PYEONGCHANG – Anson Carter’s response was “Ha, ha, that’s funny” when he first saw Chance the Rapper play a clueless New York Knicks basketball sideline reporter trying to analyze a NewYork Rangers hockey game in an NBC “Saturday Night Live” skit.
Former NHLer Anson Carter will be part of NBC’s Olympic TV crew.
But his reaction quickly shifted to “Hey, now, wait a minute” upon further review.
“I loved it, I thought it was funny, you need to laugh at yourself,” Carter, a retired National Hockey League forward/turned hockey analyst for NBC Sports Network and host of “The MSG Hockey Show.” “But at the same time, there are enough black people out there who know the game of hockey that you’re like ‘Can we actually move past that point?”
“I liked it because it brought attention to the sport, but you can’t keep using those same old stereotypes because there are actually knowledgeable black fans out there that you’re saying ‘You guys have no clue on what’s going on,’ he added. “I think that was the easy way out making fun of hockey, of all sports. There’s a lot more black fans out there than we get credit for. From that standpoint, I didn’t like it, but you’ve got to laugh at yourself.”
Carter is busy these days preparing to impart hockey knowledge on television viewers as part of the NBC team that will cover the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea, Feb. 9-25. He’ll serve as an in-studio host from NBC Sports Group’s International Broadcast Center in Stamford, Connecticut.
He says he’s mindful that the Winter Games might be the first time that a casual viewer might see a black person talking about ice hockey on TV.
“Sometimes you’re changing the channel, and you might not watch the whole game, but you might want to see what’s happening between periods, and you see a black face on TV talking about the game, giving some insightful analysis on what’s going on,” Carter said.
“I always keep in mind, too, that I have to make sure that I’m prepared at all times,” he added. “I want to make sure I’m bringing my ‘A’ game to the table because it is all about diversity. You can’t talk about being diverse on the ice, but then off the ice you don’t have that diversity as well when you have people capable of doing the job.”
Carter did the job when he was a player. He tallied 202 goals and 219 assists in 674 games over 11 seasons with the Capitals, Boston Bruins,Edmonton Oilers, VancouverCanucks, New York Rangers, Los Angeles Kings, Columbus Blue Jackets and CarolinaHurricanes.
These days, he’s is part of a growing group of black hockey analysts/broadcasters. Kevin Weekes, a former NHL goaltender, mans the analyst’s desk at the NHL Network. David Amberco-hosts the late Saturday game on “Hockey Night in Canada,” the “Monday NightFootball” of the Great White North.
Tarik El Bashir provides analysis during Washington Capitals broadcasts on NBCSports Washington, where he’s sometimes joined by Carter. Everett Fitzhugh is the voice of the Cincinnati Cyclones of the ECHL.
Last month, Fitzhugh was part of a television team chosen to call the CCM-ECHL All-StarGame that aired on NHL Network.
All these guys, to paraphrase Chance the Rapper, are doing that hockey.
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Erin Jackson, U.S. long track speedskater (Photo/US Speedskating/Alienfrogg).
It was Must-See-TV in the era black and white sets, new-fangled remote controls, rabbit ears antennae, and frozen TV dinners.
New Must-See-TV moments begin Friday night with the start of the 2018 Winter Olympics. The 242-member U.S. team that will march into South Korea’s PyeongChang Olympic Stadium for the opening ceremony will be the most diverse American team in Winter Olympic history.
The U.S. team features a record 10 African-American athletes competing in bobsled, speedskating and ice hockey.
“The fact that you’re seeing black athletes competing at the highest levels, it gives promise to kids, not just the kids, but parents, too,” said Anson Carter, a black retired NationalHockey League forward who’s working the Winter Games as an in-studio analyst for NBC. “So when you turn the TV on and see these stories on NBC about these black athletes competing in the Olympics, and competing at a very high level, that will more likely open some eyes.”
Seventy-five percent of the four-member U.S. women’s bobsled team is black. Led by Elana Meyers Taylor, the team is looking to improve upon the silver and bronze medals medals they won at the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi.
