Real Kyper & Bourne - Panthers' Pursuit with Paul Maurice

Episode Date: March 20, 2024

Nick Kypreos and Justin Bourne start the second hour with Florida Panthers coach Paul Maurice. He gets into how the team has built its lauded physical identity, going from fringe playoff team to contender last season, lineup experimenting ahead of and during the playoffs, and Oliver Ekman-Larsson's resurgence. Then, he weighs in on Tortorella scratching Sean Couturier. Later, they regroup with Sam McKee for news and notes - Tortorella ducking questions on his Couturier decision, live reaction to the Leafs' scratching TJ Brodie, Rick Nash being named Team Canada GM for this year's world championship and Vegas' playoff spot becoming less certain.The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Sports & Media or any affiliates.

the real kipper and born show it goes national live on sports that sports that 650 in vancouver and sports net 960 in calgary this hour real kipper and born brought to you by Bet365. Justin Bourne, Sammy McKee, and yours truly, Nick Kiprios. Let's welcome in the fifth winningest coach in NHL history, Paul Maurice. Mo, 862 wins. I just looked that up. And remind me, you started coaching in the NHL when you were 12. Is that correct? It's all like it.

When I first started, I felt 12. In 1995, I was 28. Okay. Do those numbers blow you away? Do you even have time to think about it or contemplate what that means? Or is your world moving just too fast? No, I'll tell you the truth. I never – there was a time where I thought if I could coach 500 games,

like that would be a pretty good career because it's not a lot of 500. And after that, it's a bit of a blur. So the wins were good. I also know I got a real big loss number in there too. But when I moved into second all-time, that one hit me because it's Scotty Bowman, right? That was the first one where I went one. Oh my God, you've been around a long time, man.

And that one, I actually, I'm proud of that. I've had a real good career. I can't call it great yet. You got to win Stanley Cups to call it great, but I've had a very good career and I've been really, really lucky. But that was the number kipper that actually I did take in.

Well, you've got a really good shot at it this year, as good as any team in the NHL at the Stanley Cup. You know, we talk about the Florida Panthers on this show quite a bit. The envy of most teams going into the playoffs, I think because of this seeming competitive nature, this feistiness. Our producer likes to say you guys play offended all the time. You know, is that something that comes from you? Is it personality driven or do we have the read wrong

and that's not the case at all? No, there's give and take there. I think it has to do with the personality of the players in the room because you can't make your team into something that it's not, but you certainly have to foster what you're good at. So there's a little bit of an edge there. We've got some mild players, some guys that aren't, that aren't, I would say competitive in a, in a,

it's not necessarily their personality, but they play hard. And then we've got some guys with an edge, right? That, and it's the Kachuk factor. There are other players like that. Sam Bennett is an underrated competitive man. So we have a bunch of guys that are wired like that, and the rest of them work real hard, and that seems to be their strength. So that's the thing that as the coach and the coaches, then you want to rally that.

I wouldn't say fan it because you have more of a challenge controlling it than necessarily firing it up. But over the course of the year, and we're probably, in truth, sitting in that spot right now, we may have to fire that thing back up with the year and we're probably in truth sitting in that spot right now we may have to fire that thing back up with our the schedule that we've got coming up we've got to get a little bit more of a snarl on in our games not and i'm not talking about the parade to the penalty box i'm just talking about the edge on the battle for the puck so mo remind me because it seems like ages ago, but it was not. It was around this time last year, end of March.

You have your meltdown in Toronto. I think you guys came back in the last minute to win. And it's almost as if that moment, your team went from this, we don't know what we are, we're not even in the playoffs, to one of the favorites to compete for a Stanley Cup. Did you see that prior to your meltdown that you have what you have now? Or did you have to just discover it? Or did they have to discover it on their own?

That was an absolutely honest reaction to the style of play that night and and it was born out of from the second from january 2nd the second period on against the new york rangers we had been a pretty good hard team we had played hard and and played right but there was always this kind of tug to go back to this trade chances flow game and snap it around but we weren't that team anymore like they lost seven guys from that team so a lot of the skill went out the door this summer that i came in like we were just different and but there's still that desire so what happened was we got into ottawa the game prior and we got beat 5-3 our penalty kill hadn't you know that was kind of a weak link for us last year so we

lost on the penalty kill i felt but i loved our game in Ottawa. It was hard. Every time we play the Ottawa Senators, it's a physical, nasty confrontation. Both the Kachuk brothers get 17 minutes just before the anthem's over. And it's fun, right? It's wired. So I loved our game in Ottawa.

And then just, you know, you tried to eat it through the first period, but you get into the second period, and I don't know, it might've been Carter or Hagee. Somebody turned the puck over right at the blue line in front of my bench. And then they scored and it was offside. So I got this kind of three timeout and truly just lost my mind. There was no, I just had it.

And it was like a year of, I mean, you know, you guys know, and you also don't know the amount of time coaches put into this, like the sheer hours, right? So I just completely freaked out. But it was also, in truth, like after the period was over, I said, look, it's yours now, Foss. This is yours. I mean, you know the plan.

You know what you're good at. You know how we're successful. You know how we're not successful. And I'm not begging you for it anymore. And this is yours. And Brandon Montour scored in overtime, and that was kind of the handoff. The team has to get handed off the players at some point during the year, and it becomes their team.

