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Some big questions for some players of color ahead of the 2018-19 NHL season

11 Tuesday Sep 2018

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National Hockey League training camps open this week and the season begins October 3 with the Stanley Cup champion Washington Capitals facing the Boston Bruins.

The 2017-18 NHL season is chock full of interesting story lines involving players of color that are worth paying attention to. Here are a few:

N.Y. Islanders forward Joshua Ho-Sang starts the 2017-18 season with a clean slate with new coach and GM.

THE NEW YORK ISLANDERS AND JOSH HO-SANG. CAN THIS MARRIAGE BE SAVED? It’s safe to say that the Islanders and right wing  Joshua Ho-Sang, the team’s 2014 first-round draft pick, have fit as well as an ice skating rink inside Brooklyn’s basketball-perfect Barclays Center.

Previous Islanders management complained that Ho-Sang was too head strong and defensively insufficient, among other things. Ho-Sang griped that the old Islanders brain trust overlooked similar deficiencies of other players and unjustly banished him to the Bridgeport Sound Tigers, the Isles’ American Hockey League farm team, while others skated scot free.

Well, there are new sheriffs on Long Island in General Manager Lou Lamoriello and Head Coach Barry Trotz, who guided the Capitals to the Cup last season by getting the best out of superstar forward Alex Ovechkin, and they seem determined to make the Isles/Ho-Sang marriage work.

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Trotz and Lamoriello say Ho-Sang starts off with a clean slate under their regime And Ho-Sang appears to be singing from the same hymnal.

“Josh has to be part of our future,” Trotz told Stan Fischler last month. “He’s a talent who needs to be understood better than he has been. In this case, Lou will be good. My belief is that the kid has been misunderstood because he looks at the game differently.”

Ho-Sang told NHL.com that the new management has “been tremendous in working with me and talking to me. ”

“I really don’t want to get into what they’ve talked to me about, but it’s all been positive,” he told NHL.com. “Every conversation that I’ve had with them since the moment they became part of the organization has just been teaching.”

In addition to featuring a new attitude, Ho-Sang will feature a new number with the Islanders, if he makes the team, because notoriously old school Lamoriello has squashed players wearing high-numbered jerseys for 2018-19.

Ho-Sang wore No. 66 in previous stints with the Isles, which caused many hockey purists to lose their minds because it was Hockey Hall of Famer Mario Lemieux’s number during his glory years with the Pittsburgh Penguins. Ho-Sang will wear No. 26.

Philadelphia Flyers forward Wayne Simmonds is in the final year of a six-year deal.

WHAT ABOUT WAYNE?  Philadelphia Flyers right wing Wayne Simmonds enters the season in the last year of his six-year, $23.85 million contract. Talks about an extension with one of the team’s most prolific goal scorers have been slow, raising question about whether the Flyers are interested in jumping off and moving on from the “Wayne Train.”

Adding fuel to the speculation are the Flyers’ free agent signing of former Toronto Maple Leafs left wing James Van Riemsdyk and the late 2017-18 rise of  19-year-old center Nolan Patrick, the Flyers’ 2017 first-round draft pick.

Like Simmonds, Patrick and Van Riemsdyk are net-front players who score bunches of goals by parking themselves in front of opposing goaltenders in hopes of tip-in shots or fat rebounds.

And Simmonds is coming off a down scoring season – sort of.  He had 24 goals and 22 assists in 75 regular season games last season and no goals and 2 assists in six Stanley Cup Playoff contests.

His 24 goals came after he scored 31 in 2016-17 and 32 in 2015-16. Some context here: Simmonds managed the 24 goals despite a laundry list of injuries that included a tear in his pelvic area, a pulled groin, fractured ankle, torn ligament in his thumb and a busted mouth twice. Still, he only missed seven games last season.

Flyers General Manager Ron Hextall insists that the team would like to retain Simmonds and Simmonds has indicated that he wants to finish his playing career in Philadelphia.

“For being injured, I didn’t have a bad season last year, but it’s still not to my best ability” Simmonds told reporters in August. “So we continue to talk, we continue to talk. It is what it is right now.”

Forward Nick Suzuki, a former Vegas Golden Knights 2017 first-round draft, was traded to Montreal.

WILL THE MONTREAL CANADIENS RIDE SUZUKI BACK TO THE PLAYOFFS? The Canadiens finally ended the Max Paciorietty saga Monday by trading the high-scoring left wing and team captain to the Vegas Golden Knights for center Nick Suzuki, who was a Knights’ 2017 first-round draft pick, forward Tomas Tatar, and a 2019 second-round draft pick.

