Halford & Brough in the Morning - The Best of Halford and Brough 4/28/25

Episode Date: April 28, 2025

Mike & Jason look back at a busy weekend in sports including a wild weekend of NHL playoff action, they get the latest around the Habs from Radio-Canada Canadians reporter Marc Antoine Godin, plus they discuss the Penguins firing Mike Sullivan and if he might be a potential coaching candidate for the Canucks if Rick Tocchet leaves. This podcast is produced by Andy Cole and Greg Balloch. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Media Inc. or any affiliate.

You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough. Okay. So there is still no word on Rick Tauket's future in Vancouver, but breaking news out of Pittsburgh, the Penguins and head coach Mike Sullivan have agreed to part ways. It was just announced by Kyle Dubas, who's the president of hockey ops and general manager.

Kyle Dubas, obviously there's a big statement about how much Mike Sullivan meant to the city of Pittsburgh and the Pittsburgh Penguins. He won back to back cups and now all of a sudden. Wow. Let the speculation run rampant because Rick Taka, a lot of speculation about him not returning to the Canucks and maybe going to the New York Rangers and the Philadelphia Flyers.

And do you think Jim Rutherford has Mike Sullivan's phone number? Do you think that they have a relationship? Oh my, that is, okay, so I did not expect this. We're still about, what, two weeks out from the regular season ending. And then you saw the, I think it was Black Monday this year where a bunch of guys got, or it was over the weekend actually, where Greg Cronin got dismissed,

Peter LaVillette got dismissed. I think it was three dismissals in total. And the Penguins took a little while before they went and made this decision. The most immediate thing that came to my mind was are we going to see some weird pseudo coaching swap, not unlike what we saw back in 2014, if I'm not mistaken, with AV and Torch going from the

New York Rangers and the Vancouver Canucks flipping places essentially. And maybe it's because I was so, I mean, that was a, that was a bad season when the Canucks hired Torz and everyone recognized it because Torz was gone after one year. And I think in hindsight, a lot of people said that Torz shouldn't have taken the Vancouver job

because his heart wasn't really in it. And he kind of jumped at the first opportunity that he got to return to a coaching gig. And maybe I'm putting the cart before the horse here. We don't even know if the Canucks are interested in Mike Sullivan. We might have news in five minutes that Rick Tuckett has resigned with the Vancouver Canucks,

but Mike Sullivan has been with the Pittsburgh Penguins as an organization for a long time now. And in some ways I'd be wary of hiring him. I think he's a really good coach. In fact, he was towards his right hand man in Vancouver, so he knows the place pretty well. But I'd be wary of a guy who has just had such a long run in one place to come to a place like

Vancouver, which let's face it, there are significant challenges. It's not like the Canucks are locked and loaded for a cup run and they just need the right guy to get them over the hump. They need a guy that's going to come in and, well, there's a lot of things that a new head coach in Vancouver would need to take on.

So. It's a long-term thing, not an immediate turnaround. At the time of dismissal, meaning about six minutes ago, Mike Sullivan was the NHL's second longest tenured coach. That's 10 years on the job. So aside from being 10 years in one place, it's also 10 years of consecutive work, which is a lifetime for an NHL coach. Usually over a 10 year span, a guy will at least get one or two sabbaticals in there. And these last couple of years cannot have been easy. No. I think he would be a much sought after candidate.

I don't really think there's any question about that. He's got tremendous pedigree and he's really well regarded, including within that Penguins organization. This is kind of blowing my mind right now. I'm going to be dead honest because when we came in this morning, uh, we were going to lead the sports part of the show anyway with, hey, we have no contract certainty on Rick Tauke. We still don't know what's going on. Another weekend has passed and we still have no idea. And then I started compiling news and notes from around the league about what the

coaching market looks like in general. So Kevin Kurres from the Athletic in Philadelphia wrote about the Flyers opening and he said that there's obvious connections there with Rick Tauke. He also noted that there's a couple of hiccups there, including the fact that his contract doesn't expire until June 30th. Also over the weekend, there was a wrinkle with the vacant Chicago Blackhawks job because David Karl, the very much in-demand collegiate coach

withdrew his consideration from that job. So that one's back open again, what a lot of people thought. He said a thanks, but no thanks to the Chicago Blackhawks. Which I kind of said. which kind of says something. And I don't know exactly what, because I haven't had an opportunity to dive into it too deep, but it definitely says something when there's an NHL job in an original six market and the opportunity to coach Connor Bedard and they come after you hot and heavy and you don't take it.

