Long Overdue

In a move that should surprise no one, Hockey Canada announced today that Canadian national women's team general manager Gina Kingsbury and head coach Troy Ryan will not return to continue their work with the national women's program. I have nothing against Kingsbury or Ryan personally, but it was hard to understand their personnel choices at the Milano-Cortina Olympics and the games leading up to the Olympics. Yes, they still brought home the second-best medal from the event, but it was hard to watch an older, slower team do everything they could to prevent losses rather than earning wins. Clearly, something had to give.

While there's no denying that Canada's veteran players have an immense amount of talent, it was hard watching the younger, faster Americans dismantle the Canadian squad in the Olympic preliminary round. Yes, Canada looked much better in the gold medal game when these two teams met a second time, but result was identical in that the Americans were celebrating and the Canadians were sobbing.

There has been a quiet chorus for years that has demanded that Hockey Canada should start looking at incorporating younger players into international competitions, but the leadership has always resisted that idea. With Canada's core players moving into the sunsets of their careers, it became more prominent with all of the young talent that Team USA was showcasing at each event. No one will deny that Marie-Philip Poulin and Hilary Knight are still big names, but the likes of Taylor Heise, Caroline Harvey, Hannah Bilka, and Laila Edwards stole the show in Italy. Canada had no answer for them.

In comments made today, Kingsbury indicated that it was time for someone else to step in and push Canada higher. She told reporters, "I'm good with the transition. I'm ready for it. It's time for someone to look at the landscape that has shifted in women's hockey and set out their own vision on what that could look like for the future."

Troy Ryan had already indicated in February that he was stepping down from his coaching position with the team, stating, "I think it's time for someone else to run with it and take it to new heights."

With both Kingsbury and Ryan moving on from their posts, this could open the door for a changing of the guard, so to speak, when it comes to Canada's roster. Players like Sarah Fillier, Emma Maltais, Daryl Watts, Jenn Gardiner, Sophie Jacques, Kati Tabin, and Julia Gosling could all play bigger roles moving forward while adding the likes of Nicole Gosling, Sarah Wozniewicz, Rebecca Leslie, Danielle Serdachny, and Raygan Kirk would all continue pushing the youth movement while challenging Canadian veterans for roster spots.

Let's not forget that all of Marie-Philip Poulin (34), Natalie Spooner (35), Brianne Jenner (34), and Jocelyne Larocque (37) are deep into Hall-of-Fame careers already while Laura Stacey (32), Renata Fast (31), Sarah Nurse (31), Erin Ambrose (32), Emerence Maschmeyer (32) and Ann-Renee Desbiens (32) likely only have one more Olympic run in them. When you consider that's nearly half the current roster, we're overdue in bringing in the next wave of players into the mix.

With four more teams being added to the PWHL next season, there will be lots of opportunity to see amazing young women show off their skills over the next few years if they choose to play professionally. Jade Iginla, Sara Manness, Kahlen Lamarche, Jocelyn Amos, Stryker Zablocki, and Chloe Primerano are just a handful of dynamic Canadians playing at the NCAA level, and Hockey Canada would be wise to keep an eye on U SPORTS when it comes to players like Grace Elliott, Courtney Kollman, Jessymaude Drapeau, and Gabrielle Santerre. There's an immense amount of Canadian talent playing across the planet. All Hockey Canada has to do is look for it.

That's the part that I never understood about Kingsbury and Ryan - they never seemed to look beyond the NCAA. Kingsbury had a handful of U SPORTS players in the lineup for the Calgary Inferno every game in the CWHL while Ryan coached the Dalhouse University Tigers women's program. Both of them are very aware that not all the best players play south of the border, but it's almost as if they forgot that some of Canada's best players learned the game here at home.

