The Hockey Show - Episode 734

The Hockey Show, Canada's only campus-produced radio show that strictly talks hockey, is back with our two usual gunslingers as Sophie is already booked as she tries to take over the world. That leaves our two opinionated hosts to discuss a number of hockey topics from this past week, and they may even chat about something fun as well! What may that be, you ask? Well, you're going to have to find a seat, a radio or internet-connected device, and tune into The Hockey Show at 5:30pm CT!

Tonight, Teebz and Jason will look at what seems to be a "canary in the coalmine" situation when it comes to the Vegas Golden Knights' sellout streak ending. There are lots of reasons for it, but the comments on one blog along with comments collected by the author might surprise you when it comes to why Vegas saw a pile of empty seats last Thursday. Beyond that, our hosts will chat about a coaching being dismissed, the continued misuse of public funds to help billionaires, a significant drop in fans in one market, and something big happening in the Winnipeg market near the end of October! It's going to be a busy show with lots of chatter, so make sure you're ready for the discussion on The Hockey Show at 5:30pm CT on one of 101.5 FM, Channel 718 on MTS TV, or via UMFM.com!

If you live outside Winnipeg and want to listen, we have options! The UMFM website's streaming player works well if you want to listen online. We also recommend Radio Garden if you need an easy-to-use online stream. If you're more of an app person, we recommend you use the TuneIn app found on the App Store or Google Play Store.

If you have questions, you can email all show queries and comments to hockeyshow@umfm.com! Tweet me anytime with questions you may have by hitting me up at @TeebzHBIC on Twitter! I'm here to listen to you, so make your voice heard! And because both Teebz and Jason are on the butterfly app where things are less noisy, you can find Teebz here and Jason here on Bluesky!

Tonight, Teebz and Jason examine a harsh reality, a vacant job, misappropriation of funds, empty seats, a fun event, and much more exclusively on 101.5 UMFM and on the UMFM.com web stream!

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

A Fun Side Quest

I don't normally spend a lot of time pouring over the transaction list in hockey, but I do keep an eye on the ECHL transactions during this time of year to see if any U SPORTS players have been added or released. One name on the list jumped out to me on October 10, and I decided to look into this person because I don't know many men named "Colleen" who play hockey. Might we be seeing the Stingrays with a female goalie?

Before we get into this, let's just remember that an EBUG in the ECHL is a contract that guarantees nothing more than a few days of working in practices. They are vitally important, though, because they fill in when goalies are moving between leagues or when a netminder gets injured. We saw how important the EBUG was to the Fort Wayne Komets back in 2002 as they earned a win with EBUG Joe Franke between the pipes! Clearly, EBUGs serve an important role.

With ECHL teams currently running through training camps and preseason games, EBUGs become important as teams wait for goalies to arrive from AHL clubs or release goalies who may not be ready for ECHL action. There have been a handful signed in the last week as teams sort out their rosters, and the South Carolina Stingrays appeared to need one on Saturday as they tapped into their local Charleston Youth Hockey Association where Colleen Jacoby was working as the association's goalie coach! The Muskegon, Michigan native last played competitive hockey in 2015-16 for the ACHA Division II University of Minnesota-Duluth Bulldogs, but she was on the ice this weekend stopping pucks in an ECHL crease as she broke out the pads and mask for the Stingrays! How cool is that?

It should be noted that Colleen Jacoby wasn't likely looking for an ECHL job as she currently works as an attorney at Tecklenburg, Jenkins & Jacoby. She keeps her skills sharp through coaching and playing adult hockey around Charleston, though, so it's not like the Stingrays were throwing an untrained, unprepared player in the crease. She's still a Red Wings fan in terms of her hockey love, and her goaltending numbers at both Gustavus Adolphus College and the University of Minnesota-Duluth shows she knows how to stop pucks!

