St. Louis Game Time

Game Time Prospect Sunday, May 27, 2012

2012-05-27T17:00:32Z

By Brian Weidler, "Game Time" Prospect Department

ALL GAVE SOME, SOME GAVE ALL...

On behalf of myself, Sean, Jesse, and all the other members of the "Game Time" family who have served, I ask you all to take a minute this weekend and remember our fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, aunts, uncles and cousins who have given back to our country, and especially those who paid the ultimate price.

"All gave some, some gave all."

PROSPECT PROMOTIONS / DEMOTIONS:

None to report this week.

PROSPECT TRADES:

None to report this week.

PLAYERS ON SICK CALL:

None to report this week.

PLAYERS RETURNED TO DUTY:

None to report this week.

PLAYERS ON SUSPENSION:

None to report this week.

LAST MAN STANDING:

There are three championships left to be decided in the hockey world -- the Stanley Cup, the AHL's Calder Cup, and the Memorial Cup.

The Memorial Cup will be decided today, and the last Blues' prospect still playing this season will be front and center.

Yannick Veilleux, the Blues' fourth-round pick in the 2011 NHL Entry Draft, will take the ice this evening with his team, the Shawinigan Cataractes of the QMJHL. Shawinigan, the host team for this year's Memorial Cup, will take on the powerhouse London Knights, champions of the Ontario League, in a winner-take-all battle for major junior hockey supremacy.

LINK to a preview of tonight's game at the Master Card Memorial Cup official site.

The preview linked above also contains a link to the webcast and radio feeds for tonight's game. The seminfinal game on Friday, which was won by Shawinigan over Saint John, had Peoria assistant coach Drake Berehowsky as part of the broadcast team, so Rivermen fans may be able to hear more on Berehowsky's plans for the future during tonight's broadcast. Berehowsky's contract has expired, and he is said to be interested in a head coaching poisition if one is offered to him.

Most of Shawinigan's top players in this game -- Michael Chaput (CBJ 2011), Brandon Gormley (PHX 2010), Michael Bournival (MTL 2011) and Kirill Kabanov (NYI 2010) -- are players in their last year of major junior eligibility. This leaves Veilleux and 2012 draft-eligible forward Anton Zlobin as the top players likely to return to Shawinigan next season.

Veilleux is a left wing with decent size who broke through this year to become a primary scoring threat for les Cataractes. His 58 regular-season points (27 G, 31 A in 59 GP) and 11 playoff points (5 G, 6 A in 11 GP) ranked him third on the club in both segments of the season. In five games at the Memorial Cup tournament, Veilleux has two goals (including the game-winner on Friday vs. Saint John) and six minutes in penalty time with an even plus-minus. Veilleux is also among the team leaders in hits, with 13 of les Cataractes' total of 97 hits in five games -- including a team-high five hits registered in Shawinigan's 6-2 win over London in the preliminary round of the tournament back on May 20.

Friday Links: Childhood Ruined . . . or is it? Edition

2012-05-25T16:32:15Z

Today is National Geek Day or something. There might be a rumor that it's also National Wine Day, not to be confused with whine. Go watch geeky things and imbibe on grapey things.

Links (sorta, but not really)

I'm a sad panda. There are only so many times you can tell people you just met "Kris Russell's my favorite." Trying to come up with Ken Hitchcock jokes without his amazing press conferences is breaking my soul much like Hitchcock broke the bench during the Playoffs.
I'm going to tell you to read Tomorrow's Blues' Memorial Cup fan posts. That's what's really cool right now. It's what all the cool kids are doing. I should know - I live in the hipster capital of the world.

Video:

CHILDHOOD RUINED. But I like counting like the Count.

gametimelinks [at] gmail.com

Wednesday's Links: Editing Makes Your Brain Forget Things...

2012-05-23T17:19:56Z

Hello one and all! I am late... I am late... said the red headed "rabbit" that was inside my brain today. I was up all night last night working on this damn DVD for my swim lesson kids. (Whom I realized this morning at 6 AM when I was finally laying down for a nap that I do entirely to much for them...) I awoke to realize that it was 9:50 AM I had to be at work at 10 AM and live 20 mins away by L as well as the fact that I had forgotten to do the Links while editing last night as was my plan... Apparently Editing not only possess the power to make time jump but also prevents access to any memory not needed to piece a cut together.