Who, you ask? Caroline Ouelette spent one year at Concordia University. Charline Labonte, Ann-Sophie Bettez, Catherine Ward, Kim St-Pierre, and Melodie Daoust all skated for McGill University. Brigette Lacquette spent a season with the University of Manitoba. Hayley Wickenheiser, Colleen Sostorics, and Danielle Goyette played with the University of Calgary. Vicky Sunohara and Jayna Hefford played for the University of Toronto. Delaney Collins played with both Concordia and Alberta. And Gina Kingsbury played with eight of these players mentioned above at the 2006 Olympics in Torino, Italy.

I want to be clear that this isn't about Hockey Canada's continued ignorance of U SPORTS, but it is about expanding the talent pool as far as one can when it comes to finding good, effective players. The preceding paragraph were examples of players that were key to Canada's dominance for so long which was a credit to Canada looking under every stone for good players. Canada needs to start doing that again by tapping into the NCAA, U SPORTS, and Europe where good, young, fast players would go through a wall to wear the maple leaf.

A new general manager and a new head coach is a fresh start for the Canadian women's program that was colloquially getting long in the tooth. We can still honour these long-serving women for their contributions, but Hockey Canada has to be forward thinking when it comes to putting the best team on the ice. Leaving younger players at home isn't the way to do that, so here's hoping that changes.

My hope is that we won't see the same dozen names in the running for these two positions as Hockey Canada begins its searches, but there's no denying that changes were long overdue for this program.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

Two Down, Two Up

The four countries shown by their flags to the left will be playing IIHF hockey next season, but the reality is that two countries will be moving down to the Division-1A tournament while two countries will join the top-14 teams playing for the IIHF Men's World Hockey Championship. If you've been following the action, you may already know who is being relegated and promoted, but these four countries are the nations in question. Who's dropping down? Who's going up? Let's find out!

Great Britain came into the IIHF Men's World Hockey Championship as the 17th-ranked nation on the planet. They found themselves in a tough group that featured USA, Finland, Switzerland, Germany, and Latvia, but there was hope that they could qualify for a quarterfinal spot if they caught a few breaks against Austria and Hungary. If they could upset Latvia or Germany, Great Britain would likely not only qualify for the medal round, but they'd jump up in the IIHF rankings as well.

Things quickly changed for Great Britain after they dropped a 5-2 decision to Austria on May 16. A 5-1 loss to the USA, a 5-0 loss to Hungary, and a 4-1 loss to the Swiss put them in jeopardy of battling to stay out of relegation territory, but it didn't get any better in a 4-0 loss to Finland. Tack on a 6-0 loss to Latvia and a 6-3 loss to Germany, and the British went winless in Switzerland as they would be the Group A team who was relegated to the Division-1A tournament.

Defender Nathanael Halbert led the British in scoring with a goal and two assists from the blue line, and goaltender Mat Robson went 0-4-0 with a 4.94 GAA and an .875 save percentage. Veteran Liam Kirk led the way with 19 shots in the tournament, and Halbert had the best seat in the house most often as he served 10 penalty minutes.

Italy began the 2026 IIHF Men's World Hockey Championship as the 20th-ranked nation on the IIHF World Rankings, and they were in Group B with the likes of Canada, Sweden, Czechia, Slovakia, and Denmark. Italy likely was looking at the games against Slovenia and Norway as the ones they had to win if they hoped to avoid relegation. Without any NHL talent on their roster, this had to be a solid team effort from the Italians if they wanted to finish in a quarterfinal berth and remain as part of the top tournament. Otherwise, they'd be in a tough spot.

Canada handed them an expected loss by a 6-0 score on May 16, and Slovakia doubled the number of losses with a 4-1 decision. Italy entered the game on May 19 against Norway looking to reverse those fortunes, but the Norwegians played well in a 4-0 win. That Italian loss was followed by a 3-1 loss to Czechia and a 3-0 loss to Sweden. Needing a win desperately, the Italians gavce Denmark everything they had, but fell short in the shootout by a 3-2 score. A final 5-1 loss to Slovenia resulted in Italy being the Group B team who is relegated to the Division-1A tournament next season that still needs a host.

