Sporting an opinion

You had a feeling his days were numbered when the Ducks traded for Brian Sutherby.

Mark Mowers wasn't here long. He was acquired in the off-season from Boston in exchange for two prospects (Nathan Saunders, Brett Skinner) and will go down in history as having played 17 games in a Duck uniform. (Shame he wasn't around for the teal-and-purple days).

There's a chance he could be back. Word has it he's discussing his options with his family: whether to accept an assignment to Portland or play in Europe. Mentioned in print, Mowers's name was usually preceded by the word "journeyman"; he's played for four teams in seven seasons. It will be interesting to see where the 33-year-old from Decatur, Ga. journeys next.

You might remember that Mowers had a brief tenure centering the Ducks' power-play unit with Perry and Getzlaf. That experiment didn't last long; Mowers didn't register a point on the power play all year. Here's hoping Sutherby fares better on the top line.

More useless info:
• Neither Saunders nor Skinner have played in an NHL game to this point, so it's too early to call the Ducks a clear loser in that trade.
• The trade leaves the Ducks with four active U.S.-born players: George Parros, Todd Marchant, Drew Miller and Mathieu Schneider.
• Do you remember Mark Mowers' only goal this season? Pat yourself on the back if you said the 4-2 loss to St. Louis on Oct. 23.

Posted by J.P. Hoornstra at 9:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Your starting goalies: Jonas Hiller vs. Ilya Bryzgalov. Strange, huh?

Mowers, DiPenta and May are your scratches.
Bryzgalov still hasn't painted his helmet.
A late-arriving crowd for a 1 p.m. game, but I'd put the Honda Center at 80% capacity when the puck drops.

Posted by J.P. Hoornstra at 1:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Todd Bertuzzi and Mathieu Schneider are in the Ducks' active lineup tonight.

Can't wait to see...
a) how many minutes Bert gets;
b) if he looks like 2002-03 Todd Bertuzzi, or first-seven-games-of-2007 Todd Bertuzzi;
c) how the newest Duck Brian Sutherby fits in the first game.

Also, apologies for today's preview capsule in the paper; Mike Smith is in net for the Stars and apparently is the starter indefinitely.

Posted by J.P. Hoornstra at 5:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A woman at the front desk of the rink in Westminster where Scotty began practicing 10 days ago says he hasn't been on the premises since that initial workout. Hmmm.

Meanwhile, Brian Burke staunchly defended his decision to wait for Niedermayer to un-retire. Or retire:

"He’s making 6.75, 7 million a year. He’s walking away right now from – I’m going to yank out a calculator – 6.75 divided by 190 days ... that’s 35 [specifically, $35,526.13] a day. Is that a guy who you can force a decision?"

Burke said he'll wait to make any more trades like Monday's until a) the whole team is healthy and playing together [which could happen Wednesday]; b) Scott Niedermayer knows if he's retired or not.

One other point of discussion during Monday's Brian-Sutherby-turned-Todd-Bertuzz-turned-Scott-Niedermayer conference call: If SN comes back, does he have to wait the NHL-mandated 21-day training period before coming back?

"We’ve asked the league how this works, does Scott Niedermayer owe us 21 days, or is this a shorter period we can agree to? They said, if and when, we could talk about it … My guess is it’s up to us. ... But this is putting the horse way ahead of the cart."

Posted by J.P. Hoornstra at 7:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Who?

And more importantly, three days after getting nothing in return for Ilya Bryzgalov, a second-round draft pick in 2009 is gone in exchange for the fourth-line center on the worst team (statistically) in the NHL?
This was asked in a conference call with GM Brian Burke this afternoon. His explanation:
"Maybe it’s a reflection of the new world. Last year, I gave up a second-round pick for George Parros, that raised some eyebrows."
“We’re playing teams that are playing Ducks hockey against us,” Burke continued. “While imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, it’s also annoying. … You don’t go into a gunfight with a knife.”
Brian Sutherby is a Ducks guy – plenty of size and speed, while sacrificing some scoring touch – and apparently Burke wanted another Duck guy. There will be another roster move only if a young player (Drew Miller or Ryan Carter) sees a significant drop in playing time; the team is now maxed out at 23 active players.

