If you didn’t see last night, scary incident in Columbus when New York Rangers coach Tom Renney was knocked out after the heel of Blue Jackets defenseman Rusty Klesla’s stick clunked the coach on the head. Renney missed the rest of the game, but should be OK.

I got some funny anecdotes this morning from Jacques Lemaire and Mario Tremblay about close calls on the Wild bench throughout the years. Of course, Jacques then warned me if anything happens tonight to him, I’m in lots and lots of trouble, like his stick over my head. Wild radio “personality” Kevin Falness then told Jacques he obviously hopes nothing happens to him, but it would be worth it to see what Jacques would do to me.

More on that in tomorrow’s paper. The Wild has played the fewest games in the NHL (five) and is the last team to finally play inside its own conference. The Wild (4-0-1) is the only team in the West without a regulation loss.

Not much going on obviously. Owen Nolan is good to go for tonight after missing three games with a leg injury. Marian Gaborik is not playing. Erik Reitz and Tomas Mojzis will be scratched, and then Jacques will have to pick another forward, maybe Colton Gillies or Craig Weller.

I’d think Cal Clutterbuck is in after a pretty strong game against Buffalo that included seven hits.

The Wild will have to make a roster move to activate Nolan. In all likelihood, Gaborik would be placed on injured reserve unless somebody will be assigned to Houston.

For the second time in history today, all 30 teams are in action.

Here’s some cool facts and figures released by the NHL on that fact:

30 Teams, 15 Games in 15 Cities — One Night

Sidney Crosby and the Pittsburgh Penguins play the New York Rangers at
Madison Square Garden in their first meeting since last season’s Conference Semifinal
playoff series; San Jose defenseman Dan Boyle faces his former teammates for the first
time when the Sharks visit the Tampa Bay Lightning; NHL MVP Alex Ovechkin makes
his first appearance in Dallas since his rookie season of 2005-06 when the Stars
entertain the Washington Capitals; Atlantic Division rivals Philadelphia Flyers and New
Jersey Devils meet in Philadelphia for the second of back-to-back games and the NHL’s
most historic rivalry resumes at United Center when the Chicago Blackhawks host the
Detroit Red Wings in the 698th all-time meeting of those clubs.

And there will be much more where that came from when more than 275,000
fans will flock to arenas throughout North America Saturday to watch 600 players
compete in 15 games on the busiest day of the National Hockey League schedule. For
only the second time in the League’s history, 30 teams will be in action on the same day.
From the first puck drop (4:08 p.m. ET) at the Wachovia Center in Philadelphia to
the final buzzer (approximately 12:45 a.m. ET) at Vancouver’s General Motors Place and
Phoenix’s Jobing.com Arena, nine continuous hours of hockey, televised through more
than 50 hours of coverage, will showcase the fastest game on earth. The following facts
and figures highlight the 15 matchups on Saturday, Oct. 25 — the first time since opening
night of the 2005-06 season that all 30 teams will have played on the same day.

NHL Broadcast Schedule for Saturday, October 25:
Hockey Night in Canada on CBC will broadcast a doubleheader, providing regional
coverage of Ottawa at Toronto and Anaheim at Montreal at 7 p.m., ET, followed by
Edmonton at Vancouver coast-to-coast at 10 p.m., ET. French-language viewers will see
the Anaheim-Montreal game on RDS. NHL Network will simulcast the Hockey Night in
Canada doubleheader to a national U.S. audience. Subscribers to the League’s Center
Ice and GameCenter Live packages will see all 15 games (subject to local blackout
restrictions).

