win some, you lose some.”
“We fought all game and did a pretty good job staying with our game plan,” Islanders forward Mike Comrie told the AP. “We got a good power-play goal at the end, but it’s disappointing when you give up that point.”
Radiohead, U2, Britney Spears * …Ted Nolan? What’s on YOUR iPod?
* For illustrative purposes only. Not actually on my iPod.
Ted’s Time is a new program hosted by Ted Nolan, in what we believe to be the first weekly video podcast to be hosted by a head coach of a professional sports team.
Ted’s Time gives Coach Nolan a chance to speak directly to the fans, no matter where the team is! He will introduce his favorite highlights and sound bites from the week, and answer your questions, submitted to NewYorkIslanders.com.
Please follow the directions below to subscribe to our podcast for free in iTunes:
1. Open iTunes
2. Go to “Advanced”-> “Subscribe to podcast”
3. Paste the following link into the new window: http://islanders.nhl.com/podcasts/TedTime.xml
You can also just search the iTunes store for “New York Islanders” or “Ted Nolan” and then look under the podcast results. I just watched the newest episode, it’s well produced and pretty slick. Kind of like a “Best Of” for all the IslandersTV coverage they produce with Coach Nolan as your host. I love IslandersTV but don’t check it out or watch it as much as I would like to. I can pretty easily subscribe to this and watch the short episodes (10 mins) on the way to work.
Exactly 20% of the NHL season’s games have been played so far after last night and James Mirtle decided to take a look at the standings and scoring trends so far. There’s still plenty of season to be played, but it’s fun to look at these kind of stats - like the Islanders and Rangers meeting in the first round of the playoffs if they started today.
The team obviously can’t and won’t win every game. What’s important as the season goes on is to keep their momentum, and avoid prolonged slumps like that 6 game losing streak from last season.
Despite only playing 13 games, people are starting to take notice of the Isles’ hot start. Mirtle is ready to alter his betting habits.
Maybe what’s most surprising has been the hot start of teams like the Islanders, Boston, Columbus and Chicago, teams that received zero respect in preseason predictions. (If I had to pick just one reason, it’d be coaching, as all four men have done an amazing job behind the bench with these teams so far. I keep saying not to bet against Ted Nolan and then breaking my own rule, and it’s hard to believe the way that team has played — something that’s been obscured by the fact they’ve played the fewest games in the league. This is a club on pace for more than 110 points.)
Not to skip past the Lightning tonight (and I certainly hope the Islanders don’t either), but NHL.com has a couple of good articles online about birthday boy Al Arbour and his return behind the bench of the Islanders this Saturday night. Al is 75 years old today.
The first article by Evan Weiner, is a look back at Arbour’s career and what his players thought of him.
Back in 1973, Islanders General Manager Bill Torrey persuaded Arbour to take the coaching reigns of a team that had just finished its first NHL season with a 12-60-6 record, which was good for 30 points and the worst record in the League.
The Islanders then drafted Denis Potvin with the top selection in the 1973 draft, and Arbour began the process of nurturing and growing his team, a team that eventually would win four straight Stanley Cups between 1980 and 1983.
Arbour coached 1,499 regular-season Islanders games, but that number just didn’t look right to current Islanders coach Ted Nolan, and he decided to do something about it. Nolan felt Arbour should have a nice round number, like 1,500, so Arbour, who celebrates his 75th birthday Nov. 1, will sign a two-day contract on Nov. 2 and coach on Nov. 3 against Sidney Crosby and the Penguins.
Arbour coached 1,038 Islanders games between 1973 and 1986, when he retired; he returned, replacing Terry Simpson 27 games into the 1987-88 season, and finished up in 1994. His teams won 739 games, made 15 playoff appearances and won four Stanley Cups. He was elected to the Hockey Hall of Fame as a builder in 1996. Arbour also was a member of four Stanley Cup teams and was the last player to wear glasses during a game. It seems that Arbour could not get contact lens in his eyes, so he opted to wear glasses, which led to his nickname, “Radar.”
There is a question, though, surrounding Arbour’s return. Number 739, the number of wins in his Islanders career, is retired and hangs from the Nassau Coliseum rafters. Should the Islanders beat Pittsburgh Saturday night, will the team have to “unretire” the number 739 and replace it with 740?
Guess that question will have to be answered after Arbour Day is complete.
If Al wins on Saturday, he gets a new banner…it’s that simple. You can’t leave the 739 up there when the man has 740 wins.