Forward Tommy Purdeller had two goals and three points while forward Mikael Frycklund had three assists as the co-leader in points for Italy. Goaltender Davide Fadani was the only goalie to earn a point for Italy as he lost in the shootout while fellow netminder Damian Clara was 0-3-0 with a 3.35 GAA and a .921 save percentage. Defender Phil Pietroniro led the team in shots with 21 and forward Tommaso de Luca served three minor penalties to lead Italy in PIMs.

A country familiar with the teams in the top IIHF tournament will make its return as Kazakhstan earned a promotion back to the big dance. The 15th-ranked team in the IIHF rankings faced off against Lithuania, Japan, Poland, Ukraine, and France in the Division-1A tournament held from May 2-8 in Sosnowiec, Poland, and the Kazakhs emerged undefeated as they went 5-0-0 in the event. Two of those wins did come in the shootout, but Kazakhstan earned enough points for promotion to the 2027 IIHF Men's World Hockey Championship in Germany next May!

Kazakhstan's run in Sosnowiec saw them down Lithuania 4-1 on May 2, beat Japan 6-0, knock off Poland 3-2, defeat Ukraine 5-4 in the skills competition, and defeat France in the shootout as well. They scored the most goals in the tournament despite only scoring once on the power-play in eleven attempts, they tied Ukraine with the fewest shorthanded situations with eight, and they took the least amount of penalties with just 16 PIMs in the tournament on eight infractions.

Forward Artur Gatiyatov had a goal and four helpers while forward Arkadiy Shestakov had five helpers to tie for the team lead in scoring. Goaltender Andrey Shutov went 3-0-0 with a 1.30 GAA and a .933 save percentage as the top stopper, forward Vsevolod Logvin led with 17 shots, and defender Dmitri Breus was the goon with four PIMs.

Perhaps the one nation that should be celebrated for being promoted after everything the country has been through is Ukraine. It's hard not to be inspired knowing that this hockey team was able to focus on winning in Sosnowiec, Poland while friends, colleagues, and family are fighting for their lives back home. Ukraine certainly had a bumpier ride in getting to their promotion as the 27th-ranked team in the IIHF rankings went 3-1-1 in their five games, but that got them ten points and promotion from the Division-1A tournament!

Ukraine opened their tournament against the hosts on May 2, and Poland won that game by a 3-2 score. Ukraine would bounce back with a 2-1 win over Lithuania and a 3-2 win over France before dropping a 5-4 shootout decision to Kazakhstan. Ukraine capped off their tournament with a 3-1 win against Japan, and that was the victory needed to earn their promotion! Ukraine scored the second-most goals in the tournament, had a 5-for-17 power-play, and killed seven of eight shorthanded situations. They did commit twelve infractions, but were the second-least penalized team in the event.

Forward Danil Trakht led the tournament in scoring with four goals and four assists while forward Olexi Vorona had six helpers to tie for the lead in the tournament. Goaltender Bohdan Diachenko played every second for Ukraine, going 3-1-1 with a 2.17 GAA and a .923 save percentage. Olexander Peresunko led Ukraine with 15 shots, and both Yevgen Fedyeyev and Artem Hrebenyk sat for four minutes.

Both Kazakhstan and Ukraine will visit Mannheim and Dusseldorf, Germany as part of the 2027 IIHF Men's World Hockey Championship that's scheduled to run from May 14-30. Great Britain and Italy will await an announcement from the IIHF to know where they're headed for the 2027 IIHF Men's Division-1A World Hockey Championship, but it would seem they'll be joined by France, Poland, Lithuania, and the newly-promoted Estonia. Unfortunately for Japan, they'll be relegated to the Division-1B tournament, replacing promoted Estonia.

The quarterfinals for the 2026 IIHF Men's World Hockey Championship will be set after tomorrow's games, and we could see some intriguing matchups if things go as expected. Of course, that's why the games are played and upsets are a possibility, so we'll see who qualifies for the medal round at the IIHF Men's World Hockey Championship!

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

The Rallying Point?