Posted by J.P. Hoornstra at 7:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Phoenix Coyotes claimed Ilya Bryzgalov off waivers this morning. No telling which other team's GMs wanted Bryzgalov, but only the Washington Capitals had a higher waiver priority than the Coyotes. And, for what it's worth, the Caps have allowed two fewer goals this year than the Ducks.

You might recall the Ducks have played Phoenix three times already, and Bryzgalov started two of the games. One was a tough-luck, 1-0 loss at home Oct. 25, one of a couple games the Ducks played without Ryan Getzlaf, Rob Niedermayer, Mathieu Schneider and Bertuzzi. He got pulled from the other start on Nov. 7, when the Coyotes won 6-5 in overtime.

The Ducks and 'Yotes play five more times this year:

Friday, Nov. 23, 1 p.m., Honda Center
Saturday, Jan. 5, 6 p.m., Phoenix
Tuesday, March 11, 7:30 p.m., Phoenix
Saturday, March 22, 7 p.m., Phoenix
Sunday, April 6, 5 p.m, Honda Center – season finale.

Posted by J.P. Hoornstra at 1:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Coyotes get a date with UCLA tomorrow after beating Weber State by 12 points at Pauley Pavilion on Monday night. It's arguably the biggest win in program history. Tomorrow is the biggest game in program history, and luckily for the Cal State community – most notably, the school's PR wing, which gets free advertising it never could have expected – the game will be on ESPN2.

Posted by J.P. Hoornstra at 9:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Randy Carlyle keeps saying he doesn't like shootouts, but I think his players are starting to disagree.

I didn't cover the Ducks last year when, apparently, shootouts weren't their strongsuit. I've only seen them play in three shootouts this season and win two of them. Giguere – supposedly not a shootout goalie, he actually went 4-6 last year in the SO – has looked fine in the two wins.

The Sharks' Evgeni Nabokov, on the other hand, is hands-down not a shootout goaltender. I remember this very clearly watching him when I was in San Jose. Ever notice why the Sharks kept a second high-quality goaltender (Miikka Kiprusoff, Vesa Toskala) on their roster during their playoff runs the last 10 years or so? It's because Nabokov doesn't do shootouts.

But sometimes – rather, always – a team needs a combination of "lucky" factors working in its favor to break out of a slump. McDonald and Getzlaf, not coincidentally the two goal-scorers in regulation, put their shots past Nabokov, and Giguere did very little work to stop the Sharks' Joe Pavelski (a seemingly odd choice) and Jonathan Cheechoo on their shootout attempts.

I'm going to go out on a limb and declare myself in favor of the shootout.

The team practices at 10:30 tomorrow, then has Sunday off.

Emptying out the notebook:
• It took me about 15 minutes before I started paying more attention to the Ducks, and less attention to the Sharks, from up in the press box. That's what growing up in a cloud of Silicon Valley teal will do to you.
• Maxim Kondratiev went unclaimed and cleared waivers on Friday morning. The Ducks gave him permission to discuss his options with his agent. One of those options is a trip to Portland.
• Somehow, 7-8-1 is good enough for first place in the Pacific Division. I'm sure the Ducks will take it. Their 17 points in the standings are 1 better than San Jose and Dallas. If I'm not mistaken, Phoenix is the only team that hasn't seen first place in the division at some point this year.

Posted by J.P. Hoornstra at 10:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Ducks have changed public address announcers.