Jacoby was splitting goaltending duties over the weekend with Ben Kraws who played with the Idaho Steelheads last season, and it's expected that there will be a goaltender sent to them eventually by the Hershey Bears as they're currently carrying three goaltenders on their roster. Until they do, though, it seems that Colleen Jacoby will be wearing a Stingrays jersey! For how long is the big question.

South Carolina doesn't play a game until Friday when they travel to Jacksonville to meet the Icemen to open the 2026-27 ECHL season. On Saturday, October 17, they'll be back in Charleston for their home opener against the Greenville Swamp Rabbits, and I'll be keeping my eye on the transactions records for the next few days to see if Colleen remains with the club. It's very likely that she'll be released before the team travels on Thursday, but any injury in Hershey or Washington may change those plans. Such is the nature of hockey.

You might be thinking that the Stingrays would be taking it easy on our lawyer-turned-pro-goalie, but it looks like Jacoby is holding her own in camp to the delight of her new teammates and coaches!
It's always awesome to see head coach Jesse Kallechy and the team's starting netminder and Jacoby's goaltending partner Ben Kraws excited about how she's been playing in camp, and that will only extend her stay with the Stingrays. Again, I'm not saying she'll be on the opening night roster or anything, but the fact that she can hang with ECHL shooters shows she has the talents to be in their camp.

I love stories like this and I'm glad that Jacoby's getting her chance to shine. She's a successful lawyer who clearly loves the game, but it seems she's living a dream this week as she's in a professional training camp with the ECHL's South Carolina Stingrays. Even if she is released by the team, she showed she can do the job if needed. Perhaps there's some room on the Stingrays' payroll for an EBUG who is skilled enough to negotiate her own professional hockey contract?

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

***UPDATE: Colleen Jacoby was released as the EBUG with Hershey assigning Garin Bjorklund to South Carolina late on October 12. As a result, Jacoby will not be on the Stingray's official roster for this week's opening games in Jacksonville and against Greenville.***

Just Dumb Scheduling

I know this seems like I'm already breaking my plan of not posting daily, but I did something last night that I haven't done in a while: I watched a hockey game without looking for a story angle. Being that I was switching into fan mode for the first time in a long time, I decided to tap into my roots by watching the Dallas Stars and Pittsburgh Penguins. I grew up a Penguins fan and I still quietly cheer for the team, but last night was where I just wanted to watch Crosby, Malkin, and Letang potentially play together for one final season. Instead, play-by-play announcer Josh Getzoff dropped some peculiar news during the broadcast that left me scratching my head when it comes an oft-heard reason for ticket pricing and playoff format from the NHL's head honchos. And quite honestly, it doesn't make much sense from a fan's point of view.

The NHL has claimed over and over that the reason for not seeding playoff teams from one through eight is due to developing the natural rivalries between teams. By having stornger local rivalries, the NHL believes that more people will buy tickets to see games in-person, thereby justifying the supply-and-demand angle of raising ticket prices, specifically for certain games. After all, a rivalry between two teams generally gets the blood pumping in those fanbases.

In saying that, it left me wondering who was designing the NHL's schedule because Getzoff, during a discussion of Igor Shesterkin's season-ending injury, mentioned that the Penguins will not play the New York Rangers this season until January 29, 2027! How on earth in this age of the NHL do two divisional rivals not see each other in the first three months of the season? Who came up with this idea?

The catch, though, is that it's not just the New York Rangers. The Penguins have a deep-rooted rivalry with their Pennsylvania cousins in the Philadelphia Flyers. The Penguins opened the season by laying a 7-0 beating on the Flyers which will surely amp up the rivalry for this season when the two teams meet again, right? Except that doesn't happen until January 31, 2027 - exactly four months after that season-opening game! Does anyone feel like that 7-0 score, which helps to fuel the rivalry, won't be as fresh in anyone's mind?