It was opening night for our softball season this evening, and we ended capturing victory for a mini-celebration at the end of the game. As we descended upon the local watering hole, we were treated to another Vegas Golden Knights comeback as they went up 3-0 in their Western Conference Final series against the President's Trophy-winning Colorado Avalanche. No one is saying that Vegas was incapable of this moment, but one of my teammates gave me pause when he said that the NHL's penalties assessed against Vegas following their series win over Anaheim may have led to this outcome. Hear me out on this because there may be some truth here.

For a long time, the Vegas Golden Knights have embraced this villain mentality in the NHL, resulting in an "us versus the world" attitude for the franchise and its fans. While there isn't a lot of hard evidence to back those statements up, it seems to be the adopted persona of Vegas and its fans in these Stanley Cup Playoffs as well. A lot of this is due to being loaded with hockey talent, having cutthroat business practices, and not caring what people say or think about them.

This season seemed to be the exclamation point for that "us versus the world" attitude as they signed Mitch Marner, they signed the radioactive Team Canada goalie, and they fired their former Stanley Cup-winning coach in Bruce Cassidy with eight games to play in the regular season, replacing him with the fiery John Tortorella who, in his own right, has a bit of an "I'll do it my way; everyone else be damned" mentality. The last thing that this team needed was someone giving them something to rally around, and the NHL may have done that with their fine and penalty given to Vegas.

Officially, that loss of a draft pick and large fine won't be recorded in the annals of history as the catalyst for what happened in this series between Vegas and Colorado, but it makes me wonder that, over the last nine days, Vegas programmed that "us versus the world" doctrine into each of the Golden Knights' players. It's almost as if Vegas, with their absolute resolve, said to the NHL, "Since you took our draft pick, we're taking your Stanley Cup. We dare you to try and stop us."

Of course, all of this is just speculation and conjecture. As stated above, there's zero evidence of any of this stuff being true, and it could simply be that the Vegas Golden Knights are playing better hockey than the Colorado Avalanche. Based each game's finish, the Golden Knights are playing better team hockey than the Avalanche, specifically in the third period where they've outscored the Avalanche by a 7-2 mark. That, to me, suggests they want it more.

Moreso than anything else, I've read and heard stories about teams finding something that unites the players into a singular focus as they hunt down sixteen wins in the postseason. For their 2018 run, Vegas used their "cast of misfits" identity and the "Vegas Strong" message as rallying points to push them to the Stanley Cup Final. In 2023, Vegas won the Stanley Cup using the motto "It hurts to win" as a reflection on the sacrifices players put their bodies through during playoff runs.

The Golden Knights really don't have a rivalry with Utah, so there wasn't anything to rally around as Vegas won that series in six games. The same goes for Vegas and Anaheim where there hasn't been a lot of hate between the two, and the Golden Knights sent the Ducks home in six games where, at the conclusion of the series, John Tortorella refused to speak to the media and Vegas made no players available. The NHL responded with a harsh penalty, Vegas's appeal failed, and now it seems like the Golden Knights are laser-focused.

Correlation does not mean causation, though, and these individual events could all be random occurences that look like a sequence of events. I'm not in the Golden Knights' room nor do I have access to any of the meetings the coaches, players, and management have, so we'll have to wait to see if there are any stories about motivating events for the Golden Knights that forced them to rise to the occasion in taking a 3-0 series lead against the NHL's best team.

Choose the saying you like - "let sleeping dogs lie", "don't poke the bear", or "don't kick the hornet's nest" as examples - but the Golden Knights are one win from playing for the Stanley Cup once again. And it doesn't seem like they're playing for second-place this year.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

A Hollow Award

It's human nature to want to celebrate being honoured for achievements. No one will deny an award they're given and it seems like no one ever will stop another from singing one's praises. I should point out that not all honours are made equal as we know that the Oscars and the Razzies are on opposite ends of the entertainment spectrum, so it would serve everyone well to remember that patting one's self on the back for being honoured may not be the best idea. I say this in the wake of the NHL being named as Sports Business Journal's "League of the Year" on Wednesday because as much as they deserve recognition, there are still issues underneath the business layer that need solving.

