Schultz Is Going All Bobby Orr In The AHL

Justin Schultz is off to a hot start with the Oklahoma City Barons and currently leads the AHL in points with 12 points in 7 games. Even more impressive is his 6 goals already this year from the back end. The Oklahoma City Barons are one of the more stacked AHL teams from the NHL lockout with Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Jordan Eberle joining the team and they are getting an extra boost this weekend when Taylor Hall returns from the IR. What makes Justin Schultz's 12 points so amazing is that The Nuge and Eberle both started the season slowly and Schultz has consistently kept the scoring going for the Barons as they sit in a playoff spot with a 4-3 record.

AHL Young Stars Off To Slow Starts

Remember when all those NHL young stars got sent down to the AHL and we assumed they'd tear it up? Well so far some of them have been slow out of the gate and haven't looked like the NHL young guns that we know or hoped they would be this year. Sure some of your AHL Fantasy Draft first rounders such as Jordan Eberle, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Justin Schultz, Brayden Schenn, Cody Hodgson, Mikael Granlund and Brett Connolly are scoring as expected, but there are a few who are struggling. While it's only a few games into the season and it's not time to start panicking about your team's prospects, we still expected more from them this early so let's single them out.

Vintage Video of NHLers Lighting Up Novice

Over the past week, a user on YouTube has been uploading highlights of NHLers in their youth hockey days. More specifically, the footage is from the The Brick Invitational Super Novice Hockey Tournament that takes place annually in Edmonton at the West Edmonton Wall. Just some background info on the tourney, it was created by The Brick's owner, Bill Comrie, back in 1990 and is now one of the biggest hockey tournaments for nine and ten-year-olds. If you know your Canadian businesses then you know that Bill Comrie is the father of Mike Comrie and little Mikey participated in the inaugural tourney (imagine if your Dad created a giant hockey tournament just for you!). The summer tournament has seen many NHLers participate in the event over the years including Steven Stamkos, Jonathan Toews, Dustin Byfuglien, Dion Phaneuf, Brent Seabrook and Jordan Eberle whose highlights you can see below:

NHL Lockout Halloween Costumes

You might be scrambling for a costume to wear to your Halloween party and with no NHL hockey so far this season being the scariest thing for fans we have some costume ideas to help you get through it. As the NHL and NHLPA continue to negotiate (or lack there of) a new CBA, why not poke fun at the Lockout and those involved?

The KHL Doesn't Fuck Around With Mistakes

"You better get this call right, or you know what will happen."

Human error happens in hockey. Referees make the wrong call or simply miss calls all the time and you usually end up seeing them back making the same mistakes a few games later. Well, in the Kontinental Hockey League, that isn't always the case. If you mess up a call, it costs you your life. Just kidding, but you will probably be suspended or lose your job.

Check Out This 12-Year-Old Hoss

You have to be a pretty special hockey player to make headlines as a 12-year-old, and Ethan Lavallee didn't disappoint in the Toronto Star. While Wayne Gretzky was making headlines for scoring hundreds of goals as a 10-year-old, Ethan Lavallee is making headlines because he is 6'5½" and 192 lbs at age 12. Big kids always get noticed, but Lavallee also comes with some skill and is lighting up his AAA league in Northern Ontario for the Nickel City Sons.

Ovechkin Breaks Glass With His Head

We knew Alex Ovechkin would break the glass one day. Maybe from one of his rocket one-timers or leaving his feet on a hit, but we mostly expected him to jump through the glass on a celebration like this kid did. Well he proved us wrong and broke the glass after a hit with his head. After levelling Alexei Mikhnov, OV flew back into the boards and the force of his body and head shattered the glass. OV would be fine and only needed to shake the glass out of his equipment before finishing the game.

 

NHLers Non-NHL Highlights Of The Week

It's been a rollercoaster week for hockey fans as we come down from the optimistic high that was the NHL's 50/50 proposal. While the NHLPA gave three counter proposals later in the week like a drunk fantasy GM, all three were dismissed by the NHL and the Lockout continues. CBA talk dominated headlines throughout the week, but there were some hockey highlights of the non-NHL variety to be seen. Here are some of our favourite NHLers Non-NHL Hockey Highlights of the Week to cheer you up.

Prospect Watch: John Gaudreau

No this isn't one of the players sons practicing with the team, he is a prospect.

Have you heard of John Gaudreau? Not many casual hockey fans have, but the Calgary Flames are pretty excited about their 4th round pick (104th overall) in 2011. Gaudreau had first round round talent, but slipped in the draft because of his size. At the draft he was listed as 5'6" and 140 pounds. No that's not a typo, he really was 140 pounds.

NHLers Catching Something Bad In Europe

Rick Nash's clap(pers) are making headlines in Switzerland

There's always one guy who comes back from a Euro trip with friends with some kind of bug they picked up, and in the NHLers case during the lockout, it's the injury bug. While some players might be living it up in their European cities like gods and contracting other bugs, NHL teams and their fans can't be happy hearing about their injuries. Injuries in hockey are common, but when they happen during the Lockout they seem like a bigger deal because the players are being injured while wearing another team's jersey with silly advertisements on it.