So with that I come to you at this late hour, forgive me my friends... but honestly tear me a new one because I deserve it... :D

Late Robot Links:

Blues News:

There is actually news out there in St. Louis Blues land! Blues Sign 2010 Pick Jani Hakanpaa... can I just call him HankyPanky because that's all his last name makes me think of... lol (Blues)
Big Walt is hosting a fantasy camp... not sure if its for hockey or hot dog eating contests. (Blues)

NHL News:

Puck from Last Night: Well the evil reign of the dark lord Quick is still upon us as the Kings skirt past the Yotes to clinch a spot in the 2012 Stanley Cup Finals... BLAH! (NHL)
Dustin Brown is a fuck head. case closed. (Puck Daddy)
Again I must reiterate... Dustin Brown is a Ass Hat. Deadspin Agrees with me and Mike Smith. (Deadspin)
From Hall Plante: "He's Alive! He Speaks!" (Calgary Herald)

Weird/Creepy News:

I have been on a Gawker Binge lately... they find the STUPIDEST people... this is like me falling asleep while on duty at the pool, while there are 3 year olds swimming by them selves! (Gawker)
Lesson learned: Never piss of the one who brings you coffee in the morning. (Gawker)
Tony Stark, in real life. (Gizmodo)
Anderson Cooper finally told this women what everyone has been wanting to for years! (Warming Glow)

Videos:

I used to do a lot of stupid stuff on YouTube...
Damn I miss the days when there was hockey to bet on and hope to recreate this one day...

Send me things!

Gametimelinks (at) Gmail.com

@RealBadRobot

Tuesday Links: RBRs Internet is Down

2012-05-22T16:59:01Z

Tuesday Links: RBRs Internet is Down

Hey guys! My internet has been down since last night and still isn't back up, so I'm posting from my phone. Enjoy this link to NHL.com for all the info on last nights game.

Blues Sign 2010 Pick Jani Hakanpää

2012-05-22T01:00:20Z

Big Finnish blueliner already used to playing for a team called the Blues

ST. LOUIS – St. Louis Blues Executive Vice President and General Manager Doug Armstrong announced Monday the club has signed their fourth round pick (104th overall) of the 2010 NHL Draft, defenseman Jani Hakanpää.

Terms of the NHL contract were not disclosed, but Hakanpää also recently signed a one-year extension of his SM-Liiga contract with Blues Espoo. Unless he makes the NHL roster this year, which is a long shot as he is a right defenseman, Hakanpää will be loaned to Blues Espoo for the 2012-13 season.

In 41 games with Blues Espoo this season, Hakanpää put up five goals and seven assists for 12 points, to go with a plus-6 mark and 30 minutes in penalty time. He suffered a season-ending knee injury in late February, and did not appear in any playoff games for the Finnish Blues, but did skate for Finland in the World Junior Championships last Christmas. In seven games for the fourth-place Finns, Hakanpää tallied a goal and two assists, with a plus-3 and six penalty minutes. His goal was a power-play tally and the game winner in the first period of Finland's 10-1 thrashing of Denmark on Dec. 30.

The 6' 5, 218-pound Hakanpää is a native of Kirkkonummi, Finland, which is located approximately 30 km west of Helsinki near the coast of the Gulf of Finland. Espoo, where Hakanpää has played the last two seasons, is located midway between Kirkkonummi and Helsinki.

LINK to article at stlblues.com.

Monday's Links: All The Pretty Girls On A Saturday Night

2012-05-21T11:01:05Z

OMG NO BLUES HOCKEY IT SUCKS!!!!

*RBRs Brain is in MAJOR Withdrawal*

Hartigan (& Other Females or Males who'd like to join) can we do a synchronized Gilmore Girls Marathon/weekly "GDT"? I am so lost and need to shoot the shit with someone during this very difficult time.