The trade caused howls among many Canadiens fans who still suffer bad flashbacks from the the team swapping defenseman P.K. Subban to the Nashville Predators for blue-liner Shea Weber in June 2016 and shipping all-world goaltender Patrick Roy to the Colorado Avalanche in December 1995.

The Paciorietty trade may look lopsided sided now – he has 226 goals and 222 assists in 626 NHL regular season games – But the 19-year-old Suzuki is no slouch. He impressed the Golden Knights in the team inaugural training camp, though he didn’t make the team last season.

Instead, Suzuki lit it up with the Owen Sound Attack of the Ontario Hockey League in 2017-18. He tallied 42 goals and 58 assists in 64 OHL regular season games. He had 45 goals and 51 assists in 65 games in 2016-17.

“Suzuki was the key piece because we like a young prospect that was picked 13th overall, which I believe at the time we had at 11 on our list,” Montreal General Manager Marc Bergevin told reporters after the trade.

The question is when will Suzuki arrive in Montreal? The OHL is one thing, the NHL is another. Some prospects need time and patience – things that are often in short supply in in hockey-crazed Montreal.

WILL THE KIDS STICK? A number of highly-touted prospects who’ve already had a small tastes of the NHL are heading to training camps looking to stay in the big leagues.

Minnesota Wild rookie left wing Jordan Greenway had a dream season in 2017-18: Becoming the first African-American to play on a U.S. Olympic men’s hockey team, skate for Hockey East champion Boston University, and play for the Wild in the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

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Now the 21-year-old, Wild 2015  second-round draft pick has got to grind it out in training camp to land a permanent job in Minnesota.

“We’re just looking at his smarts, how he adjusts,” Wild first-year General Manager Paul Fenton told The Athletic at the NHL Prospect Tournament in Traverse City, Michigan. “Being able to play in the Olympics gave him a different dimension to where he was playing in college hockey. To turn pro and play in the playoffs, from afar I was watching and he looked like he adjusted to the pro game right away. That’s what we’re looking to see – how he was able to take the summer and take his maturity an go forward.”

Calgary Flames rookie forward Spencer Foo scored 2 goals in four NHL games last season.

The Calgary Flames are doing the same thing with right wing Spencer Foo and defenseman Oliver Kylington.

Foo, a high-scoring, highly-coveted free agent from NCAA Division I Union College, signed with Calgary in June 2017, appeared in four games with the Flames late in 2017-18 and scored 2 goals.

“It’s going to be a blast,” Foo told Canada’s Global News of the upcoming season. “First game of the season is always exciting whether it’s exhibition or not. I think everyone’s pretty pumped.”

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Foo spent most of the 2017-18 season with the Stockton Heat, the Flames’ AHL farm team, where he was third in scoring with 20 goals and 19 assists in 62 regular season games.

He was there with Kylington, a 21-year-old  blue-liner from Stockholm, Sweden. Kylington was the team’s seventh-leading scorer with 7 goals and 28 assists in 62 regular season contests.

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“There’s a spot available” on the Calgary roster, Kylington told The Montreal Gazette. “And it’s a lot of work to get that spot. I feel ready, I’ve been training hard this summer and putting a lot of grind in the gym and mentally preparing myself for this year and this camp.”

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U.S. Olympian Jordan Greenway makes NHL debut with Minnesota Wild

28 Wednesday Mar 2018

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Jordan Greenway didn’t register a point Tuesday night, but the massive forward still managed to score a hat trick.

Making his National Hockey League debut with the Minnesota Wild against the Nashville Predators in Music City, Greenway skated for his third team on three different hockey levels in a six-week span.

He ended his collegiate career Saturday when Boston University lost to the University of Michigan 6-3 in the Northeast Regional final of the NCAA Frozen Four tournament.

Last month, Greenway represented the United States at the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea, becoming the first African-American to play hockey for the U.S. in the Winter Games.

He donned a Wild jersey after he signed a three-year entry level contract Monday. The Wild took the 6-foot-6, 226-pound Greenway in the second round of the 2015 NHL Draft with the 50th overall pick.

“It’s been a quick turnaround, for sure,” the Canton, N.Y., native told reporters. “But it’s all something I’ve wanted to do. It’s something I love doing, and I’m just excited to get everything started, excited to help the team out however I can.”

Greenway logged 10:01 minutes of ice time in Minnesota’s 2-1 overtime loss to Nashville, including 50 seconds of power play time and 12 seconds on the penalty kill. He didn’t mange a shot on goal.

