It would appear that injuries are pilling up on Pacific Division teams to start the season, and it’s a who’s who when it comes to names.
The latest is a lower-body injury for Los Angeles Kings starting goalie Jonathan Quick, who is listed as day-to-day with the ailment.
The injury reportedly happened at practice, and backup Jack Campbell has already been named the starter for Los Angeles’ game on Sunday against the Detroit Red Wings.
Campbell has proven to be a capable replacement, going 2-0-2 with a 2.48 goals-against average and .924 save percentage in four starts last season.
The Kings are already without Dustin Brown, who sustained a broken finger in the preseason and needed surgery to repair it.
The injury bug has taken a chunk out of the San Jose Sharks, too, after Joe Thornton was placed on injured reserve on Sunday after flying home from the team’s Eastern Conference road trip.
Jumbo Joe, 39, is dealing with swelling in his right knee, which was surgically repaired after he tore his ACL and MCL last season. Thornton has had catastrophic injuries to both of his knees now in the past two years. Despite his age, he’s been averaging around 16 minutes a night with the talent-laden Sharks this season.
The Anaheim Ducks received more bad news on Sunday after it was revealed that Ryan Getzlaf is day-to-day lower-body injury after leaving Saturday’s game against the Arizona Coyotes. Getzlaf joins a growing list of walking wounded in Anaheim, with Corey Perry, Patrick Eaves, Ryan Kesler and Ondrej Kase all sidelined.
Despite what seems like some big holes in the Ducks’ lineup, Anaheim is 2-0 to start the season. John Gibson grabbed his first shutout of the campaign in a 1-0 win Saturday.
The Coyotes have been woeful to start the season, having yet to register a goal in their first two games.
Injuries have played a role in that, too, of course.
NBC’s coverage of the 2018-19 NHL season starts with a doubleheader on Wednesday. In the first game, the Washington Capitals host the Boston Bruins at 7:30 p.m. ET. You can watch that game online by clicking here.
For the first time in franchise history, the Capitals will enter the regular season as defending Stanley Cup Champions. It didn’t come easy, but Alex Ovechkin, Nicklas Backstrom, Evgeny Kuznetsov, Braden Holtby and the rest of the team were able to get it done. So how do they respond after a summer of living it up with Lord Stanley? That’s the biggest question.
The Caps should be fine. Will they win the division? It’s possible. Will they repeat as Stanley Cup champs? You never know. All we know for sure, is that the team doesn’t look a whole lot different than it did a year ago. Outside of a few depth additions, Washington is bringing back all the characters that you know and love. Of course, Tom Wilson won’t be among them in the first few games of the season because of a suspension.
Before tonight’s game against the Bruins, the Caps will get to watch their Stanley Cup banner go up to the rafters. That’ll be an exciting and emotional moment for the team and for its fans.
“It is going to be a very exciting moment, a very special moment,” Ovechkin said, per NHL.com. “The atmosphere is going to be unbelievable. The people are going to be happy. Some might even cry. It’s all about the Cup, it’s all about this team and this organization, how we did it. We share it with all the people who live in Washington.”
As for the Bruins, they seem to be flying under the radar in a division that includes the Tampa Bay Lightning and Toronto Maple Leafs. Boston put together a terrific regular season before being bounced by the Lightning in the second round of the 2018 Stanley Cup Playoffs.
On defense, veteran Zdeno Chara and youngster Charlie McAvoy will continue to lead the way for a group that’s relatively underrated. And between the pipes, Tuukka Rask and Jaroslav Halak should provide the Bruins with a strong one-two punch throughout the season.
In the late game, the San Jose Sharks will host the Anaheim Ducks at 10:30 p.m. ET. You can watch that game online by clicking here.
Of all the additions and transactions that were made between the end of the playoffs and start of the regular season, no team made a bigger move than the Sharks, who acquired Erik Karlsson from Ottawa for a less-than-stellar package of players and picks.
Adding Karlsson to a blueline that already includes Brent Burns seems to be unfair. Can you imagine what the what that power play is going to look like? Of course, they’ll have to find a way to get Karlsson to sign a contract extension, but for now they should just enjoy the luxuries they have on that defense. The Sharks will have to find a way to put it all together, but they have so many veterans that they’ll probably be able to make this whole thing work pretty quickly.
“My wife’s been wanting this done for a long time and the guys kind of got on it and all of a sudden the shaver came out, and there it was on the plate,” Thornton said, per the Mercury News. “My 5-year old wasn’t happy this morning. When he woke up, he didn’t want to see dad. I’ve got to make it up to him somehow.”
Instead of playing that physical brand of hockey that they’re used to playing, the Ducks are going to try play quicker.
“We’re trying to put in a new system and different line combinations, and that takes time,” Henrique said, per the Associated Press. “It takes some time to adjust to everything we’re being asked to do, but we’re already seeing flashes of it, for sure. For us, it’s a matter of just trying to get it into our games.”
Ahhhhhhhh hockey season is back, everybody! Enjoy!
