TAMPA BAY, FL – Cal Foote scored his first NHL goal, one of four second-period goals for the Tampa Bay Lightning in a 4-3 win against the Nashville Predators at Amalie Arena on Saturday.
Victor Hedman had a goal and an assist, and Andrei Vasilevskiy made 23 saves for the Lightning (4-1-1).
Pekka Rinne made 29 saves for the Predators (4-4-0), who lost to the Lightning in regulation for the first time (9-1-2). Filip Forsberg had two assists.
ANAHEIM, CA – Ducks goalie John Gibson was named the NHL’s Third Star for the week ending Jan. 24, going 2-0-1 with a 1.33 goals-against average, .960 save percentage and one shutout to help the Ducks (2-2-2, 6 points) collect points in three of their four outings (2-1-1).
He earned his 20th career shutout with 34 saves in a 1-0 win over the Minnesota Wild Jan. 18. Gibson then started each of Anaheim’s two games against the Colorado Avalanche, making 29 saves in a 3-2 overtime loss Jan. 22 and 32 stops in a 3-1 triumph Jan. 24. The 27-year-old Pittsburgh native has appeared in 292 career NHL games, compiling a 141-104-35 record (2.52 GAA, .919 SV%).
ST. PAUL, MN – Minnesota Wild General Manager Bill Guerin today announced the National Hockey League (NHL) club has acquired defenseman Ian Cole from the Colorado Avalanche in exchange for defenseman Greg Patryn.
Cole, 31, owns two shots, four hits and two blocked shots in two games this season. The 6-foot-1, 225-pound native of Ann Arbor, Mich., collected 26 points (4-22=26), 83 hits and 122 blocked shots in 65 contests during the 2019-20 season with the Avalanche and set a career high in assists and tied his career best in points. The left-shot blueliner ranked second on the team in blocked shots and third in plus/minus rating (+21). He tallied his 100th career assist on Nov. 30, 2019 at Chicago and scored the game winning goal in his 500th career game on Dec. 7, 2019 at Boston. The defenseman tallied two assists, 21 shots, 27 hits and 29 blocked shots in 15 games during the 2020 Stanley Cup Playoffs.
DETROIT, MI – The Red Wings have had just three captains over the last 34 years: Steve Yzerman, Nicklas Lidstrom and Henrik Zetterberg.
WINNIPEG, MB – When Cole Perfetti steps on the ice in Winnipeg in six days, he’ll be a rookie among a Jets roster full of veterans. Until then, he’s in quarantine for the third time since Nov. 23, so perhaps that makes him somewhat of a veteran.
“The days aren’t too bad. I’m able to cook my own food in here. I’ve got a nice little kitchenette, so that kills a couple hours in a day. That’s been keeping me sane,” said Perfetti on Tuesday.
“A lot of it is FaceTime, whether it’s friends or family, just keeping in touch with everyone. I have my PlayStation so I’ve been able to play video games with the guys back home.”
Perfetti, Winnipeg’s first round pick in the 2020 NHL Draft, arrived in Winnipeg on Sunday after the team granted him some time to see his family after the 2021 World Junior Championship.
The visit was certainly well earned. On Nov. 16, the then 18-year-old Perfetti began Hockey Canada’s Selection Camp in Red Deer, AB. Following two positive cases, he and the rest of his Canadian teammates went into a two-week quarantine that had them isolating in hotel rooms.
Following that, he quarantined again prior to entering the World Junior bubble in Edmonton, then played seven games – scoring twice and adding four assists – as Canada took home the silver medal.
“To be part of Team Canada at the World Juniors is a dream come true and an honour. Words can’t really describe how it is to play for your country,” said Perfetti. “We put 55 days total together as a team in a hotel between Red Deer and Edmonton. Twenty of those days were quarantine days and we spent a lot of time in the summer on Zoom.”
BOSTON, MA- When Craig Smith talks about the act of shooting, he doesn’t always say “shoot.”
He likes to “rip” pucks. He “hammers” them. He “wires” them.
Even his word choices are energetic.
“Boston will love him,” said former Bruins defenseman Hal Gill, who watched Smith nightly in his role as a Predators radio analyst. “His interviews are always electric. Usually he’s got his shirt off, he’s high energy, he’s got a big smile. One of my favorite quotes of his is, ‘Pedal through the floor, play with your hair on fire.’ That’s the energy he brings.”