He got a taste of the difference between college hockey and the NHL courtesy of a first-period hit from rugged Predators left wing Scott Hartnell.

Greenway, 21, finished his three years at BU with 28 goals and 64 assists in 112 games. He had 13 goals and 22 assists in 36 games in 2017-18.

In international competition, Greenway scored one goal in five Winter Olympics games; tallied 3 goals and 5 assists on the gold medal-winning U.S. team at the 2016-17 International Ice Hockey Federation World Junior Championship in Toronto and Montreal; and notched a goal and 6 assists at the 2014-15 IIHF Under-18 World Junior Championship to help power the U.S. to gold in that tournament.

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Players of color compete in the other March Madness – the Frozen Four championship

24 Saturday Mar 2018

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March Madness on ice is in full swing and the road to the Frozen Four features several players of color on teams vying to get to the championship game in St. Paul, Minnesota, next month.

The Ohio State University forward Dakota Joshua was the Buckeyes’ fourth-leading scorer in 2017-18, notching 15 goals and 10 assists in 33 games. A 2014 Toronto Maple Leafs fifth-round draft pick, the junior from Dearborn, Michigan,has a goal in the NCAA championship tourney.

Ohio State University forward Dakota Joshua hopes to lead the Buckeyes to an NCAA Frozen Four title (Photo/The Ohio State University Athletics).

Joshua has a chance to score more as Ohio State faces the University of Minnesota-Duluth on Thursday, April 5, at the Xel Energy Center in St. Paul.

Buckeyes senior forward Christian Lampasso was the Buckeyes’ sixth-leading goal-scorer with 10 to go along with 3 assists in 35 games in the regular season. The 23-year-old from Amherst, New York’s Twitter handle is @formerlydreadsy, nod to his Haitian heritage and the dreadlocks he used to wear under his hockey helmet.

Ohio State University forward Christian Lampasso shed his dreadlocks but hasn’t lost his scoring touch for the Buckeyes (Photo/The Ohio State University Athletics).

Defenseman Justin Wade helped secure the blue line for the  University of Notre Dame in 2017-18. Wade, a 23-year-old senior from Aurora, Illinois, was fourth on the team in blocked shots last season with 42. He also led the Fighting Irish in penalty minutes with 54 in 33 games.

The Fighting Irish play Michigan on Thursday.

University of Notre Dame defenseman Justin Wade and the Fighting Irish are back in a familiar spot – the NCAA playoffs.

After failing to win gold at the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea, Jordan Greenway rejoined Boston University’s team hoping to win a Frozen Four championship trophy to go with BU’s 2017-18 Hockey East title.

But his quest ended when the Terriers lost to the University of Michigan Wolverines 6-3 in the Northeastern Final on March 24.

The 6-foot-5 junior forward from Canton, N.Y., had 12 goals and 21 assists in 34 regular season games for the Terriers. Greenway,  a 2015 Minnesota Wild second-round draft pick and the first African-American player on a U.S. Olympic hockey team, notched a goal in five games in PyeongChang.

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Greenway didn’t make it to the Xel Energy Center with the Terriers, but he made it with the Wild after he signed a three-year entry level contract with the team after BU was eliminated from the NCAA tournament.

Forward Erik Foley was Providence College’s leading scorer in the 2017-18 season with 16 goals and 19 assists in 36 regular season games.

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Foley, a 2015 Winnipeg Jets third-round draft pick, is joined on the Friars by forward Vimal Sukumaran. A sophomore from Montreal, Sukumaran  was ninth on the team with 10 goals and 8 assists in 38 regular season games in 2017-18.

The hockey season ended for Foley and Sukumaran when the Friars lost to Notre Dame 2-1 in the NCAA quarterfinals on March 24.

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His name changed but his game remained the same. Minnesota State University senior forward C.J. Suess, changed his last name from Franklin and took his mother’s maiden name to honor her.

Despite the new name on the back of his jersey,  he remained the same hard-nosed, high-scoring  player for the Mavericks.

The 23-year-old Forest Lake, Minnesota, led the team with 22 goals and 21 assists in 40 games in 2017-18. His 22 goals tied him for twelfth among NCAA Division I hockey players.

Suess, a Winnipeg Jets 2014 fifth-round draft pick, also led by example. He was the Mavericks’ team captain for last two seasons.

His season ended on March 23 when the Mavericks lost to rival University of Minnesota-Duluth 3-2 in overtime in a first-round contest.