Yeah, I don't know exactly what that says. I don't think it's a, I don't think Chicago comes out looking great in the aftermath, but as it pivots back to the talk, it's situation. That's another job that's still up for grabs and it moves that coaching market in a very dynamic way because vacancies and candidates are what it's all about. And right now, um, there's David Carl, who's obviously a sought after candidate. If Rick Taukett shakes free, he's going to be a sought after candidate.

Now, in case you missed it, about five minutes ago, six minutes ago, the Pittsburgh Peng was part away with Mike Sullivan after 10 years in charge as their head coach. So there is still no word on Rick Taukett's future. And I know there's a process that needs to play out in this negotiation, but it can't go on for much longer. Management said that they

expected an answer by the end of last week. Well, three days later now, if we're going to have a big argument about when the week ends, because Jamie Dodd put that in our brains, but I think we all expected Friday would be the decision one way or the other. There are a bunch of other teams looking for a new coach right now, and if the Canucks need to look for one too, they need to get going as soon as possible because there's a lot of other stuff they need to do this off season as well. I did not see any updates or reports over the weekend. So I don't know where things stand. I texted a few people and I said, yeah, I don't know what's going on there.

In other local news, just a couple of local stories, uh, and good stories too. The Abbotsford Canucks advanced to the division semi-finals of the Calder Cup playoffs. They took care of Tucson. It was a dominant five nothing win over Tucson. Are they called the road runners? They are called the road runners, Jason.

Meep, meep. Okay. Are they, they should they called the Roadrunners? They are called the Roadrunners, Jason. Meep, meep. Okay. Are they, they should be called the Tucson Toros, old PCL team. Oh yeah. Archer's Silovs needed just 21 saves to record his first career Calder Cup playoff shutout. Um, Abbotsford outshot Tucson 39 to 21.

They were dominant. Dominant game from. And by the way, it looked like a really good atmosphere in Abbotsford. So I'm sure we'll talk more about the Abbotsford Canucks and their Calder Cup run. Speaking of making a run, the Whitecaps. Let's go.

Man, they stayed hot. They went into Minnesota. They went into Minnesota and got a big three one win. Alford, you probably watched the game. They went into Minnesota with their B team, Jason. Nine changes from the team that beat Inter Miami on Thursday, including first MLS start for the 19 year old local kids, Surrey product, Jeevan Badwal, and they won 3-1.

It was another remarkable performance from the Whitecaps. After a kind of meh first half, Sebastian Berhalter was subbed on in the second half, scored immediately, and then Pedro Vite scored twice in the span of four minutes, I want to say. Yeah. And the goals, I don't know if you saw any of them, brilliant goals. Berhalter's was a rocket of a shot and the Vite goals were just great team goals. Excellent buildup and work down the line, the cutbacks.

It was crazy, crazy that they were able to do this with a squad that had like random bits of parts put into it. Like, uh, one of the centre backs, Utvix barely played this year. One of the outside backs, Bovalina barely played this year. It feels like they have such a clarity of what they want to do and how they want to play under the new manager, Jesper Sorensen. They're the leading scoring team in

MLS. You have 20 goals in MLS competition right now. They're in first place by a mile. Do you want to hear their division? The craziest stat of them all I think is Portland, Austin and Minnesota are second, third and fourth behind the Whitecaps in the West. The Whitecaps have beat them all and they beat them all by a combined 12 to 3 score. I think Austin's in second place with like a negative goal differential, so I don't know what's going on there.

They got, they got beat five one by the Cavs. That's what set them back big time. Okay. It was a wild weekend in the Stanley Cup playoffs. I watched a lot of hockey. Um, last night's game between the Kings and the Oilers might've been the best of them all. And man, if you're an Edmonton Oilers fan, you're feeling pretty happy right now and

maybe also a bit relieved. And if you're an LA Kings fan, you are ready to tear your head out. Yep. Because if you thought Jim Hiller's decision to challenge the goal in game three was a mistake, you did not get a load of what byfielders your head out. Yep. Because if you thought Jim Hiller's decision to challenge the goal in game three was a mistake, you did not get a load of what Byfield did with about 30 seconds left last night in Edmonton.