Quicky Robo Links:

Blues News:

They are absent from the minds but not hearts... *Finishes off another pint of Ben and Jerry's*

Hockey News:

Puck From Last Night: Some how Quick and Smith had a little bit of a mind swap yesterday. I'd like to thank the chinese restaurant in LA and their magic fortune cookies. +1 for Freaky Friday Reference! (NHL)
There better not be another Lock Out... I will personally kill the evil Troll Bettman... with a stick... or a shotgun not quite sure which. (The Daily Beast)
From Russia with Love. They Winz they Gold at Worlds! (Chicago Tribune)
Ze Memorial Cup. (Toronto Sun)
We Females just know how to make men well up in tears, either that or we are terrifying when disappointed, you pick. (Daily Mail)

Other News:

Someone really needs to teach Jon Travolta the meaning of the "No-No Square." (Gawker)
Ever wonder how you grandparents would react to Skrillex? Now you know. (Crave Online)
Creepy or Effective? You be the judge. (Another Mag)
A Bee Gee has fallen. RIP Robin Gibb. (Yahoo!)
If Only This happend in video parody form... I'd watch it, like 80,000 times a day. (DeviantArt)
The Pixar Avengers - If you don't like this then I hate you. Forgive me its the withdrawal... I am in the lashing out phase. (BuzzFeed)

Videos:

SNL lost a few members this week... the Digital Short brought back so many high school memories.
And who said Hockey was the most violent sport again...? These kids beg to differ.

I will see y'all tomorrow after wrestling through the protests and all the NATO Sequirity to get to work... Wish me LUCK!

Send me things Please!

gametimelinks (at) gmail.com

@RealBadRobot

Game Time Prospect Sunday, May 20, 2012

2012-05-20T17:15:08Z

By Brian Weidler, "Game Time" Prospect Department

Another short and sweet week, as there's just not much to talk about right now in the World O' Prospects. After the Memorial Cup, there will be heavy emphasis on the upcoming NHL Entry Draft.

PROSPECT PROMOTIONS / DEMOTIONS:

None to report this week.

PROSPECT TRADES:

None to report this week.

PLAYERS ON SICK CALL:

None to report this week.

PLAYERS RETURNED TO DUTY:

None to report this week.

PLAYERS ON SUSPENSION:

None to report this week.

PROSPECT NEWS AND NOTES:

ITEM: MEMORIAL CUP UPDATE.

Three Blues prospects have made it to the Memorial Cup tournament with their teams, all from the QMJHL.

The Saint John Sea Dogs have repeated as QMJHL champions, and prospects Ryan Tesink and Stephen Macaulay will have another opportunity this season to do their thing in the annual tournament to determine major junior hockey supremacy.

Tesink drew first blood among Blues prospects in last night's 5-3 loss to OHL champion London; the 2011 draftee (162nd overall) scored a power-play goal at 12:01 of the third period to bring the Dogs back to a one-goal deficit, but the powerhouse Knights scored on their own power play with less than a minute to play in order to seal the win.

Tesink finished with an even plus/minus, while Macaulay was a minus-1 and won just three of the 11 faceoffs he took.

The other Blues prospect in the Memorial Cup is 2011 draftee (102nd overall) Yannick Veilleux of the host team, the Shawinigan Cataractes. Veilleux scored at just about a point-per-game clip in the regular season (27-31-58 in 59 GP) and playoffs (5-6-11 in 11 GP), but was held off the scoresheet and was a minus-2 in les Cataractes 4-3 loss to WHL champion Edmonton on Friday night.

Shawinigan faces London today at 6:00 PM CST, while Saint John takes on Edmonton on Monday, again at 6:00 PM CST. Scoresheets, highlights, webcasts, etc. can all be accessed by clicking HERE, on the Master Card Memorial Cup 2012 official website.

...

ITEM: TARASENKO WATCH.

As was reported here and at The Post Dispatch online, along with several other places, during the last week, the powers-that-be in charge of the Russian entry in the World Championships have elected to deny Blues' draftee Vladimir Tarasenko a spot on this year's WC squad.

