James Duthie is joined by TSN Hockey Insiders Chris Johnston, Pierre LeBrun, and Darren Dreger to discuss whether Hockey Canada can expect more help from the NHL for the World Juniors, the Montreal Canadiens goaltending situation, officiating at the Winter Olympics, and more on Insider Trading.
James Duthie: Hockey Canada released its World Junior camp roster on Monday with the annual asterisk that it hopes to get a couple of additions from a couple of NHL teams.
This includes one potentially critical defenceman.
Chris Johnston: That would be [San Jose Sharks defenceman] Sam Dickinson, who is making his first hometown appearance [against the] Toronto Maple Leafs on Thursday night.
Hockey Canada would love to get him and He would be viewed as a massive add for that team.
At this point, what I can tell you is that they haven’t been told ‘no’. So there’s still hope and there’s still a chance.
Although one thing I should point out is that he is playing a lot more for San Jose of late. He’s become a critical part of their team and they’ve been doing winning than early in the season.
From the Sharks’ end of this equation it is a big decision and it’s going to involve the coaching staff in addition to management.
I should also mention as well Berkly Catton of the Seattle Kraken was another player Hockey Canada had targeted and had high hopes for, but he blocked a shot over the weekend with his hand so he’s now out of the mix.
Duthie: Dickinson would be a huge addition. Celebrini is also eligible, but he’s not coming.
In the Atlantic Division, it seems like teams are taking turns having catastrophic runs here. The latest one are the Montreal Canadiens where their goaltending situation has not been good whatsoever.
They called up Jacob Fowler [from AHL Laval], but he’s still a kid who they would rather not have him playing in the NHL. So is a trade possible at some point?
Pierre LeBrun: It is at some point, but it’s not the first option for the Canadiens.
First of all, they want to see how Fowler reacts to this promotion. Lets be fair, if you were to ask the Canadiens before the season they would have told you that a promotion to the NHL would have been in the second half of the season in a perfect world.
What they have right now is not a perfect world. They’re not getting save from Samuel Montembeault, in particular.
So, Fowler gets a run.
No. 2 they hope that Montembeault, who has been a very good goaltender for the last couple of years, finds his game with a bit of a reset. They still have hopes for that.
Between those two things, how Fowler does and how Montembeault rebounds, they hope they can avoid going to the trade market.
But the reality is that if those things fail, yes, they’ll try to go for a goalie upgrade. But it’s been difficult to do in in season, as we’ve seen here over the last couple of years around the league.
Duthie: The most talked about infraction in the NHL the past week, by far, was the hand pass. It seems like in every coach’s scrum they mention they’re upset about it.
Will anything come of this?
Darren Dreger: The situation room applies some criteria in making these rulings by review. The No. 1 question they ask every time something like this occurs, and it is the month of the hand pass, questioning if it is a ‘direction’ or a ‘deflection’.
Judgement is applied in determining if the offensive team gains an advantage if the puck hits the glove.
Now, we’ve seen some contentious scenarios like [Tampa Bay Lightning forward] Brandon Hagel protecting his face, [Florida Panthers winger] Brad Marchand reaching to grab the puck, and [Chicago Blackhawks forward] Colton Dach stopped the a loose puck.
[Dach’s play] was the easiest of the bunch to declare it was a hand pass. It was contentious, no question, and it will be on the agenda when the GMs meet in March.
Duthie: We spent a lot of time talking about the dimensions of the Olympic rink in Milan and whether it will be ready on time. Assuming it is, what about the officials that will skate on it?
Are we talking about NHL officials mostly? International?
LeBrun: It’s going to be a 50/50 combination of IIHF and NHL referees and officials. There will be 13 on each side and 26 in total with six referees on each side.
The interesting things is, the league, kind of under the radar, had a camp for both the IIHF and NHL officials in August in Buffalo. All 26 were in attendance. Not more, not less, “the” 26 that were chosen for the Milan Olympics were at that camp.
The NHL referees, from my understanding, will be Wes McCauley, Gordie Dwyer, Chris Rooney, Brian Pochmara, and Kyle Rehman.
Now, the reason the have not been announced yet is because there have been injuries this year, as we’ve seen with some of the referees. They want wait closer to the Olympics to name them and make them official.
Here’s the most interesting part for me, it’s the officiating standard at the Winter Olympic Games. This is an IIHF tournament, but what our understanding is the NHL and IIHF agreed to referee these games closer to an NHL standard as opposed to IIHF in terms of the penalties called.
We’ll see whether or not that’s realistic.
Dreger: There’s always a higher level of sensitivity when it comes to officiating and even the discipling aspect of these types of events, like the Olympics.
The NHL and IIHF have a joint discipline committee. At the end of the day if it’s a big hit that’s being questioned, like a player that was injured by a big hit and if there’s some scenario where they look at a suspension, George Parros, the head of the NHL Department of Player’s Safety, will have that final call.
Duthie: One of the forever standards in hockey has been that one team always wears white, but we’re seeing some exceptions including this week with the New York Rangers and Blackhawks.
Are we likely to see more of those?
Johnston: If the NHL has their way yes we will. One of the things coming out of the Board of Governors this week was the encouragement from the league to teams to look for opportunities to do this.
As we reported while we were down there in Colorado Springs this week, it’s going happen between the Colorado Avalanche and Montreal Canadiens in January as well as a Stadium Series game between the Boston Bruins and Tampa Bay Lightning.
But the league has left it open to teams where they can both agree if it makes sense and as long as no confusion on the ice in terms of the colours being too similar.
The NHL wants to do it and there’s a good reason for that, the NHL sells far more dark jerseys than it does white ones. So there’s a business aspect to it as well.
