The Sheet with Jeff Marek - Land of the Gold ft. Pierre McGuire

Episode Date: January 6, 2025

Jeff Marek is joined by Pierre McGuire to recap the USA winning gold at the WJC again, OHL socials team taunting Hockey Canada, phone's falling out of hockey pants on the ice, Ovechkin's stick, Max Domi's fine, and much more...SHOW INDEX(00:00) Intro(05:50) Hockey Canada(11:30) Ovechkin’s Stick(18:29) Pierre McGuire(48:48) Rapid Fire Closing ThoughtsReach out to [e-mail] to connect with our Sales Team and discuss opportunities to partner with us!If you liked this, check out:🚨 OTT - Coming in Hot Sens | https://www.youtube.com/c/thewallyandmethotshow🚨 TOR - LeafsNation | https://www.youtube.com/@theleafsnation401🚨 EDM - OilersNation | https://www.youtube.com/@Oilersnationdotcom🚨 VAN - CanucksArmy | https://www.youtube.com/@Canucks_Army🚨 CGY - FlamesNation | https://www.youtube.com/@Flames_Nation🚨 Daily Faceoff Fantasy & Betting | www.youtube.com/@DFOFantasyandBetting____________________________________________________________________________________________Connect with us on ⬇️Link Tree: https://linktr.ee/daily_faceoff💻 Website: https://www.dailyfaceoff.com🐦 Follow on twitter: https://x.com/DailyFaceoff💻 Follow on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dailyfaceoffDaily Faceoff Merch:https://nationgear.ca/collections/daily-faceoff Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Let's start off with a fun fact today. Kick off the week here on the sheet. On my daily face off fantasy Twitter feed, XFeed, at DFO fantasy, Eric Halla is expected to be out week to week with an ankle sprain. New Jersey's facing Seattle tonight, more on that later on. Eric Holla may have the coolest nickname in the NHL. You know as we always bemoan the fact that nobody has cool nicknames anymore around the NHL, Eric Holla may have the best. I'm curious to see how Zach Phillips feels about this one. Eric Holla's nickname?

Zach? I don't know. Eric Halla's nickname, Zach, I don't know if he came up with it or if someone came up with it and it just stuck. Eric Halla's nickname is Halla Famer. That is good, that's a good nickname. That is a Hall of Fame nickname. That is a Hall of Fame nickname. Nothing's gonna compete with the old days, you know,

George Vesna, the Chacudemy, Cucumber, etc., Pembroke, Peach, all those types of things. Like those are in a category all on their own. Those are separate. But in the era now where you just add an EY to someone's name, I do like the Hall of Fame. I mean, because it stands out that much more. Yeah.

Okay. That's like mine. They just throw a Y. I cut my middle name or my last name in half and threw a Y at the end. So Phillips, Jeff, Billy. I was like Jeff. Yet what do you get? You get Zachy. What do you get? No, I get Philly. Philly is what I get. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Anyone whose last name is Campbell gets. Supe. Yeah. Always. gets... Soupy. Yeah. Always.

Hey Cassie. Anyone who's out there, like who's had that nickname. Anyhow, not the most important thing today at all, but I do want to let you know a couple of things. One, Pierre Maguire is going to be stopping by here in about 15 minutes. There's a lot to get to with Pierre, both NHL and perhaps more pacifically, Zach, as we say in the Atlantic. To be Pacific, as we say in the Atlantic.

Who says that? People, old timers, I don't know. To be more pacific as we say in the Atlantic, Zach, we'll talk about the World Juniors with him and congratulations to USA. It was a fun game as well. Fins keep your chins up. That was a heck of a game, although you might want to learn how to play in the three on three because it really became apparent that the United States knew how to play three on three and Finland might have just that the United States knew how to play three on three and Finland might have just been kind of making it up as they went along But nonetheless, yeah

Congratulations, like look as I said on Twitter X last night Zach like the best team won Like not my emotional favorite my emotional favorite in the tournament was Latvia Like I wanted Latvia to pull off like a Latvian miracle on ice in Ottawa I wanted Latvia to pull off like a Latvian miracle on ice in Ottawa. Like after that, in against Canada. Did you not want the same thing? You couldn't help but cheer for Latvia. But as far as like the best team, the Americans were it. Like United States, like full compliments, full marks.

Although, I'll tell you one thing. So talking to Colby Cohen right before I came on the air here with you, and Colby brought up an interesting point. Because I missed the morning Cup of hockey today because you and I had a meeting and so I missed the coffee boys and I kind of said like I'm gonna listen to the pod when I take my kid to practice later on today. I said is it going to be 60 minutes of a victory lap and he said nah like we're all happy for USA and gold medal and that's all great. But he said like, you want to beat Canada in the final. Like you want it, like as an American, like that's who you want to beat.

Finland is great and the gold medal is awesome and Cole Hudson, what a tournament. Ryan Leonard, although he should be playing in the NHL right now, great dominant tournament for Ryan Leonard. Spencer Carberry had some nice things to say about him coming up in a couple of seconds. We'll play that coming up for you.

But he said like, look, you want to beat Canada in the final. And it got me to think, you know, the one thing that popped to memory for me right away as he was saying that, like, you don't just want to win gold. You want to slay dragons along the way. When the Washington Capitals won the Stanley Cup, you know what was most important? I mean, other than obviously winning the Cup itself and Overhaving his swim in the fountains, etc in Vegas The most important thing along the way was beating the Pittsburgh Penguins

Yeah, they needed to beat the Penguins en route to winning the Stanley Cup Just like if a team like the Ottawa Senators wins the Stanley Cup, you gotta beat Toronto on the way You gotta beat the Maple Leafs along the way. You know what I'm getting at there, Zach? They have a thought or two on that one. I really believe that along the way you gotta slay the Dragons and at the end you want to beat the one big Dragon and set up like a video game. I am so glad you said this because I've been dealing and battling with people who are like, like I do agree that where you finish in the standings and who you play in the rounds matters and you would prefer an easier matchup. But at this point as a Leafs fan, I'm like, I don't care.

You got to beat the best teams. Give me Boston. Give me Tampa. Give me Florida. Like, let's run through these teams. Like getting over that hump is something that could propel you to the next one. Yes, Tampa was a great one for the Leafs. Give us Boston.

Let's take down the Bruins. Like, I'm not going to do the whole we want Florida thing here with we want Boston, but it for the Leafs. Give us Boston, let's take down the Bruins. Like, I'm not gonna do the whole we want Florida thing here with we want Boston. But it's the same concept, right? That's what I want. I want to beat the best teams. If you're the best team, you beat the best teams. Yeah.

Okay, so here's how today's show is gonna go. Pierre McGuire is gonna stop by in about 10 minutes time. Like, full admission here. My day, my weekend has been pretty scrambling. I had a close family friend pass away who was at the viewing this afternoon. I'm into the show, I'm right there with you. Don't worry, I'm paying attention to everything,

but I kinda had one of those weekends, eyes on, eyes off. So it's gonna be a little bit scrambly. Today, we're gonna try to bring you as good as possible a show as we can. So essentially, I'm just gonna sort of turn this over to you, Zach, and just say, fire away. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, one thing, one thing that I had, I wanted to get to this.

So texting with a good buddy, Anton Thun, former agent, Cortex M5, we're texting back and forth about, because everybody in Canada, I wrote about it in the blog, everyone's, and we'll talk to Pierre about it, what's next for Hockey Canada, what's next for this program, and I thought Catherine Henderson was rightfully pointed out, like look, U17, U18,

Clink Gagretzky, all wonderful in Canada, still on top there, the women are still on top, the U18's going on right now, Chloe looks fantastic, and Para, it's, you know, Canada is number one. But the thing about the world of juniors is why Canada needs to get it right at this level. This tournament specifically means so much financially to a lot of the other hockey Canada programs. Like after 2018, when all the sponsors pulled out, or the Lions share of sponsors all pulled out,

you know who that hurt more than anyone else? The women. Because a lot of those programs were floated by the money that the World Junior Hockey Championships makes for Hockey Canada. So this is now the sponsors have all come back, but it's been two flame outs in a row. This one on home ice, so this one really stings.

And that's why you need to get this tournament right if you're Hockey Canada, because a lot of the financial success at this tournament helps a lot of the other programs. Okay, park that for a second. As everybody tries to figure out what's gone wrong, sky is falling, chicken little symposium, all these types of things.