I think that mistake was worse than Hiller's because Hiller, even if he hadn't challenged it to tie game, they still could have lost the game. If Byfield gets that puck out, the Kings are winning that game. I think LA has to have major, major crises of confidence right now across the board, because this is, starts with the coach on Friday night, right?

The ill-advised challenge that goes AWOL on them. You're also talking about, now it's a couple of blown third period leads. You mentioned the byfield mistakes. You've got mistakes from the guys executing on the ice. You've got mistakes behind the bench. You're leaking goals now. And whatever momentum you had after those first two games has kind of evaporated. And you've also done it.

And I think I was talking to Ladi about this before the show. You've done this against an Oilers team that kind of hasn't been very good for what, 75 to 80% of this series. I mean, they were incredible for the last part of that game, but that's because the Kings had a 3-1 lead and, you know, and then you can blame the Kings for a little bit because they were badly

outplaying the Oilers for the first half of that game. And then they got the two goal lead and the Oilers just came at them. You chase Stuart Skinner from this series. You forced the oilers to rely on Calvin Pickard. That should work in your favor. Yet Calvin Pickard has come in and kind of not

unlike what he did against the Kinox, he stabilized the series. Although I don't think they're going back to Skinner in any way, shape or form. Now I think this is Pickard's net until, I don't know how long this is going to go because again, I think the Kings have been the better team in this series,

but it's two, two after four. Yeah. Apparently Jim Hiller was not in a very good mood last night when he was asked about the way that the Kings defended the lead. How do you change your approach in the third period to better close out games? How do I change your approach in a third period to better close out games? How do I change it?

Next question, please. We're that far away on the empty net. Q-chip's that one out, Bichard makes a good play. We're not even talking about this. Yeah. So, I mean, it is true. They nearly hit the empty net on, well, in icing. I guess that's the way they do it now. They just ice the puck.

They go for, they go for the net. In my day, you never ice the puck with an empty net. But look, this series has been incredible. In the Kings, I think it's worth noting that the previous time that the Kings have been beaten, they weren't all like last season. Last season, the Oilers just beat them, right? Again, we went back to a few years ago.

It was a game that I happened to be at down in LA. The Kings had a 2-1 series lead and then a three-nothing lead in the game. They blew that lead and lost in overtime. And then they didn't win a game in the series and they lost in six. After three- three, after being up three nothing in that game, that game four, they're up two one. They should have been up three one in the

series and they might've found a way to close that series out. If they come back and they lose this series, if Edmonton goes down to LA and steals a game because Edmonton is going to have to win at least one game in LA, the Kings are going to look back at all the times that they had the Oilers on the ropes and they let them off the ropes and just be

like, what do we, what is it us? Is it, is it a franchise thing or is it the fact that the Oilers have a guy like Connor McDavid and Leon Dreisaitl and those guys are just so tough to defend even when you've got them against the ropes? I think it's in LA's head, the inability to close this thing out. That's the only logical explanation I can come up with because they've been the better team.

They've got the better goalie. I think, you know, overall in terms of team depth, yeah, they don't have McDavid and dry subtle, but they've got a lot more depth than a lot of different positions. This series has been almost exclusively about Edmonton rallying. Remember in game one, it was a four nothing lead that the Kings managed to squander. And I will say this, if they could make this series go like nine or best of nine or best of 11, I would be all for it.

Cause this has been an unbelievable series so far, four games in and it's been, it's been an absolute roller coaster. Like the highs and lows have been amazing. The, um, the playoffs are always about the big mistakes at the wrong time. Sure. Um, but I know that Martin Saint-Louis, the head coach of the Montreal Canadians was pretty upset about the officiating in that game and he was complaining about that.

And some of the players were complaining about the massive hit that Tom Wilson put on Carrier. Although I thought that was a great hit. That's keep your head up through the middle of the ice, especially when you know you got Tom Wilson on the other team. But why did he pull the goalie so early? That, I was watching that game with the boy. The boy is nine years old. He's like, why is he pull the goalie so early? That I was watching that game with the boy.

The boy is nine years old. He's like, why is he pulling the goalie so early? Why is the goalie out when there's like three minutes left and there's an offensive zone faceoff? Why not wait till you have clean possession? Now they did win the faceoff and Hudson turned the puck over and Hudson was very upset with himself.

