Puck Podcast

OTTAWA – John Tavares of the Oshawa Generals paced Canada to an 8-1 win over the Czech Republic with two goals and an assist Friday at the world junior hockey championship.

WASHINGTON – Alex Ovechkin, Viktor Kozlov and Boyd Gordon scored goals, and Jose Theodore made 22 saves in the Washington Capitals’ 3-2 victory over the Buffalo Sabres on Friday night.

NEWARK, N.J. – Marc-Andre Fleury made 37 saves for Pittsburgh’s first shutout of the season, and Ruslan Fedotenko scored midway through the second period in the Penguins’ 1-0 victory over the New Jersey Devils on Friday night.

UNIONDALE, N.Y. – Bill Guerin scored twice to reach 400 goals, Rick DiPietro made 28 saves in his first game since late October, and the New York Islanders snapped a 10-game losing streak with a 4-1 victory over Toronto on Friday night.

VANCOUVER, B.C. – Contract talks between veteran defenceman Mattias Ohlund and the Vancouver Canucks have stalled.”I don’t think there’s too much going on at the moment, but we’ll see what happens,” Ohlund said Friday after the Canucks’ morning skate in advance of a game against the Edmonton Oilers.

OTTAWA – David Rundblad scored the eventual winner and Jacob Markstrom stopped 21 shots as Sweden opened their world junior hockey championship with a 3-1 win over Finland on Friday.

UNIONDALE, N.Y. – Rick DiPietro returned to the New York Islanders’ lineup Friday night, starting against Toronto after missing 27 games following his second knee surgery in five months.

James van Riemsdyk and Drayson Bowman each scored a pair of goals to lead the U.S. to a 8-2 win over Germany to open the world junior hockey championship Friday.

Pavel Chernov had a goal and an assist to lead the Russians to a 4-1 win over Latvia in the tournament’s opening game on Friday.
“It wasn’t a great game on our part, but it was a solid win in the first game,” Russia’s Nikita Filatov told the IIHF website.

DAVOS, Switzerland – Canada received passing marks during its first test at the Spengler Cup. The next one should be even tougher.After weathering a tough first period on Friday, Canada picked it up on the power play and beat Czech squad Energie Karlovy Vary 3-1 in its tournament opener.

DAVOS, Switzerland – Canada received passing marks during its first test at the Spengler Cup. The next one should be even tougher.After weathering a tough first period on Friday, Canada picked it up on the power play and beat Czech squad Energie Karlovy Vary 3-1 in its tournament opener.

OTTAWA – When Pat Quinn called Ryan Ellis last spring to tell the young defenceman he was on Canada’s under-18 going to the world championship, Ellis didn’t believe it was Quinn on the phone.

OTTAWA – Canada’s world junior team is planning to honour the memory of Luc Bourdon.
The Canadian players will wear `LB’ stickers on their helmets during their tournament opener against the Czech Republic later Friday.

It promises to be an important year for Steve Yzerman.
Even though the Olympic hockey tournament won’t truly take the spotlight until 2010, the decisions Yzerman has to oversee in the coming months will play a huge role in determining if the Canadian team wins gold in Vancouver.

OTTAWA – Pat Quinn wasn’t ready for life after hockey.
After 19 years coaching in the NHL, Quinn was at loose ends when the Toronto Maple Leafs fired him in April, 2006.

Hockey scouts will be out en masse for the World Under-17 Challenge that begins next Monday on Vancouver Island.
They will be watching players like Regina Pats forward Jordan Weal, hot Quebec goaltender Louis Boileau-Dominique of the Moncton Wildcats and Ontario sniper Ryan Spooner of the Peterborough Petes, who are unfamiliar names even to many scouts right now, but may not be for long.

DETROIT – Tomas Holmstrom gets Christmas wish lists from his Detroit Red Wings teammates. They figure that because he’s from northern Sweden, he’s close enough to the North Pole to have connections with Santa Claus.

PHILADELPHIA – The names that top the list of NHL scoring leaders are about as expected as a Zamboni cleaning the ice between periods.
Malkin.

NEW YORK – Chicago Blackhawks forwards Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews own comfortable leads in voting for the NHL all-star game while races for the other Western Conference starting spots remain open.