On Oct. 10 the Bruins added Smith, the 31-year-old right winger, for his buzzy brand of 5-on-5 attacking. The signing, $9.3 million over the next three years, was widely hailed as one of the offseason’s smartest: a bargain for a five-time 20-goal scorer. Since debuting at practice on Jan. 3, Smith has ripped, hammered, and wired pucks next to third-line center Charlie Coyle and left wing Nick Ritchie. The Bruins believe they’ll get consistent production from the burly Ritchie, puck-possessing Coyle, and Smith, who scored 18 goals last year and was on pace for 21 when the season ended early.
CALGARY, AB – As a youngster, Connor Mackey received some advice from one of the original leaders of the Calgary Flames.
Connor’s father, Dave, reached the big leagues as a tough-as-nails forward and is a proud member of the Chicago Blackhawks alumni. When the old-timers in the Windy City would congregate for family-friendly holiday scrimmages, Dave would often bring his twin boys along.
“Here’s a story for you … Do you remember Phil Russell, the old captain of the Flames? I think he was No. 5,” Dave said over the phone from Tower Lakes, Ill. “I remember one time our alumni was skating, and he and Connor were D partners. I think Connor was, like, eight years old at the time. They came off and Phil gave him heck. He was like, ‘Hey, you’ve gotta move that puck to me a little quicker.’ ”
Dave chuckles.
“I always tell Phil, ‘I actually think he was looking you off,’ ” he continued. “But Connor goes, ‘Jeez Dad, I guess I have to move the puck a little quicker.’ And I said, ‘Yeah, you might want to listen to that guy.’ ”
Indeed, Russell was a pretty good resource for an up-and-coming rearguard. He belongs to the NHL’s silver-stick club and played a five-season chunk of his 1,000-plus games with the Atlanta/Calgary Flames, serving as alternate captain when the franchise moved north and then having the ‘C’ stitched on his jersey from 1981-83.
Now 24, freshly signed out of the collegiate ranks and hoping to be tapped for his own NHL debut sometime soon, Connor is these days trying to learn as much he can from the current leader of the Flames. In a nice bit of symmetry, Mark Giordano wears No. 5, too.
Giordano, apparently, has been impressed. At the outset of training camp, based on what he’d witnessed in small-group skates, he singled out the rookie pro as a guy who “looks like he’s pretty close to being ready to play.”
When a not-long-ago Norris Trophy winner makes a comment like that, it gets back to the newcomer pretty quick.
“That was cool to hear, for sure,” Connor said.
The Flames’ coaching staff must be impressed, too, with what their prized college free-agent signing has shown since the team opened camp last weekend.
They’ve now rearranged their groups, with all of the everyday NHLers lumped together in the morning wave. Mackey is the only guy in those star-studded sessions who has yet to log action at the highest level. It is, he admitted, “definitely a confidence-booster” to be keeping that sort of company.
DETROIT, MI – A trip to a beautiful golf course may help the Detroit Red Wings on the ice.
Dylan Larkin is poised to be named team captain before the 2021 season. It hasn’t been announced yet by general manager Steve Yzerman, but it’d be shocking if it was anyone else. The two have bonded since Yzerman returned to the Wings in April 2019, chatting regularly about what it means to be a good Red Wing, what it means to do things right.
One of those things is making sure a teammate feels welcome, feels like he is part of the camaraderie.
BOSTON, MA – Craig Smith peeked up at the building under construction in downtown Madison. Smith, then a University of Wisconsin freshman, beeped the horn on his scooter as he rode by.
From a lift five stories above the ground, Kevin Smith waved at his son. Then he went back to his work as a glazier, fitting glass into the buildings he was helping to build.
By then, Smith’s son was pretty much on his own. The right-shot forward had earned his Wisconsin scholarship. Smith was living on campus, even with the family home 10 minutes away. The 20-year-old’s NHL rights were owned by the Nashville Predators, after he went in the fourth round of the 2009 draft.
