– The Memorial Cup, for those of you who don’t follow CHL hockey is when the host team of the tournament and the championship winners of the WHL, OHL, and QMJHL compete to be named the best team in the Canadian Hockey League. The Memorial Cup has a new location each year, generally rotating amongst the three leagues. Recent winners of the Memorial Cup are the Windsor Spitfires (2009, 2010), the Saint John SeaDogs (2011), and the Shawinigan Cataractes (2012).

The host team of the Memorial Cup automatically gets a bye to the tournament regardless of how they finish in their respective CHL divisional league. This year, the Saskatoon Blades are the hosts this year. They have also started their season 2-6-0-0. Although it’s still very early in the season, with the way they are playing they are going to be the laughing-stock of the Memorial Cup tournament. A stat that was brought to my attention earlier shows that at their current pace, they are likely to only score on 6% of their total shots. This stat is actually kind of high considering how often they actually shoot the puck on the net (they only managed one shot, ONE, in the third period of their game last night against the Portland Winterhawks).

For the sake of their players confidence, let’s hope their general manager can conjure up some decent trades (preferably not taking notes from Peterborough Petes former GM, Dave Reid, but that’s a completely different story). Perhaps Lorne Molleken should consider trading defenseman Duncan Siemens, the team’s captain last season before he was stripped of the title and given to new comer, Brendan Walker. Walker was also given permission to name his alternate captains, leaving Siemens out of the mix. There is no doubt that Siemens is the Blades’ best defenseman but he isn’t playing to his potential on a team that he probably doesn’t want anything to do with.

In short, they need to do something. Fast. Either get their team dynamic together or trade some guys. Which ever they chose, it needs to happen sooner rather than later.

– This might be an unpopular opinion but I don’t think cheerleaders belong in hockey! I get ice girls, they normally wear tasteful clothing and shovel the snow between whistles. But having teenage girls/young women prancing up and down the aisles in tight and often very little clothing between whistles is not a part of hockey! At least in my experience they’re nothing but a huge disruption to fans trying to watch a hockey game.

Recently I attended a OHL game between the Ottawa 67′s and the Niagara IceDogs. The game was pretty good. The older, more experienced IceDogs completely walked all over the young 67′s during the last 20 minutes but overall it wasn’t all the bad. I was thoroughly enjoying myself until the first stoppage of play. That’s when a group of about 10 teenage girls came skipping down the aisle in Lululemon Athletica clothing, holding pom-poms and began shaking their behinds trying to get fans to start chanting ” Let’s Go 67′s”. I remember looking over at my friend who accompanied me to the game, even though she isn’t that big of a hockey fan, and giving an unamused look.

I don’t think that hockey is a sport that needs cheerleaders to make it more exciting, regardless if it’s a junior or a pro game. If you go to a local high school sports match, you won’t see the cheerleaders cheering at hockey games, they only “perform” at football and basketball games. Hockey is a sport that is so entertaining you need to go looking for some extra entertainment. Sometimes when the whistle blows, you’re relieved because your team just iced the puck when they were getting lazy in the defensive zone. During those rare moments to recover, you don’t necessarily want someone trying to get you to stand up and dance with them.

I also don’t like the reputation they give female hockey fans. We already have the reputation for being “puck bunnies”. I consistently have to tell male hockey fans that I love the sport for more than just the attractiveness of some players. Although I acknowledge that Jonathan Toews is an attractive human being, he isn’t the reason why I like the Chicago Blackhawks. It is always astonishing to the guys that I’m talking hockey with when I know more about their favourite team and their players than they do. But the fact that organizations hire girls to shake their bums and wear skimpy clothing at their games makes all female fans look like all we do is fangirl over the players.

At the game I was at my friend and I were so kindly joined by a 67′s cheerleader who wasn’t allowed to perform that night because she missed a practice. She spent the entire third period commenting on how sexy all of the 67′s players are and how they all want to “get with her”. Thank god the IceDogs were playing their game because if not, I probably would have slapped the girl. You can only listen to a girl talk about how much she wants to add the 67′s players to her kill count for so long. Even at NHL games it is inappropriate. Not all NHL teams have cheerleaders but the ones that do have girls doing suggestive moves in front of young fans.