Pavel Kubina's Lockout-to-Lockout Suspension

Pavel Kubina signed with HC Vitkovice Steel on September 16th, but is yet to play a game for the squad in their Czech Extraliga season. While there are plenty of players who are getting in better game shape (Evander Kane not included) before joining their European clubs, Kubina hasn't been playing as he is serving a suspension that dates back to April 2005.

Red Wings European Gems Lighting It Up

Erika was drafted by the Red Wings 136th overall in the Ice Girls Draft.

The Detroit Red Wings are known for their diamond in the rough European draft picks such as Henrik Zetterberg (210th overall), Pavel Datsyuk (171st overall) and Nicklas Lidstrom (53rd overall). Well, their prospects playing in Europe during the NHL Lockout are looking just as bright. The Red Wings have had six players suit up in Europe so far and have three more signed and looking to play this weekend. Of the six Wings who've already played overseas, five have been stellar (singling out Jakub Kindl for shitting the bed) and in that group there are three prospects who will be looking to make the Red Wings roster full time when and if this NHL Lockout ends.

Struggling NHL Tendys Overseas

At least Ondrej Pavelec's save percentage isn't the same as his BAC

While some goalies such as Viktor Fasth and Semyon Varlamov are off to great starts with their European clubs, the majority of NHL goaltenders playing in Europe have struggled between the pipes - none worse than Michal Neuvrith and Ondrej Pavelec in the Czech Extraliga. Both goalies are sporting 0-6 records and have looked like Shooter Tutors for opposing teams. 

Get To Know The Swedish Elitserien

During the NHL Lockout, we'll profile some of the different leagues all over the globe that 

you can turn to for your hockey fix and catch some NHLers in action while locked out.

The Swedish Elitserien was founded in 1975 and has grown to become one of the most competitive leagues in the world and higher attended hockey leagues in Europe. The Elitserien has roots dating back to the Swedish Division I and the Swedish ice hockey championships which have awarded a champion of Sweden since 1922. An amazing part of Swedish ice hockey history and the Elitserien is that the championship trophy awarded every year was donated by an American film director, Raoul Le Mat, with money from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) in 1926 and is named after Le Mat to honour him as one of the founding fathers of Swedish hockey.

NHLers Still Dangling Despite Lockout

Kopitar getting haggled for an autograph during a game

The horde of NHLers in Europe is growing every day with the lockout and while there is no NHL hockey highlights to be watched we are still getting treated to European highlights of NHLers scoring goals in Nascar uniforms. It's almost three weeks into the lockout and many of the NHLers playing overseas have won over their home teams hearts with their skill that clearly separates them from the rest of the league. Some are tearing up their leagues and they should overtake scoring leaders shorty if they keep their scoring pace up. It's been exciting hockey - despite not being NHL hockey - and as a hockey fan you have to appreciate that.

Pavel Datsyuk Is Pretty Good At Pickpocketing

Pavel Datsyuk is hockey's greatest thief. He would fit right in with the Ocean's Eleven crew or Sean Connery in Entrapment (Catherine Zeta-Jones is a babe in that). Being the NHL's leader in takeaways since the 04-05 Lockout has helped Datsyuk win the Frank J. Selke Trophy for best defensive forward three times and be nominated five times in that span. Datsyuk is known for his slick hands and dirty dangles, and having those kind of hands are what makes him so good at the defensive component of the game.

Locked Out Fantasy Hockey GMs

No NHL is a huge loss for hockey fans and as expected it is having a pretty big effect on many of the traditions that often occur prior to the regular season puck drop. Watching preseason hockey without a care for the final result has already been wiped out, but perhaps the biggest tradition affected is your annual fantasy hockey league draft being postponed or cancelled completely. You may have already done a draft and felt empty inside throughout the process, but most leagues are simply postponing until this whole lockout thing comes to an end. It's probably the best move to delay as long as possible and wait for any news, but essentially fantasy hockey GM's have been locked out until further notice.

NHLers European Statistics Made Easy

We've been missing the NHL quite a bit over here at Dirty Dangle and are already getting sick of writing posts concerning the Lockout. Thankfully, hockey is a global sport and NHLers like European vacations so we still get to follow some of the top hockey players in the world as they represent teams across the pond (and their sponsors). While it's easy to look up stats for the KHL as they've made their league very English-friendly, some of the other leagues in Europe may be tough to follow as looking up various teams and players in over ten hockey leagues (with rough Google translations) can be quite time consuming. From our searches there are no other sites currently tracking the statistics of NHLers in Europe for NHL fans to quickly see how the NHL's players are stacking up against the competition over there - so we decided to.

5 Things You'll Miss Saying Thanks To The Cancelled NHL Preseason

With the NHL preseason officially cancelled, it's a sad time for hockey fans as the preseason is actually kind of fun to watch. Not only was it NHL hockey after three months of offseason, but the preseason provided some foreplay before the NHL campaign truly started. With daily cuts from camps and plenty of webcam quality highlights, it was always a sign of NHL hockey saying "Hey buddy, I'm almost back I just gotta shake the rust off."