The Hockey Show: Episode Eighty

The Hockey Show, Canada's only campus-produced hockey radio show, will dive into European hockey tonight as we pull back the Iron Curtain, open up the borders, and get intimate with hockey in an unfamiliar setting. With the Gagarin Cup happening in the KHL, we'll highlight a couple of series that we have an interest in and run down the other series in quick fashion. We'll take a look at and talk about Orebro HK over in Sweden where Jared Aulin was the recipient of an impressive outpouring of support from the Orebro fans. We'll highlight Linkopings in Sweden where the ladies' team brought home some new hardware. More on all of this below.

It hasn't been a highly-publicized thing, but Jared Aulin's mom is battling cancer. Jared, who is a Friend of the Show, is currently playing hockey in Sweden for Orebro HK, making it very difficult to be with his mom in her time of needing her loved ones around to get her through this. The fans in Orebro, who have taken a liking to Jared, heard about his struggles in wanting to be by his mom's side as she battles this disease, and they all became extended family the other night when they showed their support for Mrs. Aulin. How impressive is that? Kudos to the people of Orebro for this outpouring of support. While I don't know her personally, Mrs. Aulin is a heckuva woman based upon how Jared was raised, and she deserves a little support here at home. The Hockey Show wishes nothing but the best in this battle you're facing, Mrs. Aulin, and if there's anything we can do to help, please ask. We'd be happy to help in any way we can.

Staying in Sweden, I was lucky enough to catch the photo on the right on my Twitter feed. That's former Team Canada player and current Linkopings team member Bailey Bram on the right chomping down on her gold medal! In front of 3,449 spectators in Fjällräven Center in Örnsköldsvik, Linkopings won their first Swedish women's hockey championship over MODO! The two teams battled to a draw in regulation time, but MODO was handed a penalty before the horn sounded to give Linkopings a powerplay to start the overtime period. In a bizarre move that seems to be one borne out of desperation, MODO head coach Mikael Nilsson asked for a measurement of Linkopings goaltender Kim Martin's mask during the intermission! The measurement came back as being within guidelines, and MODO was hit for a delay-of-game penalty to put Linkopings on a two-man advantage to start overtime! MODO goalie Valentina Lizana Wallner made a number of key saves, but Bailey Bram got the gold medal-winning goal at 61:06 when she fired home a rebound on the right side to give Linkopings the 3-2 overtime win! Congratulations to Bailey Bram and her Linkopings teammates on their championship!

We'll also look at an interesting report that came out of the IIHF yesterday that looks at the attendance at hockey games in a number of European countries. It was rather interesting to see that SC Bern has the highest average attendance of all European-based teams, and that the Swiss League has the highest as well. SKA St. Petersburg, possibly thanks to the addition of Ilya Kovalchuk, is the team with the third-best attendance, and is the KHL's best team in terms of attendance. The KHL as a whole, though, fell behind the Swedish Elite League to fourth-place in overall average attendance. We'll discuss some of these numbers tonight as we look at all things hockey in Europe!

Finally, we'll enjoy some cake after the show as we celebrate another birthday! Columbus, our loyal and dedicated student of the game of hockey, is turning... 80 43 12 does she still work here?... um, another year older! Happy birthday, Columbus, and we'll have cake tonight!

Join us at 5:30pm CT on 101.5 UMFM if you're in the listening radius, and on the web at the UMFM site if you're listening elsewhere on the planet. Feel free to give us a call on this or any other hockey topic that you'd like to discuss at (204) 269-8636, or feel free to tweet is at @TeebzHBIC and we'll read those tweets on the air! Looking forward to a big show tonight as we bring you a ton of news from across the pond!

PODCAST: MARCH 20, 2014: Episode 80

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!