The NHL has been boasting about record revenues and increased attendance and television numbers every year for some time now, and it seems that the Sports Business Journal is finally recognizing these benchmarks. A lot of that has to do with "a long-awaited return to international competition" and a "strong working relationship with the NHL Players Association," but the "12-year extension of its Canadian media rights agreement with Rogers Communications" was also cited by the publication as a major reason for the honour.

What concerns me is that Sports Business Journal didn't even get the terms of the Rogers' deal correct. Alex Silverman wrote,

The problem is that the value of the entire deal through 2037-38 is $7.7 billion in US funds. With Sports Business Journal reporting that the deal was worth $7.7 billion "annually", they have significantly and carelessly overstated the value of the deal by billions of dollars. The actual deal works out to being approximately $642 million USD annually for the NHL, so the Sports Business Journal overvalued the deal by $7.1 billion annually by their report. Details matter.

With the Sports Business Journal already recognizing the 4 Nations Face-Off as the SBJ Event of the Year last year along with having the Florida Panthers as Sports Team of the Year, the Sports Business Journal recognized the success of the 2026 Milano-Cortina Olympics as the reason for the NHL seeing "its best U.S. viewership in more than a decade". If that's the case, shouldn't the Milano-Cortina Olympics be recognized for its part for these great TV numbers?

In fact, the NHL should get zero credit for any Olympic involvement and the resulting benefits from the Olympics because of how long the NHL refused to participate. It was the NHLPA who demanded Olympic participation in the latest CBA negotiations, not the NHL. Taking credit for something that they were repeatedly criticized for not doing is entirely dishonest, and the Sports Business Journal should be fully aware of these facts. Somehow, they decided to ignore them.

I'll give credit to the NHL for working with the NHLPA more closely to improve relations between the two sides, and both sides deserve equal creit for extending the CBA through to 2030 before it was even close to expiring. However, that work wasn't entirely all the NHL's doing, and the NHLPA deserves as much credit as the NHL for keeping that labour peace. Again, the Sports Business Journal should be aware of this fact, but they seem to only credit the NHL for the CBA peace.

On the surface, the "League of the Year" seemingly didn't do much, so recognizing them for not being stupid doesn't make them smart. It only makes them less stupid. And yet there are other problems facing the NHL for which the Sports Business Journal didn't account.

In celebrating "its best U.S. viewership in more than a decade," the Sports Business Journal didn't speak of all the regional broadcasters who stopped showing games due to financial issues. The FanDuel Sports Network isn't broadcasting the NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs due to filing for bankruptcy, both RDS and TVA Sports will stop French broadcasts in Quebec with TVA Sports' issues going as far back as 2017, Rogers Sportsnet announced increased costs for national and regional broadcasts, and teams such as the Dallas Stars, Vegas Golden Knights, Florida Panthers, and Utah Mammoth have all gone with cheaper over-the-air stations and their own streaming services for regional games. Talk about record TV viewers all you like, but the NHL is failing here with no way to recoup lost regional TV revenues.

Home attendance numbers will likely begin falling as well as ticket prices continue to climb. The Carolina Hurricanes are already priced out of some fans' budgets in these playoffs, the NHL's worst team is raising season ticket prices again, 2026 Stanley Cup Playoff tickets have exploded in price across the league, and some of the most expensive tickets in all of sports went up again this season.

With ticket price increases clearly outpacing the rise in income levels for fans, the NHL as a gate-driven league is on the precipice of seeing less fans come through the turnstiles due to how out of whack their ticket prices are. And I haven't even mentioned merchandise, concenssions, or parking yet. This, more than anything else they're facing, should be the most serious concern for the NHL to address.