So Anton and I are texting and he's like, yeah, I said like, oh, can I read this out? Because I think this is a really thoughtful text from Anton. So I'm curious your thoughts on this one. I bounced it off Colby a couple of seconds ago before the show and I seem to have found an audience there with him. We'll see if I find an audience with you and with everyone in the chat and everyone listening or watching.

Thought of the day, like Anton makes things big, thought of the day. When Canada was so much better and deeper than other countries at junior hockey, it didn't matter where they competed. Today's Canadian juniors are not battle tested enough. The U-20 cohort plays against younger competition and dominates. See Makenna Marton meets at the top of the scoring. Most other leading nation's players are playing against older, stronger players in their home leagues.

That matters when talent is equal or close to it. This element may change if Canada's best 19 and 20 year olds switch to NCAA schools." You know, I think that's a really interesting point. Like you look at someone like Easton Cowan, okay? Maple Leafs prospect, so this is gonna hit you where you live. Make a lot about, you know, the 50 game point streak, 53 game point streak. You know what that's an indication of? His development now is linear. Whereas you look at all, like you look at the kids from the United States, right? They're playing college hockey and they're playing against older, bigger, stronger competition.

And you look at, you know, that Czechia Sweden game. How many of those players play pro hockey in Europe? Half? Yeah. Maybe more? Like they're playing against competition that is pushing them and their development is growing. You look at the lion's share of the 19-year-olds

playing for Team Canada and they play in the CHL where they're playing against certainly other 19-year-olds. They're also playing against 16-year-olds and 17-year-olds. They get a certain point, the development becomes linear. And I'll use Easton Cowan because we're celebrating this point scoring streak, but perhaps that point scoring streak is indicating, and maybe we saw this at the World Juniors,

a deeper problem, which is the development now, I don't wanna say it's stopped, but has at least slowed down, where other teams and other players are competing against higher competition and being more, in Anton's words, battle tested. Does that find a home with you? Yeah, 100%.

It's one thing, you actually said it, I was looking back on it, you said it when you did the announcement that you were joining the Nation Network on the Leafs Morning Take Show, talking about Easton Cowan and where would he be this year? And I was listening to both Rosie and Nick's thoughts about it. Yeah. And it was college and you said college and Nick's point was kind of, okay, now you go past, you're at this, you're too good for

the OHL, right? You're too good for the CHL. You can't go to the AHL because of the way the rules are set up right now. So you're just stuck. And I look at these Canadian players, a lot of them who are like the creme de la creme at the top, they hit this point where it's kind of now, where do we go? Like now what? I've put up, a lot of these guys are probably going to put up the same points, Jeff, as they did last year. And does that mean they didn't like their? It's just a weird place to be because how much better can you get? How many more points can you score? How much more mature can you be? There needs to be kind

of that middle ground. And I think that NCAA is going to make this really interesting. I think so too. We'll pick this up with Pierre Maguire coming up in a couple of moments. Pierre is gonna be aboard in about five minutes time here. Anything else you wanna throw at me before we get to Pierre? I know we have a sort of laundry list

of things we wanna get to and honestly folks, I can honestly say we really try. But I know we get sidetracked, we go to like different streets all the time on the- We've got a lot of stuff. We really try to get it all in every day. So what else do we wanna get in today, Zach? Let me prioritize this one here.

Let's go with you. You said you were back and forth this weekend. Well, there was one thing you noticed that I've never noticed. And then I went through the Washington capitals, social media accounts, and I've done my own Zapruder films on this. I don't know if you have noticed Alex Ovechkin has a yes no branded stick and yes I mean this has no audio I'll play this for people like I literally cut this clip shot this down like look look at this comes in the. I rewind this thing looking black stick.

No branding on the stick. No, nothing, nothing. Why is he using a blank stick? Like what is, I thought this guy's been a CCM guy for the entire time. He switched over to Bauer briefly, went back to CCM. Yes. And nothing. That's correct, 100% right.

Cause he started CCM, went to Bauer, and then back to CCM. Sticks change every year. It seems to me that Alex Ovechkin, who's poised to break the greatest goal scoring record of all time, is going to do it without a branded stick. So it's not going to be a Bauer stick, it's not going to be a CCM stick, it's not gonna be a Bauer stick. It's not gonna be a CCM stick. It's not gonna say anything on it. It's gonna, and part of me really likes that,

that it's just gonna be like this, I don't know, kind of like a crowbar. You can say a crowbar. That is using to score all these goals. And he obviously has found, he has obviously found a stick that meets all the specifications of what he wants in it. All the way up from the toe to the top of the stick. He's found one. And I'm guessing he's having this made on his own outside of the majors.

And he likes it and it's working for him. It works for his game, where he's at right now, his age, how he plays, how he wants to shoot, how he wants to play. But as of right now, he is going to break this record. And the stick that goes into the hockey hall of fame, breaking Gretzky's record is going to be an unbranded stick. It's not going to be one of the majors at all. Now branding in hockey has always been kind of interesting to say the least.

My favorite branding story was, I wanna say this would have been, I'm gonna throw a dart and say 95. This was Grant Fuhrer then playing with the St. Louis Blues. Rich Winter would have been the agent, and Winter had a deal cooked up with his client, Grant Feuer, with Pepsi, the cola company. And they had, I gotta find a, I gotta find this,

had a deal with Pepsi, and they wanted to paint and design Grand Fierce Pads to look like Pepsi cans. And the NHL said, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, no chance, not going to happen. Like players just can't go out and start selling sponsorships on their own. Like everything that happens during a game, anything that any logo that's presented has to go through the National Hockey League. To the point where I can recall when Pyotr Kachetkov first started with the Carolina Hurricanes. You can see there's plenty of pictures of this. Watching his first game, like he's got black tape all over his like pads and blocker and catcher and all that and I investigated and it turns out that it was because it was made from a manufacturer that didn't have an agreement

or any type of deal with the NHL. I think it might've been a Russian manufacturer, Zach. I'm just doing this off the top of my head. And so they had to put like black, black stick tape, black stick tape, blocker catcher, and on his pads as well. I think this is, this is a case where he's having these sticks made by himself. He's having these sticks made on his own. And that's why it's going in unbranded whenever he breaks this record.

And now he is 23 games away. The Washington capitals face off against the Buffalo Sabres tonight. I can see you're furiously trying to find Kachetkov cause it was like all white pads, white gloves as well. Um, and that's, I think that's where we're at with Alexander Ovechkin. And we'll see what happens tonight. Buffalo's lost three games in a row.

Alexander Ovechkin remains hot, he keeps on scoring, scored another goal on Saturday as the Washington Capitals beat their foes, the New York Rangers. So we'll see. But he's found a stick that meets his specifications. He's gonna break the record with an unbranded stick. For me, I think the crowbar is a cool look.

I think it's pretty fantastic. I think it's cool. And I think it's really cool too. In the days where right now, the world that we live in, there's branding everywhere and in our heaven, the clouds have billboards on them. I think it's kind of cool that we're, Ovechkin's gonna do this with a blank black stick,

which looks mean. I dig it. I do agree. I dig it. Spencer Rue in the chat there says, CCM ghost model is all black now. Now, I know. CCM stick. Yeah, I know what he's is all black now. And now it's not a CCM stick. I know. CCM stick. Yeah. I know what he's talking about. It's not.

It's not that stick. I looked at this. I thought the ghost was all white. Wasn't the ghost all white? There's a, there's an all black one here as well. I'm pretty sure now. But, uh, yeah, I, I, it's not that I recently had to buy a stick anyway. So I have seen all of these, unfortunately, had to buy a stick., so I have seen all of these unfortunately had to buy a stick I have to give up your first firstborn male Yeah, pretty much. It basically haunted around Say hockey life open up a vanes

Yeah, purely that's pretty much okay, actually, you know what like we've got Pierre waiting here So I don't want to keep But I'll just tell you this I went into the store to get skates, and I was like putting off getting a stick I knew my stick was gonna break. I went in I picked up a stick I was like oh, this is looks like like not the highest-end model. I grabbed in it was like $298 like wow really thankful they held off that extra $2. Great, thanks guys. What the hell are you doing?

Are you the guy in men's league that won't take slapshots because he doesn't want to break the stick? Are you that guy? Well, I don't want to hit anybody, but I don't want to be doing that to people. But yes, I didn't want to break my sticks anyways. But yeah, I looked and I was like, what are we doing? Why? What is this?