From a press release Wednesday:

Due to his increased responsibilities and work schedule at KFWB 980 AM, Phil Hulett will no longer be able to serve as the Ducks’ primary public address announcer. Mike Carlucci, who served as Anaheim’s PA announcer from 1994-97, will return to the microphone beginning tonight vs. Phoenix. Phil will continue to be available in a backup PA role, and Anaheim will recognize Phil’s 11 seasons with the Ducks at a future home game.

Posted by J.P. Hoornstra at 11:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

At an ice rink somewhere in Southern California, Scott Niedermayer, Jeff Friesen and Travis Green are skating together, so says the LA Times. Is this the biggest Ducks news of the year?

If I were in the business of rumors, I'd make a big deal about this, but alas I'm in the business of news and – sorry Ducks fans – this isn't big news. Not yet. When Scotty (or Teemu) says "I'm going to come back," that will be news. It hasn't happened yet.

I grew up watching Friesen in San Jose (more on that later) and have a hard time believing he can't find work, what with scoring down so much this year across the NHL. Neither can Anson Carter, apparently. If I see Brian Burke at the game tomorrow, I'll ask if the Ducks ever considered floating either of those guys a line.

Ducks practice this morning was intense. So was head coach Randy Carlyle. But it all seemed trivial when I read this.

As I said before, I grew up a Sharks fan. Tomorrow will be the first time I've covered them since taking over the Ducks beat. Should be ... really, really weird.

Posted by J.P. Hoornstra at 4:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Just when you thought you had the Ducks figured out, a 6-5 overtime loss to the Coyotes at home.

There were actually two shots tonight that I thought for sure would go in (making it a 7-6 game, wouldn't that be something). One was when Phoenix's Mike York got a cross pass in front of an open net in the first period, but completely fanned on the shot. The other was when Todd Marchant hit the post on an open-ice breakaway scoring chance in the second period. Marchant put a move on Alex Auld, the type of move you'd expect a guy to use in a shootout. Except that Marchant used his speed to outskate two Coyotes to the puck, then put the move on. It was pretty. Too bad for the Ducks it didn't go in.

Marchant did get end up getting his first goal of the season earlier in the period.

In addition to the shortcomings of the defense in front of him, Ilya Bryzgalov was reacting a little slow in the eyes of Randy Carlyle: "I didn’t realize that the (Ed) Jovanovski shot (a 2nd-period goal) had gone in off (Steven) Reinprecht’s pants, but I thought the one goal where [Bryzgalov] got his stick caught behind, those things are signs to me. Four goals on 14 shots, 15 shots, somewhere in that area – when you do those things, you’re not thinking about the individual goalie. The way I think about it, I’m thinking about the other 20 guys that can stop the bleeding or provide some sort of a wake-up call to the other guys.

Irony department: The Ducks' five-goal outburst comes the day after this story.

Also:
• Something to keep an eye on: In the locker room between the second and third periods Wednesday, Mathieu Schneider said the team talked about how penalties were become momentum-killers.
• Shane Hnidy met the wall late in the third period, he skated off gingerly, and I didn't see him come back out the rest of the way. My memory of the play was erased by the dramatic conclusion to the game, so I didn't think to ask Carlyle after the game if Hnidy was OK. Will get the update at tomorrow's practice.
• Token Wayne Gretzky quote: "We had a 19-year-old kid get three goals. That's pretty special for him. ... Either you're a natural goal-scorer or you're not. You have to be a little bit lucky to be a goal scorer and Peter (Mueller) is."
• Ducks record: 6-8-3, tied for second in the Pacific Division.

Posted by J.P. Hoornstra at 10:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Emptying out the notebook from today's practice ...

"We know they’re a hockey club that has changed their face. They’ve committed to a youth movement that has provided them energy. Everybody talks about how young they are, yet their defense core hsa been together for going on three years now. They’ve solidified that from a standpoint. They’re a dangerous hockey club, because they can go in and play astifling type of hockey game with their work ethic and with their skill."