The NHL is welcome to celebrate the Sports Business Journal's "League of the Year" award, but it should have been a little more humble in recognizing and giving credit to riding the coattails of some remarkable events and an incredible partner in the NHLPA who, I'd argue, did more to help the NHL than the NHL helped itself. There are still massive problems on the horizon when it comes to TV and ticket prices, so it's not like the NHL radically changed the sporting world in 2025 based on the Sports Business Journal's criteria.

You don't get credit for being smart when you're only less stupid.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

Hammered In The Hammer

The image to the left is supposed to be of Mjölnir, the hammer carried by Norse god Thor. According to Norse legend, Thor, the god of thunder, used Mjölnir to defeat the enemies of Asgard and in ceremonies such as weddings and births. If you're a Marvel fan, you know that the hammer was only wielded by those who were deemed "worthy" as only select Avengers were able to lift the hammer from where it rested. In short, the marketing options would have been endless for a hockey team who wanted to call themselves "Hammers", but it seems these eay wins aren't even in consideration for the city of Hamilton.

With the Islanders and the city of Hamilton coming together for their press conference yesterday to introduce the world to the Hamilton Hammers while promoting this logo to the right, I was left wondering who approved this logo and name and why it needed to be rushed. It's been known for a couple of weeks that "Hammers" was one of the names that the AHL Hamilton franchise had applied to trademark, and I wasn't fond of it then. Seeing this "clipart" logo they introduced yesterday only makes me hate the name more. It's total garbage.

The explanation of the logo is nothing more than marketing rhetoric.

"Rooted in Hamilton's history as a resilient steel town, the team's logo features crossed hammers symbolizing the strength, grit and togetherness of the community, embodying both the city's steel-working heritage and the spirit of the game. The design reflects Hamilton's pride and determination, showcasing the unique character that defines the city, while bold, angular lettering evokes the spirit of Steel Town."

Nothing in that logo above shows any of Hamilton's characteristics or traits regarding the city's background. If it didn't say the word "Hamilton" in the logo, the image could be used for any other city and sport on the planet. Whoever designed this and whoever approved this should be fired immediately because this has to be one of the worst logos in the history sports. And an AHL team will wear it.

Ready for some more marketing garbage? Here's a second serving!

"Subtle hockey puck details on the hammer knobs pay homage to the iconic puck in the New York Islanders logo, linking the sport's identity with the craftsmanship of the tools and nodding to the franchise's origins, including the fisherman logo era. The orange-and-blue color palette is also drawn from the Islanders' classic team colors, reinforcing the connection to the club's history and evolution. The logo was created by the New York Islanders, while the broader brand identity was developed by Canadian creative agency Recess Creative."

If you had told me the knobs on the hammer's handles were pucks, I would have called you a "knob". Those look nothing like pucks, and this verbal diarrhea about linking identity and craftsmanship and the Fisherman logo is the biggest pile of manure I have seen. The only good thing in that entire paragraph was the information about the Islanders creating the logo because now I know exactly who to hate moving forward after unveiling and hyping this train wreck of a logo.

The only positive I see that came with the logo unveiling today is that the team won't have any issues rebranding for its new city after it relocates from Hamilton sometime over the next decade. As much as I dislike teams moving, Hamilton's track record with AHL franchises is terrible, and there's no reason to believe this time will be any better for the AHL in Hamilton as most Hamiltonians cannot name a single player who suited up for the Bridgeport Islanders last season.

Will the Hammers have time to grow on Hamiltonians? Absolutely. After all, the franchise signed a lease agreement to play in the newly-renovated TD Coliseum for a handful of years, so they'll be part of the winter sports scene in Hamilton for a while. Whether or not they succeed will be completely on the New York Islanders because they won't have many fans attending games if they're perennial underachievers. In five years in Bridgeport, the AHL Islanders made the playoffs only twice, bowing out in the first round both times.

What won't grow on me is this calamity of a logo that the Hamilton Hammers will wear. Good luck to the Hammers marketing team in selling the Hammers to The Hammer. It might be "Hammer time" in Hamilton, but selling this team as a winner will be tough as nails.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!