Anyways, yes, that's what happened. All right, let's bring, let's bring Pierre McGuire aboard. We have a lot of things to get to with the NHL. We'll talk about branded equipment. We'll talk about Alexander Ovechkin. We'll talk about the games. We'll talk about the World Junior Hockey Championships with our good friend Pierre McGuire. Hello, Pierre. How are you, bud? I'm Jeff. I'm fantastic. That was so good. You and Zach were outstanding. So let me, okay, so let me ask you, so your thoughts on this one. So it seems as if this Gretzky record is going to be broken with an unbranded stick.

And I know that in the era we live in where everything is branded slash over branded, here comes Alexander Ovechkin with, as I call it, his crowbar. And it's just all black, nasty looking stick. You know, I was telling the story about Rich Winter and Grant Feuer back in 95 with the Pepsi Can. You remember, Pia, like the deal that Rich Winter had cooked up for the Pepsi Can pads for Grant Feuer, etc. I'm sure you've come across a million stories like this. But although it may be a goofy topic, do you have a thought on the greatest goal scoring record,

maybe the biggest individual record of all time is going to be broken with an unbranded hockey stick? That's a little different. That was a good pickup by Zach and you, by the way, but the one thing that's interesting, when you score a goal, you have CCM gloves on if you're Alexander Ovechkin, you got CCM skates on,

which you can see clearly in the picture. And I'm only asking the question because I don't know the answer. But I'm wondering if when you get within three to five, if all of a sudden, goals of Gretzky's record, if all of a sudden the branding doesn't appear. So you think he might be holding out to the very end waiting for the best deal and then, hey hey I'm a couple of goals away. Who's gonna be the

first company to the trough on this one? Yeah I'm just wondering I don't know that but I got to tell you a quick story about Brandon. Sure. So I'm doing a Minnesota Anaheim playoff game way back in the early 2000s. 203. And a player from Minnesota breaks his stick and I lose it. And I say these sticks stink. And Niedermeyer goes in for Anaheim and scores a shorthand of goal. So I don't think much of it. And then I realized that a good friend of mine from Montreal, Matt O'Toole, is the president of Reebok, which owns the stick company. So I get up and look at my, back then it was a Blackberry. I look at my Blackberry and I'm like, uh-oh.

So I, hi Matt, it's Jerry. What's up? Can we meet when you get back to Montreal? I'm like, yeah, we can. And yeah, no, I apologized and we moved forward, but I can tell you, like, people do pay attention to the branding and they do pay attention to what you say about it. There's no question about it. See, one of the things that interests me is when Ovechkin breaks this record, like, that stick's going into the hockey hall of fame. 100%. And we're used to seeing, geez, like Northland sticks and Titan sticks and like all kinds

of Easton with Kretzky, like we're seeing all kinds of sticks and there's going to be this crowbar that sits there with Ovechkin whenever he does it, however he does it, that just, it's going to be unique because it's going to sit there as it is right now. Like, listen, I'm with you, part of me is just like, okay, let's see what happens when it gets close if all of a sudden, whoop, there becomes a label that appears. But as it stands right now, that thing's going in there without branding. Okay, that's a sidebar.

I wanna get your thoughts on a couple of things. Team USA, Team Canada, before we get to those teams, I want to ask you about David Carl. So who's been wildly successful? Listen, national championships, gold medals. I understand that when you have a job like he has right now at the University of Denver, if you want it, it's a job for life. But, at the University of Denver. If you want it, it's a job for life. But like how much longer, and maybe it already has happened where he's been close to making the jump to the NHL, how much longer is the NHL not going to have David Karl in it? Do you think?

Oh, I would imagine at the end of this year, there's going to be some significant soul searching done by him and his family. I thought he was probably going to look at two or three jobs last offseason, Jeff, to be fair. I watched his team play at times. I probably watched all their games. I even watched their games this week when he wasn't there when they played against University of Maine this weekend. In the two-game set, both games ended two to one. One time was won by Denver, one time was won by Maine. But the truth is that he's NHL ready. I've watched him run his bench both at the college level and the world junior level.

I've talked to players that have played for him, talked to coaches that have coached against him. I've watched him myself and he's ready to go coach in the NHL. There's no question in my mind. Team USA, congratulations, gold medal. Full of value. They're the best team of the tournament, hands down. There were some great stories along the way.

Latvia was an absolutely wonderful story. Very happy about Czechia as well. Disappointed again with Sweden and we'll park Canada here for a second. When you look at Team USA, and this is back to back gold and wonderful that program is a number of players that are still going to come back and make it a great event next year in Minnesota. How many players, because I think we all looked at Ryan Leonard and said, how come you're not in Washington? When you

look at players on that United States team right now, how many do you look at and say, this guy should either be playing in the NHL right now or is like right there and real close to playing in the National Hockey League? I bet you Peter Labille Lepp would like to have, you know, a pro. Yeah. Yeah. I think you need to have Gabe Perot right now. Zev Boyam is somebody that I've watched for a long time. I got to think the Minnesota Wild as soon as Denver's season is over and if Minnesota's still playing, I got to think there's going to be a uniform for him in Minnesota. I think Danny Nelson's a guy that's going to get a legitimate opportunity with the New York Alms. That's just a couple off the top of my head. Fortescue's a guy that I think's probably got some development time still.

Munition's still got a time, or Minetian, depending on how you want to pronounce it. He's probably got some developmental time at Boston College still, but he had a tremendous tournament. Teddy Stieg is a kid that I know very well. When my son left Belmont Hill to go play in Penticton, Teddy Stieg came in and took his position on that team. So that's another player that I know well.

I gotta think he's got development time left at Boston College, he's a Nashville pick. So I'd say there's a good number of them that are going to play in the pros. I think that Leonard and Perot and, and Boyan are probably the three that have the best opportunity at the end of this year to go and play. Um, I want to ask you about, uh, Cole Iserman. So he goes 20th overall to the New York Islanders. Uh, I think we're looking at that right now and saying, well, the Islanders stole one at 20. You know, players at the draft are so fast,

sometimes we can over scout them, pick apart little things. Like I know the boots aren't there for Cole Iserman, but then I look at this and I say, you know what, the hardest thing to do in hockey is score goals and this guy does it like breaking sticks. Quick thought on his tournament and the future of Cole Iserman. And did the Allenders rob the bank without wearing a mask? I don't know if they robbed the bank because I think Montreal was in the discussion too.

I think they thought long and hard because remember, Cole Iserman was supposed to go to Boston University and to play with Macklin celebrating. Macklin obviously turned pro in first overall. And so the rest is history. But with Cole, you made a really good point. There's a Corey Perry element to his game in terms of how he shoots the puck, how he establishes offensive zone presence. He's not the fastest player in the world,

but he finds a way to get open pretty quick. I respect players like that. So I think they did get a real good player. Obviously they put Oliver Wallstrom on waivers. I don't know if that was maybe down the road, open up an opportunity for him to come and play and talk about Iserman, but I still think there's development time left for him.

But he was a 13th forward through most of the world junior. But here's what I'd say about it, Jeff. His ability to score in a power play, he's a left-hand shot usually plays on the right side That's it. That's a lethal shot that he has and I've seen him play so many times I mean, it's already NHL level shooting. It's just now just refining his game and figuring out so he's not Completely haphazard defensively. Okay. Let me get to Canada here with you one of the conversations I was having over the weekend, and I read out a text, Anton Thun,

the former agent with Cortex and M5 and I were having a text exchange, talking about development, different programs and all that. One of the things we're talking about is, if you look at a lot of the European players at this tournament, right? So they all come from pro leagues, the lion's share of them come, they play pro leagues.

And you look at the kids on the gold medalists, for example, and they play against older, stronger, bigger competition as well. Battle tested every single game. And one of the points we sort of came to is, you know, at a certain point in the CHL for a lot of these kids, certainly the 19 year olds, the development kind of gets linear. It's not always going up because

sure you're playing against other 19 year olds but you're also playing against sometimes 16, certainly 17, and most often 18 year old players. And you wonder if that is doing those players a disservice. Now a lot of these players, you know, eventually, unless they have NHL contracts, will find their way into Division 1 and that may change some of these things. But as we look at, you know, two quarterfinal flameouts for Canada and everybody is auditing, you know, what's next and what the development path is going to look at, do we look at the CHL here? I know we've talked a lot about, you know, Easton Cowan and the point streak, etc. It's remarkable. You can look at it cynically and say,

well, there's nothing left for him to do. Like, is he not developing any longer? Does he need higher competition to push him? Like we see with the American kids, like we see with the Europeans. You have a thought on the Canadian Hockey League as a developmental model for 19 year olds specifically and has the rest of the world caught up because they're pushing their kids.