The second article is by Dan Rosen and deals more with the current Al Arbour - what’s he been up to since leaving coaching and what it took to make Saturday night happen.
Al Arbour, who coached the New York Islanders to four consecutive Stanley Cups in the early 1980s, will step behind the bench again this Saturday to coach his 1,500th NHL game.
Al Arbour’s routine has changed quite a bit in his golden years.
No longer does the Hall of Fame coach stay up late at night wondering about line combinations or defensive pairings. He isn’t concerned with starting Chico Resch or Billy Smith. He never has to worry about traffic on the Long Island Expressway.
These days, the former New York Islanders’ legendary coach watches a period, maybe a period and a half of hockey via Direct TV from his home in western Florida before his eyes close for the night.
“I haven’t coached a game in 15 years,” Arbour said. “I haven’t seen a game in person in three years.”
Come Saturday night, all of that changes.
So Arbour and his famous glasses will return Saturday night, but since he doesn’t watch all that much hockey anymore he’s spent the last week and a half getting himself acclimated with the Islanders and Penguins.
Nolan said they sent game notes and game films to Arbour at his home just outside of Sarasota, Fla. last week. Arbour is expected at Islanders practice Friday, and the morning skate on Saturday morning.
He’s still not sure what his duties will be on game night.
“If I’m in charge, they’re in trouble,” Arbour said.
Not so, according to Nolan, who plans to stand next to Arbour on the bench and utilize this incredible resource of hockey knowledge.
Here’s the rest of my notes from last night’s game after the Islanders got hit by a bus named the Hurricanes…
- Park had a penalty shot in the 3rd period and was stopped by Grahame. I checked NHL.com but it wasn’t in the video highlights package, nor was it even mentioned in the game recap.
- Isles outshot Carolina 17-7 in the 3rd and actually ended up outshooting them in the game 31-26. They crashed the net hard in the third with lots of shots but couldn’t beat Grahame until Sillinger’s PP goal with just 5 seconds left.
- Isles were 2/5 on the PP but 2/6 on the PK.
- Got enough iron in your diet? The Isles had at least 4 posts last night, including 2 by Satan.
- Attendance was a little over 13,000.
- I called the hat-trick last night…it was just for the wrong team (Brind’Amour).
- DP, Sillinger, and Guerin spoke with the media and bloggers after the game. DP wasn’t too happy and spoke about not making excuses about the time off. Sillinger said the Hurricanes were just hungrier and were beating the Isles to the puck. Guerin said mental mistakes got the team in a hole and then they were trying to do too much.
- After that was Coach Nolan’s press conference, he didn’t want to blame DP and reminded everyone of all the nights he keeps the team in the game. With the Isles facing another 4 days off, the big question is how they prevent this from happening again on Thursday - Nolan said the team needs to compensate and make their own energy during practice to be ready.
Thanks to the Islanders organization for the Blog Box invite. It was a bad game last night, but great experience - an experience I should add, that is already evolving just like the Islanders said it would. The Blog Box concept is a work in progress and already some changes have been made. On opening night the bloggers got to ask questions of just one Islander player brought in to speak with the bloggers separately, but now the bloggers are being treated like the regular press and have access to the same Islanders players that they do. We are told to allow the regular press to ask their questions first, but are free to ask our own questions after that. Being my first time, I was just hiding in the back trying to stay out of the way and take notes but the other bloggers are right in the middle of the action with their voice recorders and don’t hesitate to ask questions. I’ll be sure to post a bunch of their links from last night later today. Also, Islanders jerseys are apparently no longer welcome in the locker room as I was asked to remove mine before entering the locker room with the press and bloggers. I was wearing a Jets shirt underneath…which was probably more embarrassing than the Islanders jersey. I’ll be sure to break out a collared shirt for Coach Arbour next Saturday.
Also a quick shout out of thanks to my fellow bloggers who welcomed me in the box. I have spoken to some via email before but it was still nice to meet the people behind the blogs I read.
So what’s the difference between the bloggers and the press at Islanders games? As a blogger, I have the luxury of coming home and playing Xbox after a crummy game like that and waiting until the morning to write about it. Blogging…FTW!!
Low-lights Highlights from NHL.com
After the July 1st Hempstead Turnpike traffic jam of Islanders leaving town, GM Garth Snow had his work cut out for him to fill in the holes in the Isles’ lineup. This was done via a combination of free agent signings and re-evaluating the talent the Islanders had in the minors at Bridgeport. If you thought Coach Ted Nolan’s job was tough last year, wait until you see this year with a large percentage of the lineup having little experience playing together. If there are two things we learned last year they are, 1) DP needs to stay in the $%@@! net and avoid collisions in March, and 2) Coach Nolan excels at getting the most out of his players.