And then from that point on, you know, you're standing behind the bench and you're going to say something to correct something, and one of the other players says it, and then that's when it's theirs. And that's where we get to. I don't think that that – I mean, I don't know. There are lots of good screams, fests, and speeches. I think if there was anything good of what I said, it was absolutely honest, and they knew I was telling the truth.

I think that was the strength of my berserker. But it did pull something out of them that I think they just didn't know was there maybe. Maybe that people around them care. It's okay to care. It's okay to show some passion in your game. It's okay to want to win every night. And it's okay that maybe you don't play the friendliest game all the time.

And if you're getting beat, you should be a little bit upset about that. And I think if you buy tickets to come play the Florida Panthers, play. There's very few nights walking away going, those guys didn't try to earn their money tonight. That's what I mean behind the bench. Behind the bench, these guys play pretty darn hard. It's exciting. It's a hard gap game, so there's some mistakes that come with it.

Like, you rarely get bored at one of our games, and that's not the coach. That's the players. That's the personality. So most coaches go in and give them a little speech there before they head out to the ice for the game i don't i go in i do mine an hour and a half before the game and then that room is 100 theirs and we've been a real good starting team this year with exceptional last couple games um but the players own the room now

it's theirs well that tirade is one of my reasons i think that the nhl should sell like an after dark mic'd up thing or something where we could watch and listen in and get you know i'm sure that would go over well no i remember my first three words and there's not one of them you could you could use in the in the hotline area that that might have been the end of my career when i got to number two after that fair enough um you know one thing that might have been the end of my career we would have got to number two after that fair enough um you know one thing that we've been talking about uh on this show is is the toronto maple leafs obviously relief show in the first hour and there when they played you guys in playoffs last year they used 22 variations of their forward lines over five games you guys had

four lines you didn't even use a fifth line in a single game you stuck to exactly you know your group is you know how early in a season like are we at the time of year where you want to know exactly what those lines are where where does that shape come from where you say this is the mold we're in and we're not going to deviate from that yeah so we didn't as much as it yeah that was an unusual series first First of all, I will tell you this. Sheldon Keefe runs one of the hardest benches to match in the league for me. Because when you... You know, it's that almost 11-7 idea.

And even if they dress 12, it's sometimes de facto 11-7. When you start moving Nylander around the lineup, that's a problem. And you know what? They caught me in game three, I think, the game that they won on a line change, and I think it was the difference in the game. So I went back and charted every single line change that had happened in that series. And it's not easy. It's not easy to pattern Sheldon Keefe and his lineup.

Now, every team is different. So there are some teams that really flourish with that, and I think the Toronto Maple Leafs do. I think they have. Because they had so many center ice options, right, with O'Reilly there. That's just another beast to contend with. And then he could hang two wingers on either side that could make plays or check or skate or hit.

It was a real challenge. For our team, we were built differently, and we had just really worked in pairs all year. So Lusteron and Lundell, they're still together here today. Bennett and Kachuk are still together. The new one for us has been Reinhardt and Barkov this year, but for the most part, I haven't split them up, and I'll move those other guys around.

So we've got Tarasenko that comes in. He played four or five games with Barkov. Now he's going to play with Lundell, and then probably somewhere in the next five. We got this really hard 10-game block coming up in 17 days. So that's where I'm going to do all my experimenting to get a look. But because we didn't make a trade at the deadline last year and because we have brought, I guess, one forward in the top nine,

I don't have to do as much experimenting. And I got a pretty good idea of what each line looks like. My job then is to find out when it's not working. So Verhege moves between Barkov and Bennett, and that's my job is to figure out when it's stale or the matchup the other team has the advantage, and then I'll play with it. I will tell you that, you know, in each,

before each season, I kind of go around to the team and ask the players what they like about the culture of our room and one of Matthew Kachuk's comments was he loves the fact that everybody doesn't care who they play with. They can play with anyone. And he leads that. He truly doesn't care who he plays with. He loves playing with Sam Bennett, but

he can play with anybody. And so there's no nobody's feelings get hurt when I move the line around here or somebody doesn't play much, as much as they used to. They're all real good about it, real good pros. We're talking to Paul Maurice, head coach of the Florida Panthers. Now, when we competed against each other, North Bay versus Windsor, did you score an overtime goal against us?

Like never, ever in my entire career. You, on the other hand, my friend, missed a penalty shot. I did. Jablonski, who was in that? Yeah, on a puck that I put my hand on in the crease, and I'm leaning. And you didn't have to go on the bench in those days, so I'm just leaning on the sideboards, kicking my foot,

praying to God that Nick Kiprios didn't score, because that might have been game five or six. You guys beat us in game seven, I think, in overtime. Yeah. I think, I don't know, one of the North Bay Saints. I'm trying to envision you scoring back in junior and passing off that wisdom to Reinhardt because there has to be a reason he's now on the cusp of scoring 50 goals it must be your

your coaching and your your goal scoring really smart guys will find a way to take credit for it and then i said this to him uh no my just just to backtrack my first goal in the ontario hockey league didn't come to my second year it was in Ottawa, and it was banked from our end into their net in the empty net. I got the puck, and the boys were giving me the absolute business about that being my first goal, so I just threw out the stands. And actually, my mom caught it, so it was a good ending.

