huzer

I'll follow up to my post now that the season is over. As for billeting, it was an ok experience. Our transportation arrangement fell apart about 2 weeks into the school year, which made for some challenges. In fact, the family that agreed to provide transportation more often asked us for help, so we severed that relationship fairly quickly. My biggest concern coming in was transportation, and that issue presented itself fairly quickly. As far as the player, he ended up not quite being the role model we expected. It turns out he's the talented kid that's been catered to thus far in his hockey career. He was the big fish in a little pond, and here, became just another fish in a big pond. He wasn't used to putting in the effort and earning his coach's trust. As such, it made for a difficult start to the year, to the point where we were expecting him to not return after the Thanksgiving break. He was benched a few times due to attitude issues. So while we had hoped he would be a positive role model and influence for our son, that wasn't the case. There was literally zero extra effort put in other than what the team had scheduled. Overall, he's a good kid, respectful, polite, and about what you'd expect from a 15/16 year old. Will we do it again? With our own son playing competitive hockey at a different association, no, we will not. The transportation became difficult, and my wife and I want to watch my own son, not divide and conquer during the hockey season. As an interesting note, our billet's 15u AAA coach has resigned his position after several years (and being named the 15u coach of the year) to become the 10u (Squirt) director at my son's association. My son will be a second year squirt this upcoming season, and is one of only 2 returning goalies. My wife and I are hoping he gets placed at his correct playing level, rather than a default AA goalie because of need. Last year, my son's team was again fairly strong (28-10-2). Their lowest placement in any tournament was 2nd, including an OT championship game loss, and a championship game shootout loss, and his team finished second in the state.

Apparently, the Hughes brothers have combined into one player. from https://bleacherreport.com/articles/2837972-nhl-draft-combine-2019-dates-schedule-format-and-top-prospects "Top draft prospects Jack Quinn and Kaapo Kakko are expected to attend and participate fully in the combine."

Much like last year with putting Domi at C, the Habs will sign Karlsson and put him on the left side, then draft a crapton of LD and consider the position addressed. Philly seems to have a decent amount of young LD with Provorov, Gostisbehere, Hagg, Morin.

Teasdale with 1g so far in this one. 2-0 after the 1st.

Any less interest in Karlsson now that he has re-aggravated his injury?

Sure, but in this case, I'll take Thompson and Weal over Peca and Chaput.

Is Weal the only righty center on the team?

Good call. I figured Weal/Folin would stay, Benn/Thompson would leave. Salary wise, I never have a clue anyway.

In a surprise to no one, Yzerman GM of the Wings.

Man, that was an entertaining Flames/Avs game!!

I guess if we go off the previous pattern, when Julien gets canned, either Bergevin fills in on on interim basis, or they hire Gainey as coach for a few months before bringing in Carbonneau.

Vigneault hired, McLellan hired, Quenneville hired...what other coaches will get recycled this offseason? I'm guessing Therrien isn't on anyone's radar, at least.

Karlsson only had 2 primary assists last night and led the Sharks in ice time. What an injured bum. I'm a bit surprised at the debate around Karlsson, and the underlying thought that Petry is "good enough" thus the Habs don't need to improve. The fact that we're comparing Petry and Karlsson seems a bit weird to me, never mind Karlsson played 29 fewer games. That's like saying we couldn't use a Taylor Hall because Lehkonon scored as many goals. I guess if the point is not to improve the team, the Habs shouldn't show an interest in him. I don't have any realistic belief that he'd sign here, but to not aggressively pursue would be absurd.

At least the Habs can't fall any further!

I’m not talking about building your team via UFA as the Rangers used to try and do. I’m talking about supplementing your roster vis trade/UFA. Even TB roster is about half homegrown/half acquired. Last years UFA crop wasn’t the greatest after Tavares. There were a few goalies that were out there, but the Habs were pretty content after Niemi was competent as a backup. I’m not concerned that last year the Habs didn’t sign anyone. This year, as of right now, there are a few bigger fish out there than there were last year. My initial points are still valid, being do we trust this regime to develop players (in year 7, take a look at the 12-15 draft years, those picks for the most part, haven’t panned out), do we trust them to make competent trades (year 7, seems to be ok), and do we trust them with UFAs (meh). Contracts seems to be a weak point (Plex extension, Alzner, Desharnais extension). Personnel (held on to Therrien/Lefebvre way too long) also doesn’t seem like a strength either, maybe last summer will tilt that more towards the positive, but it took 6 years. I’m hopeful that the 17/18 drafts turn out better with a new development team in place. After a few years of general failure, I’m not ready to completely say the Habs have righted the ship. They’ve missed in 3 of the last 4 years. The AHL team has missed 7 of 8 years.