Posted by J.P. Hoornstra at 11:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Last Thursday there was a video tribute on the Honda Center bigscreen to Jacques Plante, the legendary goalkeeper of the 1960's and 70's who pioneered the use of a goalie's mask and was the first to roam out of the crease to play pucks. Taking a page from Plante, Dallas 'keeper Marty Turco more than handed it to the Ducks on Monday night.

The Ducks learned the hard way that Turco is one of the best at playing pucks away from his own net. Time after time, they dumped it in toward Turco from the neutral zone, and time after time he made them look bad for doing it.

Ducks coach Randy Carlyle: "Dallas has got a great trapping hockey club that forces turnovers in that area, and any time we put dumps in, Marty Turco had an easy night. As far as when we get pucks, we were dumping the puck and they were all ending up where he had a position to play on it. He’s as good a goalie as there is in the league as far as playing the puck. Those things really played against us. We didn’t seem to find a way … to change that."

Scott Niedermayer echoed the sentiment: "Against him, you've got to be smarter on the chip and the dump, chipping away from him, so you can get with the defensemen. We weren't being smart about that. That's an easy game for them."

Other stuff that didn't make the paper ...
• "The Chip" and "The Dump" were two of my roommates my junior year at UCLA.
• The 5-0 loss is the Ducks' third at home this year ... all shutouts.
• Ducks record: 6-8-2, T-2nd in the struggling Pacific Division.

Posted by J.P. Hoornstra at 10:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Saturday's win over the Phoenix Coyotes (on the road!) was a game the Ducks should have won. Breaking the power-play slump and getting into a bunch of fights were mere bonuses.

When the Ducks lost 1-0 to the Coyotes 10 days ago, it was one of the worst hockey games I'd ever witnessed. Put simply, guys were being asked to score who weren't scorers. As a result, no one scored.

The Ducks' power-play scoring drought reached 22 in the first period Saturday before Mathieu Schneider did was he was asked to do: Score on the power play. The Ducks got four more goals before time was up on the 5-2 win over a team they should beat 5-2. I don't think that anyone expects Schneider to score goals so frequently, and so timely, in every game. But GM Brian Burke seems too smart to hand a 2-year, $11 million contract to someone who won't contribute, so Schneider's immediate production isn't a total surprise. It's got to be a welcome relief.

Anyway, these back-to-back wins are really baby steps back toward the level of respectability the Ducks earned last year, and toward a .500 record. They can get there tonight by beating Dallas, an above-average team that has also beaten the Ducks in recent weeks.

Posted by J.P. Hoornstra at 4:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Ducks recorded their 41st consecutive sellout at Honda Center on Thursday night. But I swear the place was 90 percent full. Entire rows were missing. Maybe they bought their tickets before Halloween and still had a stomachache from eating all of last night's candy.

Seriously, there have been two home games this year – tonight's and October 15 against Detroit – when I thought for sure this mammoth sellout streak would see its terminus. And was definitely a lighter crowd tonight. But alas, Honda Center clearly measures sellouts in paid attendance (as opposed to butts-in-seats), and so the "streak" continues.

Regardless of how many people weren't here, they missed a damn good game. Ducks put together their best power-play performance against the best penalty-killing team in the league (and still came up empty). I saw my first 10-men-at-once fight, and even that was after three separate instances of one-on-one glove-dropping.

And then there was 39-year-old Mathieu Schneider. Broadest smile in the clubhouse after he shot, and made, the first shot he's ever taken in a shootout in his life. But he wouldn't have been there if not for a gutsy call by Randy Carlyle that I loved. Schneider was one of the last people you'd have expected to shoot, and that made it perfect: He could only go out there and have fun, make or miss. If it was a guy like, say, Corey Perry, upon whom so much pressure has been heaped to provide offense, the pressure would have been on. Even Schneider confessed he thought Carlyle was kidding when Carlyle asked him to shoot.

I mentioned this to Carlyle after the game. "No. I wasn't kidding," he said.

Posted by J.P. Hoornstra at 10:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)