All in all, cheer leaders need to go. They make the female hockey fans who actually know what’s going on in a game look like they are only there to scope out a new hookup.

– The Edmonton Oil Kings have started their WHL season fairly well after winning the Ed Chynoweth trophy last season (WHL Championship) and having a very disappointing showing at the Memorial Cup. Their goalie, Laurent Brossoit, is playing spectacularly despite having a team in front of him who don’t look like they have necessarily clicked yet. So far, in 8 games, they have won 5 games and scored 29 goals thus far. They seem to be decent but you can only wonder how good they’ll be when they find their chemistry. Right now. it looks like their main competition for another WHL championship will be Prince Albert; a team that most WHL fans didn’t expect to be playing as well as they are. But it’s still early in the season, anything can happen.

The Oil Kings have recently suffered a few injuries early in the season, which could be one of the reasons they haven’t been able to really mesh as a team. Stephane Legault recently suffered a broken foot, taking him out of the Oil Kings roster 4-6 weeks, Keegan Lowe suffered a foot injury was out for a few games as well. Then their biggest blow came when Martin Gernat got injured at the beginning of the team’s training camp in September. Gernat returned back to the Czech Republic  and had surgery. However, all of his medical files from the surgery are in Slovakian so the Oil Kings medical staff is unable to understand them. It has been reported that he would be returning back to Edmonton for rehabilitation and once he has been cleared, to play.

The most surprising news of the Oil Kings season thus far is the fact that they had their two worst games of the young season while Keegan Lowe was sidelined with injury. It is common knowledge that Lowe likes to take stupid minor penalties and can sometimes be more of a liability than an asset to a team with so much fire-power  but he logs big minutes playing with captain Griffin Reinhart as the teams top defensive pairing. I’m sure the Oil Kings are happy to have him back. Last nights 4-2 win over Hunter Shinkaruk and the Medicine Hat Tigers proved that, despite Keegan taking 3 minors (tripping, cross checking, and roughing).

– The Peterborough Petes have (finally) fired General Manager Dave Reid. Reid made two questionable trades last season that the Petes evidently lost. Although it is thought that there were other reasons as to why Matt Puempel was traded for basically nothing. Regardless he is playing much better with his new team than he did in Peterborough.

Teams that have just had a member of their personnel fired either play their next game horribly or they’re fantastic. Unfortunately for the Niagara IceDogs, they played great. I still think that there is more work to be done when it comes to getting the players to buy into head coach Mike Pelino’s system since they have only won 2 games, officially putting the 67′s at the bottom of the OHL standings.

– Hockey fans who use social media outlets such as Twitter, Facebook, and the popular blogging site, Tumblr, have made their opinion on the lockout very clear. THEY DON’T LIKE IT! But 1) tweeting #nolockout isn’t going to do anything, Gary Bettman already thinks the fans are idiots and 2) signing an online petition to end the lockout isn’t going to do anything either. Do you really think that the NHL and NHLPA care about an online petition? No, they don’t. There is a lockout, accept that both sides are being incredibly greedy and move on with your lives.

The only thing that really annoys me is that fans are saying that they miss hockey *so much*! However, if you’re a true fan of the sport, you could easily find hockey to watch. No, I’m not saying get up at 5:00am to watch the KHL or the SEL. There is CHL hockey, USHL hockey, and even supporting your local Junior A teams. If you really care about the prospects of your favourite NHL teams, you could even support their AHL affliates or their ECHL affliates. There is plenty of hockey to be watched, but you need to be creative about who you are going to watch if your favourite pros are not playing at convenient times.

I know that it’s tumblr and most it’s users are attention seeking adolescents but saying that you can afford to go to LOTS of NHL games but the CHL is too expensive to watch live is completely idiotic. The only way that I will accept this statement is if you live in a city that is nowhere near a Canadian Hockey League team. But when you flaunt that you are from a major Canadian city, you sound stupid. I go to CHL games for 20$ a ticket. My NHL tickets are about triple that amount so I’d like to know where you get your NHL tickets if it’s too expensive to go to see a CHL team…

– Nathan Mackinnon is unreal. Despite all of his comparisons to Sidney Crosby and rather creepy similar history, he is certainly shaping up to being the next big thing to hit the hockey world.