She saw my first goal, but it was from 200 feet. So my game was just glassing out, right? No feet, no hands, no skills, glassing out. But anyway, here's this interesting little story about Sam Reinhart and Barkov. The year before I got here, they tried them for the first 20 games, and it didn't work. And then I get to training camp the next year, and I'm watching these two guys move around.

I go, man, those guys got to be good together. They have to, right? So I put them back together, and they had chances, and they played such a smart game. They killed penalties together. They were very effective at that, but the puck just wouldn't go in the net for them. So now we're 20 games in, and I've got two really important players that aren't producing, so that's my job, right, put players in a position to produce. So we broke them up.

And then I would say that if there was a change, Barkoff and Reinhardt came back to camp even faster this year. And they trained hard this summer. Not that they don't in the past. They're two of the fittest guys on the team, but it's a half step, perhaps. So in that half step, great players find the way. Or maybe it was just one went early. It built a belief,

and then they relaxed and their greatness comes out. But these two guys, what's special about them for the coach is that as good as they are offensively, they are equally, if not better, defensively. So they are scoring line and they're checking line on one. They're penalty kill metrics as a pair or elite in this league. And they don't cheat the game. So for Sam Reinhart, you know what it's like when a guy, the idea gets into their heads that for a player who's never scored 20, might score 40, but a guy could score 50 goals.

You start to see it. And everybody, you know what? Everybody accepts it. You want to cheat the game a little. The shift stays out a little bit longer. You're kind of checking your shoulder to see if the coach is putting you out there when the goalie's out. All of that stuff happens.

Except Sam hasn't had any of that. He just plays the game. And he plays the right way. And his shift length doesn't get longer. And he doesn't jam stuff into the middle of the ice. He shouldn't. And he dumps pucks that he's supposed to. But he cheers his TDs.

He's just a real fine pro. So his contract's up this year. So other than he's mean to animals, he's away from them this year. You can't. You know what? He's earned it. He's had a great year and he's earned it.

And he's a fine pro, fine man. Yeah, that's great. The strength of your team seems to be that not cheating and that's reflected back in goals against. You guys are, I think, second best in the NHL in that category right now. Part of that,avarovsky is obviously playing very well but also like your decor looks like the type of decor as we see in the cup finals oliver ekman larson has showed up and you know sort of rejuvenated his career has he been maybe the most pleasant

surprise on the decor in getting you guys to where you've been at defensively. Yes, absolutely. Yes. There are some stories that go with it with that though. The first is it shouldn't be right because Oliver Ekman Larson that we remember a few years ago as a dynamic player, what, what I, you know, in talking to him, he just felt that he had been hurt for two years and he spent two summers rehabbing, not training. So when he stepped out of the lineup, and I think that would have been in February,

by the time the summer hit, this summer hit, and he had been bought out, he was actually healthy. So the summer was spent training instead of rehabbing. And he comes back in. And also, right, it's not about pressure. It's about expectation. He could come in and just play the game. He doesn't have to lead the room. He doesn't have to answer for the power play he just has to play the game yeah so when we found

this guy he'd come in and he's in a great mood and he's a good veteran pro and he makes landing but he's got an edge to him too that i never saw when he was in arizona probably a function he's playing 20 30 minutes a night here his minutes are down but he's played with an edge so he would be the biggest the biggest surprise that you shouldn't have been surprised about if you went to looking at him. Nico Mikola would be the guy probably around the league that people didn't know that has shaped the way our blue line looks as much as anybody. So we lose Stahl and Gudish.

Really important for the fabric and the character. Mikola has taken up the play of those two men, respectfully. He's just been fantastic for us. And so our blue line's gotten stronger. Sergei Bobrovsky and Anthony Stoller. There's a story there, too, because this guy, his numbers are phenomenal and his game is, too. And both of those guys have been incredibly consistent.

I would say that the one metric, the thing that's changed our team the most has been our penalty kill. So we were not a good penalty killing team last year. Kevin Stenland coming out and Nico Mikula coming in are the two big pieces to that. Dmitry Kulikov kills penalties for us, so there's another defenseman that wasn't with us. But we added people to kill penalties.

Sylvain Lefebvre runs that for our team as a coach. He's a penalty killer in his career. So we feel we've got a good mix there. But the biggest improvement would be our blue line got shaped in a way for us to survive both Ekblad and Montour being out for the first 16, 17 games this season. And then when they came back, we found out we had a pretty good core. Mo, I'm not sure if you're up on this storyline but there's a certain nhl coach out there that recently healthy scratched

his captain and the perception out there mo is that you treat all your players the same right doesn't matter so can you confirm for me today that if you healthy scratched Barkov, it would have no different effect if you say you picked Ryan Lomberg? Kip set a trap here. See how you do with this one. Must be a Philadelphia thing. A healthy scratch Roddy Brendamore when he was the captain of our team. He's still not very happy about that.

Is he still hanging on to that? Which game? No, it was a regular season game, and it was in Pittsburgh, and we won 2-1, and it would be, yeah, a while ago. And I still remember it. It's a hard thing to do. You know what, though? We all have – okay, so when you walk into a room as a coach, I think you establish a certain trust,

but before trust, a certain amount of truth, right? Like, these are the things that we're going to be... We're just going to tell the truth. We're going to do this as a hockey team. We're going to handle these four or five things. And that has to be true of Barkov and Lomberg. Whatever it is that you hold to be true, we're going to be this kind of team. We're going to make sure we're going to make some mistakes.