The hits keep coming for the Anaheim Ducks, and the headaches are unsettlingly familiar.
Last season, particularly early on, the Ducks were forced to deal with significant injuries, often needing to put far too many AHL-caliber forwards on the ice. Remarkably, the Ducks mostly kept their heads above water thanks to John Gibson and whoever else was able to suit up.
(You know, when Gibson wasn’t injured.)
Well, the Ducks haven’t even played the first of a looming 82-game grind, and it’s already looking like they’re going to need to stitch things together.
About a week ago, word surfaced that veteran winger Corey Perrywould miss five months because of knee surgery. The Ducks announced more bad news today, as speedy winger Ondrej Kase is out indefinitely thanks to a concussion.
Kase, 22, suffered the concussion during the Ducks’ final exhibition game against the Los Angeles Kings on Sept. 29. The team didn’t provide specifics about how Kase was injured, so we’re left to wonder if this violent moment with Drew Doughty might explain it.
Either way, the Ducks are hurting entering the 2018-19 season. Perry and Kase are out, Ryan Kesler‘s entire season is cloudy, and Patrick Eaves is dealing with the sort of health questions that transcend the sport.
Anaheim also still has Nick Ritchie‘s RFA situation unsettled. Yikes.
With Wednesday’s season-opener (airing at 10:30 p.m. ET on NBCSN) nearing, the Ducks’ dire situation may best be seen in projected forward lines. Here are the latest combinations, via Left Wing Lock:
Good grief. Some of those names are so obscure, you’d almost assume they were randomly generated like draft picks in NHL 19’s franchise mode.
Considering the addition of Erik Karlsson, the Sharks stand to make even fully-featured teams look silly at times this season. On paper, this could be an incredibly one-sided matchup to begin the season.
At least the Ducks have experience making things work with such a threadbare roster.
Each day in the month of August we’ll be examining a different NHL team — from looking back at last season to discussing a player under pressure to focusing on a player coming off a breakthrough year to asking questions about the future. Today we look at the Anaheim Ducks.
2017-18
44-25-13, 101 pts. (2nd, Pacific Division; 5th, Western Conference)
Playoffs: Lost 4-0 vs. San Jose Sharks, first round
A fifth straight 100-point season ended with a thud when the Ducks were swept out of the first round by the Sharks. That prompted general manager Bob Murray to say there would be changes before the 2018-19 campaign began, but as we arrive in the final month of summer, these Ducks have a pretty similar look to the Ducks of last season.
The biggest changes for the Ducks when the puck drops in October could be the return of Patrick Eaves and the absence of Ryan Kesler. Eaves missed all but two games last season dealing with post-viral syndrome. Kesler, meanwhile, played only 44 games and all four playoff games while battling through injury. In May, Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman reported that there was a chance the 33-year-old forward would sit out the entire ’18-19 season.
“I’m more confident that Patrick Eaves is going to play for the full season than I am of Ryan Kesler at the moment, although ‘Kes’ says he’s going to be fine,” Murray told season-ticket holders during an event last month via the Orange County Register.
Injuries down the middle early on forced Murray to trade defenseman Sami Vatanen to the New Jersey Devils for Adam Henrique. He would settle in nicely and find chemistry with linemates Nick Ritchie and Ondrej Kase. His addition would help an offense that needed some assistance as veterans Ryan Getzlaf (11 goals) and Corey Perry (49 points) were again among the team’s scoring leaders, but posted some of their lowest numbers of the past few seasons. Meanwhile, Rickard Rakell had another career season (34 goals, 69 points) and continued to show what a bargain ($3,789,444 AAV through 2021-22) he is around the NHL.
Josh Manson (37 points) and Brandon Montour (9 goals) made huge strides on the blue line, aiding Cam Fowler and Hampus Lindholm on the back end. Then there was John Gibson, who put himself into the Vezina Trophy conversation. With four shutouts and a .927 even strength save percentage, the 25-year-old has set himself up for a hefty pay raise should he continue his strong play. He’s set to become a restricted free agent next summer.
Prospect Pool
• Sam Steel, C, 20 – Regina (WHL) – 2016 first-round pick
In 54 games last season captaining the Pats, Steel led the team in scoring with 83 points and finished second with 33 goals. He led Regina to the Memorial Cup Final and would earn MVP honors with 13 points in five games. After being one of the final cuts for Canada’s World Junior Championship team two years ago, he made the roster for this past season’s tournament in Buffalo, scoring four goals and recording nine points in seven games.
The 2018-18 season was an adventurous one for Terry. His college season with Denver was interrupted when he got the opportunity to represent the U.S. at the Pyeongchang Olympic Games. After he returned, he finished his collegiate career before joining the Ducks for two games. Averaging 1.3 points per game in his final two seasons with the Pioneers, Terry will battle for one of the final roster spots on the Ducks in training camp, but he may be better served playing regular minutes in the AHL at first.