The U.S. men’s bobsled team features Hakeem Abdul-Saboor, a former football star at the University of Virginia College at Wise, and Chris Kinney, a former GeorgetownUniversity track athlete.
Best of luck to Chris Kinney -my fellow Hoya! He is representing the USA and Georgetown on the 2018 Bobsled team! #hoyasaxapic.twitter.com/8XOOQdrymG
Speedskating legend Shani Davis returns for his fourth Winter Olympics. He’s joined by Erin Jackson, the first African-American female U.S. long track speedskating Olympian, and 18-year-old Maame Biney, the first black female U.S. short track Olympic contestant.
Jordan Greenway, a massive and massively-talented forward from Boston University, makes history as the first African-American to play for a U.S. Olympic ice hockey team. Carter is expecting big things from the 6-foot-5, 238-pound junior from Canton, New York.
“You don’t find too many players like him that are big and strong and fast,” Carter told me recently. “I don’t think it’s a token ‘Here, kid, come on to the team, we’re going to give you a chance. We’re going to try to get our black quota of players up just so we can put the story out there.’ That’s not how hockey works.”
“If you’re a black hockey player you have to be really good to play at the next level,” Carter added. “For a guy like Jordan to come and play on that team, that says a lot about his ability, that says a lot about his talent, that says a lot about how much respect he’s getting in the hockey community as a player who could be an impact player at the National Hockey League level.”
And the diversity in PyeongChang extends beyond the U.S. team. Jamaica is back with a bobsled team – the Caribbean island nation’s first women’s squad. They’ll be joined by the country’s first skeleton athlete.
Nigeria is in the house with its first Winter Olympics participants – a women’s bobsled team and a female skeleton athlete.
Not only are Seun Adigun, Akuoma Omeoga, and Ngozi Onwumere the first Olympic bobsled athletes for an African country, but they're also the first people to ever represent Nigeria at the Winter Olympics. https://t.co/Q82EbMFgEY
I’m in South Korea this month covering the 2018 Winter Olympics for McClatchy Newspapers. In addition, you’ll be able to catch me occasionally on NPR. I’ll be talking Winter Olympics with host Michel Martin this Sunday on NPR’s “All ThingsConsidered” weekend edition.
So give a read and a listen. In the meantime, here are some of the folks who are adding a splash of color to the Winter Olympics.
Just 18 years old, Maame Biney is the United States’ first black female Olympic short track speedskater.
Erin Jackson skated into the history books when she became the first African-American woman to qualify for the Winter Olympics in long track speedskating (Photo/US Speedskating John Kleba).
The U.S. Women’s Bobsled National Team. Left to Right, Kehri Jones, Brittany Reinbolt, Aja Evans, Lauren Gibbs, Elana Meyers Taylor, Jamie Greubel Poser, Lolo Jones, and Briauna Jones. Evans, Gibbs, Meyers Taylor, and Greubel Poser will operate two U.S. bobsleds at the 2018 Winter Olympics. Briauna Jones will be a backup in PyeongChang (Photo/Molly Choma/USA Bobsled & Skeleton).
North Carolina’s Kimani Griffin will make his Olympic debut in long track speedskating (Photo/US Speedskating/John Kleba).
Shani Davis is competing in his fourth Winter Olympics. He’s won two gold and two silver medals in his Olympic career. (Photo/Harry E. Walker).
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Boston University forward Jordan Greenway, who’ll be the first African-American to play for a U.S. hockey team at the Winter Olympics, isn’t the only American making hockey history.
Randi Griffin of Korea’s unified women’s Olympic hockey tea (Photo/Korean Ice Hockey Association).
Former Harvard University forward Randi Griffin, a North Carolinian of Korean heritage, will also be a part of history as a member of the unified Korean women’s hockey team that will compete at the 2018 Winter Games in PyeongChang, South Korea, Feb. 9-25.
When the team takes to the ice for its first game against Switzerland on Feb. 10, it will be the first time in Olympic history that athletes from North and South Korea will be teammates in one sport.
The International Olympic Committee announced Saturday that the two Korean squads will become one by adding 12 players from the North to the existing 23-player South Korean roster.