We've got some skill. We've got a little bit of this. But these are the four core principles of our hockey club. That has to be true for Barkov and Lomberg. How far down the line you get before you scratch a guy, that's technique and that style, I guess, of the personality of the coach. So if you've done it to two or three other guys and they're all looking at you going, hey, just bench those three guys and now it's his turn because he just broke the code, whatever that is, kind of in a spot where if you don't do it, then you've got a real problem.

But it doesn't happen very often because if you, you know, even great guys make mistakes, I understand that, but you pick your leaders right, you don't get into that situation very, very often. I think this is towards – I was eavesdropping on you guys talking about the coach of the year. Thanks for the vote, Foles. But I think John Tortorella is a strong, strong candidate because he has a way of doing things and he doesn't deter that. So the players trust him. They may not always like it, but they got a pretty good idea of what it's going to be like when they come to the rink every day this is the

guy we're going to get this is what he values this is what he's going to hold true and at that i think john's elite and he's been always like that so it fits very well maybe for the philadelphia flyers and john tortorella where maybe it wouldn't fit for me to do that because i haven't done it to other players there's not a lot of healthy scratches that have come out i don't know maybe i miss a meeting but if that's your rule then of healthy scratches that have come out. I don't know, maybe I miss a meeting. But if that's your rule, then that rule has to be true of everybody. We don't really have that rule here, but I've also never really had anybody late

for a meeting. We've got a rule that everybody's got my cell number. If you're going to be late, you call. If you call me two minutes before you're late for a meeting, you're late. You call me 25 minutes before you meet because your sick kid's sick, you're stuck, you get here when you can get here. Life happens. So every team has its own set of rules. And the coach has a certain bandwidth of truth that he has to stay in

for every player. But it's also not true of anything outside that. You know what? If park officers, the pizza right up the middle and they score a goal, yeah, I'm not scratching. I just find it real interesting that you started your answer with pizza right up the middle and they score a goal yeah i'm not scratching there are i just i just find it real interesting that you you started your your your answer with he's still not happy with me so what happened in in the weeks that followed the next game uh were you able to move

on or is it something that kind of hung over everyone's head i don't remember this is a while ago kipper so all i i don't know i don't i don't think that roddy a while ago, Kipper. So I don't know. I don't think that Roddy and I were warm and fuzzy with each other anyway straight through. Yeah. Okay. We won the conference together, but I don't – Yeah.

I mean, I've got this young man, and he's got an incredible young son, great human being in our organization, plays for our American League team. I love the guy. But the pressures and the competition of pro sports, sometimes two guys that might be great fishing buddies just aren't going to get along because of the way your pressure points. Everybody has a way.

And some guys are perfect for some coaches and some aren't. Roddy and I, he had gotten to a point at that year, I think he was minus 19 early in the year. We were floundering. So I scratched him. But I'm going to blame it on Jim Rutherford. That's what he did. He's in the Hall of Fame.

That's right. Mo, great stuff, man. We really appreciate your time. And, you know, you have our vote, but we're just trying to make this thing interesting for coaches. I think you guys were right on it. Rick Talkett has done an incredible job. Rick Bonus with the injuries that he'd had.

Incredible job. There's two or three teams that I think you've got to wait to see if he'll make the playoffs. I think Philly, you've just got to go back. Go back to March of last year to where the teams were and what they were like and how long the rebuild is. And then you turn them on. I'm also saying that because Philly's beat us twice,

and they played us hard. They were a heavy man game in there about a week ago, and they scored with 20 seconds left to go in the game to win it. They played a hard man's game and got a lot of respect for the way they play. We're going to let you go, man. Thanks for doing this, Mo. All the best to close out the season,

and we'll stay in touch, okay? Paul Mauriceice everybody head coach your time florida panthers wow that was awesome i think honestly this sounds like hockey geek but i think that's my favorite interview we've ever done okay he's just like he wrote down 40 things it's amazing uh just we know how he wants to coach right brutal honesty and just tell him the way it is, the way he sees it. And then he comes on an interview, does the same thing. I'm kind of really surprised. And we'll get into this after the break or we're going to do game time. I don't know what our producer wants to do.

But I want to get into this after on how honest and candid he was on benching Brendamore. That was big news for me. Yeah, you think that ties into the Couturier thing? Yeah, I do. I do. I was just, as I like to do when you mention junior hockey, I brought up the team that he played for.

Yeah. The Windsor CompuWare Spitfires. Doesn't get much more mid-80s than that. Keith Gretzky on that team. Yes. And Adam Graves as well. He's on his junior team. So there you go.

So you play against him. And they had some tough guys too. Okay. I think I fought Mo maybe. Really? Yeah, I think I did. The leading Pim. Probably shoved or something.

I don't know. The Pim getter on that team was Kevin Kerr. Kevin Kerr. 266 Pims. Buffalo Sabre. 59 games. Ex-North Bay Centennial. Brian Blatt had some Pims.

So lots of fights back then. But I thought that was pretty interesting, Kippy. So do you want to do game time here? Buffalo Sabre. X North Bay Centennial. Brian Blatt had some Pims. So lots of fights back then, but I thought that was pretty interesting, Kippy. So do you want to do game time here or do you want to go to break and then we'll come back and do everything? Let's do game time. Okay. Get it out of the way?