Like you see these kids play pro in Sweden and they may not be putting up points and then they play in this tournament and they look like Peter Forsberg when he put up 31 points. Like you know what I'm getting at here and it's a long winded question here but like is there an issue with the development model now all of a sudden with Canada? Are kids being pushed enough? I'm gonna take you back from 1998 till 2003.

Okay. Canada, no medals, no medals, no medals. Then 02, silver, 03, silver, 04, silver. Bob Nicholson's in charge of Hockey Canada, Jeff. Bob, I was there. I was broadcasting the games for TSN with Gordon Miller. And I'll never forget after the loss in Helsinki, he was no more messing around from Bob. He was no more messing around. And he went straight, we're going outside of the family and we're going to bring in Brent Sutter. And he's going to be able to pick his staff. And I don't

care where the guys come from. If Brett's comfortable with them, I'll be comfortable with them. And what happens is we have the nuclear winner in the NHL and all those kids from the 03 draft. So whether it's the on for now, Shay Weber, it doesn't have Patrice Bergeron, doesn't matter. You know who I'm talking about. All those kids, Mike Richards, Jeff Carter, Ryan Getslap, they all come to Team Canada and they're getting coached by a guy that is tough as nails. And so there's no more messing around. That's probably the best World Junior Team Canada ever sent and they do really well.

Then they bring Brett Brent for another year in 06 with a team that had no expectation of winning at all, but it's led by a young guy by the name of Jonathan Taves who chooses not to go into the Western Hockey League, but choose to go the University of North Dakota from Shattuck St. Mary's. It works out pretty well too. Brent had an assistant named Craig Hartsburg, and then Hartsburg goes and wins in the Cane or the Taves and Price World Junior in Lexan, Sweden in 2007. And Hartsburg goes back to part of Beats in the Czech Republic in 2008 and wins with that great team with, you know, Stephen Stamkos and Claude Giroud.

You know, the list goes on. I mean, it was crazy. Murderous row of players. Brad Marchand was on that team. I mean, it just, you can go Drew Doughty was on that team. It was crazy. But Hartzberg was a coach again. And then they say, Bob Nicholson says, you know what?

I'm going to take it one step further for Ottawa. I'm not messing around. Brings in Pat Quinn. Pat Quinn coached the World Junior in O-Night. That's the last, they win the gold. So my point on all of this is they win five straight gold medals after not winning any gold medals from 98 to 2004. Zero gold medals.

And it all came down to no more politics, no more playing around. We're going to get the best players. Doesn't matter where they're from. We're going to get the best coaches. Doesn't matter where they're from. They can pick their own staffs. Doesn't matter where they're from and we're going to go win. And I think that's where hockey Canada has to go back to again.

And I saw something that Scott Salmon said, that I've been saying this. Canada used to put together these ghost rosters, and I know you know, Jeff. They put it, and Sutter's like, no chance. I'm not living with a ghost roster. If a guy's a good player, I'm going to make him a checker. I'll never forget this, Jeff. In 2007 at the summer summit series between Canada's best U-20 and Russia's best U-20, I was there calling the games. the that we're watching this practice. We've never seen that before. And guess what happened in that eight game series? Canada lost zero games.

Zero games. So this is my point. I think hockey candidates gotta get out of the political business and get into the hockey business. You know, it's interesting too. There's always been this sort of feeling and I can't prove any of this. This is all just the feeling that's out there.

Oh, Misa didn't go to the Hylanka, so Misa's not gonna go to the World Juniors. Oh, Suzuki didn't go to the World Championship, so he's not gonna go to the Four Nations. Like that type of political thinking, like you're either part of the program or you're not as opposed to just, regardless of what has happened previous,

if you're one of the best players, coaches, et cetera, right now, you're coming. It doesn't matter whether there's been this loyalty to the program, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. No, like I'm with you. Like all of that needs to be gone. Oh, we can't bring in this coach. He hasn't been part of the Hockey Canada program. You know, I think I'd make a hell of a coach here.

Gardner McDougall. I could make a hell of a coach for Team Canada. I'll just tell you this right now. Why wouldn't you look at, I said this to the Americans when John Tortorello was out of work, I said to the American USA hockey guys, you guys are nuts. One of the best coaches in the NHL is out of work. Bring in the coach, your world junior team. And they're like, well, he's not been part of USA hockey that I'm like, that's crazy.

You know, it's interesting because you say that about players. I remember a player that wasn't invited to a Hockey Canada event the tryouts for the 2002 games in Salt Lake City and there happened to be an injury. So Jerome McGinley got the call to drive down from Edmonton to Calgary to father David Bauer Arena and it's a good thing he picked up his phone that day. It's not only did he make the team, he was a star player in the team, when that was really his breakout

into being a star player in the National Hockey League. But it was amazing because when you think, he was not even invited to the camp. It's, I mean, it's gonna be intriguing to see what they do here. I mean, I don't think that as much of a focus on like I think that age is a mindset and you don't like whether you're 24 or 34 or 54 or 64 it doesn't matter as long as you haven't let the cement harden around your ideas and you're willing to understand the player of today and how rosters are

Composed and what you need players to do and not overthink things I really don't think that that age should be an issue but I will tell you like there were there were two days of press conferences last week there was Friday where it seemed as if that was outside of Scott Salmon who did you know who did fall in the sword here and say, I hired the coach, I hired the scouts, this one's on me. But there was a whole lot of Dave Cameron saying, oh I wouldn't change anything. And there was a lot of defense of how the rosters were constructed, almost as if trying to double down on the wrong decisions that were made.

Saturday was a much different tone. Now, I was trying to explain off the top of the show just how important this tournament is for Hockey Canada specifically. Success at this tournament, as you well know, Pierre, you've been involved in it for a number of years, have been around it for a number of years. Success at this tournament financially floats a lot of the other programs

that Hockey Canada puts together, namely a lot of the women's programs. And that is the one major growth area in hockey period. Canada, United States, Europe, everywhere. That is the major growth area. So for Hockey Canada specifically, success at this tournament is paramount. U-17's great. U-18's awesome. Helene Kagretzky, all of that, that's all good. But for a lot of these

other programs to go, Canada needs to be successful at this one. Do you have a thought on that? I totally agree, 100%. And it's not just what it does at the gate, it's what it does with sponsorships. So there's some fence mending that's going to have to go on with sponsors. I can't think the people at TSN were thrilled with their numbers at the end of the tournament. And I haven't seen the numbers, but I can't imagine they were elite compared to what they were. I'll give you an example. In 2011, here's a pretty good one for you. I was looking at it the other day. 2011 is probably the greatest meltdown in Canadian international history. Canada had a 3-0 lead going into the third period against the Russians.

Dave Cameron happened to be the coach in 2011. They lose a game 5-3. Panarin, Teresenko, and Kuznetsov play as a line, and they just run rough shot over Team Canada, and they end up winning the game five to three. But what I remember from that 6.88 million people in Canada watch that game on TSM. Six point eight eight million. Jeff, think about that for a second. It's massive. They would like to get that number for an NHL Stanley Cup final game seven in the United States. They got that number for a Stanley Cup final game of seven in the United States.

If they got that number for a Stanley Cup final game, they'd be doing high fives all over the corporate offices at TNT or ESPN. I'm just telling you. That just shows you how, it's to your point, it shows you how important the World Juniors, it's massive. It is massive. And once you get this situation in the last few years, it's not good. Final thought on that.

Do you have anything else to add from what we just saw over the past couple of weeks? And I don't wanna move on to NHL here, but is there anything else that you think is particularly salient or that you think viewers slash listeners should be aware of? We didn't respect the Finns enough. I think Finland is a burgeoning hockey country

and they will continue to improve and get better. and way more physicality. And you saw when Finland played anybody over here on the smaller rank, they weren't intimidated by physicality. In fact, they initiated more physicality than what they took. And I think that's a lesson for a lot of the other European teams, but the Finns are on the come and they're gonna be good for a long time. Okay, we'll see what happens in Minnesota. It was great seeing Lou Nani, by the way, on the week. And I have a real soft spot on my heart for, the greatest president-

I was gonna keep quiet. Sl slash commissioner the NHL never had. Lou Nanny, great marketer, great thinker of the game, all of it. I just turned this show into a Lou Nanny fan club, but, um, off the juke page. I'm a big fan of Lou. No, Lou used to come to my home in the summer here where I am right now in Northern Quebec. And yeah, I used to spend time with he and his wife and I got to enjoy a few Italian red wines that Luke likes to drink. Cigars too, he loves cigars too, Pierre. I went out to dinner with him a couple of years ago at the Board of Governors, Mike Russo hooked us up and it was a thrill. I can't

imagine what's great for Luke because I bugged him for like four hours with dumb Minnesota nurse star's questions but it was it was a thrill but he uh he liked the red grapes and he liked the cigars he liked cigars okay nhl if you're the Toronto Maple Leafs is there any way that you let Austin Matthews go to this tournament is there any given what's what's happened here now is there any way Pierre only if the doctors sign off that anything he's got wrong with them will never get worse. If they can't sign off on that, I'm not letting them go. No chance.