South Korean Head CoachSarah Murray, a dual Canadian-American citizen and daughter of former National Hockey League coach Andy Murray, will guide the unified team.
Under the unification agreement forged by the IOC and the North and South Korea Olympic committees, Murray will dress three North Korean players for each game.
Korea’s Randi Griffin (left) in action in an exhibition game against the Connecticut Whale of the National Women’s Hockey League (Photo/Korea Ice Hockey Association).
Griffin, 29, skated for Harvard from 2006-07 to 2009-10. She tallied 21 goals and 18 assists in 124 games for the Crimson. She joined the South Korean women’s national team in 2015 after receiving an email invite that she initially thought was a scam.
Read more about Griffin’s journey from Apex, N.C., to Cambridge, Mass., to PyeongChang in a story I wrote for McClatchy Newspapers.
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Another U.S. speedskating Olympic trial, another African-American woman on the team that’s headed to the 2018 Winter Games in PyeongChang, South Korea, next month.
Erin Jackson, a 25-year-old from Ocala, Florida, Friday became the first African American woman to qualify for the U.S. Olympic speedskating team in the long track competition.
Erin Jackson skated into the history books Friday when she became the first African-American woman to qualify for the Winter Olympics in long track speedskating (Photo/US Speedskating/John Kleba).
She accomplished the feat at the trials in Milwaukee nearly three weeks after 17-year-old Maame Biney became the first African-American woman to make the U.S. team in short track competition.
What makes Jackson’s road to PyeongChang, South Korea, especially stunning is that she’s only been doing long track ice skating for four months.
“I surprised myself a lot. I really wasn’t expecting any of this,” Jackson said after making the team. “Just coming in as a newbie trying to do the best that I can.”
Like several other speedskaters, Jackson made the transition to ice from inline skating, where she won a bunch of medals in international competition from 2008 to 2015. She’s a three-time roller sport athlete of the year.
“I’ve been an inline speedskater for 15 years,” Jackson said. “I came to Salt Lake City (Olympic oval) for the first time in March, well the end of February into March. Then I went back to inline for the summer and came back to Salt Lake in September, so it’s been about four months combined.”
Jackson is also a roller derby veteran. She began in the bruising sport in 2012 and was a member of the New Jax City Rollers, part of Jacksonville Roller Derby, an all-female flat-track roller derby league in Florida.
Now she’s teammates with Biney and the legendary Shani Davis, the 35-year-old Chicagoan who’ll be competing in his fifth consecutive Winter Olympics next month.
ERIN JACKSON HAS ONLY BEEN SPEED SKATING FOR FOUR MONTHS. FOUR GODDAMN MONTHS. (She was an inline skater before that.) pic.twitter.com/vH73KzDuDf
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Boston University forward Jordan Greenway was named to the U.S. Olympic men’s hockey team that will compete at the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea next month.
Boston University forward Jordan Greenway is PyeongChang-bound (Photo/Andre Ringuette/HHOF-IIHF Images).
Greenway, 20, is the first African-American player ever chosen for the U.S. team.
“Even starting in 1960 when we had the amateurs playing in the Olympics and we were able to get the gold medal there, and then most recently in 1980, just being able to build on that legacy is an unbelievable feeling for me, and I’m happy I’m able to get this opportunity now,” Greenway told the Sporting News. “I’ve been able to accomplish a lot of good things and just allowing a lot of African-American kids who are younger than me who see kind of what I’m doing, I hope that can be an inspiration for them.
Greenway was one of four collegiate players selected for a U.S. team that largely consists of players who are starring in overseas leagues, a career minor-leaguer, and a 38-year-old recently-retiredStanley Cup champion.
The U.S. team opted for this mix after the NHL announced that it wouldn’t send its players to the Winter Games for the first time in 30 years.
Greenway’s selection wasn’t a surprise: He had participated in Team USA pre-Olympic media events.
A junior at Boston University and a 2015 Minnesota Wild second-round draft pick, Greenway earned a spot on the Olympic roster with a breakout performance at the 2017 International IceHockey Federation World Junior Championship in Toronto and Montreal.
The 6-foot-6, 227-pound forward from Canton, New York, was a man among boys for the gold medal-winning U.S. team, combining an intimidating physicality with soft scoring hands.