Get it out of the way. All right. Let me pull up my thing here. As I pull up my sheets. It's game time presented by Bet365. Visit the app for the latest odds and find out why it's never ordinary at Bet365. Must be 19 plus.

On tarot only. Please play responsibly. Now, I was trying to go on here to find the coach of the year numbers on Bet365. But at the very moment, they're not posted, which is interesting. I'm not sure they're making some additions. They just heard that interview with Paul Maurice. And they're like, wow, he's minus Paul Maurice. We're going to bump him up. And they're like, wow, he's minus 500 now,

so we got to get him up at the top. We forgot about him. But it's funny. I was looking through a lot of these futures, and there's no real races. I mean, the heart, you know, Nathan McKinnon is a minus 200 favorite now. Austin Matthews, who was the favorite. Sunk like a stone.

Plus 1,800 now. So he's way out of it what is that like in 10 days two yeah i think he's three goals in his last 11 games or something i mean the rocket richard he's still a massive favorite he's like minus 5000 to like you're not gonna make any money on that the norris trophy they seem to think that Quinn Hughes is minus 450. So it's like there's no – the Vezna, Connor Hellebuck minus 800. To bet 365, these are all set in stone. These are a lock. So not a ton of races in the standings or even in the stats here. So just looking at the games tonight, Leafs in Washington, a pretty big favorite, minus 135. I really don't have a lean on this.

I think there's two different narratives coming together here, the second half of the back-to-back. And if I'm not mistaken, didn't Washington just come off their West Coast road trip? Isn't this their first game back? Because they played Calgary, right? Yeah, they beat Calgary 5-2 on the weekend. So I think this is their first game back from a West Coast trip so you know that's a classic narrative where they teams always lay

lay an egg in that game so i'm not sure which way to lean on this but if i'm gonna do one thing uh you know how i love the the happiness hedge yeah uh i was gonna look up um um ovechkin's goals against the leafs like his numbers but i just i was like it's a lot he scored a lot of goals against the leafs throughout his career yeah owned them in fact so tonight give me an alex ovechkin goal at plus 140 just as a little bit of a happiness edge because i don't want that to happen yeah yeah okay go back to uh the mvp thing for a second. No problem. Where are you guys on Kucherov and McKinnon right now? Because it seemed like it was McKinnon's, McKinnon, and just watching Kucherov now, Tampa getting hot.

He's had 11 points, I think, in his last three games. Like, he's on fire. He's taken over the league lead. He's got 118 points, one more than McKinnon. The only thing that bothers me about Kucherov is... Everything. He's minus two, I think. Couldn't have said it better myself.

He will not. I mean... He's so good. He's so good. He's unbelievably special. But Nathan McKinnon is unbelievable. Connor McDavid chasing down the two of them from a distance. I think it's a real race.

Yeah? Yeah, I do. You could do worse than betting on not McKinnon in terms of trying to find odds. So they have the field versus Nathan McKinnon and that is plus 160. So you're betting, it's not great. You're getting McDavid and Kucherov combined.

To me, it's just I look at how good Colorado has been and how much better they're going to be. Like, they're just, they're forecasting. I just think McKinnon is the clear heart winner. What about Hellebuck? Does he have any sort of... He is not.

He is a 75 to one shot. Oh, man. Throw 10 at it. He's, like, his goals saved above expected numbers are as good as any. Like, the Carey Price heart season, like, he's getting into that category. They have a trophy for the goalies.

I know. No one wants to vote for it, but the reality might be he's the most important guy. I mean. It's like a pitcher winning MVP. Yeah. To me, it's just like. You play every fifth day.

Yeah, it doesn't. Like, Verlander, I think, is the last one to do it. They have their own ones. You know, Cy Young. Yeah. Anyways. Can't market a goal, it doesn't. Like Verlander, I think, is the last one to do it. They have their own ones. You know, Cy Young. Yeah. Anyways. Can't market a goalie. Can't.

No. Really tough to sell. But that's not what we're doing here. We're voting on the best guy. Minus 450 for Quinn Hughes to win the. That's quite a. And who's second? McCarr?

Plus 350. I believe earlier in our show that we were made fun of for having Mike Kelly on and him saying that he's going to win the Norris, and he got absolutely buried for that. And looks like he might have been right that day. It was a good call. All right. That was Game Time presented by Bet365. Visit the app for the latest odds.

Find out why it's never ordinary at Bet365. Must be 19+. Ontario only. Please play responsibly. Okay, let's take a quick break, and we'll come back with some NHL news and notes. Coyotes news floating around. Nash, the GM of Team Canada. Rick Nash.

Rick Nash. You thought I was talking about the basketball guy? I thought maybe the hockey team. Nash. Nash. And still some meat on the bone when it comes to this Tortorella situation. I'll tell you what really ticked me off after the game.

All right. What if Peter Griffin really grinds my gears? What up next? As if he didn't piss me off. He doubled down, didn't he? He doubled down on his post-game comments, and we'll get into that after the break. You know what really grinds my gears?

There it is. There you go. That and more when we return to Real Kipper and Bourne. Breaking down the top stories in the NHL every day. The Jeff Marys Show. Subscribe and download the show on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. We're back.

