Rielly, Greig incident draws out the ‘Pin-Dicks’

 Middle ground and balanced opinion? Not that we were expecting anything different but there wasn’t much of that coming out of Saturday night’s coup d’etat of the Ontario hockey universe by frothing fans on both sides of the fracas involving Ottawa’s Riley Greig and Toronto’s Morgan Rielly. Make no mistake,

It’s cold-and-flu season, here’s how to deal with it (or not)

 It’s either the flu or it’s a heavy, heavy cold. Either way, I’ve got it and it’s going to be seven days tomorrow. (And before you roll out the old man-cold line, my friend Steph also has it. She’s bedridden and she’s also tough as beef jerky, so there.) It’s

Who’s Your Dance Partner, Edmonton, Vancouver or Winnipeg?

 No need to haul out your best Clarence Darrow suit-and-tie to walk away from the lectern as a winner in this debate: Which Canadian territory holds superiority over the other – the NHL’s West or the NHL’s East? It’s as obvious as an Alberta slaughterhouse. Carrying the league’s hottest team

Curing the Blue Monday Blues

 So get this – did you realize we just passed, what is considered, the most depressing day in the calendar year? The third Monday in January is labelled “Blue Monday,” and it has nothing to do with the song by New Order. Nope. The term comes from this ‘makes-sense’ algorithm

Tire Fire Reaches Halfway Point

 Fire the general manager, get stiffed on a first-round draft choice, see a top forward sent to NHL purgatory for half a season, put the torch to the inflammable head coach, reassign your flagging goalie coach, watch a promising and potentially break-out year go up in flames early and often.

Making the Wrong Call on Ottawa

 As most of the NHL’s member clubs approach the halfway point of the season (Ottawa, at 36 played, still has some catching up to do, despite the glut of games the past month), a number of items appear on this week’s agenda. Here’s what’s popping.   DID WE REALLY SAY

Hurry up and Wait, Ottawa

 Most of you are well into your cups as far as New Year’s resolutions. A full three(!) days(!) in(!) . . . which might suggest the gym is now slowly re-entering the rearview mirror, the Haagen-Dazs has been restocked in the freezer and you’ve barked at your kids or dog

Are they listening, Jacques?

 It wasn’t an oil painting. Hell, it wasn’t even a decent watercolour effort. Baby steps though, right? Ottawa’s won back-to-back games under ‘new’ head coach Jacques Martin, and for at least one night (for most of the night anyway) the team that couldn’t-wouldn’t play collective defence if its life depended

In a word – ‘Ugh’

 OK, I’ve got it. If the fabulous brain boxes at The Hockey News ask me to write the Ottawa Senators preview for the 2024-25 campaign, I have the perfect lede: “Cue the broken record. A dismal start doomed the Senators yet again last season, as the club missed the playoffs

Under .500 Again? It’s not all on the Coach

 It’s the justification I just don’t get. Ottawa management, yeah the new group, keeps bringing up the suggestion that sending Senators’ head coach D.J. Smith and his crew packing would just simply be . . . a bad idea. The reason? ‘The players have told us there’s already been far

Playoffs in Ottawa? Might be Asking too Much

 As of this morning, the Ottawa Senators sit seven whopping’ points out of a playoff spot with little real estate ahead of them available for coasting or letdowns or easing off of the pedal. No breaks, and no respites are available. Period. Here we are on December-freakin’-6th and the entire

Are we Already at Make-or-Break?

 I’m pretty sure you’re familiar with the projected math (and what it all can signify) approaching U.S. Thanksgiving: If you’re ‘in,’ come the final days of November, you’re likely ‘in.’ Subsequently, if you’re ‘out,’ you’re likely ‘out,’ come season’s end. In-and-out? The playoffs. Yeah, it happens this early. American Thanksgiving

Battle? What battle?

