NEUGSIE’S AROUND THE RINKS

By: Rod Pedersen
Voice of the ND Hounds/DUBNetwork MJ Warriors Beat Writer

1. Quiet on the hater front: All the Maple Leaf haters out there are pretty pretty quiet as Toronto has won nine of 10, and four in a row, and are tied atop the Atlantic with Rod Pedersen’s Florida Panthers. Do I think this team has a chance to win the Cup? No way. Am I surprised they’re steamrolling the regular season again? Also no, I am not. People love to abuse me when the Leafs are struggling, so I’m enjoying the peace and quiet for a bit.
2. Still can’t do it: Had a roady on Tuesday so I downloaded a couple of the Leafs series on Amazon Prime to watch, but then once they were done downloading, I promptly deleted them straight away. I can’t watch it, I know it’ll be too painful, and the Leaf haters material will be bountiful. I know what happened on the ice, I watched it all, so I don’t want to know everything now. I’m sure it’s entertaining for the neutral, but I don’t think it would be for me.
3. Hughes: Cool to see Jack Hughes get extended by the New Jersey Devils and well-deserved; I’ve heard nothing but awesome things about him as a kid. My Jack Hughes story is that in the 2016-17 season he was called up in the playoffs as a 15-year-old out of the Toronto Marlies U15s by the Georgetown Raiders Junior A; the very team that teams I worked for kept running into in the playoffs, year after year. Hughes and another current Devils’ prospect Michael Vukojevic were both big parts of that Raiders playoff run, and they broke my heart by beating my Oakville Blades in the post-season my last year in the OJHL. He was so so good back then too. After the playoff series, I tweeted that I was nice for the future of the Ontario Hockey League to help the Raiders out so much, but that didn’t sit well with a couple of excellent vets I knew well on their club and got an angry couple texts from one of them aha. My buddy Jack Jacome was awesome on that team and is now the captain at Clarkson D1! 
4. Can’t pay him enough: How much of a bargain is Alex Ovechkin at $9.5 mil per? Crazy. As the 32 Thoughts podcast said this past week: Ted Leonsis and the Caps cannot pay him enough for what he’s done for that organization. The way he’s going Gretzky’s goal record is definitely in danger, but what a marvel he is at 36 and playing well in all three zones. The Leafs need to beg guys to stay at 10 mil plus, and Ovi gets 9.5…crazy.
5. Happy for Alberta: Is Alberta’s run at the top of the Western Conference sustainable? I don’t know, but obviously, Calgary is a serious system-first team with a few really good players, and Edmonton has two of the best players on planet earth, so I’m happy for those great fan bases. Enjoy the ride. Did anybody have Calgary in first and Vegas in fifth in the Pacific 20-plus games in? I certainly didn’t.
6. They finally lost: Everett finally lost and big surprise, it was a Canadian team that beat them. It was the first Canadian team they played all year, the outstanding Kamloops Blazers, that marched into Washington State and got the game-winner from Telus Cup-winning Notre Dame Hounds alumni and defenceman Quinn Schmiemann! Obviously, the Tips are fine and pretty good; but I still say the American Division in the WHL is pretty weak.
7. The new Melville: One team that no longer looks weak to me is the Melville Millionaires of the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League. Mike Rooney plays the Noah Wills, Nicholas Samson, Zach Cain line a tonne, but they look like they can handle it; and led by captain Jonathan Krahn, it also looks like the team has really bought into what Roons is preaching. They don’t tend to play pretty games, to be honest, but they compete, they muck it up, and they have just enough skill to really burn you when you make those mistakes. I’ve also heard plenty of shade for Jared Thompson their No. 1 goaltender, but he’s proving everyone wrong. The Mils beat the Hounds Tuesday night in Melville and outplayed them in every zone of the ice. I sure hope the young ND squad can play better than that when they head into Battlefords this weekend, host Estevan and head to Humboldt the week after, or it could get ugly.
8. Blevins the prophet: Rory, Darren Dupont, and I had a blast last week calling the SJHL Game of the Month on Sasktel TV Local from Melfort. The big news coming in was the Mustangs had acquired two 20-year-old captains, Mark Snarr from Kindersley and Nolan Doell from La Ronge, and that there were all sorts of enthusiasm as a result. Well, sure enough, Melfort coach Trevor Blevins walks up to Rory and me pre-game and says: “I remember a couple of years ago we acquired a couple of big guns like this, then went on a three-game losing streak, because everyone was sitting back expecting it to come easy now.” Sure enough, Melfort is on a three-game losing streak right now! They will be absolutely fine though: I love the way Blevins gets his team to play, and they have some real upgraded pieces from their moves.
9. Fine with it: To baseball and the Blue Jays faithful saw Cy Young winner Robby Ray and all-star infielder Marcus Semien sign elsewhere this past week and to that say: no problem. Both could not possibly hope to be better than they were this past year, and with the core, the Jays have, plus the addition of Kevin Gausman and the extension of Jose Berrios, they are well on their way to being a premium team in the A.L. East next year. Gausman knows the division, although he struggled against it, and Hyun Jin Ryu has to be better than he was last year, right? So, it’ll be fine, especially if they don’t cheap-out on the bullpen like they did last year.
10. Diapers, diapers, diapers: Finally, I have to give a huge, huge shoutout to my wife Jill for carrying a big load taking care of our daughters, including the newborn, while I’ve been quickly back to work. She is an incredible, incredible wife and mother, and I could write a multi-volume novel about all the ways I love and admire her. Thank you for supporting me while I do my silly sportsy work!

(Follow Jamie on Twitter at @Neugsie)