The New York Islanders, who share a long and storied rivalry with the Penguins, won't see the Steel City team until January 13, 2027 this season either. And while I get that playoff races are more fun with in-division games later in the season, there's also a chance that one of these four teams will not make the playoffs nor be in a playoff race at the end of the season. I'm not here to speculate on which team(s) that might be, but one team just lost a world-class goaltender for the season and another has only scored seven goals in six games.

If the NHL wants rivalries within divisions to grow, sprinkle in the hatred throughout the season more. I want the bad blood, the hurt pride, and the general dislike to carry over week to week so that when that logo pops up on the calendar, both teams' blood starts to boil. I want the chirping and the face-washing and the slashes across the back of the legs to be a way of life when two divisional rivals meet. I want fanbases that breathe fire towards the other city.

That doesn't happen if teams don't play each other in meaningful games. No players are willing to put life and limb on the line if there's no chance of playing in the postseason. Alternatively, there might be more reason for players to take cheap shots against good players if those players aren't heading towards the postseason because the race already doesn't matter if he gets suspended. That will develop bad blood between teams, but that's not how one fosters a burning rivalry. That's why playoffs SHOULD feature rivalries.

The Penguins will play the Rangers three times between January 29 and April 6, and those games may not matter if they can't find decent goaltending to replace Shesterkin. They'll play the Islanders three times between January 13 and April 1, and those games could potentially be interesting if both the Penguins and Islanders stay healthy. And they'll play the Flyers three times between January 31 and April 3, and those games may not matter if the Flyers continue to struggle to score. That's not how to build rivalries between teams.

I clearly don't understand what goes into scheduling the entire NHL season because rivalries should be built and cultivated with games more often than the last three months of the season. Right now as a Penguins fan, the Rangers and Islanders are just two teams in the division. There isn't a rivalry there because there's nothing between the teams that would foster any sort of dislike other than past games and transgressions. After a summer apart, though, I need something to spark that hate again. Waiting until January isn't that spark.

Like a fire, you have to feed it fuel and stoke it every once in a while to have it burn hot. The NHL, it seems, believes that pouring gasoline onto a fire will make it burn hotter which is true, but only for short periods of time until that fuel is burned. That's the problem with how the NHL is treating these rivalries - it's a long-burning fire that requires fuel and stoking rather than an immediate, flammable fuel source. Unless that flammable fuel source is being used to re-ignite a long-burning fire that already existed, there's nothing there to stoke.

Penguins and Flyers fans will still dislike the other's team. Rangers and Islanders fans will never mix like oil and water. But the rivalry between the Penguins and Islanders won't get better or run deeper without playing one another more often. The same goes for the Rangers and, to some extent, the Flyers, yet the NHL will tell you that these rivalries have never been stronger at any time in history.

It's just not true, though, and their scheduling is part of the problem because I don't hate the Islanders like I did in 1993 when David Volek ended the Penguins' shot at a three-peat. That hatred doesn't exist with Bo Horvat, Matthew Schaefer, or Ilya Sorokin like it did with Volek, Rich Pilon, and Darius Kasparaitis. And squeezing three games into three months won't re-ignite that hatred for the Islanders in me.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

HBIC's New Direction

As we got closer to the number shown in the picture to the left, it's hard to believe that I've written this many articles here on HBIC. I often wonder how I've attracted 22 million hits on this page, but it seems like I've written a few articles that were read by people on this planet and that's not lost on me as I write this final daily entry. I'm one of the few independent bloggers who is still writing on a daily basis, but all good things do come to an end. HBIC will persist, but it will exist in a new format beyond today.

Blocking off free time to commit to writing HBIC was something that I always tried to do, and I'm grateful that people took the time to read the articles I've written to an extent that I cannot say "thank you" enough. I'm not here to do a top-ten list or anything, but I'm proud of the research and collaboration that went into articles like "Where The Shirts Have No Names", "Benny, Mick E., and Icy?", and other articles where good people like Rob Ullman and Fiona Quinn have given me story ideas. Not everything comes from this writer's noggin.