 What we have here is a national crisis. When one of our country’s most established, venerated, respected institutions tumbles into near obscurity, what else would you call it? Yep, crisis pretty well sums it up. The Battle of Ontario? Please. Nerf Ball war is more like it. Ottawa and Toronto

Dorion’s firing . . . and spinning the wheel on Senators, Habs and Leafs

 Collectively they should be recognized as the Holy Trinity of hockey around these parts. Three entities that swallow the large majority of fan support in the Eastern Ontario region. So in no particular order, here we have Montreal, Toronto and Ottawa, and if you’re a hockey follower in the region,

Bad habits just won’t go away – Senators

 Expectations can create resentments? Yep. Especially those darned unfulfilled ones. So when you’re the Ottawa Senators – the new golden child of the National Hockey League’s collective media as well as the club’s jacked and re-juiced fan base – and you watch what came about during the team’s last two

It’s Crack-of-Dawn Early but Ottawa’s Wide Awake

 One down, 27-ish to go. It’s just one full week into the NHL season and already proclamations are being made league-wide: “The Canucks are soft,” “The Oilers stink,” “Seattle stinks too,” “It’s either Vegas-Ottawa in the final or Colorado-Detroit in the final!” One full week in and we’re thrust into

It’s here, it’s finally here

 Never let a good idea get untold . . . again? Well, it’s a damn good idea. With that in mind, after discovering Sportsnet’s National Hockey League regular season primer sitting on my laptop earlier this morning, my interest and ability to pilfer were fully engaged. In essence, the crew

Blue is the colour of Toronto

 It’s here. The first installment of ‘real’ hockey; hockey that matters. It’s happening and gets started Tuesday night as Vegas hosts Seattle, where-and-when the Knights unveil their Stanley Cup banner, Pittsburgh entertains Chicago where Crosby and new-Crosby face each other, and Nashville is at Tampa in the first entry into

Ottawa Fan Should Be Thinking: ‘Pinto-Shminto’

 Folks will tell you to try and appreciate what you have, as opposed to what you don’t. You’ve heard of it I’m sure: Gratitude. So try laying down this wisdom on a hockey fanatic. Go ahead, try it. In most cases it doesn’t go very far . . . a

Senators Relishing the Pressure?

 The elevation from doormat to Golden Boy couldn’t have happened quicker. Last year, two years ago (. . . three years ago, four years ago, five years ago . . .) when asked about the pending fate and fortunes of the Ottawa Senators, hockey panellists would kind of look awkwardly

NHL Quiz Show

 What’s up this week? Well, I’ll tell you what’s up this week: questions and answers that potentially could carry great relevance to a 2023-34 National Hockey League season, which opens in less than one month. That’s what’s up. The one caveat here – as it tends to be since we

Newsflash: Penguins are old! (Stop the presses!)

 Terry Marcotte, a cherished Ottawa personality while with CTV News, produced a weekly segment for the local channel a few years back highlighting the accomplishments of senior citizens in the sporting community. Too bad Terry didn’t stick around for another few years cause he could have filled a month of

Subtraction not in Dorion’s vocabulary anymore

 “The final mystery is oneself.” — Oscar Wilde Brainy quotes aside, if this is in fact the start of the final frontier for Ottawa Senators’ General Manager Pierre Dorion, even his toughest critics would have to admit that this is a guy who knows himself. As a self-identifier, Dorion must

Dad’s love for hockey never wavered

 There were plenty of things to admire about my dad. A steady and - when-required - stern hand as father to three animated, overly clever and bedlam-seeking boys; dedicated engineer for seemingly thousands of decades at Domtar; solid provider; incredibly wise man with finances; supportive when needed; not-so-supportive when justified;

DeBrincat takeaway – fans disenchanted with deal

 Based on what we’ve seen and read from the fan base in the past 12 hours, Ottawa Fan is not quite starting the work week on their happy feet. What happened was Ottawa Senators General Manager Pierre Dorion traded away sniper Alex DeBrincat to the Detroit Red Wings and wise-man