Nick Kiprios, Justin Bourne, Sammy McKee. So watching the Leafs crawl back in the third period against John Tortorella's captainless team last night, how many were you just sitting sitting there going for no other reason if the leafs come back and win it'll look good on a tortorella team that couldn't hold on to a lead and maybe a selkie winner could have helped i mean they ended up scoring a goal on a meltdown play by the leafs but listen they turtled and still got filled in and gave up three goals in the third period even though they didn't lose the game it still happened without couturier that they got filled in for 20 minutes lilligren banged one off the end boards from between the hash marks

with a chance to tie the game like they had multiple chances in that last minute to tie it yeah and the narrative on old torts the matrix, a few bullets there. Hey, before we move on, we were just talking to Paul Maurice, and I was looking at his HockeyDB page in the break. So his last year with the Compware Spitfires was 88. Yeah. And he was an assistant coach the next season.

The next season. In the NHL. No, no, for that same team. Oh, really? He immediately became an assistant coach. That's crazy. So how old would he have been? 22 21 not even not even you know he would have been an overage yeah 21 that's crazy i would have loved to know what his salary was as a 21 year old assistant coach in

ohl in 1988 probably 20 bucks no different than the players but he was beloved yeah and of course jimmy rutherford was a general manager of this uh windsor spitfires back then oh really they started this relationship he saw something in paul that uh give jimmy full credit turns out he was right yeah he was right this guy had a a brilliant hockey mind i forgot he was the marley's coach for a year too in the ahl a coach for 80 games anyways so you were getting pretty hot and bothered there no i'm gonna say yeah the one thing that stood out yesterday for me was that tortorella did not he made the decision to healthy scratch Couturier before the skate, so he purposefully made himself unavailable to answer any questions about that.

He ducked it. He ducked it. 100%. And then post-game. We have the clap if you want it. Okay, let's play it, and then we'll come out. As I told you, I'm putting the players out on the ice to win a particular game,

and these were the 20 that we decided to go with. Not talking on Sean. I'm not debating with you. I'm not conversing with you. It's between Sean and I. So just talk to me about the game, guys. Sean, how do you think the team responded? It has nothing to do with Sean being out. You're asking me about the team? guys. Sean, what's up? How do you think the team responded, especially? It has nothing to do with Sean Viano.

Are you asking me about the team? How did they respond in your eyes? Our team played good tonight. Audacity, getting your back up over people asking questions about you scratching your captain. Like, what did you think was going to happen? Which is the biggest storyline. Of course it is. Brooksy, if I wanted to explain it to you, I would.

It's actually disrespectful to Couturier that he thinks it's a non-story. It's an entertainment product. What do you think we're doing here? It's not like all of them coming in there and asking him about scratching Bobby Brink. Right. It's the captain of the Flyers who just was named. You might have to have a thought on that post-game. And I'm okay. I am absolutely okay with him saying that I played the guys

that I thought I could win that night. Sure. No problem at all. But why can't you mix it in with something that kind of alleviates a little bit of the pressure off the organization? To mention, listen, Sean's a great guy. He's a big part of our future, and we're going to just something. Give them something.

But that pours gasoline on the fire. And you know the media. You ducked it this morning. You ducked it last night. We're coming right back at you the next day. And not only that, we're going to go into that dressing room. We're going to ask 20 of your players. You don't want to answer that?

You are now driving me into asking the players. Now they've got to deal with it. For sure. Brian Burke has talked about going out and, like, making himself a story to take the heat off the players intentionally in some cases this is deflecting it back to the players oh and by the way your captain has said to the media that he's not real happy with his treatment lately you don't think that's relevant for the news media to wonder about your club and the worst part is that he acts

like how dare you even ask me you know like you peons you know if and listen we just heard from paul maurice talking about brenda more and making him a healthy scratch and his first words were like yeah he's still probably not happy with me and that is 100 true like they don't you don't get to recover off of this it'll always be there moving forward here i don't know i don't know how this kind of fixes itself i really don't well couturier would have to be the bigger man and say you know all right well i guess i'll just take my lumps and i'm here till 2030 and but do you want to take your lumps? Is this the way you want to go moving forward, that I'm supposed to be your captain and your representation leading this team

and clearly you have a problem with me? Yeah. Like, again, for me, this is strictly about a guy that was recently named your captain. If Couturier had an a on his jersey i've got no problem with healthy scratching him but not four weeks ago where you and your team of what your general manager maybe your president jonesy uh briere you were supposed to have collectively got together and said this is our face yeah and you were a part of that or we at least think you were a part of

that right why would you dump all over him like that and then in the post game come you can't find one good thing to say about sean couturier. One good thing. He's a good guy. He's a leader. We just got to get him on board. But in the meantime, I played the best players, and that's it. We're good. We're good. Sean's a good kid.

I like him. He's our leader. He has my backing to be the captain of the team. Did he say any of that? No. And if you expect to turn this franchise around and win playoff games in the years ahead, he's going to be the core of what you're doing.