But for me, that's a bad decision to have the goalie out. I'm not against the early goalie pole, but you have to have clean possession. Yeah. And the Habs never got it because they won the faceoff, it went back to Hudson and the Capitals pressured the point and it worked out for the Caps and it was an immediate

two on one and all of a sudden it's like, that was a deflating moment for the Bell Centre. Now, unlucky for the Habs that they didn't have Montembeau in there. Maybe Montembeau saves that shot by Manji Upani, but man, like I just, there was some mistakes by Patrick Laine, um, earlier in the series when he was still in the series. Um, and, and look, it was probably unlikely that Montreal was going to score six on five, but they

never even gave themselves a chance because in my opinion, they pulled the goalie way too early. Now that series is, has been awesome and it's been great to see playoff hockey back in the Bell Center and it was terrific to watch and the Caps are a better team than Montreal. So that series is probably rightly three to one for Washington. The series that a lot of people might be texting in and saying, hey bro, I thought you said the series was over. I said the same thing. Um, St. Louis has fought back to make it a two, two series with Winnipeg.

Now my point still stands because I said after Winnipeg won the first two games, I find it hard to believe that St. Louis is going to win four of five against the jets. And in a way I still do because they have to win one in Winnipeg, but. But? Connor Hellebuck, what's going on there? Okay, so Hellebuck has now allowed at least four goals

in 10 of his last 13 playoff appearance. Connor Hellebuck has also been pulled in consecutive games for just the second time in his career. That's regular season or playoffs. Laddie, what have the St. Louis Blues done in terms of scouting to get an upper hand on Connor Hellebuck? Well, I'll steal it straight from Mike McKenna because he laid it out perfectly in a tweet and said the three main things that they scouted and looked at were number one, his

passive hands. Hellebuck, if you watch, he's got kind of lower hands than most goalies have. He's huge so he can get away with it most of the time. But when you're up against top shooters and top teams in the playoffs, they can pick on stuff like that.

The second, his lack of backwards flow. He's not a guy with a lot of movement in his game. If you watch Hellebuck, he kind of just takes up a lot of space, right? Not a lot of, not a lot of movement left and right. He tries to, yeah. That's what makes you a great goalie. Little different reasons for Hellebuck.

I don't know, backwards or forwards. And then the third thing was his puck handling. Yeah. He's had a few issues playing the puck behind the net. They're really keying in on getting him out of the net, forcing him to play the puck. It's all working and you got to hand it to the Blues, I think.

It's not really Hellebuck's fault. These are his flaws. They've just done a really good job exposing them and the jets are just letting them. So here's a question. Do you entertain at all the idea of making a switch to Comrie? Cause we've seen it in other series. Especially not going home. You talk about the heart trophy.

Like you're not going to take that guy out of your lineup. He's also allowing goals at a rapid pace. You're living there, you're dying with them. So we'll talk more about the jets with Jim Toth later in the show and we'll talk about the Leafs send series, which we haven't touched on with Sam McKee coming up next. Um, if you are just joining us, Mike Sullivan

has been the way they put it. They parted ways. They parted ways. He's been fired. Mike Sullivan, uh, the, the Penguins are moving on from Mike Sullivan. Now, obviously this is going to be big news in Vancouver because of the Pittsburgh connection with the management and the fact that Rick Tocket is still on side.

A couple of things I want to point out. Just scrolling social media, everyone else is thinking the same thing. Boston is like, hmm, there's been rumors about Boston and Mike Sullivan. He's already been there, done that. Yeah, no, I know. Old hat. I know, but.

Technically he's already been to the Canucks too. Yeah, exactly. Older hat. He wasn't Mike Sullivan with two Stanley Cup wins then, though, when he was with Boston. Philly is going to be all over him. I saw someone from Chicago being like, go get him, Kyle Davidson. So Sullivan's going to be- New York Rangers for Sullivan's the big one. Yeah.

If the Knots don't figure out Taka though, like Sullivan's coming here, right? Like- No, no. I would not say that because here's another thing. Here's another thing. Okay, hey doc. Here's another thing.