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Black athletes competing at 2018 Winter Olympics makes it ‘Must-See TV’

03 Saturday Feb 2018

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SEOUL I’m old enough to remember when it was a big deal when a black person appeared on national television.

The phone in my family’s Philadelphia home would ring off the hook with relatives or friends calling to alert us that Sammy Davis Jr., Diana Ross & The Supremes, or Flip Wilson were going to be on “The Ed Sullivan Show,” “The Hollywood Palace,” or “The Andy Williams Show” that night.

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.

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.”

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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.

Ghana also has an Olympian in skeleton, a sport where athletes zoom face-down on a twisting, frozen concrete track.

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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Jordan Greenway becomes first African-American on U.S. Olympic hockey team

01 Monday Jan 2018

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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-retired Stanley 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 Ice Hockey 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.

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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, Montreal Canadiens 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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Could Earl and Greenway be on their way to the Winter Olympics in South Korea?

28 Thursday Dec 2017

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BUFFALO, N.Y. – “Who are these guys?”

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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Springtime means hockey is in full bloom

15 Saturday Apr 2017

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For a winter sport, ice hockey is pretty darn busy in the spring.

The Stanley Cup Playoffs are in full swing; the International Ice Hockey Federation Under-18 World Championship is underway in Slovakia; the IIHF’s World Championship kicks off in Paris and Cologne, Germany, May 5; USA Hockey begins evaluating players for the 2018 Winter Olympics women’s hockey team; and National Hockey League teams are making their lists and checking them twice ahead of the 2017 NHL Draft in Chicago in June.

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, Ottawa Senators, 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. Oshie for Washington. Forwards Auston Matthews and Nazem Kadri for the Leafs.

Montreal Canadiens vs. New York Rangers: forward Mika Zibanejad for the Rangers. Goalies Carey Price and Al Montoya and forward Andreas Martinsen for Montreal.

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. Subban skates for the Preds.

St. Louis Blues vs. Minnesota Wild: Forward Chris Stewart and defenseman Matt Dumba for the Wild. Forward Ryan Reaves for St. Louis.

Edmonton Oilers vs. San Jose Sharks: Defenseman Darnell Nurse and forward Juhjar Khaira for Edmonton. Forward Joel Ward for the Sharks.

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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).

Team USA’s Tyler Inamoto (Photo/Len Redkoles).

Tyler Inamoto, a defenseman for the USA Hockey National Team Development Program is patrolling the blue line for Team USA in Slovakia.

The 6-foot-2 NHL draft-eligible defenseman skates for the USA Hockey National Team Development Program 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.

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“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 6 against 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

National Women’s Hockey League (by the New York Riveters), is a selection camp invitee. She tallied 8 goals and 23 assists in 33 games for the Tigers.

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 Quebec Major Junior Hockey League. He’s ranked 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’s ranked 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.

 

Jordan Greenway continues to impress at IIHF World Junior Championship

01 Sunday Jan 2017

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Team USA's Jordan Greenway

Team USA’s Jordan Greenway

If the U.S. team at the International Ice Hockey Federation World Junior Championship was a 1960s pop music group, it would probably be called Jordan and the Americans (Okay, I had to get some kind of Jay and the Americans reference in there before the end of the year).

Boston University forward Jordan Greenway continued his impressive play for Team USA at the tournament Saturday, by notching a goal and an assist and by generally wrecking havoc on Team Canada in the U.S.’s 3-1 victory at Toronto’s Air Canada Centre.

Greenway, a 2015 Minnesota Wild second round draft pick, made his 6-foot-5, 230-pound presence felt at both ends of the ice and made life miserable for Team Canada’s goaltender with numerous close-range stuff-in attempts.

His play Saturday caught the attention of analysts on the NHL Network and several folks on social media.

More from Chris Peters’ The United States of Hockey blog:  The way Greenway has developed over the last two years should give a lot of hope to Minnesota Wild fans. He played like the power forward he was brought onto this team to be, using his frame to get pucks to the net and make some plays. The move he made to score Team USA’s second goal showed his combination of power and finesse. You need guys like that to impose their will on a game and I thought we saw that more today from Greenway than any other time in the tournament.

Jordan Greenway stars as U.S. beats Latvia 6-1 at World Juniors

27 Tuesday Dec 2016

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Boston University forward Jordan Greenway made his presence felt in the United States’ 6-1 victory over Latvia in the International Ice Hockey Federation World Junior Championship Monday night.

The 6-foot-5, 230-pound sophomore capped the U.S. squad’s night, scoring the team’s sixth goal against a scrappy but outgunned Latvia team. He led Team USA with seven shots on goal, most of them close to beleaguered Latvian goaltender Marek Mitens.