He had 3 goals and 5 assists in seven games at the World Juniors. He’s tallied 7 goals and 10 assists in 19 NCAA Division I hockey games this season.
Boston University Head Coach David Quinn has said that if Greenway wasn’t a hockey player he would be “a five-star tight end for Alabama and Notre Dame” because of his size.
Jordan Greenway, right, was a towering figure for the U.S. at the 2017 IIHF World Junior Championship. USA Hockey is hoping for a repeat performance from him at the 2018 Winter Olympics (Photo/ Matt Zambonin/HHOF-IIHF Images).
U.S. Olympic men’s hockey Head Coach Tony Granato hopes Greenway’s size and skill will give opposing players fits in PyeongChang just as it did in Montreal and Toronto in 2017.
Here’s the entire U.S. roster. The team will be captained by right wing Brian Gionta, who notched 289 goals and 299 assists in 1,006 games for the New Jersey Devils,MontrealCanadiens and Buffalo Sabres from 2001-02 to his retirement after the 2016-17 season. He won a Stanley Cup with the Devils in the 2002-03 season.
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That’s likely to be the response from some fans on New Year’s Day when USA Hockey announces the roster for the men’s team that will compete at the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea Feb. 9-25.
Forward Jordan Greenway has represented the U.S. before. Will he do it again in PyeongChang? (Photo/Andre Ringuette/HHOF-IIHF Images)
The National Hockey League isn’t pausing its season to send its star players to the Winter Games for the first time in 30 years, meaning hockey powers such as the United States, Canada, and Russia are going to have to be creative in filling out their Olympic rosters.
The U.S. team could be a mixture of young collegiate stars and seasoned former NHLers who are still playing the game in North American minor leagues, Europe, or elsewhere.
If that’s the case, watch out for two names: Jordan Greenway and Robbie Earl. Greenway, a left wing for Boston University and a 2015 second-round draft pick of the Minnesota Wild, made an international splash about this time last year at the International Ice Hockey Federation World Junior Championship in Toronto and Montreal.
The 6-foot-6, 227-pound forward from Canton, New York, was physical force with a deft scoring touch at the tournament. He notched 3 goals and 5 assists in seven games at the 2017 World Juniors.
Boston University forward Jordan Greenway played in both the IIHF’s World Junor Championship and World Championship in 2017 (Photo/Andre Ringuette/HHOF-IIHF Images).
Greenway, 20, also appeared in eight games for the U.S. at the 2017 IIHF World Championship in Paris and Cologne in May. He went scoreless in a tourney that featured squads stocked with NHL players whose teams didn’t make or were eliminated early from the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
Greenway got off to an admitted slow start at BU this season, tallying 7 goals and 10 assists in 19 games.
“I don’t think I’ve played as well as I wanted to here in the first few games of the season,” Greenway told the St. Paul, Minnesota’s twincities.com in November. “I still have a couple of months to show them what I can do. I do think I could play in the Olympics, for sure.”
Jordan Greenway hopes to overcome a slow start at Boston University this season and make the U.S. men’s Olympic hockey team (Photo/Boston University).
Slow start or not, U.S. hockey people like Greenway’s game. He participated in the Team USA pre-Olympic media summit at Park City, Utah, in September and posed for pictures wearing a U.S. national team jersey with the American flag in the background.
“I feel very fortunate for this opportunity,” he told reporters at the summit. “I didn’t think it would come this soon, but I’m going to take full advantage of it.”
Will forward Robbie Earl go from 2005-06 Frozen Four MVP to 2018 U.S. Olympian?
Earl also appears to be trying to take advantage of opportunity presented to him. The 32-year-old forward from Chicago is an assistant captain for EHC Biel, a team in Switzerland’s National League.
He had an Olympics audition of sorts playing for the U.S. at the four-team Deutschland Cup tournament in November. He was scoreless in three games.
Earl played college hockey at the University of Wisconsin from 2003-04 to 2005-06. The Badgers won the NCAA Frozen Four title in Earl’s final year at the school and he was named the tournament’s most valuable player. He scored 58 goals and 63 assists in 125 games in his collegiate career.