Jones spent a third season back in junior in ’17-18 and while production dropped (24 points) after an injury-plagued year, he did curtail his time in the penalty box as he adjusted to a mid-season trade from London. He’ll get another shot to stick with the Ducks roster during training camp
Dominic Moore’s NHL career has allowed to him to play for nine different teams, including two stints with the New York Rangers and Toronto Maple Leafs. He has 897 games under his belt since breaking into the league in 2003-04. His long playing career has also allowed him to share his love of Ping-Pong with many fellow players inside various dressing rooms.
Given his travels around the league, you could probably play a “Six Degrees of Separation” game with Moore. For example: When the 37-year-old was in his first full NHL season in 2005-06, his usual Ping-Pong partner was veteran Michael Nylander. Last season while with the Maple Leafs, the teammate who he found himself playing against on a regular basis was William Nylander, Michael’s son.
“It’s kind of a hilarious turn of events there,” Moore told Pro Hockey Talk this week.
On Aug. 1, he will be hosting the seventh annual Smashfest Ping-Pong tournament featuring around 25 current and former NHL players. (According to Moore, Patrick Eaves, the three-time defending champion, is well enough to participate after missing most of the 2017-18 season with post-viral syndrome.)
In the six years Moore has put on the event, he’s been able to raise $665,000 for concussion and rare cancer research. Smashfest 1, back in 2012, raised $20,000. Now in a few years he’ll hit the $1 million mark, which wasn’t even on the radar when things were getting going.
“Never thought about that, honestly. Obviously we wanted to raise as much as we could every year,” Moore said. “Last year we got up to $165,000. I was really hoping we’d be able to hit $1 million this year — I was a bit maybe ambitious with that. I doubt we’re going to get there, but once we got close it certainly became a goal to try and hit.”
***
Some of the money that’s raised goes toward rare cancer research benefitting the Broad (pronounced Brode) Institute of Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Moore wanted to ensure that the donated funds would make an impact.
“Especially with cancer research, it seems like it’s easy for money to become a drop in the bucket because it takes so much money to do the research,” he said. “And obviously in the cancer space there’s a lot of money that’s put into this research. But for rare cancers, because of the fact that there isn’t a lot of funds behind it, I felt like it was so important to spend our money wisely.”
What the Broad Institute does as part of a special project with Moore is solicit tissue samples from patients around the country suffering from rare forms of cancer. With proprietary technology, they’re able to turn one sample into hundreds and then multiply the tissue for additional testing.
“The premise of it, you’re trying to get tissue directly from patients because what happens with rare cancers is someone will go into a hospital in San Francisco, they have their surgery, that tissue stays in the hospital, they’re the only one on the west coast that has this particular cancer, there’s no money to fund it, nothing gets done with that tissue, but it sits as a commodity in that hospital’s fridge and nothing ever happens with it,” Moore said. “Or maybe they do do some research on it but it’s just an isolated piece of data that has no value.
“So the whole premise of our project with The Broad is that wherever these patients are around the country we get the word out to them that they can and should send their tissue to the Broad Institute. The Broad actually jumped through a bunch of logistical things to try and make this happen so they made a whole kit, and shipping cancer tissue and keeping it alive as you ship it and making it easy for patients to do that, it sounds easy — just ship the tissue — but it’s not.”
The Broad Institute is also making all of its data available to those who want to use it in order to advance the research.
“The open source nature of it too is something that we’re really proud of,” said Moore.
***
The idea for Smashfest originated in 2011 with Moore wanting to use Ping-Pong as a way to raise money and also showcase player personalities. He’s always loved the game, going back to his childhood. Growing up he heard stories about the 1980s Edmonton Oilers competing in intense games that would last until minutes before puck drop. When he reached the NHL, it became a regular activity with his teammates, wherever he went.
“I think it’s just that it’s conducive to you put a table in the middle of the locker room and it’s something fun and competitive that the guys can do,” said Moore, who’s currently an unrestricted free agent and would like to continue playing. “It can help them warm up. It just seems like it fits. I had the idea. This is the perfect thing for a charity event. I loved it, I loved playing. Marty St. Louis and I played a lot in Tampa together. That was around the time I was finally like I’ve got to get off my butt and try and make this happen.”
From the start, Moore wanted Smashfest to be different than a charity golf tournament. He wanted it to be fun, quirky and unique. With help from the NHLPA, gather a bunch of hockey players and fans at a Toronto brewery in the middle of summer for a Ping-Pong tournament. Sounds like the makings of an interesting night, right? He had no idea how it would go over, but from the very first event it was clear there was traction and it would be a success.
“It’s been a labor of love. It’s something that the team that works on it has worked incredibly passionately on and spends a lot of time on,” he said. “For me personally, it’s something I enjoy working on. I do put a lot of time into trying to grow it. We’ve got some great partners and sponsors and friends of the event that all kind of work together to make it what it is.
“That’s what’s allowed it to grow, as well as the unique nature of the event in terms of showcasing the players in a totally fun way. I think that’s just been the recipe that’s made it grow to the way it is and hopefully we can continue that. I’d love to continue to make it bigger and better.”