Team USA's Erik Foley, left, and Jordan Greenway stand during the playing of U.S. national anthem during preliminary round action at the 2017 IIHF World Junior Championship. (Photo/ Matt Zambonin/HHOF-IIHF Images).

Team USA’s Erik Foley, left, and Jordan Greenway stand during the playing of U.S. national anthem during preliminary round action at the 2017 IIHF World Junior Championship. (Photo/ Matt Zambonin/HHOF-IIHF Images).

Greenway, the Minnesota Wild’s  2015 second-round draft pick, was named Team USA’s best player after the game for his offensive display and his intimidating physical play.

For those watching the world juniors – and it’s great viewing to see the next generation of NHL players – Greenway is easily found. He’s the man-mountain parked in front of the opposing net casting an imposing shadow over the goalie.

BU hockey Head Coach Dave Quinn has described Greenway, a Canton, N.Y. native, as a highly-skilled hockey player with the football body of “a five-star tight end at Alabama or Notre Dame.”

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Greenway plays a game similar to Philadelphia Flyers high-scoring forward Wayne Simmonds: screen the goalie, try for tip-in shots, and fight for rebounds.

Greenway is making a name for himself at the IIHF tourney in Toronto and Montreal and in Boston. He’s BU’s second-leading scorer with 6 goals and 10 assists in 16 games.

 

Tampa Bay draftee Mathieu Joseph to play for Canada at 2017 junior championshp

20 Tuesday Dec 2016

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Congratulations to forward Mathieu Joseph, a 2015 Tampa Bay Lightning fourth-round draft pick, for being selected to play for Team Canada in the 2017 International Ice Hockey Federation World Junior Championship.

Team Canada's Mathieu Joseph (Photo/Matthew Murnaghan/Hockey Canada Images).

Team Canada’s Mathieu Joseph (Photo/Matthew Murnaghan/Hockey Canada Images).

Joseph, 19, will represent Canada for the first time at any level internationally when he takes to the ice for the tournament that begins December 26 in Toronto and Montreal.

Canada will open with a tough matinee match against Russia at Toronto’s Air Canada Centre while the United States plays Latvia in an evening contest at the arena.

 Joseph is the second-leading scorer on the Saint John Sea Dogs of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League with 25 goals and 20 assists in 29 games. The 120th overall pick in the 2015 National Hockey League Draft has scored 80 goals and 91 assists in 176 QMJHL games since the 2013-14 season.

Mathieu Joseph in action against the Czech Republic in exhibition game play during the 2016 National Junior Team Sport Chek Selection Camp Photo/Matthew Murnaghan/Hockey Canada Images).

Mathieu Joseph in action against the Czech Republic in exhibition game play during the 2016 National Junior Team Sport Chek Selection Camp. Photo/Matthew Murnaghan/Hockey Canada Images).

Joseph got an early Christmas present in December when the Lightning signed him to a three-year entry-level contract on the eve of the IIHF tournament.

Joseph’s game is about high energy and enthusiasm – traits he carries on and off the ice. He’s a gregarious personality, something he inherited from his parents.

“I’m a pretty outgoing guy,” he told  Canada’s TSN. “Honestly, it’s easy for me to talk. My family has been raised like that. My parents are like that, maybe not as hyper per se, but I”d say they raised me like that.”

Joseph isn’t the only one in his family who was recognized this month for his hockey prowess. His younger brother, defenseman Pierre-Olivier Joseph of the QMJHL’s Charlottetown Islanders, was selected to play in the 2017 Sherwin-Williams CHL/NHL Top Prospects Game in Quebec City on January 30, 2017.

Charlottetown Islanders' Pierre-Olivier Joseph.

Charlottetown Islanders’ Pierre-Olivier Joseph.

Pierre-Olivier Joseph has 4 goals and 23 assists in 32 QMJHL games this season. NHL Central Scouting lists him as a player to watch and projects him to be a second or third-round pick at the 2017 draft to be held June 23-24 at Chicago’s United Center.

USA Hockey will announce its final 23-man  U.S. roster   for the IIHF world juniors on Dec. 24. Three players  of color who were also chosen in the 2015 draft are in the hunt for roster spots: Caleb Jones, a defenseman for the Western Hockey League’s Portland Winterhawks and an Edmonton Oilers fourth-round pick; Boston University forward Jordan Greenway, a Minnesota Wild second-round draft choice; and Providence College forward Erik Foley, a Winnipeg Jets third-round pick.