He is. If money is a problem with Rick Tauke, like they don't want to pay him what he wants and they'll only pay so much for a head coach, does that change for Mike Sullivan? Because Mike Sullivan is going to be more expensive than Rick Tauke. Because Mike Sullivan has a much deeper resume,

he can say, listen, I've won two Stanley Cups as a head coach. And especially if you're coming to Vancouver, I'd be like, yeah, I was the head coach of the culture that Sidney Crosby built. Rick Tocca was there. He was playing poker with Phil Kessel, but I was there and I ran it for a long, long time.

If Tocca wants this, I want more. So are the Canucks going to be willing to pay that? You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough. You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough. 703 on a Monday. Happy Monday everybody. Halford Brough, SportsMed 650. Halford Brough of the morning is brought to you by Sands and Associates, BC's first and

trusted choice for debt help with over 3,000 five-star reviews. Visit sands-trustee.com. For more, we are in hour two of the program. Hour two is brought to you by Jason Homonuck at jason.mortgage. If you love giving the banks more of your money, then don't let Jason shop around to find the perfect mortgage for you. Visit him online at jason.mortgage. We are coming to you live from the Kintec studio, Kintec Footwear and Orthotics, working together with you in step.

Our next guest joins us from Montreal, Marc-Antoine Godin from Radio Canada joins us now on the Haliford and Brough show on Sportsnet 650. Good morning Marc-Antoine, how are you? I'm good guys, how are you? We're good, thanks for taking the time to do this this morning. Before we dive deep into the series,

just set the stage and what the atmosphere is like in Montreal right now. The return of playoff hockey to the Bell Centre, of course, this time with fans in attendance. What's that been like? Well, the Bell Centre is not out of practice, surprisingly. I mean, it's been many years since there was a full building for a playoff game. I mean, we have to go back to 2017. The only remaining member of the Montreal Canadi Canadians who lived that was Brendan Gallagher. So it was new for everybody else. And so there was, it felt as though a whole generation of fans also had not lived it.

And, you know, it's funny because there's been so much hype around the building, around the impact that the crowd may have on games. So much so that there's a hype on the hype, you know? But ultimately, it makes for a great playoff atmosphere. I mean, it might sound a bit chauvinistic or call it whatever you want, but I think that the NHL is in a better place when Montreal is in the playoffs because it's a good window to the sport, to the passion of the fans. And whether it's the Montreal Canadiens players or their opponents, everybody loves to play

in that atmosphere. Absolutely. You are 100% right. That being said, Washington is leading this series three to one. What's been the difference for you between Washington and Montreal? Well, you got to hand it to the Capitals for the way that they played defensively and really

stifling Montreal's offense. The Canadians are not a powerhouse in this league by any stretch, but they're trying to come at you in waves and have four lines rolling. But really, if you manage to quiet down the Nick Suzuki line, the pressure on the other lines to produce and be a threat is a lot more significant. And in that sense, the Capitals did a really good job in three games out of the four to shut down Suzuki's line and to greatly reduce the threats coming from the other lines.

You saw at times the Dvorak line with Gallagher and Josh Anderson doing your buzzing a little bit in the offensive zone. But mainly for the Canadians, it's been special teams that's been where they've been impactful, where they might have, you could argue that they've been the better team throughout the series, but five on five, even yesterday. I mean, the Capitals were the better team five on five for the first 40 minutes. But the Canadians managed to kill a three on five, and then they scored on the power play late in the second period. So they were up two to one at the end of the second period and the Capitals were totally deflated when they went back to their room. Spencer Carberry said, you know,

that the guys had done such a great job at even strength. They started the game strong. They were not impressed by the atmosphere at the Bell Center. They were ready for it this time. But the fact that the Canadians managed to get the lead after 40 minutes was deflating to us. So the Cavs managed to come back in the third period.

The Canadians were not entirely up to the moment. They were a bit distracted and they lost their focus. So defensively, to answer your question shortly, I think that defensively the Caps are strong, but you see also their experience showing up a great deal. Let's get some health updates here. Alex Carrier took a massive hit from Tom Wilson, one of the defining plays of the series. How is he and also what is the health of Monta Bo? Yeah, so well regarding Carrier, Carrier left the game twice yesterday because in the first period he just nearly managed to escape Alex Ovechkin's hit that almost propelled Ovechkin on the Canadian's bench.