The hands-on work of shaping a boy happened earlier. Smith’s son loved being on the ice, whether it was for the Madison Patriots, the Madison Capitals, Team Wisconsin or Madison La Follette High School. Kevin and his wife Dawn, a homemaker, had to get Craig to and from practice and games and keep him geared up. It wasn’t easy, especially on those brisk Wisconsin days when handling heavy glass and frosty metal frames chilled Kevin’s fingers.
But from three years old, when Kevin put Craig on skates, the boy enjoyed being at the rink. Kevin and Dawn would see to it that as long as his love for the ice continued, they would get him there. Even for those Team Wisconsin games on Friday nights in Minnesota, three-and-a-half hours away.
“I never had to wait on them,” Craig Smith recalled. “I was never late. That’s how I got to college. They said, ‘That’s 80 percent of life, really — just being there and showing up.’”
Reliability is partly why the Bruins invested three years and $9.3 million in Smith. The right wing was on pace for 21 goals last season. It would have been the sixth time in the last seven years that Smith exceeded the 20-goal threshold.
“The biggest feather in any NHL player’s cap is, ‘Can you be consistent? Consistently good?’ Craig Smith was consistently good in Nashville,” said Kevin Magnuson, Smith’s agent. “He’d show up every single fall, being in the top three of the best shape of all his teammates every single year. He rarely got injured. He had a consistent career in Nashville, one he can look back on and be really proud of. He’s got a lot of years left because he’s taken such good care of his body. Consistency is something Nashville fans really grew to love.”
Dependability, it seems, is a family trait.
Becoming a Badger
In Madison, the state university is everything. It is one of the city’s cultural, economic and social engines. For a native like Kevin Smith, who attended Wisconsin hockey games at Dane County Coliseum, life and UW almost always collided. Years later, when the Badgers moved their home games to the Kohl Center, Craig, perhaps a peewee at the time, made a bold declaration.
“He came over to my seat and said, ‘I’m going to play here,’” Kevin Smith recalled. “My brother and I said, ‘Yeah, good luck with that.’ ”
Craig Smith became good enough for the USHL’s Waterloo Blackhawks to land a Wisconsin offer. There was no second choice for a teenager with deep Madison roots.
“That was one checked off the bucket list,” Smith said. “Growing up, I never watched the NHL, really. As far as I knew, the Badgers were the biggest and greatest thing out there. That was my peak. That’s where I wanted to play. I never even thought about playing after. I just wanted to get to Wisconsin.”
Smith joined a behemoth. His freshman year, teammates included future NHL players Ryan McDonagh, Derek Stepan, Brendan Smith and Jake Gardiner. Blake Geoffrion, the 2010 Hobey Baker Award winner, was his linemate. The Badgers lost to Boston College in the NCAA title game.
It was no easy thing, then, for Smith to say goodbye after two years. Smith loved being a Badger. His parents, who drove three hours each way to attend his USHL games in Waterloo, had the easiest commute of their lives.
But Nashville was offering something unique. Because of Smith’s play as a sophomore (19-24—43 in 41 games) and his six points with and against men in the 2011 World Championship, Paul Fenton, then Nashville’s assistant general manager, said a spot on the big club would be available in the 2011-12 season.
This is uncommon for the Predators. One of their organizational pillars is that the road to Nashville almost always includes a stop in Milwaukee, their AHL affiliate.
“My experience, and my firm’s experience, is that never had the Nashville Predators promised anything like this before,” said Magnuson. “With that promise and our trust level in Paul Fenton and (GM) David Poile, we felt comfortable that it was time for Craig to make the jump. It was not an easy or quick decision. We always err on taking things slow as opposed to fast. But with this one, it all added up.”
Nontraditional growth
Fenton kept his word. As a 22-year-old rookie, Smith scored 14 goals and 22 assists in 72 games. It was the baseline for future performance. Whether Smith played alongside Mike Ribeiro, Matt Cullen, Kyle Turris or Nick Bonino, the Predators could count on the speedy shoot-first wing to let pucks fly — and usually get them on net.
Consider that over the last three years, Smith averaged 11.08 shots per 60 minutes of 5-on-5 play, according to Natural Stat Trick. Only two forwards in the league with 2,000 or more minutes had more: Brendan Gallagher (13.41) and Brady Tkachuk (11.15).