Time (ET) Game Nat’l TV Local TV
4:00 p.m. New Jersey at Philadelphia MSG+ 2 (NJ), CSN (Phi)
7:00 p.m. Atlanta at Boston SPSO (Atl), NESN (Bos)
7:00 p.m. Ottawa at Toronto CBC, NHLN (US)
7:00 p.m. Anaheim at Montreal CBC, RDS KDOC (Ana)
7:00 p.m. Carolina at NY Islanders FSN (Car), MSG+ (NYI)
7:00 p.m. Pittsburgh at NY Rangers FSN (Pit), MSG (NYR)
7:30 p.m. San Jose at Tampa Bay SUN (TB)
8:00 p.m. Los Angeles at Nashville
8:00 p.m. Columbus at Minnesota FSN (Min)
8:00 p.m. Washington at Dallas CSN (Wsh), FSN (Dal)
8:30 p.m. Detroit at Chicago FSN (Det), WGN (Chi)
8:30 p.m. Florida at St. Louis FSN (Fla) , KPLR (StL)
9:00 p.m. Buffalo at Colorado MSG (Buf), ALT (Col)
10:00 p.m. Edmonton at Vancouver CBC, NHLN (US)
10:00 p.m. Calgary at Phoenix AZTV (Phx)
2

Longest time between meetings of
Oct. 25 matchups:
1. San Jose vs. Tampa Bay: 10/29/06
2. Washington vs. Dallas: 11/30/06
3. Buffalo vs. Colorado: 3/7/07
4. Florida vs. St. Louis: 12/13/07
5. Anaheim vs. Montreal: 3/9/08
Longest time between meetings inOct. 25 venue:
1. Buffalo at Colorado: 12/4/05
2. Anaheim at Montreal: 12/10/05
3. Washington at Dallas: 1/12/06
4. San Jose at Tampa Bay: 10/29/06
5. Florida at St. Louis: 12/13/07
Set Your Watch: With the drop of the puck at the Pepsi Center in Colorado at 9:08 PM
ET, 12 NHL games will be in progress simultaneously.
Going the Distance: The Calgary Flames will have travelled more than 1,600 miles
from Nashville to Glendale, Arizona for their Saturday night match-up against the
Phoenix Coyotes. The New Jersey Devils will travel fewer than 100 miles for their
second game of a home-and-home with the Philadelphia Flyers.
Behind the Bench: The coaches will bring a total of over 180 seasons of NHL head
coaching experience to the 30 benches. Calgary’s Mike Keenan, in his 20th season as
an NHL head coach, leads the way. Minnesota’s Jacques Lemaire and Toronto’s Ron
Wilson are each in their 15th NHL seasons. At the other end of the experience
spectrum, John Anderson (ATL), Peter DeBoer (FLA), Scott Gordon (NYI) and Todd
McLellan (SJ) are first-year head coaches.

Age Gap: Tampa Bay forward Gary Roberts (42 years, five months, two days old) is
the oldest player and Atlanta Thrashers defenseman Zach Bogosian (18 years, three
months, 10 days old) the youngest expected to be in action Saturday night. The
difference in their respective ages: 24 years, 53 days.

Stripes: On average NHL Officials log between five and seven miles on their skates
each game in addition to the 300 miles they usually travel just to drop the puck. Of the
67 officials (33 referees, 34 linesmen) only seven will have the night off: Referees
Stephane Auger, Mike Leggo and Dan O’Halloran along with linesmen Scott Driscoll,
Tim Nowak, Dan O’Halloran, Lyle Seitz and Mark Shewchyk.

Lights, Camera, Action: It will require approximately 800 people, 300 cameras, 150
miles of cable and 150 replay sources to produce the 26 different broadcasts — including
16 telecasts in HD — that will comprise the more than 50 hours of game content and
programming. In addition, 600 photographers will aim to capture every second of the
nine hours of hockey in pictures.

By the Numbers: Fans attending Saturday’s games are expected to consume more
than 95,000 soft drinks, 37,000 hot dogs, 33,000 slices of pizza and 23,000 orders of
nachos. In addition, they can be expected to purchase approximately 7,500 t-shirts,
3,300 jerseys and 3,000 pucks in the 15 NHL arenas open for business.

