All posts in Sports

Photo courtesy of Rob Ferguson. All rights reserved.

As I watched Steven Tambellini glide across the stage at last night’s NHL Draft Lottery I giggled. Not because anything amusing was going on. But because I knew there was absolutely no way the hockey gods would have predicted the Edmonton Oilers would AGAIN nab a first round pick. Inconceivable at best, the Oilers defied the odds, and stole the first overall from the even lowlier Columbus Bluejackets. To call any organization “lucky” while they simultaneously tank three years (or more) in a row to become lotto eligible is not lost on me. It’s also quite entertaining to watch the worst of the worst in the NHL crack smiles, shake hands, and smile for cameras at an event of this nature — less than 24 hours prior to the best of the best battling each other for the Stanely Cup. Ironic indeed.
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I’ve done a handful of interviews this season. Some really solid, some scarily boring. But every now and again you strike sporting gold. Like this week, when Matt Donovan earned his first NHL callup to the NY Islanders. Matt, of course, is the only born, raised and trained Oklahoman to play in the NHL. It’s a first with many years in the making. After that interview I took a couple of deep breaths. At a hamburger. Enjoyed some unseasonably warm Oklahoma weather, and digested my interview that occurred at Copper & Blue of Matt as well as what this call up really means for the state I call home. Here are those not-so-eloquent ramblings. READ THE FULL C&B INTERVIEW HERE >>>

Interviewing the young defenseman, Matt Donovan, is something that I had planned to do for at least a year now. I’d not done it for several reasons, most of them time related, but nonetheless it just never happened. The Bridgeport Sound changed my mind, as did the sharply tuned Donovan in his rookie season. Like out of nowhere, Matt Donovan became one of the best minor league defenders in the country. He scores, he skates, he passes, he assists — the kid seemingly got good. Unless you followed the pre-professional days of Donovan, this likely surprised you a bit. While hockey fans were seemingly impressed and Isles fans basked in a prospect with great determination, the culmination of what was and is occurring in Matt Donovan’s early pro career is fantastic to behold. But when you understand that this kid came from a hockey community with great tradition, but one where hockey is one of the least likely sports for kids to embrace, the story becomes infintely more interesting.
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Photo courtesy of Dennis Pause. All rights reserved. Visit his Flickr page for some great photos.

The Athletic Tryout contract that exists in the American League is intended to bring in players that might be considered for future play within the organization, and give valuable ice time to those that are guaranteed that same future. It’s a time, typically in postseason play, where young players are given the opportunity to taste the pro ranks. Players that are finished with their junior or college seasons are eligible for these opportunities (with the latter becoming ineligible for return to the collegiate level). It’s a nice setup, but also one that is strangely awkward for teams that have a familiar core for nearly 80 games a season. Yet the clubs take it in stride and every now and again a diamond in the rough is spotted (Hunter Tremblay, who knew?).

The ATO parade has begun for most teams in the American League, but the Barons seem to be jumping into the fray as well. In a tweet discovered by good friend Scott from OilField Hockey, Mike Marcou, a smallish defenseman from the University of Massachusetts has likely signed an ATO with Oklahoma City.

#okcbarons RT @Edzo16: Congrats to my boy and now former teammate @Mikeymarcou22 on signing with OKC Barons in the AHL. #29Teams #UncleRicky

— Scott@OFH (@ScottEOFH) March 27, 2012

Marcou is a Kings Park, New York kid that earned a mini camp tryout with the Islanders this past season. In addition to being a UMass defender, Marcou had a USHL career with the Waterloo Blackhawks where he appears to be a hard working, slowly improving defender, that overcomes a bit of a size issue with tons of heart. Continue reading →

Photo courtesy of Rob Ferguson Photography. All rights reserved.

“The farmer has to be an optimist or he wouldn’t still be a farmer.”
- Will Rogers

The Oklahoma City Barons earned four out of a possible six points this weekend in a three games in three days home stand with the playoffs in full and glorious view. The Barons, for the second straight season, will make the playoffs. They’ll also look to make some history as an Oilers farm team, and quite possibly in a shortened season.

The 2002-2003 Hamilton Bulldogs are the only Oilers affiliated farm team to have nabbed over 100 standings points in the regular season. That team did have the advantage of being dual affiliated with the Habs, and thus featured the talents of some players you may have heard of – Michael Ryder, Tomas Plekanec, Marc Andre Bergeron, Marcel Hossa, Fernando Pisani, Mike Komisarek, Francois Beauchemin, Raffi Torres, and Mike Ribeiro to name a few. That squad eventually would lose in the Finals of the AHL Playoffs but they were a dominate team from beginning to end. Continue reading →

Photo courtesy of Stu Seeger. All rights reserved.