You want him to get going and playing well. And it seems like this just added to the pressure. Like he's talking about, oh, he hasn't played well over the past, you know, or other people have mentioned that he hasn't played well over the past month. That's right when he was named captain. Maybe he's feeling pressure and maybe he doesn't played well over the past month. That's right when he was named captain. Maybe he's feeling pressure,

and maybe he doesn't need the pressure doubled on him. Maybe Tortorella didn't want him as captain. How about that? Well, that's the impression you get, isn't it? How can you not have that impression? How can you not be led to that conclusion that maybe Tortorella doesn't really think that you're a captain here? So, for me, making him a healthy scratch

just isn't a reflection on his play. It's a reflection on maybe you and people around you made the wrong decision making this guy captain. It's funny because he could have, by speaking about this and explaining it, you could make sense of it and saying, look, he's having a tough go. We feel like he needed a rest, but, you know, he's obviously such a big part of our club.

We're going to see if we can get one for him tonight and let him watch from up above. He'll be ready to go the next night and back in, and off we go. Do they need a captain, by the way, at this stage of their development? Next question, will they do a win and you're in type of thing and leave him out of the lineup for another game after beating the Leafs? I cannot see Keith Jones and Daniel Breer going, we're healthy scratching our captain another game.

Good on that. We have more healthy scratch news. Okay. TJ Brody will be a healthy scratch tonight. Oh, good call. As Connor Timmons comes in. Yeah. Ryan Reeves is an eye injury

and Noah Greger will also play in his place. So Labushkin's still sick. Timmons comes in. Yeah. Ryan Reeves is an eye injury, and Noah Greger will also play in his place. So Labushkin's still sick. Timmons coming in. Yeah. I said it two weeks ago. Yeah. That he was not trending for me, Brody. So I'm surprised, but good on them.

Yeah. Right? Good on them. It's the right decision. He's really been struggling in this. And I'm curious to see if Keefe comes out and says, hey, we need this guy going. This is about, you know, helping him, not, you know, the team necessarily.

What did you think of the fight between Ryan Reeves and Nick Deloria? Had nothing to do with the hockey game. Was not momentum. They arranged, just got nothing. It was pointless. I'm with game. It was not momentum. They arranged. It just got nothing. It was pointless. I'm with you. I'm with you. It didn't, it just didn't fit.

It just didn't fit. It was a fight from 10 years ago where two guys planned to fight off the face off. You go, if you guys are done, we're still playing a hockey game over here. We're good. We can play again. Okay. Yeah. So very similar to what happened with Rempe, too,

and we all liked that one. No, the Rempe one was like. Which Rempe fight? The Reeves-Rempe. Yeah, it was a new guy in town establishing himself in the league, trying to take on all the heavies. You knocked Labushkin out of the game. Yeah, yeah.

Taking runs. To me, I didn't like the timing of it either, you know, from Ryan Ree reeves perspective because i'm late it's too late and we've had this conversation before that i'm i'm supposed to be the x factor i'm supposed to stop you from running our players so you get to you get to pick and choose but you know what bothered me last night on the on the telecast last night was them just cutting deals in the background of one of the reporters on TSN. Yeah, or they're just like, okay, whenever you want to do it.

And then you got the sense that Reeves is like, let's just get out of the way right away. Let's just do this thing we're going to do, which to me makes it so clearly separate from sticking up for people. And it was a bad fight. Sorry, he got poked in the eye. Got a fall in the eye or something. It was a bad fight.

It needs to be more around the game and the emotional element of the game. Reeves had been playing a more impactful brand of hockey for the Leafs. I don't hate the idea that he wants to fight for the Leafs, but that one didn't make sense. So, yeah, if you're just joining us, healthy scratch TJ Brody tonight, which is a big deal for the Leafs. All right. You guys surprised Rick Nash,

named general manager of Canada's men's team for the world championship? That one kind of caught me off guard a little bit. Does it feel like maybe some experience for him before becoming GM of the Columbus Blue Jackets? I've said this all along that that's not the job you want Rick CBJ yes why not because you want the president of hockey ops you want the one above it you want to name requires some experience to just be a president no no well if you have if you have the right person guiding you, if you have good experience around you, I think at this stage you can do it.

Let's have a frank and honest talk about the role of NHL GM and how it has been usurped by President, by Gorton, by Rutherford, by Dubas. You know, this President title is now the person calling the shots to me they used to be a more business focused role right they worried about selling tickets and you know uh pr and marketing and all now it's like is the gm making the decisions about personnel or is the president president well he has final, he has final say. He's got to stamp all the decisions. It's collaborative. Which kind of loops us around on Brandon Shanahan then.

Does it not? Sure. If he's been here for eight years or whatever, is he the guy making decisions? Did we not learn a lot, though, just it's always about the western canada just like you guys are having to talk about rick natch no it's talking about alvin came in that first year and we're like jimmy rutherford's the man yes well right the same with kenny kent hughes in montreal it's like yeah but i mean gorton going to make the decisions, you know, until he's established or whatever.

And now, is it Jeff Jackson in Edmonton? Is he going to be president and GM? I would imagine that they'd have a new general manager. Everything points to the direction that this will be Ken Holland's last year. I don't know if a Stanley Cup changes that, if he even wants it. If he wants to continue, we do know that his contract's up, if I'm not mistaken. Is it his son that would be kind of next in line? Is that?

I don't know. He's not a king, I recognize. I don't know. I'm not sure. Yeah, maybe he'd be in the running. Well, Brad. Rick Nash played a lot for Team Canada. I don't know. I'm not sure. Yeah, maybe he'd be in the running. Brad? Rick Nash played a lot for Team Canada. Was a great player for Team Canada.