What do you make of this right now? You know, there's all sorts of speculation, but you know what this is indicative of is, you know, he needs to have his games managed. He needs to have his workload managed, make sure he's ready for the playoffs. Look, you know how expensive hockey tickets are in Toronto. Fans, when they buy their tickets, they want to go see Mitch Marner and William Neal.

They want to see Auston Matthews. And if all of a sudden the Toronto Maple Leafs are talking about taking games off the table for Auston Matthews, I don't know how season ticket holders will respond to that. Don't know how sponsors would respond to that as well. But I mean, this is more than just a hockey player issue right now for the Maple Leafs, isn't it? It is, and that's well framed by you. Jeff, you know, the biggest thing with me is

there's gotta be a level of trust in the hockey world from player to trainer, trainer to doctor, doctor to GM, GM to director or president of the organization. And if that trust or that level of trust gets broken down in any way, it's a problem for the organization, it's a problem for the player, and eventually it becomes a problem for the fans. All I can tell you is I don't have any reason to doubt there's not a really good level chain of command with Toronto Maple Leaf right now. The way Brad's running things, the way

the Ruby coaches, he knows what it takes to win the Stanley Cup. My only protocol on this would be if the doctors can't tell you a hundred percent that whatever's ailing him will not get worse at the four nations, there's no way I would let him go. It's too important. I watched him play Saturday like you did and I watched him play Sunday like you did. I thought he played fantastically well. I didn't see any issues with him.

I mean, he had three assists on Saturday, he had two assists on Sunday, and he had a game winning assist on Sunday. You know, the great play over to Morgan Riley. So I don't know why that would be an issue right now based on the way he's playing. One quick follow up on the Maple Leafs and then we'll shift gears.

You ever thought on Matthew Nyes' weekend? I know they're singing songs from on, they're singing songs from up on high that Matthew Nyes has returned and the villagers are bringing water back from the creek for Matthew Nyes. You have a thought on his weekend? Yeah, pulling a china shot. That's always got to play. And the Ruby's got to keep counting that into him. It can't be slick, stove drag and stuff. Get to the front of the

net, create havoc. The thing about the Leafs, and people aren't talking about this enough, Nyes, Patrueddy, McMahon, and Lorenz. You got four guys that are massive. You got four guys that can skate and you got four guys that can initiate physical contact. You do not want to, if you play in a playoff series against Toronto, your right defense is going to be pulverized by probably game two or three. And that's how they're going to win. They're going to create cycle in the left corner for them, the right corner for the opposition. They're going to cycle the opponent's net. their left wingers are gonna dominate and Nice is gonna be one of those guys.

Continue to build up the bull in the China shot mentality from Matthew Nice. He is a perfect tonic for Mitchell Marner and Austin Matthews. A couple of interesting games on the board later on this evening. Vancouver, Quinn Hughes is a game time decision there. We'll get on that page in a couple of seconds. But I wonder if this is a possible Stanley Cup preview of the Florida Panthers facing off against the Colorado Avalanche. I think we can all look at Florida and say, you know, some teams like all the all the answers are in the postseason. Every now and then the Florida Panthers will put together a string of games that remind you just how good they are.

But like let's let's be honest. This is a team that's pacing itself through the regular season. They know what they have to do if they've done it all before. You've seen teams like this, you've been part of them as well. Um, so we can see the Florida Panthers getting there. Can you look at the Colorado Avalanche now? We're making a lot about Mackenzie Blackwood and we should. Can you see the Avalanche as constructed right now and say, this could be a Stanley Cup preview tonight. Where are you at on Colorado? It's Gabe Landiscock part of the equation. Boy, I hope so when he's in he's my favorite player in the NHL hands down full stop. So we're so we don't rehearse this. I'm shaking your hand right now virtually, but yeah, no, we agree. Um, if he's part of it, then I think they're well constructed.

We got a legitimate chance to go the player and we'll see him in the four nations, and I know you're a fan of his, Devontaev's that are getting nearly enough credit in the national hockey league, no chance. He's such a good player and he and McCarr are a tremendous tandem. I think if they had to do any tweaking at all, maybe add some depth on their defense, but the way their team is constructed right now, I don't see why there would be any problems for them. The one caveat to everything I just said, Vegas, LA, and Edmonton, those two teams in the Pacific

are jumping through the gym right now. You look at their records, and you look what they're doing in the Pacific, they're just pulling away from everybody. And so I think that's a bit of an issue, but outside of that, I don't see how there's much of an issue for Colorado. I'm glad you mentioned Vegas.

I want to get on that page with you here. Like to me, this is remarkable. Year in and year out, it seems that the only way that they're felled is by injuries. Do you have a thought on what we're seeing with the Vegas Golden Knights right now? Like to me, you know, Jack Eichel is in, you know, Hart T trophy territory.

Um, what, what do you, what are you seeing? I mean, Mark Stone still goes to the net as hard as ever. I, again, he's, he's going to, Mark Stone is going to go into that batch of players. That's, you know, one of the greatest to, to never win the Selkie Miko Koivu is in that group, Marion Hose is in that group. Um, where are you at on the Vegas Golden Knights right now, Pierre? They're so well coached. Cassie's a really good coach.

Bruce doesn't get enough credit. I know he's won the Stanley Cup, but he didn't get enough credit. He's really orchestrated, and he holds his guys accountable, and Michael's a perfect example. What I think the best is their roster construction. They take players at a lot of organizations.

I'll use Victor Olson. He couldn't play in Buffalo, but he could play in Vegas on the power court. Okay, I get it. So they do a really good job finding players that other teams don't want, and then they take them and make them into players. And I think part of that is with the salary cap the way it is, if you can't have internal development and your pros and coach can't identify players that

are cap friendly that can get better, you're going to have a tough time being consistent in this league. But the biggest thing to me is their defense. They got those big green trees back there, Jeff, and they're hard to get to the net. And so regardless as to whomever's their goalie on any given night, it really doesn't matter because they are not a lot of second chance opportunities when you play Vegas. And I think that's one of the things that makes it the most difficult to play against. Just their size on the back end is just soaked up. Okay, let's finish on this point. I'm glad you

talked about the blue line for the Vegas Golden Knights and you mentioned Devontaeus previously. When it all comes down to it, teams that win the Stanley Cup, nine times out of ten, the common denominator that I see with all of them is they can defend. If you can defend, I know we talk about like what Kale McCarr can do and Quinn Hughes and that's awesome and that's great and that's spectacular to join the rush, you know, a three on two is a four on two, like I get it and that's fun. But at the end of it, true or false, the teams that win the cups are the ones that can defend.

If you don't have seven guys that can defend, you're gonna have a hard time winning. You know, I ran a defense that won two Stanley Cups and we had guys that, you know, we took off from different teams. Larry Murphy didn't start in 1991 with our team. Peter Tagli and Eddie didn't start with our team. Ophie Samuelson didn't start with our team. You look at all the different guys that we had in 92, Shel Samuelson didn't start on our team. We brought in all these different guys from different places. The reason why Craig Patrick was so smart that he understood we weren't deep enough on defense. We weren't good enough on defense. We didn't defend well enough.

So I know it's 35 years ago, it doesn't matter. It's still relevant today. You don't defend, you can't win. Go back and look at the Stanley Cubs from the Montreal Canadiens in the 1970s. The big three on defense, they were insulated by. I mean, you can't win without, you can score your way out of trouble in the regular season.

It's hard to score your way out of trouble in the regular season it's hard to score your way out of trouble in the playoffs it truly is. Smile on my face hearing you say Peter Taglionetti always one of the more underrated tough players in the NHL. Troy Loney was another one on those old Penguins team. Peter was tough and I'll tell you one thing he's one of Lou Lamarello's favorites he went to Lou Yu at Providence College. He's one of Lou's favorites. Real tough. Listen, I know you're super busy. Thanks for parking a lot of time for us today. Really appreciate it, Pierre.