But he seemed to tweak something in the leg and had to leave, you know, he had to leave maybe he might have missed the last seven or eight minutes of the first period, came back for the second and just really got his bell rung by Tom Wilson in the third period. He was not able to escape that one. That was a hit that really changed the momentum of the game. Second time, while Carrier had to leave, he had something, it seemed as though like a bag of ice on his neck, so he stayed on the bench for a while. And then at a TV timeout, he skated for a little bit and decided to go back into the room. So for now, we don't have any updates on him. You know, you would assume that if he would be out, they would call it an upper body injury and nothing any more than that.

But we'll know more about him today. He's an essential part of the Canadian blue line. His acquisition this year was really impactful because the Canadians needed an effective, a reliable right-handed defenseman and they found one in Carrier who was obtained only for Justin Barron. And as for Montembourg, well, the fact that they had to call up Kaden Primo, he was not able to dress as a backup yesterday, you know, it doesn't really bode well. For now, he's called being under day-to-day observation. So again, I think we'll know more today, but they might play this close to the chest and not even disclose anything regarding Mouton Boulle. But you know, as he was out yesterday, his backup, Jacob Dobesh, did an okay job, I guess.

Okay, Marc-Antoine, I know you got to go, but in five seconds, Marten Solian, San Luis, did he pull the goalie too early? No, I don't think so. I don't think so. I mean, obviously over three minutes or something, it's likely that the other team's gonna touch the puck. My bigger beef would be with the fact that early in the third period, the Canadians had a powerplay and their first line, their first powerplay unit had been buzzing and they had scored two goals.

But in that third period, he pulled the first unit and placed the second one after only 58 seconds of a powerplay. play. And I thought that had he given the first unit, potentially the full, you know, the full two minutes were at least a longer, a longer leash on that power play. Uh, they might have scored a third goal and put the game more out of reach of the, of the Washington capitals. Or for me, if I have to second guess any of Marty's and we's the decisions, I look more towards that than the, uh, at pulling the goalie. Mark Antoine, this was great. Thanks for taking the time to do this today. We really appreciate it. My pleasure. Take care, guys.

You too. Thank you. That's Mark Antoine. I'm from Radio Canada in Montreal here on the Halford and Brough Show on Sportsnet 650. So if you're just joining the show, big news out of Pittsburgh. The Pittsburgh Penguins have moved on from Mike Sullivan. He is no longer the head coach in Pittsburgh. So add Pittsburgh, the Pittsburgh penguins have moved on from Mike Sullivan. He is no longer the head coach in Pittsburgh. So add Pittsburgh to the list of teams that's going to be looking for a new head coach, but also add Mike Sullivan to the list of potential

candidates. Now I did have a thought about this. Another thought. I've had a few thoughts. Thoughts. I like thoughts. Another thought. I've had a few thoughts. Thoughts?

I like thoughts. Could this, in some ways, work out for the Canucks because it might make Rick Tauke it wonder if he really does have a ton of leverage. You're going to need to explain that thought even further. Well, let's say he was going after, let's say, we're not saying this is what he's doing.

Set the hypothetical for me. Go. Let's say he wants the Rangers job. Talk it. And he wants to wait it out and he's going to get the Rangers job because he's going to say no to the Canucks. Okay.

Does he still feel that way? And you could do this for any job out there, right? Maybe it's a flyer's job or whatever. Does he suddenly go like, Ooh, maybe I won't be a top choice because those teams are going to go after Sullivan. Right. You know, and maybe he's like, Ooh, should I

just accept this Canucks job? Because, you know, a lot of people have thought about it in a way of maybe Sullivan will come to Vancouver because of the Pittsburgh connection. And that's obvious. And maybe he will, but Sullivan might also not want to come to the West coast.

He might look at jobs in Philly or New York or Boston as more appealing to him. And then if suddenly, if you're talking, you're like, oh, I don't know. or New York or Boston as more appealing to him. And then if suddenly if you're talking, you're like, oh, I don't know. I mean, I do think it requires an exploration of these jobs and the markets and the team that the coach would be inheriting. And I guess part of that is always putting it up

against the Vancouver job. Like here's one, here's the other, but let's, we know what the Vancouver job is. We know what it entails. Good, bad, ugly, otherwise. Uh, these other gigs that are out there, we ran through them about a week ago. None of them are perfect. Aside from New York being New York and I guess Boston being Boston, the status of

the franchise, original six, everything that goes along with it, playing in a big market, coaching in a big market. They don't strike me as teams that are going in a really enticing upward trajectory. Yeah. Maybe the Rangers. Are you looking, are you loving the depth down