Here’s a look at some training camp articles from NY Islander beat writer Greg Logan:
Arguably the Islanders’ biggest off-season signing, new first line center Mike Comrie.
The Islanders’ new No. 1 center made his first appearance in a training camp scrimmage today, and he couldn’t have been more impressive. Mike Comrie showed off his quick hands by scoring a hat trick to lead Team Gillies to a 4-2 victory over Team Bossy in regulation time before a shootout narrowed the final margin to 4-3.
The one thing I’m really impressed with is his leadership. Even in practice [on Friday when Comrie’s team didn’t scrimmage], he was taking control, asking questions and skating. He doesn’t go through the motions and wait until the season starts. We talked about it before coming here, and he wanted to be the go-to guy. He wanted to be the man. Early indications are that he’s demonstrating it with his actions.”
Young speedster Jeff Tambellini
Jeff Tambellini’s reward for a terrific training camp performance last season was an opening night start with the Islanders and then a one-way trip to Bridgeport because of a two-way contract that permits him to be sent to the minors without clearing waivers. But this season, Tambellini said yesterday, “is a different mind-set.”
Said Tambellini: “This is the year I can step up and show these guys I can play full-time in the league and be an impact guy.”
Last year, Tambellini was one of the spare forwards trying to make an impression. This camp, he’s playing left wing on the second line with center Josef Vasicek and right wing Miro Satan. Matched against the top line of Mike Comrie, Bill Guerin and Ruslan Fedotenko in yesterday’s scrimmage, the second line produced three goals, two by Tambellini and one by Satan, in a 4-3 win in regulation time.
Radek Martinek, an up and coming defender who’s season was cut short by an injury last year.
Martinek’s season ended Feb. 3 in Montreal when a bad landing after a collision left him with a fractured left leg. The Islanders missed him dearly, especially in their playoff loss to Buffalo. Teamed with free-agent signee Aaron Johnson, Martinek was a steadying presence for an Islanders team in a defensive mode against a veteran Canadiens lineup.
“Martinek looked really good, and Johnson continues to impress,” Islanders coach Ted Nolan said. “Marty was a big loss last season. He was in our top pairing with Brendan Witt, and losing him was a big blow. Watching him here tonight, I thought time’s a great healer.”
6 foot 6 inch defensive monster free agent Andy Sutton.
Early in the first period, Sutton dropped Kyle Chipchura with a crushing blast against the boards, and midway through the third period he smeared Duncan Milroy into the glass. After the game, coach Ted Nolan praised Sutton and Brendan Witt for their “nasty” play in front of the net, saying, “If anybody wants to come in that territory, they’ll have to pay the price to get in there. That’s what we got them for.”
Witt became a mainstay last season, but signing Sutton to a three-year, $9-million deal in the offseason was vital for the Islanders after losing Tom Poti and Sean Hill, who provided major minutes and experience on the blue line. The courtship of Sutton was prolonged, but the Isles finally got their man five weeks after the free-agent market opened.
“We had plenty of offers,” Sutton said of the signing process. “I was really holding out to get things right with the Islanders . . . This is a team on the up-and-up and making a lot of changes for the good. I really liked where the organization was going. It was a no-brainer for me.”
And finally, a young Islander who ended up playing in Finland last year due to a contract dispute, Sean Bergenheim returns to the Islanders this year.
Given his high-energy aggression, Bergenheim should fit the mold of a Nolan player. “I know I can play much better than I’ve played so far,” Bergenheim said before turning in an energized effort in a 3-2 overtime loss to the Canadiens Saturday in Montreal. “It’s a little bit of an adjustment for me to get back to the North American style. My style actually suits playing here.
“I don’t consider myself only being a checking line guy. Skating is my strong point, but I also want to be a smart player, not just a guy who runs around. I want to do some damage, scoring goals and playing a smart, two-way game.”
For now, Bergenheim is trying to make the adjustment to the smaller rinks and quicker reaction time required in the NHL, as well as to Nolan’s system. If he has to pay his dues a little longer to win a larger role, Bergenheim is prepared to do it.
“It’s up to the coach, and for me, I accept everything I get,” Bergenheim said. “Whatever Teddy wants me to do, I will do. But certainly, I believe that if I play well, I can earn a higher spot on the team. It’s all up to me.”