You be well. Are you kidding me? I love doing this with you. You are the voice of reason. Oh, geez. Don't say that. I don't have you that fool. You're smarter than that, Pierre.

Come on. I don't have you. I don't have you fooled. Thanks, bud. Have a great rest of your day, pal. We'll talk soon. Thanks, bud. Talk to you later Jeff. Goodbye. There he is, the great Pierre McGuire joining us here. He joins us regularly on

Sheep. Um, a lot a lot of stuff in there and really interesting about Austin Matthews as well for the Toronto Maple Leafs and you know sorry USA fans that they the four nations but like if you're the Toronto Maple Leafs like unless you are 100% sure that these injury woes aren't gonna continue all season long I really don't see no you know mind you if he was Canadian would I be saying the same thing yes I would if I was a Toronto Maple Leafs fan let's bring out a Maple Leafs fan for that matter. Zach how do you feel about the idea of Austin Matthews given what we've just seen the Camille go away Camille go away

I'm injured. I'm not peekaboo. I'm in the lineup. How do you feel about Austin Matthews going to play in this tournament? So I said this when he returned and I don't think that it's not that he can't play or he won't he's not going to be effective If he can get re-injured, you do not play him with the Leafs with the Four Nations With uh ball hockey with his neighbor on the street I don't care if he's going to get re-injured or could get re-injured. You don't play him I the goal here in Toronto is to win the Stanley Cup. I just don't see the purpose of it But I don't know. I kind of just had a point like You know what if because there is the you know, the scene of it. But I don't know. I kind of just had a point like, you know what? Because there is the scene in Miracle on Ice, right?

That was one of the things I thought of when he comes in and he's like, it's a bruise on the leg. Can he hurt? Herb Brooks says, can you move it, hurt it more? He says, no, but it's gonna be incredibly painful. And he says, well, then he's gonna play. Then if that's what it is, if he can't hurt it more, and it's just he's got to battle through,

okay, different situation. But I do trust the Leafs doctors. I will say that. I thought you were gonna hit me with the, oh, the legs far away from the hearts. Well, that's the scene, right? That's the scene. Yeah, no. I'm not questioning his want to play, need to play, nothing like that. It's just like, can he hurt it more? That was the first thing I thought of. But I don't know. We're gonna wrap up with a few things here, but can we do that KHL cell phone, Viz?

Okay, so I was gonna ask you to do this because I now have an answer from the player about what happened. I'm not gonna run it here. It's in Russian, but I've read the translation of it all. So yeah, here's- Okay, because I have, so I was, hang on because I want to see if it's the same thing, because I was texting with someone who plays in the KHL.

We're going back and forth on this one. I can't say who it was, but he's got a thought on it as well. We'll play this first. Okay. And then I got a quick story. Okay, so there's no audios. This is Nikita Dnack, who plays with Akbar Kazan. The cell phone falls out of his hockey pants.

Oh yeah, that's mine, that's mine, that's mine. Now, a couple of things here. One, let me find this. The person I was talking to suspected... Okay, so I texted him this morning about this one and the first is some of the plays in the KHL said he had to be listening to music with air pods and totally forgot to take the phone out of his waist is that the answer no the answer that he gave okay that answer would make a billion times more sense than the answer he gave.

Now potentially he got lost in translation, but what he says, he's in the locker room and he points to it. So above his head is the part where you put the elbow pads on the gloves. If anybody's been in or seen any of these kinds of professional locker rooms, like there's separations, right? The helmet goes above that. Okay. So he said, Jeff, that he put his phone

where the elbow pads go. And when he turned around to grab the elbow pads like this, pulled them down, the phone fell out into his pants and he didn't know. I don't believe that for one second, like not one second. I was born at night, but I wasn't born last night. That's the old saying, right? The name's Tucker, not sucker. Like I would have believed it. If that was what he said, if he said, I was listening to music, forgot to take it out.

I mean, I don't even think twice about this. The fact that he said that makes me think that this is, there's something going on now, okay That couldn't have been real. So when I first saw this My first thought was to a conversation I had with Ryan Whitney Okay, X NHL or and I was spitting chickens as we all know. Yeah, we're talking about KHL stories And one of the stories is we're doing actually we were working the World Cup together in Toronto We're sitting on stage or whatever,

went out for a drink after, I can't remember what it was. We were talking about KHL stories. And one of the things that he said was when he first got there, I think it was his friend, but his first game, the trainer comes up to him and starts cutting his hockey pants. He's like, what are you doing?

And he said, oh, we're getting paid today. And you got paid with like a bag of cash that like sat in your locker room. He said like, put your money in here. He said, why? He goes, if you leave it in the room, it'll get stolen. Someone will take it. He's like, you guys skate with your money.

He's like, oh yeah. And the goalies have like a place in their pads where they like put their, it's like literally they're playing hockey. Wit told me they're playing hockey with like a bag of cash and so i texted this guy i know wild eh i said yeah i said i'll just read you the taxi i said do you guys still get paid with a bag of cash every two weeks, no, it's all straightforward here. All new rules and new tax codes started January 1st. KHL cracked down.

Supposedly it used to be bananas. So listen to all those KHL stories on spinchiclets. Oh, it's so good. Like the KHL stories are amazing. Anthony Stewart told me when he went over there, because he was suspicious of the food he went to uh Costco and got loaded up with like a suitcase full of chocolate covered almonds like it was extra baggage that he brought to the kit and the whole suitcase was just chocolate Kirkland Kirkland right just yeah yeah yeah with chocolate covered almonds an extra suitcase for the season. Because he thought the food was going to be crap.

So that's what he brought over with him to the KHL. Crazy, right? But that was my first thought. It's like, OK, he didn't want to leave his phone. And maybe like everybody's got like their phones and their cash and jewelry like all in their pocket. He's got his wallets in his pocket, in his pants. Could you imagine? We find out these guys are skating around

with all that stuff. Oh no. They used to skate with money. They used to skate with money in their pants. Why not have everything in their phone, wedding ring, jewelry, all of it. Why not? They're all in there.

This is good from the chat. Zach Boychuk says, he's saying that so the team doesn't fire him after the game, but 100% Zach. Yes, Zach. I believe you. Yes, Stubaka99 says imagine that on a Berkey team. Berkey watching his team. Hang on. Foam comes out the pants. Put that on the list for... We got this running list of things we want to talk to Berkey about. Put that one on the list, Zach. Yes, that from the chat kid makes it to the Berkey conversation on Friday.

Oh yeah, 100%. Oh, you know what I want, you know what, should I go ahead? Go for it. I was gonna say, imagine the camera cut to him when that happens. Him leaning in the press box. Yeah, sorry, go ahead.

You know what, by the way, my favorite camera cuts of all time, this was so cruel, but you'll appreciate this. You're a Toronto Maple Leafs fan. There was a while there where every time the Maple Leafs got scored on, the cut was to Kyle Dubas. Yeah, I know.

Kyle was just like, Kyle has a hard time. He's an emotional guy. He's like, he's not like a passive, mm, stoic, mm, dog face, mm. He's not that guy. Like, he wears it. He feels it. And, you know, there was a while there

I just wanna be like, get another seat. Like, they know, like, they know exactly where he's gonna be. Like, that's gonna be the, actually, you know who the master of that was? I'll tell you what. There was a master of that was? I'll tell you what, there was a master of understanding hockey television that Pat Quinn had that nobody else had because when the play

stopped, Pat stopped. Just stood there. Oh really? And then when the puck dropped, because that it was at that moment where the camera could be on you, right? Yeah, yeah. If they do a cutaway to the bench, you don't want to see this guy go on banana sandwich, right? But then when the puck dropped, that's when he let the guys have it. That's when it was on because Pat knew like, okay, camera's not going to be on me now. I'm going to give these guys a blast, but I'm not going to do it when the whistle blows because camera might be on.

Never notice that. So you're getting dog face. Oh yeah, Quinn was the you know another I don't know if you noticed this. It was at one of the games we were at in Ottawa, the world juniors. They do a camera cut to Jason Spetsa in the crowd. Everyone's cheering going nuts. I don't know if you saw this Jeff. Steven points it out and he goes, that's Kyle Dubas. I said, right beside him. What? I'm like, that's Jason Spezza.