You should be the GM. He was a two-time gold medalist. Scored my favorite goal in hockey history against Russia. He can come in there. You've never watched a Team Canada game in your life. He could go into Columbus and help and help them though for sure just be just his history alone and he's a good guy and he's wants to learn and he's a hard worker he's fresh he's they could do a lot worse than rick nash in a in a in a in a big position but like i said make sure who's around him

who's got the experience who can guide him yes i do i feel like you need some experience you can't just throw a guy in that role uh jets boys jets beat the rangers how about shifley shifley's breakaway goal where it's like he gives it the look behind. He knows how much time he has, and then he just shoots it right in the net. I thought it was a fantastic goal. A little bit of deception, like he's going to do something that's a little more slow or whatever. He just fires it. Love that.

Really good. Jets can win the cup, boys. Jets. I told you that the other day. Our off-air show is more and more believing in the Winnipeg Jets, which is encouraging. And Toffoli is sneaky good pickup. Oh, yeah.

Oh, man. He really changes the look of that group. And I said this on the air the other day, just the way they can move guys up and down the lineup, like Nemesnikov. Love Ehlers. Every line he's on is suddenly super effective. They are at 93 points first in the

central you know that would mean right now oh you don't want to face vegas but uh oh are you sure canox they probably played nashville they should want to face vegas and what's going on there they can't get a save thumped up they can't get a save their goal tenings and killing them they're not gonna miss the playoffs are they well the wild are now ahead of the blues i think there are three games three points back of them now three points back of vegas come on wild do it doing non-game time on uh i was just looking at the odds on bet365 for the jets to win the cup they're 12 to 1 they're behind vegas dallas boston vancouver florida rangers Carolina, Colorado, Edmonton. They're behind all those teams.

To me, 12-1 is decent value for the Jets. Buddy, Connor Hellebuck. Yeah, man. He's having a prime season. Maybe the best he'll ever have. Vegas could miss the playoffs here, boys. They're not. God, it'd be so sweet, wouldn't it?

Do you think, like, everybody wants to see them miss? Everybody. I don't. Everybody. I don't. I don't either. Why not? Because they're, like, having them Everybody. I don't. I don't either. Why not? Because they're like having them in there now.

Like they've established themselves. Maybe they're in a radio show. Fans don't. And they've got like big brass ones. Yeah. That's why. I agree. That's why I like them.

Because they go out there and they say, I'm not playing it safe. Right. They're saying, we will blow through the laws and the rules of the sport. What rules? Did they break JB? We're doing the thing where we the laws and the rules of the sport. What rules did they break, JB? We're doing the thing where we pretend they've done nothing wrong. Yes, we are. Give me factual evidence.

Yeah, you got like a PI working on Mark Stone. Chopping wood in his backyard or something 100% healthy. Go hide in the bushes and get something on Mark Stone. But he found the Minnesota Wild. That's what I'm doing right now. P.I.'s all over there. They've been just swinging since day one. What's that?

Since day one. They're franchised. They've swung for the fences. They've traded first-round picks. Think of the guys they brought in. Stone, Eichel, Petrangelo, Hannafin. They just bring in superstars. And I will say I am half-ar half arguing just to argue because I love that.

You know, I recognize elite talent wins you games. I hate that Seattle Kraken were like, maybe we can, like, middling players in analytics and defense. How about Benstrom? Yeah. You know, like, I hate that. To be fair to Ron Francis, everybody, like, George McPhee just absolutely rinsed everybody. And now they're like, you're not pulling a George McPhee on me.

Yeah. No, you got way harder for Seattle. For sure. Anaheim gave up a first and Theodore to protect someone else. I know. And that. Yes. Oh, my God.

Go look back at some of the names that Anaheim could have kept on their blue line. I know. Like Theodore, like Lindholm. Anaheim's blue line like three years ago was Josh Manson, Theodore, Cam Fowler. They were stacked. Hamptons, Lindholm.

Lindholm. They were stacked. How did they end up with nothing out of that? I don't know. Mickey Mouse might have had something to do with it. Isn't there Disneyland? I think so. I think it was Mickey Mouse that did it.

Who named what Ducks defenseman? Cam Fowler. Jamie Drysdale. Wait. No. He got your check. They were stacked. Anyways.

Yeah. Do we care about Coyotes? Gary Bettman saying they're in a holding pattern for year number 24. Now that you're in Montarina, folks, you heard it here first. Is it too late now? No one's talking Salt Lake City now next year. Well, Bill Daly said that they're going to let Arizona participate in this auction. And if they don't get the land, it seems like it's too late to pivot at that point to go to Salt Lake City.

The Jets went from Atlanta to Winnipeg in May. Is it like an auction, like the one I see on the show Hoarders? I don't know. Imagine losing this auction, though. What is it? It was Storage Wars. Storage Wars. Which is an electric show.

I love that show. Imagine there's a lot of that happening in Arizona. Who's got $1,000 for a mullet arena? Move them. All right. Our thanks to our head coach, Paul Maurice, who was absolutely fantastic. If you're just joining us, download that.

It was something. And who did we talk about in the first hour? Alan May. All right. Just three games on tap. Enjoy it. And we're back tomorrow on Real Kipper and Bourne.