the middle of any of those teams? I mean, the Rangers, I know they have JT Miller now, but Zabana Jed was one of the reasons why they really struggled this year and you have to wonder if his best years are behind him and in Boston, we all know the issue is down the middle there. So throw the Pittsburgh job into the mix for

sake of argument, the now vacant Pittsburgh Penguins job. The pros would obviously be like a reunion of sorts. Also, you get the opportunity to be Sidney Crosby's head coach But that is a team that has been not just on the outside of the playoff picture the last few years but increasingly Farther away. Mm-hmm like way way outside of the playoff picture and how many more years of sitter you're gonna get I think I think one of talk it's big concerns in Vancouver is

How long he's gonna have Quinn Hughes here. I think that's obvious that he is probably just as unsure as some of us that Quinn Hughes is going to resign. And what happens if Quinn Hughes strongly signals next summer that he's not going to come back? At that point, aren't you obligated to at least look at a trade?

Aren't you obligated for the better, better men of the franchise to look at trying to get some assets for Quinn Hughes, as opposed to letting him walk away for nothing? I think you are. And then, um. And then what are you as a head of coach then? You're like, okay, well who's my leader here? Who's my guy?

Which is why when you take the step back and look at it, you kind of can understand why there's been no resolution. It's almost like you need to have some sort of resolution on that before you can have the resolution of taking or moving on from the job. But it's impossible to have that resolution, right? I think you could probably get a good,

there's two figures here, let's be honest. It's Hughes and it's Pedersen. And you wanna get some level of clarity on both. At a certain point, there will be a drop dead decision time, deadline time. This has, we gotta go one way or the other here. Yeah. I do wonder if they're both parties,

like we do have time. Like I understand that there's outside pressures, there's media, there's people wanting answers, and there's an active coaching search going on across the National Hockey League. But there is no huge rush, say in the next week. But every day that goes along, more questions come up. but every day that goes along, more questions come up.

And every day that goes along, more developments happen. I did not anticipate coming in this morning and getting news that Mike Sullivan, after 10 years on the job and the second longest tenured coach in the NHL, was gonna be out in Pittsburgh. That does alter things. It creates another job,

it puts another very viable candidate on the market. And because of the relationships between Vancouver and Pittsburgh, there's a lot of different dynamics that you can unpack there that are at play. Peter and Cloverdale, why would Sullivan want to come to Vancouver? They can't even pay their top prospect an extra $200,000 if he hits his bonuses. Yeah, Tom Willander is still unsigned. It is a very uncertain situation in Vancouver. And if you were interviewing as a new head coach or a head coach candidate, you know, that

part of the interview where the interviewer goes, do you have any questions? You'd be like, ah, yes, I have a hundred questions about what the hell just happened in Vancouver this past season. What is going on here? What is going on there? What's your plan to fix this? Every part of the organization from the captain on down all the way to the

prospects seems uncertain right now. And that could be seen if you were a Mr. Positive thinking as I see these things as an opportunity. But they're also like, they could be challenges. Just to answer Peter and Cloverdale's text though, why would Sullivan want to come to Vancouver? He'd finally get a chance to coach Quinn Hughes. Remember how excited he was at the prospect

of flying him in for the foreign agents? Remember he jumped the gun and said, he's like, Quinn Hughes is on his way. Like there's a coach, there's a coach that wants is on his way. Like, there's a coach. There's a coach that wants to coach Quinn Hughes. You know Sullivan's gonna take the job and Quinn is gonna be like, actually. I like talk it better.

Yeah, I'm gonna try and follow him. Yeah, I wanted to argue with you about Sullivan to Vancouver because it's good sports radio. about Sullivan to Vancouver because it's good sports radio. And I'm having a hard time seeing how that would be a good fit because of all the things that you laid out. He's been at one job for too long, very much scarred from the Tortorella. And I know it was over a decade ago, but the vibes are way too similar. A guy that's been in one market for an awfully long time, it was at his heart and soul in that job and then just kind of takes another job

because it was available. That to me feels way too similar. Yeah. And I think the market, given the scars from that history and those memories, maybe it's best to go in a different direction there if you have to, I just don't see it. I want to go back to what you were saying about

trying to find some certainty in for any coach, whether it's Tocket or a new head coach in Vancouver. How do you do that? How do you, how do you, if you're a management group, how do you convince Tocket or any other candidate that things are going to be okay? That is a, that is a tough thing because how do you, let's go through the list here.