And then all of a sudden the camera zooms out this much and Kyle Dubas' face is in the corner of it. Yeah. I saw that. But I imagine if it was like Alfredson or Heatley beside him, they would have made a two shot or a three shot. If that was heater, heater or Alfie, they would have expanded it out. Yeah. Okay. You want to rapid fire a couple of things here, Jeff?

Yeah. What do you got? No, go ahead. What do you got? Let's rapid fire a few things. Okay. First of all, Max Domi fined yesterday, the hit on Garnet Hathaway. Okay. Okay. The hit on Garnet Hathaway, no audio on this one, obviously. But it gets across. Again, like it's... Pretty obvious elbow. Pretty obvious.

And a pretty obvious elbow again. What's going on? Yeah. Yeah, I know. He just like flash KO'd Jake McCabe. Yeah, yeah, yeah, in that fight. Okay, so he gets fined $5,000. Okay, here's my question about elbowing.

Mm-hmm. Does every elbow have to be an elbow to the head? Is it possible to get an elbowing penalty if you elbow someone in the chest? If you elbow someone in the shoulder, is it still, because if you slash anyone, and you slash to the chest, slash to the shoulder,

still slashing, slash the head may be more severe, but is it possible to get an elbowing penalty if you elbow someone in the chest or in the arm? Does it always have to be the head? That's the only time it's called. Should we put this on the list for the other Berkey? For Patrick Fergant, probably better safe. Vicious elbow to the traps. Vicious elbow to think of any. Every elbowing penalty is always it's an elbow. It's an elbow to the head. Have you ever seen like an elbowing call where it wasn't an elbow to the head?

It's always an elbow to the head. And there for sure could be because you see the ones where the guy cuts back and tries to dodge a guy who's coming in to hit and the guy reaches out with elbow like that. Right. But then those get called as tripping or a knee or something else where they get some other part that hits the guy flips the guy like it's never. Does every elbowing penalty have to be an elbow to the head? You ever thought about that? No, that's a good question, actually. Think about it. That is a good question.

Think about it. Um, OK, another one here. And I have no idea what you think about this. I'm interested to hear. I saw this tweet from Craig Morgan. I think you retweeted it. It's about the NHL bringing hockey back to Arizona. I'll let you expand.

But first thought was kind of, I saw this and I went, why? It's not that I don't want hockey in Arizona to grow this, but this is like, you tried, you tried, you tried, and we're still going back there. That's my surface level thoughts on it. Okay. A couple of things. One from Craig Morgan's point of view. This is like, this is the Godfather for Craig Morgan. He is Al Pacino. They keep bringing me back. This story. I love Craig. I'd love to have Craig on to talk about this. This is Al Pacino Godfather for him. They keep bringing me back. They keep bringing me back. He cannot quit this story. I'm glad because he's the most thorough guy on the story.

It's great to have him on the case. He will never be done with this story. Craig Morgan plus the future of the Arizona Coyotes is money in the bank every single time. Two, this should come as no surprise to anybody. The minute the Coyotes officially went to Utah, the clock began on when they're coming back. There will be another hockey team in Arizona, period.

Full stop, last call, like all of it. It will happen. There's no way that the NHL is going to abandon that market. That will be part of another wave of expansion as soon as something can get sorted out with an arena. Listen, I understand that people are sick of the story. I understand that it became like at a certain point everybody hate, like I would tweet about it or I would write about it or I would do something on the radio tv about it and I'd get like the anger like oh just please shut up

like stop with this Arizona story. I'm kind of like Craig, I can't stop. Like I was there when I was working at CBC they sent me to to to Phoenix for the story of the at Judge Redfield T. Baum's court. Like I was there for all the circus. So I can't quit this story. I'm still too fascinated with this story. But make no mistake about it. The NHL has been consistent. They are determined to go back to Arizona.

None of this should surprise anybody. No hints, no whispers, breadcrumbs, all of it. They are going back to Arizona. None of this should surprise anybody. No hints, no whispers, bread comes, all of it. They are going back to Arizona eventually. Period. Stubaka 99 says the rebrand to go back as the Arizona civilians. I'm not saying the story. I'm not saying the story. Like I get it. No, no, I'm not sick of it. I, the thing that I'm sick of is not, uh, not understanding like the, do they think that there's there, there, oh, we've identified the issue and it's going to be different when we go back. Like they know what the problem was or they, that if they just try again, things will be okay. the location. But like how much is that changing? Like how much more revenue is that bringing? Like they strongly believe the fan base and everything is there and like they're going to get people going out. When you sell nationally, the first thing that any sponsor asks is which markets do

you have? Like outside of the hockey, I'm just saying like when you sell nationally, one of the first things they ask is which markets do you have? And if you're a group like the National Hockey League, the National Hockey League, you wanna be able to say that you have Arizona. And I know I might be the minority on this one, but I think that with the rink in the right location, the Arizona Coyotes can be a success

because they have a great minor hockey program too. Like it doesn't, you know, measure up against some of the elites like in the, in the Northeast, but look what it's already produced. Right? You were going cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs Saturday, I'm sure Zach, about a couple of them, the return of Austin Matthews and oh, look at Matthew Nice. Yeah, I know. of them, the return of us and Matthews and oh look at Matthew, nice! Yeah, I know, I know.

The interest is there, it is a market that you can grow. It was just false started so many different times by so many different owners and by the end they ended up with one of the worst ones that they possibly could have had. And I remember I used to always ask, I remember asking Gary Bettman back in 2008 when I did Hakan and Canada radio, when are you done with a market? And he said, when there's no one there that wants to own it. Always found an owner for Arizona.

And I think they could find another owner for Arizona still and they will go back. They will go back, Zach, they'll go back. They will go back Zach. They'll go back. Much to some people's chagrins. It's interesting. We just, yeah, but I want to see the kachinas again. Yes, so do I actually. Okay, you want to do like a couple of rapid fire OHL things. You want to see this video that the OHL social media account blasted out that I couldn't stop laughing at. Not necessarily just because of what happens. No, but it's funny in a different, it's one nothing, Oshawa. First of all, that is,

I know it's become a punch like, I don't know if you're around the rinks much this weekend, but I was all weekend long and everything is like chemistry, Canada, don't be too tired to practice, like just all of it. Man, I was, by the way, I was texting with Shannon Goldman last night after from the athletic, after USA won.

It's like, oh, congratulations, all my hockey friends. Shoot him a text, any Americans that are invested in it and saying like, oh yeah, you know, Canada is going to spoil the celebration next year in Minnesota. And she just rakes back, yeah, after not too tired practice. It's like, oh man, as a Canadian, like Dave Cameron just handed people like so much ammunition. So this was all the talk around all the ranks. And that was a great call by someone who was one of the most underrated play-by-play callers in the game period.

Like I think the NHL has a lot of underrated play-by-play callers. One of them is Dan Dunleavy in Buffalo. The other, that's Mike Luck, who's a longtime voice of the Oshawa Generals, has done some work with Hockey Night in Canada as well. Lucky's awesome. So it doesn't surprise me that Lucky was able to

clue into that one pretty fast. Kal Ricci and Beckett Seneca, getting together with some instant chemistry as they danced all over Flint. What was the final that game, like seven to one? Oshawa, who just looks amazing as everyone's trying to load up here at OHL trade deadline. So great call by lucky, not exactly surprised because it wasn't as if team

Canada didn't give us enough ample opportunity for hockey comedy, whether it's Mike Lucker in my case, Shana Goldman, Shana. Thanks for that one, Shana. If chemistry was what they're looking for. They could have found it. It's pretty good. Here you go. Yep, there you go.

He's just got to show Ray Kopp and Porter Martone on the power play in Brampton next. Like, oh, there you go. Had him. Yeah. Wanted to scratch one in favor of the other the entire tournament but what do we know? I'm just a simple country lawyer I don't understand much

about hockey. What you big city folks do with that ice hockey game of yours? Last thing I'll pump your tires here quickly. The Sheet blog came out this morning earlier and the other thing that I wanted to ask you about here in this is CHL Trades. Eric Smeteko, one of the big ones that was moved. He was the guy that jumped off the page to me. Four draft picks right now. Looks like Morris coming at the draft here as well. Like, what are you making of these trades that are going on right now?