He was taken by the Toronto Maple Leafs in the sixth round of the 2004 NHL Draft. He appeared in 47 NHL games between the Leafs and the Minnesota Wild, tallying only 6 goals and 1 assist.
Robbie Earl skated for Team USA at the 2017 Deutschland Cup in November Photo/von Mathias Renner/City-Press GbR via USA Hockey).
Earl had a productive North American minor league career playing for the Leafs’ American Hockey League affiliate in Toronto and the Wild’s former farm team in Houston, collecting 66 goals and 103 assists in 313 games.
His scoring carried over to Switzerland where he’s skated for Biel, EV Zug, and Raspperswil-Jona. He has 91 goals and 110 assists in 225 NLA games since 2012-13.
An assistant captain on the Biel team this season, Earl has 11 goals and 13 assists in 30 games.
Chicago native Robbie Earl is a swift-skating scoring threat for EHC Biel in Switzerland (Photo/Hervé Chavaillaz).
While Greenway and Earl represent opposite ends of the hockey spectrum – one player nearing the start of his professional career while the other is approaching the twilight of his – they have one thing in common: University of Wisconsin connections.
Earl is a Wisconsin alum. Tony Granato, the U.S. men’s Olympic hockey team head coach, is also the Badgers bench boss. Greenway’s younger brother, J.D., is a sophomore defenseman who plays for Granato at Wisconsin.
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We interrupt this hockey blog to give a Color of Hockey big shout-out to Maame Biney, who became the first African-American woman to make the U.S. Olympic speedskating team.
The 17-year-old short track skater from Reston, Virginia, punched her ticket to PyeongChang, South Korea, in February with a dominating performance at the U.S. Olympic trials over the weekend in Kerns, Utah.
She swept the women’s 500-meter finals with a 43.291 finishing time in her first final and a personal-best 43.161 in the second 500-meter final.
“When I crossed the finish line, I wasn’t sure what I was thinking,” Biney said. “At first I was like, “‘Hey, cool, I won.’ When I realized I made the Olympic team, I started cheering like crazy.”
Her father was apparently pumped, too. He held up a sign before her second final that read “Kick Some Hiney Biney.”
Bineyis no stranger to international competition. She won a bronze medal in the 2016-17 Short Track World Junior Championship and was a member of the 2015-16 U.S. world junior short track team.
While she’s the first African-American woman to make the U.S. Olympic speedskating team, African-American women have an illustrious history of participation in other Winter Games sports.
Vonetta Flowers was the first African-American athlete to win an Olympic gold medal when her two-person bobsled finished first at the 2002 Winter Games in Salt Lake City, Utah.
Debi Thomas captured a bronze medal at the 1988 Winter Games in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, in figure skating. The 2014 women’s Olympic bobsled team that competed in Sochi, Russia, featured fiveblack women. The 2018 team could be mostly minorityas well.
Biney began speedskating at age 6 after she was told she was too fast for figure skating. She’s an alum of the Fort Dupont Kids on Ice Speedskating, a Washington, D.C. program that was conducted at one of the few ice skating rinks in the United States located in a largely African-American neighborhood.
According to her Team USA bio, she wants to be a chemical engineer. She said that if she could have any super-power it would be the ability to freeze time.
Apparently, she already has the ability to crush it.
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Auston Matthews leads the Maple Leafs to the playoffs in his rookie year.
And players of color are in the thick of all these events. Of the 16 teams in the opening round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs, all but four – the Boston Bruins, OttawaSenators, Calgary Flames and Anaheim Ducks – have minority players.
And two of those teams have minority coaches. Sudarshan Maharaj, a Trinidadian raised in Toronto, is the goaltender coach for the Ducks and Paul Jerrard is an assistant coach for the Flames.
So who is playing in what series? Washington Capitals vs. Toronto Maple Leafs: forward T.J. OshieforWashington. ForwardsAuston MatthewsandNazem Kadri for the Leafs.
Pittsburgh Penguins vs. Columbus Blue Jackets: defenseman Trevor Daley for the Penguins. Defenseman Seth Jones and forward Brandon Saad for the Blue Jackets.