Hockey Canada normally only chooses 1 draft prospect per year to be on their World Junior team. As much as I love Hunter Shinkaruk, I think if they are going to choose one, it should be Nathan Mackinnon. Imagine him on a line with Jonathan Huberdeau and  Ty Rattie.

*And that was my rant on the hockey topics that have either annoyed, confused or just simply made me think over the past few days/weeks/whatever. I’m sure there will be plenty more of these rants coming mainly because I’m pissed off that I can’t watch NHL hockey.

Ps: A good way to get your mind off of the fact that the NHL season would have started tonight is by either tuning into one of the 4 OHL games tonight (if you live in Ontario/somewhere that gets the OHL action pack) or cry out your feelings while watching the newest episode of Greys Anatomy.

Some interesting results around the league on Thursday Night:

Sudbury got back on track, going into Peterborough and coming away with a 4-1 win.

• The Petes are in bad shape. Slater Koekkoek is not happy: “I’m not sure what’s going to happen in the future here, with regards to what’s going to happen with this team or certain players. Something has to give here. This is going to be the longest season ever if we continue like this.” There’s more, lots more, from the Petes’ star blueliner in this story by Mike Davies. And be sure to read the comments left by fans. It’s an ugly situation.
• Mike Pelino also spouted off to the press last night, post-game: “To me it isn’t any different than a guy that has an addiction problem. If he wants to make changes, he has to admit that he has a problem,” explains Pelino. Good grief. Read more here.

Elsewhere, Brampton handed Kingston their first loss of the season, a 4-1 decision at the Powerade Centre.

• Battalion Captain, Barclay Goodrow lead the way with a three point night. Check out the recap from the Brampton Guardian

Looking ahead to tonight, the Erie Otters will open their new (renovated) arena tonight as they host Brampton. Regardless of the result, it’s an exciting time for Otters fans. Nice new rink and a nucleus of young talent, headlined by Connor McDavid.

GM Sherry Bassin is sick of losing and judging by this interview, he’s going to try to bring in some experienced veterans to help mentor this young group.

While I never grew up with any aspirations of working in radio by any means, I must say that co-hosting two online radio shows from July 2008- April 2009 made me give it some serious thought. The first, with which I worked on with Alan Bass, who has since gone on to write a book about the 1967 NHL Expansion and work with The Hockey News, introduced me to the field, and although it was a little stressful, proved to be a rewarding experience. He was a freshman in college at the time, and I was a high school senior. With absolutely nothing on our resumes, we were still able to get some pretty neat guests on what we quickly dubbed NHL 2Day, which made the show more interesting, and allowed us to be a little more daring with our interview requests in the future. While broadcasting on the free sports service YouCastr, we landed analysts Jim Jackson (TV; Flyers), Dave Mishkin (Radio; Lightning), and Kenny Albert (Radio; Rangers), as well as my favorite guest, then-current New York Rangers goaltender Steve Valiquette, and a prospect who is currently playing for the Nashville Predators, Colin Wilson. After I left the show in November because of scheduling conflicts, Alan was able to get the legendary Mike “Doc” Emrick, and later, the General Manager of the Columbus Blue Jackets, Scott Howson. Within weeks after leaving, though, I started up another show, called Rinkside!, with a fellow senior at my high school, Brett Bodner, who is now a journalism major and my assistant editor over at The Proprietary Times in Perth Amboy.

