Kenan Thompson has unusual hockey roots for a celebrity NHL fan. Before he was an Emmy Award-winning sketch comedian on “Saturday Night Live,” he was a Mighty Duck. Thompson, who is hosting the NHL Awards for the second time on Tuesday night at 7 ET in Tampa, Florida, played Russ Tyler in “D2: The Mighty […]
Continue readingSo with three coaching vacancies already open this cycle — the Arizona Coyotes, Columbus Blue Jackets and Seattle Kraken — it’s easy to guess who will get first looks. John Tortorella (who recently parted with Columbus after six years), Rick Tocchet (done in Arizona after four years) and Gerard Gallant (who took the NHL season […]
Continue readingThis Friday marks the one-year anniversary of the NHL suspending its 2019-20 season amid COVID-19. The pandemic upended everyone’s daily lives and routines, and it put the NHL season on pause for four months before returning for a postseason — though some teams went 10 months without any game action. ESPN asked more than a […]
Continue readingOn Feb. 28, Maddie Rooney will play at Madison Square Garden as part of the Professional Women’s Hockey Players Association Dream Gap Tour. For the 23-year-old goalie, it’s “an incredible opportunity” to play in New York City at the world’s most famous arena. Unfortunately, her preparation for the game hasn’t exactly been ideal. Since the […]
Continue readingIt was inevitable that COVID-19 would impact the 2021 NHL season, but the Washington Capitals didn’t imagine it would impact them so early — or so hard. After their first road trip to Buffalo and Pittsburgh, goalie Ilya Samsonov tested positive for the coronavirus. The NHL’s contact tracing revealed the team’s four Russian players (captain […]
Continue readingIt’s the same question most Blueshirts fans are asking after the team kicked off the season with a 2-4-1 record. Such is the nature of the NHL’s unforgiving 56-game schedule, where a slow start can feel insurmountable and a losing streak of five or six games could derail all playoff hopes. Maloney texted his daughter […]
Continue readingMy favorite thing about the “return to play” documents released by the NHL and the NHLPA this week — besides the whole “here’s a way to bring hockey back this summer” thing — is the subtle renaming of their “hubs” as the much more heavy metal “Phase 4 Secure Zone,” which sounds like something Katniss […]
Continue readingHe stood at the bench, lowered his head and raised his right fist in the air, becoming the first NHL player to engage in a peaceful demonstration during the national anthem in solidarity with athletes who protested in other sports. Brown had consulted military families beforehand about what they thought were appropriate ways to protest […]
Continue readingNHL players and teams made strong statements against racial inequality over the weekend, using social media to address the killing of George Floyd and the protests that followed. Floyd died last week in Minneapolis after Derek Chauvin, a white police officer, kneeled on his neck for more than eight minutes. He was 46. Chauvin, fired […]
Continue readingFirst, because if you’re a hockey fan, that’s inferred. The National Hockey League season was paused due to the coronavirus outbreak just as the playoff races were rounding the corner. It’s like you’re watching “Star Wars” and the film just stops as soon as the Rebel fighter squadron leaves the atmosphere of Yavin 4 en […]
Continue reading