Chicago Blackhawks vs. Nashville Predators: Defenseman Johnny Oduya for Chicago. Defenseman P.K. Subbanskates for the Preds.
While NHLers battle for the Stanley Cup, teenagers from 10 North American and European nations are fighting for international bragging rights at the IIHF U18 World Championship.
Akil Thomas, a rookie forward with the Niagara Ice Dogs, is playing for Canada. The son of a Canadian career minor league hockey player and a mother from suburban Washington, D.C., Thomas had 21 goals and 27 assists in 61 games for the Ontario Hockey League team.
Forward Akil Thomas joined Team Canada for the IIHF U18 World Championship after his strong rookie season with the OHL’s Niagara Ice Dogs (Photo/Matthew Murnaghan/Hockey Canada Images).
He’s joined on Team Canada’s by another major junior rookie, defenseman Jett Woo of the Western Hockey League’s Moose Jaw Warriors. Woo collected 5 goals and 17 assists in 65 games with the Warriors.
Moose Jaw Warriors defenseman Jett Woo has been making waves at the IIHF U18 World championship with his solid play (Photo/ Matthew Murnaghan/Hockey Canada Images).
The 6-foot-2 NHL draft-eligible defenseman skates for the USA Hockey National Team DevelopmentProgram and is ranked as the 68th-best North American skater by the NHL’s Central Scouting.
Inamoto tallied 2 goals and 9 assists in 42 games for the U.S.’s Under-18 team in 2016-17. He had 2 goals and 5 assists in 17 games for Team USA in the United States Hockey League.
If Inamoto is drafted, the NHL will have to wait. He’s committed to play hockey in the fall for the University of Wisconsin Badgers.
“Inamoto is a predator,” Badgers Head Coach Tony Granato said in November. “He is a physical, hungry, intimidating player. He is a great athlete. He’s big, strong, and has a mean streak…He’ll be a physical impact player right away next year. He’s strong enough already to play a physical game at the college level.”
USA defenseman Tyler Inamoto is ranked as the 68th best draft-eligible North American skater by NHL Central Scouting (Photo/Len Redkoles).
While the Under-18 championship is going on, 16 countries are finalizing their rosters for next month’s IIHF World Championship, a tourney that will feature some NHL players whose teams didn’t make the Stanley Cup Playoffs or were eliminated in the early rounds.
Team Canada quickly snapped up forward Wayne Simmonds, who led the Philadelphia Flyers‘ in goals with 31 in 82 games.
Team USA named Boston University massive forward Jordan Greenway to its squad. Greenway, a 2015 Wild second-round draft choice, was a 6-foot-5, 230-pound force in January, powering the U.S. to a Gold Medal at the 2017 IIHF World Junior Championship in Toronto and Montreal.
Greenway scored three goals and five assists in seven games for the U.S. and was the team’s second-leading scorer. Two of his three goals were game-winners. He was BU’s fifth-leading scorer in 2016-17 with 10 goals and 21 assists in 37 games for the Terriers.
Despite his impressive season, Greenway has elected to return to BU for his junior year instead of trying to make the leap to the NHL.
“I have a great time here with my teammates, and BU has just been great to me,” Greenway told Boston Hockey Blog’s Jonathan Sigal. “I want to win a couple more championships here, so definitely one more year is what I’m going to do.”
I haven’t seen co-host country France’s roster yet for the Worlds, but you can bet that it will include Flyers forward Pierre Edouard Bellemare, who has become one of the best French-born players to skate in the NHL.
Pierre Edouard Bellemare is pumped about World Championship being in his home country, France.
A late bloomer, the 32-year-old defensive specialist tallied 4 goals and 4 assists in 82 games. The Flyers liked Bellemare’s grit and grace enough that they re-signed him for two years at $1.45 million per year and added him to the team’s leadership, making him an assistant team captain.
He’s as pumped about the prospect of playing in his home country during the World Championship as he was getting the new contract and the ‘A’ from the Flyers. France, whose men’s team is ranked 14th in the world, opens the tournament May 6against Norway in Paris.