I'm a head coach. I'm asking you, you're the manager. We'll do a little role playing here. Okay. I love role play. Okay. I'll be Tauke it or whoever. Can you be certain that Quinn Hughes is going

to be here in two years or even a year? No, but we're going to try and we're going to tamper. Can you be certain that Elias Pedersen is going to turn his game around? That he's going to put the work in this off season and he's going to be the difference maker that his contracts suggest he should be? No, but we're going to trade him.

Can you be certain that you can trade Elias Pedersen? We're going to damn try. Okay. That's your opinion by the way. Yeah, no. But we're doing role play. So when you trade Elias Pedersen, can you be certain that you can fix the center position because if you trade Elias Pedersen, you definitely don't have

a one C and you may not have a two C. No. Can you be certain that, uh, Thatcher Demko, um, will be healthy and here for a long time, or are we looking at, uh, a team where Kevin Lankinen is the number one goalie? We're looking at a team where Kevin Lankinen might be the number oneie? We're looking at a team where Kevin Lankton might be the number one goalie.

You're being too honest here. I know. But you gotta answer the questions. But you're Jim Rutherford, it's like, I call him like a tit. Yeah, I'll go and get another goalie, maybe one under contract. Do you know what I'm saying here, right?

We've done this, this is just a new way of doing the same exercise, but yeah, I do think that instead of off, you can't offer certainty on anything. I think what you can offer is honesty and clarity. There's no point trying to sugarcoat what the Canucks are. Your sales pitch as a management group is going to be, we're going to do everything in our power to keep Quinn Hughes. we've made that abundantly clear by skirting the line of tampering at our end of year media availability. We have, and if you wanna try and toot your own horn

a little bit, you can say we have made a lot of trades and a lot of transactions in our time on the job. And if you wanna have a calling card as a management group, you can say we inherited a really bad blue line and our active NHL blue line one through six right now, like we built that. And we moved pieces on the chessboard. How'd you do that?

Yeah, they're Rob Peter, PayPal. Sullivan's like, okay, I'm fine with all of this, but please tell me about your practice facility. Right, yeah, yeah. I was gonna make that joke, it's like, all right, you've convinced me, I'll take the job. Now, if you can y'all like, no. I was gonna make that joke. It was like, all right, you've convinced me. I'll take the job. Now, if you can just direct me to the practice facility and we'll get started.

Yeah. Right. About that. Right. Yeah. Sign here first. I will say this, because so often the success and failure of a coach comes down to the goaltending.

I do think that you could spin a pretty nice narrative that if Demko is healthy, and I think you could point to some different levels of optimism with him, understanding what his body can and can't do, and also, we've addressed the workload issue because we've got Lankinen. You could say you might have the best goaltending duo in the NHL.

Sure. And that's- Hughes has suggested that. And that's not spin. If those two guys are healthy and going and they can lessen the load on one another, you do have a very good goal tending tandem. Yep. And that is something that a lot of coaches will look at, because there have been plenty of coaches in the NHL who when they're walking out the door because they're fired, look at the goalie and they're like, that's one of the reasons why. So I think there's that.

Also, maybe everything works out. Maybe Hughes doesn't leave, Petey finds his game, Demko isn't injured anymore, and there we go. Yeah. So you can always, that's always possible. I mean, it is possible. Sunshine and lollipops. It is.

Yeah. So you could sell Sullivan on that. Look, regardless, you're going to be up for a challenge and there will be a challenge coaching this team, but maybe things will work out well. Yeah, people that buy stocks when the stock market is down, you know? Yeah. Sometimes get destroyed.

Yes, but they won't sell it like that. They'll be like, but it might work. I like the suggestion in the Dunbar Lumbertex line to go with Coach GPT next season. Coach GPT, that is a good one. Yeah, when will the first AI coach be? Soon. Every line go out on the ice at once.

What, Coach GPT, that doesn't work? How far do you feel like you don't use chat GPT at all? I've never used it. You've never used it. Never used it. Never? No. The game just starts, Coach GPT says to pull the goalie

We gotta try it it's my gut it is going to work you're listening to the best of Halford and brough