Both of us going to school together (and knowing each other since kindergarten) made broadcasting much easier, as we could be in the same room to do it, as opposed to talking through Skype, which sometimes made for choppy dialogue, especially if the internet connection was slow. He was a Devils fan, and of course, me for the Rangers, and that did nothing but make our conversations and rants all the more intense. When we first started, I did not know if we would go for the same types of guests that we had on the other show, but after a few episodes, we sent out some requests and were very pleased with the results. Our first guest would be Keith Jones (TV; Flyers) who does nationally televised games on NBC now, and later, Dave Strader (TV; Coyotes), Joe Beninati (TV: Capitals), Jamie Baker (Radio; Sharks), Dan Terhaar (TV; Wild), and Joe Bowen (TV; Maple Leafs). But our biggest guests came a little bit later, with then-New York Rangers assistant coach Mike Pelino, who actually spoke with us on the afternoon of a game-day, and the “Hockey Maven”, Stan Fischler, where admittedly, not everything went according to plan. Brett recounts, “l’ll never forget our interview with Fischler when he called Greg out for saying the wrong name of the Ottawa newspaper we were quoting, and for being extremely grumpy the entire time, but it was one of the great memories we had from the show and I’ll never forget it.” While the experience with Fischler was a tad intimidating, we were both very surprised by Pelino’s cordiality; the same could be said for most of our guests, who took time out of their busy schedules to talk to a couple of high schoolers, and did it happily.

The overall experience was very exciting for the both of us, as many of our friends would listen in to the weekly show. It was always fun going to school the next day and hear people talking and asking about the show, especially when we were playing hockey in gym class, and the school’s big-shot football coach was even listening in to a few episodes. We had many different segments, which we mixed up every week, including a hockey themed version of “Carnac the Magnificent”, “Strange News” where we would find something really weird that happened in the NHL that week and talk about it, “Bod Burns” where Brett ranted angrily for five minutes on a certain topic, and the best segment as voted on by our listeners, “Remember Him?”, where we would rant about or make fun of some obscure hockey player that was no longer in the league, who might have been touted to be something special before he bombed out. One time, we even got off on a tangent about McDonalds’ filet-o-fish sandwiches and how nasty they were; sure enough, the next week, we ate two live on the air.

You can then understand why it was such a saddening shock when we were informed by the network that they would be ceasing broadcasts of radio shows to focus only on online television broadcasts of high school sports. We were given two weeks notice, if I remember correctly, and while we searched for other options, none were to be found at the time. Our last episode broadcasted on March 28, 2009, and we said our goodbyes before officially making an announcement on our website a few days later in April.

Though our radio show days lasted less than a year, it left all of us with an experience of a lifetime. I remember the day over the summer of 2008 when Alan called me out of the blue and asked, “Hey, you want to do a radio show with me?” and I said yes, not knowing what would become of it. While we had no problems with just talking for an hour or so by ourselves, it was very hard for us to sit still and not want to improve it by bringing in guests who were respected in their field and actually had some credibility. This article was not written to gloat or to brag, but to show that anything is possible if you want to give it a try to set your mind to it. A couple of high school kids talking to NHL players and legendary analysts is proof of that. So, if you are sitting there and have an idea about something you want to do, why not go ahead and do it? There are too many bright people sitting around doing nothing with their lives. You just never know; something small and fun may blow up to be something incredible.

Nigel Dawes scored two goals yesterday, leading the team to a 2-0 victory. On closer examination, however, this may be an indication of a serious problem: Nigel Dawes is a selfish player.

Take a look at his career statistics:

Games: 12

Goals: 3

Assists: 0

Numbers do not lie, and in Dawes’ case, the numbers reveal a selfish puckhog unwilling to pass. And some members of the Rangers’ coaching staff are taking notice.

“Yeah, Dawesy has got to pass the puck more. Look at guys like Shanny and Cally. They’re great goal scorers, but they’ll still dish the puck to their teammates,” said coach Tom Renney, revealing both his displeasure with Dawes and his proclivity for astonishingly predictable nicknames for his players.

The assistants were more blunt. Mike Pelino said that Dawes was “a selfish player.” Perry Pearn claimed that Dawes “is thinking only of statistics. He should help out his teammates.”

Renney suggested that Dawes try to emulate fellow Ranger Brandon Dubinsky. Dubinsky has never scored a goal, preferring to share the puck, as illustrated by his assist.

Selfish teams are rarely successful, and it only takes one bad apple. Look at the numbers. Nigel Dawes is that bad apple.