Announced yesterday, the San Antonio Rampage will play host to a preseason game between the Florida Panthers and the Dallas Stars. The game will be played Friday night, September 28th at the AT&T Center in San Antonio. It will be the third time an NHL preseason game has been played in San Antonio, but the first played in the ten year old AT&T Center. Tickets will only be $15.

From the release:

“This is a great opportunity to showcase the NHL talent from our affiliate the Florida Panthers and from Texas’ NHL team, the Dallas Stars,” said Spurs Sports and Entertainment President Rick Pych. “Spurs Sports and Entertainment is dedicated to providing the highest caliber sports and entertainment to the San Antonio community and this NHL game will feature some of the best hockey players in the world. For years the Rampage have been developing talented players right here in San Antonio that have gone on to achieve great success in the NHL. This game will exhibit exactly what the Rampage and the American Hockey League is all about, which is seeing the same players who you once saw in San Antonio and other AHL cities now playing at the highest level on teams like the Panthers and Stars.”

This is fantastic on the part of both the AHL and NHL as well as the two affiliates. Pitting a Texas team against the Rampage affiliate is a double-whammy of excitement for fans. It’s also an interesting wrinkle to the on-going discussion of how AHL and NHL counterparts can work together to promote the game well beyond the boundaries of any particular city.
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Nightly the playoff seeds change. Nightly I get a little precocious in my hopes that the Barons get a good matchup in the first round of the Calder Cup playoffs. Ironically, last season it was the Barons that were clinging to a final playoff spot during the month of March. With the uneven divisions, the Barons narrowly made the postseason, and played as admirably as any 8th/9th seeded team could have hoped to do. But the tables have turned. The Barons are on top and dreaming of whom that 8th seeded team just might be.

Today we look at the Lake Erie Monsters. Affiliated with the Colorado Avalanche they are (pun intended) eerily similar to their parent club. They don’t have dominate scoring on any forward line, but can unleash chunks of offensive erratically. They play a defensive style of hockey as a result, and can muck it up with the best of them. Continue reading →

Arguably the most interesting playoff series of the Western first round would be Abbotsford vs. Oklahoma City in a five game grudge match. Simply put, these teams matchup well at times, but the firepower of the Barons offense is too much to swallow for Heat goaltenders. But even more than the player-by-player matchup is the Heat-Flames and Barons-Oilers affiliations that have deemed this rivalry the “Baby Battle of Alberta”. Although it’s not been a stout competition nor anything resembling a persnikity rivalry, the games are fun to watch. Owning a 9-3-0-0 record against Abbotsford over the last two seasons, there is reason to believe that the Barons might soar through a first rounder with the Heat. Even more cretankerous for the Heat is their inability to dismantle the Barons in Abbotsford. So much so that the Heat haven’t beaten the Barons in Western Canada in six attempts. That’s painful. Continue reading →

All-Star Games are ridiculous in nature. They are intended to honor the cream of the crop in a specific sport. The greatest of the great. The top dogs. The faces that launch a thousand ships. Or something like that. Of course, we all recognize the idea of playing an All-Star Game, and it’s usually all about the benjamins. And that’s perfectly fine with me. However, let’s not pretend that the All-Star Game or festivities in any sport is anything else.

As a fan of minor league hockey, the American Hockey League has had a tumultuous idealogy when it comes to the annual All-Star Game. For years it was Team Canada versus Team Planet USA. Basically those in the American League whom were born in Canada played for Team Canada. Everyone else fell into the strangely named Planet USA. I guess that sort of adds to the intrigue a little. However, it also alienates fans of the game outside of Canada for various reasons, but mainly because it assumes Canada is dominating in the sport of hockey. Which, of course, it is.

In an attempt to create a more even ground, and more NHL-like environment, the AHL in recent years has gone to the West vs. East. Needless to say, it neither heightens the importance of the All-Star weekend nor does it make the players any more enthused. For all practical purposes, the AHL is not the landing spot, but a refueling station on the way to the NHL. Plain and simple, a minor league All-Star Game is absolutely pointless in terms of game or play.
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Photo courtesy of Keith Allison on Flickr. All rights reserved.

The NBA announced this week that the season had been resurrected following a tenative aggreement between the players and owners that is nearly a 50/50 split of basketball related incomes along with a slew of “b-sides” that slightly changed the previous collective bargaining agreement. The decision to finally have a season, which begins on Christmas Day, comes with a feeling of consternation. There are some that desperately missed the NBA, but the majority of sports fans didn’t miss the doldrums of an early season. Including this afficianado. Continue reading →