“I think it’s going to be incredible,” Bellemare, a member of the French national team since 2004, told IIHF’s Lucas Akryod. “It is the first Worlds in France. I hope we will get a lot of fans for all the games, and that hockey will continue to develop in France.
And let’s not forget women’s international hockey. USA Hockey recently invited 42 players – including all 23 members of the 2017 Gold Medal-winning world championship team – for a selection camp April 30 to May 4 in suburban Tampa, Florida.
Kelsey Koelzer (Photo/Nancie Battaglia)
The camp is a prelude to developing a final U.S. a roster for the 2018 Winter Games in PyeyongChang, South Korea.
Kelsey Koelzer, a senior defenseman for Princeton University and the 2016 first overall pick of the
Hockey’s busy spring rolls into summer when the brain trusts from the NHL’s 30 teams convene inside Chicago’s United Center for the draft June 23-24.
The NHL’s Central Scouting released its final player rankings earlier this month and there are several players of color to watch in addition to Inamoto.
There’s Nick Suzuki, a 5-foot-10 center for the OHL’s Owen Sound Attack. Central Scouting ranks the London, Ontario, Canada native as the 10th-best North American skater. He was the Attack’s second-leading scorer with 45 goals and 51 assists in 65 games.
Owen Sound’s Nick Suzuki is ranked as the 10th-best North American skater eligible for the 2017 NHL Draft (Photo/Terry Wilson/OHL Images).
Then there’s Jason Robertson, a 6-foot-2 left wing for the OHL’s Kingston Frontenacs. Central Scouting ranks the Michigan native as the 14th-best North American skater. He led the Frontenacs in scoring in 2016-17 with 42 goals and 39 assists in 68 games.
Kingston Frontenacs left wing Jason Robertson jumped from 34th in NHL Central Scouting’s midterm rankings to 14th in its final listing before June’s NHL Draft (Photo/Aaron Bell/OHL Images).
Pierre-Olivier Joseph, a defenseman for the Charlottetown Islanders of the QuebecMajor Junior Hockey League. He’sranked as the 27th-best North American skater by Central Scouting.
The 6-foot-2, 161-pound 18-year-old notched 6 goals and 33 assists in 62 games for the Charlottetown.
Joseph is the younger brother of forward Mathieu Joseph, a sniper for the QMJHL’s Saint John Sea Dogs and a 2015 fourth-round draft pick of the Tampa Bay Lightning. He signed an entry level contract with the ‘Bolts prior to playing for Canada in the 2017 World Juniors.
Another potential 2017 draftee is Cole Purboo, a forward for the Windsor Spitfires of the Ontario Hockey League. He’sranked as the 189th-best North American skater. The 6-foot-3 Oakville, Ontario, Canada native scored 11 goals and 6 assists in 68 games for the Spitfires.
“I was hoping (to be) a little higher, but it’s alright,” Purboo told The Windsor Star last week of his Central Scouting rank. “It’s just people making a list…The same thing happened with the OHL draft. I don’t pay too much attention to them.”
Cole Purboo of the Windsor Spitfires (Photo/Aaron Bell/OHL Images).
Standing on the outside of top North American skaters on Central Scouting’s list is Elijah Roberts, a defenseman for the OHL’s Kitchener Rangers.
Elijah Roberts of the OHL’s Kitchener Rangers (Photo/Terry Wilson/OHL Images).
The 5-foot-8, 159-pound blue-liner, slipped from 208th in Central Scouting’s midterm list. He scored 4 goals and 14 assists in 65 games with the Rangers in 2016-17.
He’s considered undersized by today’s NHL standards, but his height hasn’t stopped him from excelling on ice. He was a major contributor for Team Canada in the World Under-17 hockey challenge.
“He’s a fast skater, very mobile, very aggressive on the ice,” one scout told Canada’s Sportsnet. “He’s been aggressive at the OHL level, too. He’s just a good kid; he skates hard and he works hard.”
Some NHL teams have drafted small D-men. The Vancouver Canucks took Jordan Subban, P.K. Subban’s 5-foot-9 younger brother, in the fourth round in 2013.