The "official" reason given for T-90's exclusion from the Russian squad -- who will face Slovakia today for the 2012 World Championship -- can be discerned from this tweet by Alexander Zaytsev (a Russian who covers the KHL, NHL, and Team Russia at the RussianHockeyFans.com website), retweeted by Russian hockey journalist Alessandro Seren Rosso (Twitter @AlexSerenRosso.)

Alexander Zaytsev ‏@AlexandrZaytsev ... Bilyaletdinov: "Tarasenko is overweight. We tried to help him lose weight but to no avail. He is not ready physically." #STL ... Retweeted by AlessandroSerenRosso

"Bilyaletdinov" refers to the head coach of Team Russia for this year's entry (and, not coincidentally, for Russia's 2014 Sochi Olympics entry as well), one Zinetula "Bill" Bilyaletdinov. A former player for Moscow Spartak in the old USSR, Bilyaletdinov served as an assistant coach for the old Winnipeg Jets from 1994 to 1996, and moved with the team to Phoenix for one season in 1996-97.

There has been a great deal of speculation that Tarasenko's exclusion from Team Russia was due more to politics than to any perceived weight issue. To begin with, Tarasenko played deep into the KHL playoffs with SKA St. Petersburg, where he was among the league's playoff scoring leaders with 10 goals and 16 points in 15 playoff games. That impressive performance followed up a solid regular season split between SKA and Tarasenko's hometown club of Sibir Novosibirsk.

In 39 games with Sibir, Tarasenko put up an 18-20-38 scoring line (plus-12, 15 PM, 7 PPG, 4 GWG). After his trade to St. Petersburg in mid-January, Tarasenko added five goals and nine points in 15 games, playing mostly on the fourth line with a reduction of average minutes played. With Sibir, Tarasenko played an average of 18:48 per game; with a stronger St. Petersburg squad made up of more veteran players, the 20-year-old saw his ice time reduced to just 11:22 per game.

Tarasenko still managed to finish the regular season with an impressive 23-24-47 scoring line (plus-18, 15 PM, 7 PPG, 6 GWG) in 54 total games. In the playoffs, he led SKA in goals and overall scoring despite getting just 12:16 of ice time per game.

Those are not numbers put up by a player that is out of shape, and immediately after SKA's elimination from the KHL playoffs on Apr. 3, Tarasenko reported to Team Russia's camp. So, if the "official" version of the story is to be believed, in just over four weeks' time, a 20-year-old player who had just come off of a solid regular season and an arguably dominant post-season was unable to get into good-enough shape to satisfy his coach.

(NOTE: The opinion expressed in the following is my own, and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of "St. Louis Game Time" or the management thereof.)

Male bovine excrement.

Tarasenko is being punished by a coach with an agenda, because he (Tarasenko) has expressed repeatedly his desire to play in the NHL, and because he is on the brink of making that jump as we speak. Bilyaletdinov and the powers-that-be in Russia are trying to pressure Tarasenko and other young Russian stars to stay in Russia in order to make the KHL more competitive vis a vis the NHL.

To Tarasenko's credit, he has not publicly complained of the less-than-first-class treatment of his situation by Bilyaletdinov, and his only public statement has been that he will make his decision after the World Championships so as not to overshadow his countrymen in the pursuit of the gold medal.

I'm not Vladimir Tarasenko, but if I was, the decision would have already been made for me.

Sunday Links: Again? Again.

2012-05-20T15:47:29Z

Okay, now we're just losing it. The Rangers vs Devils debate went way too far last night, and went straight to an Albany Devils vs Connecticut Whale all - out fight. The casual Devils fan thought we were nuts. Whatever.

Blues News:

Hartigan misses Blues hockey a lot. So much. I start 75 percent of my sentences with "The Blues" and the remaining sentences start with "you annoy me."

The gist of the hockey world:

WCF: [LA Times]
ECF: [Post Dispatch]
Worlds: [IIHF]
Memorial Cup: [Buzzing the Net]
Poor Philly [THN]

BEER!

I'm suggesting a group trip to a Triple Crown Event next year. All the hip horse races are trying to lure the 21-30 crowd with alcohol. Look at the Preakness. [PS it's working]

Video:

I do not understand.

gametimelinks [at] gmail.com