“He wants to be throttle down and play with his hair on fire,” said ex-Bruin Hal Gill, now Nashville’s radio analyst. “That’s what he’s made himself into. Heavy on the forecheck. Always grinding. Always moving his legs. Always pushing the pace. He’s streaky. When he gets hot, he is lights out. When he gets dialed in and starts picking corners, there’s a difference in his shot when he gets into that method. He’s finding corners and he’s drilling them.”
Smith and the Predators grew up at the same time. In Smith’s rookie season, Nashville won its opening playoff series against Detroit. It was only the second time in franchise history the Predators won a round.
In 2016-17, the Predators lost to the Penguins in the Stanley Cup Final. The following season, they won the Presidents’ Trophy for the first time.
“We made it to the second round, and that was a big deal,” Smith said of his rookie season. “Getting there, it was just exciting getting to the playoffs when I was first got there. By the end of it, by the time I left, it was expected. It was expected for us to win.”
So it was disappointing for Smith that, as he advanced through his ninth season as a Predator, a 10th was unlikely. Nashville lost to Arizona in the qualifying round of the NHL playoffs. The Predators informed Smith an extension would not happen.
“Just to pick up and leave … I think it hit us last week,” said Smith of him and wife, Aleah, saying goodbye. “We went back to Nashville, packed up our house and moved (to Boston). It’s mainly the relationships you make with people. Our friends inside and outside of hockey made that whole experience great for us. The next time we come back to Nashville, it won’t be the same.”
Chasing big things
Smith’s preferred target is muskie. It is a freshwater fish. In the lakes of Wisconsin, muskie grow to be as big in real life as the fish described in lubricated tales. They are as smart as they are large.
“They call it the fish of 10,000 casts,” Smith said. “If you don’t get one, it can be a pain throwing lures all day. But if you know what you’re doing, you can get on top of one. Usually, all you need is one for a summer to be great.”
Lakes put Smith at ease. He does not need much to be happy. The fish don’t even have to bite.
“I don’t want to say this as demeaning, but he’s simple. He’s a simple guy,” Gill said. “You don’t need to play the tricks with him. You just tell him what you want. He’ll go and get it. A good Wisconsin boy.”
Smith did not bring a muskie home this offseason. But on Oct. 10, he landed something more lucrative, a target with possibly an even bigger prize at the end of the line. Chats with Don Sweeney and Bruce Cassidy, followed by a call with Patrice Bergeron, helped Smith decide on the Bruins.
“It was a cool conversation,” Magnuson said. “There was mutual admiration between Don, Bruce and Craig — Craig toward the Bruins and how they play. To be part of that conversation was special for me, hearing Don and Bruce know Craig’s game inside and out, exactly where he’d fit on the second power play, exactly where in the lineup, Bruce intimately knowing Craig’s tendencies in a positive way.”
For the first time, Cassidy should have a full cast at right wing: David Pastrnak, once cleared to play, running on the top line, followed by Ondrej Kase, Smith and Chris Wagner. Pastrnak, Kase and Smith will not have to be told to shoot the puck.
Smith and his wife recently settled into their Boston home. He visited Warrior Ice Arena for the first time. He saw the flash of the six Stanley Cups that sparkle outside the dressing room. Smith would like to be part of a seventh.
The transition will not happen swiftly. He is learning a new organization, new teammates and new city after spending 11 years identifying as a Predator.
“It’s definitely going to take some time here over the next couple weeks, getting used to things,” Smith said. “That’s expected. I’m ready for that. I know it’s going to be a little different, moving here and getting situated. That’s to be. People make a place great. From what I’ve seen so far, it looks like there’s just a great group of guys here. I’m lucky enough to be here with those guys. I’m excited to get to work with them.”
Smith doesn’t have a history with any of his new teammates. He will be guided by the advice his father gave him years ago.
“I just want you to be a good person,” Kevin Smith would tell his son. “Everything else will come. Be a good person, a good team player. Everything will fall into place for you.”
As a boy, Craig Smith missed out on Take Your Child To Work day. He wanted to accompany his dad to job sites. Workplace regulations, however, made them off-limits to kids.
It may be one reason Smith did not follow his dad and become a glazier. He had another kind of smooth and hard surface in mind.
The ice business has worked out.
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