Classic Q draft. I mean, there's like the trade right now and then there's like the side piece to it. So, Smeteko goes from the Seedogs to the Oceanic Ramoussi's got a good team like they're loading up here like there's some like Moncton's awesome Obviously, but there's some really good teams in the queue and when you look at The landscape right now across the CHL

I don't know the minute I say this like one phone call is gonna gonna happen and Tanner Mullendike is gonna go to Tri-City. But like as of my last check-in, all was pretty quiet around Tanner Mullendike. I think a lot of people are wondering about Jet Luchenko. So first round draft pick of the Philadelphia Flyers, he was the one that had Buffer do the intro, which was one of the best things in that first round. There is a feeling that the London Knights,

surprise, surprise, top team in the CHL would like Jet Luchenko as part of the mix. I just, I'm just not sure that that's gonna happen, not because they can't do a deal with London. I think that part of them thinks that Jet Lachenko might be going back to junior hockey next year. I know a lot of Philadelphia Flyers fans might not like that, but one of the names

that I keep hearing whenever I ask about Jet Lachenko is Matthew Poitras, who made the Boston Bruins last year, kind of surprised a lot of people, maybe even himself to some extent, and now finds playing in the American Hockey League in Providence. And is that a sort of cautionary tale for how you're going to handle Jet Luchenko? So if Goal feels that he's coming back next season, maybe this isn't the season to get rid of Jet Luchenko as a rental. So not sure if that one is going to happen.

One thing I didn't put in the notes, Owen Sam is getting a lot of calls on Sam McHugh, who's a prospect for the Toronto Maple Leafs. I think he was the sixth rounder, maybe seventh rounder. I mentioned the Oshawa Generals, like they're loading up. I wouldn't be surprised if Andrew Gibson, defenseman, Sousa Marie Greyhounds, Detroit Red Rings prospect, if he ends up there. But you know, as deadlines approach here,

the news will get more and more interesting around all three leagues. That's kind of a snapshot of some of the bigger names that I see out there right now. And I don't think that my, I know that I had a lot of texts over the week, I don't think Michael Misa's going anywhere. I don't think Sagina I know that I had a lot of texts over the week. I don't think Michael Mesa is going anywhere I don't think Saginaw is doing anything with with him or Zayn Perek

For that matter and I do expect them by the way to be on the world junior team next year If you're gonna pencil anybody in Try put those You don't think that there's gonna be frustrations from hockey Canada and keeping those guys out because they were liking Instagram posts and tweets and stuff. It can't be. You can't. I understand what you're getting at. And like, put it this way. I'm just poking fun. No, no, no, no. But you're legit. Because once upon a time, that would have been disqualifying. Oh, they did something against Hockey Canada. They said something controversially you know it's like we're only gonna bring the Boy Scouts to these tournaments like no

like kids are gonna be kids was it a dumb move like yeah probably kids being kids on social media I hit the like button because I'm pissed that I'm not on the team on the scale if that's like the biggest worry in your life like you're doing really well that's kind of where I'm at in my life if like like the petty little things of like, if this is bugging me, then I'm doing really good. That I'm doing great. If this tiny little thing upsets me that much, then my life must be awesome. And hockey Canada can't think like this way anymore. Oh, he didn't go to this tournament, so he can't come.

Oh, he did this thing on Instagram. So he can't like, there are some things certainly that are disqualifying but hitting the like button on Instagram but a loss to Latvia like you're not wrong Zach like there's a level of pettiness that we've seen before from hockey Canada that would preclude those players from ever playing for hockey Canada again but I think considering what's happened the last two years those days are in the rear view mirror I think considering what's happened the last two years, those days are in the rear view mirror. I think you're gonna see a different way to do things around Hockey Canada.

I like Stephen Ellis' idea of Gardner MacDougall. I like that a lot. His son is a GM there in Moncton, I think is gonna be a wonderful executive one year as well, former agent, now manager. Like there's a lot of these people all around. They just haven't been in hockey Canada programs so they don't get the hockey Canada magic wand waved over them. I think that's got to change. I think that's got to change. And I think it probably will. That's all I had for you here. That's what we got? Yeah, from the list.

All right, we are back tomorrow. How was the chat today, by the way? I know sort of pre-occupied. Very good. Chat was good. Very good. Crew was good today. Yes, active, yes.

Wait, actually, you know what? Do you want to hear a funny story here? Oh, hang on, by the way, by the way, one real quick, just checking that Nick Hout says, Dunleavy says slot area, though. Okay, I'm taking them off. Have I told you my pet peeve about slot area? No, no, no. What's the difference between slot area and the slot? Yeah, okay. Well, I read that comment. It's an extra word. I was like, yeah, slot. I just say slot. That's why. No, no, because Nick's probably heard me before I go on

about like empty calorie words. Slot area. Oh, you mean the slot? Okay. Good goal. You mean goal? Okay. Okay.

I, I, the good goal. Slot area? As opposed to what? Yeah, slot area makes sense. We got him in the, hit him in the back area as opposed to the back? Yeah, yeah, okay, fair. You hear it all the time. Yep.

And we just let it fly by like the Tai Chi guys in the park like, woo, woo. It's just like, we're just taking it for granted, but if we really think about it, like, these potato chip words that exist all over our language is all into hockey now. It's ridiculous. Oh, it looks like you hit him in the back area. What do you mean the back? EVP says, I still owe you for sprinkling curious through interviews.

I do that. I've always done that. Well, you know what? It's funny too, if you look at the history of me broadcasting, there's two words that I always come back to. Curious and maybe. Those are my two words that I always come back to, curious and maybe. Those are my two words because all I'm interested in are possibilities.

I'm glad you mentioned that. As though two things I'm really, really interested in, possibilities. So curious and maybe pop up a lot in my vocabulary. True. Yeah. Sorry, what, you want to say something from the chat or are you just preoccupied with slot area now? It's gonna bug you. No, I was thinking about slot area. Every time you hear it, I'm like, oh. Yeah, I, what you want to see something from the chat or are you just preoccupied with slot area now?

It's gonna bug you. Every time you hear it. Yeah, I was thinking about it. Now I'm thinking about what do I say when I do some stuff. I'm like, do I bring these up? I don't think I'd never say slot area, I say slot. But I'm thinking about you said good goal. I'm like, ooh, I'm pretty sure I use that one.

That's a good goal. You mean it's a goal. But I think I say like good goal if I'm using it in That's a good goal. You mean that's a goal. But I think I say like good goal if I'm using it in the context of something like, you know what I want? That's a good goal in regards to like, what? This is a job for Wes McCauley. Okay?

Okay. On a review. Instead of we have a good goal, if the goal doesn't count. No, no, we have a bad goal. Yeah, I'm in on that. Yeah, you can do this. Do it for hockey. And language. We have a bad goal. Bad goal doesn't count. Yeah. Yeah. All right. I mean, if we can get them to do that, that would be pretty awesome. I'll text them after this. We should see what kind of we can if we can get them to do that, that would be pretty awesome.

I'll text them after the show. We should see what kind of we can, what we can get going. We'll monitor everything Wes does over the next while until he says it. Yeah. Finally, just text me back and then go piss up a poll. Like, just leave me alone. I'm trying to get my job here. You know, I don't knock the slur, I don't knock the slurpy machine around when you're at work. Okay, Merrick, like just go back to do your job. Yeah, leave me alone. Don't text. Lose my number.

Yeah, you're gonna get the message back, green bubble. The number you have reached no longer in service. Yep, gonna happen, gonna happen. We got anything else or are we released, boss? Yep, gonna happen, gonna happen. We got anything else or are we released, boss? No, that's it, that's it for me. That was all we had on the notes. We had a lot of rapid fire stuff today.

Chat looks good. Chat looks good. I just want to fire back and go through the chat from today. Chat looks good, I'm gonna do that. Alright, we're cutting out here. Four games tonight on the NHL. Enjoy them, Quinn Hughes is a game time decision for the Vancouver Canucks as we've mentioned Vancouver a much different team with him in versus him out and here's a question for tonight as well It's Montreal actually good now discuss amongst yourselves. We'll watch the game tonight talk to you tomorrow here on the sheet

Thanks to Pierre Maguire for stopping by Tomorrow is Tuesday. That means MVSSW once again, MvSW Redux, so Greg Wyshynski from ESPN will be aboard. We hope you will as well. Thanks to everybody in the chat, thanks to everybody listening or watching here on the Daily Face Off YouTube channel. The sheet returns tomorrow at 3 o'clock Eastern, noon Pacific. Smist! specific. Dismissed! You try to give me little medicine I'm like, no, man, that's fine I'm not against those methods, but I knew It's me, myself and how this gon' be fixing my mind I do want the record I turn down the music

I do want the record I turn on the music It's enough, yeah, I don't get you sometimes losing Helping on the days that went wrong