I certainly haven't avoided trouble when it came to what I wrote as I was threatened by a handful of organizations with some sort of legal action for what I wrote, but, thankfully, cooler heads prevailed and the threat of lawsuits remained as threats. The University of Lethbridge was none too pleased about my "Extinction Of The Pronghorns" article nor the "Hiding The Real Message" follow-up article, but they seemed to get over their anger. There were things said during negotations between the Manitoba Bisons and UMFM that ended a partnership in "The Art Of Negotiation?", and The Hockey Show and UMFM were threatened with a lawsuit if we reported about a major incident that happened on campus that we investigated.

Speaking of The Hockey Show, that will continue and I'll still post show previews here on HBIC as we push forward with some fun radio opportunities. Teebz's Book Club will take advantage of having more time when it comes to reading hockey literature, and there are a ton of books that I want to cross off the "To Read" list. More than anything, though, I want to get out to rinks more often and watch hockey. I honestly don't care if it's TimBits hockey or NHL hockey, live hockey is certainly better when one is watching in the arena.

On that note, expect us to have a lot of fun calling games at the Female World Sport School Challenge this November, we'll get out to call a handful of sledge hockey games alongside the great people from Sledge Hockey Manitoba, and we'll work with the Balmoral Hall Blazers to schedule a few broadcasts of their games as well. We're always looking for fun games and events to call, so feel free to reach out if you want UMFM at your event! We'll try to make it happen!

I want to be clear: HBIC isn't going away. There just won't be daily posts any longer. I'll still have a voice on here when it comes to covering big stories, looking at hockey history, and posting fun articles like "Musicians in Jerseys", but I want to use my time more effectively for me. Besides, there are 7000 articles on this site, and I don't know if anyone has read them all. For all the ones you have read, though, thank you. You made the last two decades worth it.

This isn't good-bye as much as it is "see you soon". Whenever that is.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

The Hockey Show - Episode 733

The Hockey Show, Canada's only campus-produced radio show that strictly talks hockey, returns tonight with a full house in the UMFM studios! It's always good to have fun guests join us who have a lot to talk about, and we have that tonight with two guests who are joining us. However, we also will add another voice to the fun as we welcome a young lady who wants a future in broadcasting to sit in with us for this show and, possibly, more in the future. In short, the studio's chairs will all be full tonight as we hit the air, so get ready and take your seat tonight for The Hockey Show at 5:30pm CT!

Tonight, Teebz and Jason and Sophie welcome back two of the people making a difference in Manitoba as Shay and Les from Sledge Hockey Manitoba are back to chat about everything happening on the development side of things! We'll chat with them about summer developments, tournament results from last season, growth of the programs, making new connections, bringing home hardware, and the always-persistent challenges that they face in trying to grow sledge hockey enrolment and participation in Manitoba! It should be another very interesting show with lots of news from two of Sledge Hockey Manitoba's most important people in Shay and Les, so we'll get into everything happening on the sledge hockey scene tonight on The Hockey Show at 5:30pm CT on one of 101.5 FM, Channel 718 on MTS TV, or via UMFM.com!

If you live outside Winnipeg and want to listen, we have options! The UMFM website's streaming player works well if you want to listen online. We also recommend Radio Garden if you need an easy-to-use online stream. If you're more of an app person, we recommend you use the TuneIn app found on the App Store or Google Play Store.

If you have questions, you can email all show queries and comments to hockeyshow@umfm.com! Tweet me anytime with questions you may have by hitting me up at @TeebzHBIC on Twitter! I'm here to listen to you, so make your voice heard! And because both Teebz and Jason are on the butterfly app where things are less noisy, you can find Teebz here and Jason here on Bluesky!

Tonight, Teebz and Jason and Sophie chat with Shay and Les from Sledge Hockey Manitoba about summer fun, growing numbers, winning hardware, having fun, attracting talent, making connections, and much more exclusively on 101.5 UMFM and on the UMFM.com web stream!

PODCAST: October 8, 2026: Episode 733

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!