The diminutive defenseman was the sixth-leading scorer for the Utica Comets, the Canucks’ American Hockey League farm team, in 2016-17 with 16 goals and 20 assists in 64 games.
Danelle Im first thought it was one of those Internet scams, you know, like when the prince from some faraway land sends you a too-good-to-be-true email promising to share his vast stolen fortune if you help him recover it by supplying your bank card or social security numbers.
Danelle Im (Photo/Alex D’Addese).
When Im, a Toronto native, got a message in 2012 inquiring whether she’d be interested in playing hockey for South Korea in the 2018 Winter Olympics, she was a tad skeptical.
Lucky for the 2018 Winter Games host country, Im did her homework and the former Ryerson University forward joined South Korea’s women’s national team.
“Being handed this opportunity – it’s literally been given to me – is extremely humbling,” Im told Ryerson’s Eyeopenerin February. “That’s why I want to put up my best effort. This is a gift.”
Her tally was an even-strength goal that came in the third period and extended South Korea’s lead to 4-1.
Im, who recently finished her first and only season at Toronto’s Ryerson, was one of several hockey players with Korean-sounding last names and living in North America who received invites to help the Asian nation quickly build Olympic-level women’s and men’s ice hockey from teams almost from scratch.
South Korea’s method for filling its Olympic hockey roster isn’t unusual. For example, Jamaicais scouring the United States and Canada for hockey talent of island heritage in hopes of fielding an Olympic ice hockey team in the near future.
Togo, a West African nation, used Facebook to recruit a Togolese-born skier who was raised in the French Alps to be a member of its two-person team for the 2014 Winter Olympics.
And Dominica’s cross country ski team at the 2014 Winter Games was a couple who hailed from Staten Island, New York, not the Caribbean island nation.
Former Ryerson University forward Danelle Im played 20 games for the Rams in 2016-17 (Photo/Alex D’Addese/Ryerson Rams Athletics).
South Korea isn’t known for hockey – its women’s and men’s teams are both ranked 23rd in the world by the IIHF. The country has only 2,591 players, 259 of them women, according to the IIHF
But because PyeongChang, South Korea, is the site of the 2018 Winter Games, the country gets to field men’s and women’s teams to go up against more established hockey powers from North America and Europe.
From Toronto to PyeongChang. Former Ryerson University hockey player Danelle Im is looking forward to facing the world’s best at the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea (Photo/Alex D’Addese/ Ryerson Rams Athletics)
So when South Korea put out an all-call to help boost its program pronto, Im was only too happy to sign on – once she learned that the offer was legit.
“I never dreamed this would happen,” Im, who was born in Toronto to Korean parents, told The New York Times in February.
Im’s goal Sunday matched her output for Ryerson in 2016-17. She had a goal and 3 assists in 20 games for the Rams.
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Congrats to Sista Sled – members of the U.S. Women’s Bobsled National Team – who captured gold and silver medals Saturday at a World Cup event on the track built for the 2018 WinterOlympics in South Korea.
The U.S. Women’s Bobsled National Team. Left to Right, Kehri Jones, Brittany Reinbolt, Aja Evans, Lauren Gibbs, Elana Meyers Taylor, Jamie Greubel Poser, Lolo Jones, and Briauna Jones (Photo/Molly Choma/USA Bobsled & Skeleton).
By finishing first, Jamie Greubel Poserwon the overall World Cup points title. She piloted a two-person bobsled pushed by Aja Evans. The silver medal-winning sled at the PyeongChang, South Korea, event carried Elana Meyers Taylorand Lolo Jones. The second-place finish moved Meyers Taylor to third in overall World Cup standings.
All four women were members of the U.S. team that won the bronze medal at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia. That team featured five women of color. This year’s team has six.
Saturday’s showing bodes well for the U.S. women’s chances at the 2018 Winter Games, which runs Feb. 9 thru Feb. 25, 2018. The Meyers Taylor/Lolo Jones sled set a track record with a push time of 5.25 seconds.
We interrupt this hockey blog to give a Color of Hockey big shout-out to Maame Biney, who became the first African-American woman to make the U.S. Olympic speedskating team.