A Day Off: There will be no NHL games on Sunday, Oct. 26, marking the first time since
November 21, 2001 that no games will be played in the midst of a season (excluding the
Christmas break, All-Star break, Olympic break, and the days between the seasonopening
games in Europe and the start of the North American part of the schedule).
3

Hockey Fights Cancer: Six teams — Colorado, Dallas, Montreal, Nashville, St. Louis,
and Tampa Bay — will host their Hockey Fights Cancer Awareness Night. Clubs have
teamed with local and national cancer organizations to promote cancer awareness and
raise funds for hockey’s most important fight. Teams will hold on-ice presentations,
50/50 raffles, promotional giveaways, contests and discount ticket offers. Tickets and
arena suites will be donated to Children’s Hospitals and cancer-affiliated programs, and
young patients will be involved with in-game opportunities including rides on the
zamboni, puck-drops, radio booth visits and player meet-and-greets.

International Flavor: More than 20 nations will be represented on the ice as players
born in countries from Brazil (Robyn Regehr, CGY) to Denmark (Mikkel Boedker, PHX;
Jannik Hansen, VAN; and Frans Nielsen, NYI) and Poland (Wojtek Wolski, COL) to
Slovenia (Anze Kopitar, LA) suit up for their NHL Clubs.

Trophy Case: 48 trophy winners are represented on the active rosters for the 2008-09
season, with 16 multiple winners and 13 of the last 15 Calder Trophy winners (and
almost certainly the next one) in action.

October 5, 2005 - A Look Back
The NHL has scheduled all 30 clubs in action on the same day just once before -
- October 5, 2005, the opening night of the 2005-06 regular season and the first games
played under sweeping new rules promoting speed and skill. From the opening puck
drop in Buffalo to the final horn in Vancouver nearly six hours later and 2,700 miles
away, this historic evening was highlighted by:

Increased offense: A total of 95 goals, an average of 6.3 per game, were scored in the
15 games. It marked a 30% increase over the average of 4.9 goals scored in the first 15
games of the 2003-04 season.

Star debuts: Many of the NHL’s acclaimed group of young stars were among the 46
players making their League debut, including Pittsburgh’s Sidney Crosby, Washington’s
Alex Ovechkin, Calgary’s Dion Phaneuf, Anaheim’s Ryan Getzlaf and Corey Perry,
Philadelphia’s Mike Richards and Jeff Carter, Detroit’s Johan Franzen, Buffalo’s

Calder 13 Patrick Kane, Evgeni Malkin, Alex Ovechkin, Andrew Raycroft, Barret Jackman,
Dany Heatley, Evgeni Nabokov, Scott Gomez, Chris Drury, Sergei Samsonov,
Daniel Alfredsson, Martin Brodeur, Teemu Selanne

Frank J. Selke 12 Pavel Datsyuk, Rod Brind’Amour (2), Kris Draper, Jere Lehtinen (3), Michael Peca
(2), John Madden, Sergei Fedorov (2)

James Norris 9 Nicklas Lidstrom (6), Scott Niedermayer, Chris Pronger, Rob Blake
Rocket Richard 9 Alex Ovechkin, Vincent Lecavalier, Jonathan Cheechoo, Rick Nash, Jarome Iginla
(2), Ilya Kovalchuk, Milan Hejduk, Teemu Selanne

Hart 8 Alex Ovechkin, Sidney Crosby, Joe Thornton, Martin St. Louis, Jose Theodore, Joe
Sakic, Chris Pronger, Sergei Fedorov

Lady Byng 8 Pavel Datsyuk (3), Brad Richards, Joe Sakic, Pavol Demitra, Paul Kariya (2)
William M Jennings 8 Chris Osgood (2), Niklas Backstrom, Miikka Kiprusoff, Martin Brodeur (4)
Vezina 7 Martin Brodeur (4), Miikka Kiprusoff, Jose Theodore, Olaf Kolzig

Bill Masterton 5 Jason Blake, Phil Kessel, Teemu Selanne, Saku Koivu, Gary Roberts
Art Ross 5 Alex Ovechkin, Sidney Crosby, Joe Thornton, Martin St. Louis, Jarome Iginla
4
Thomas Vanek, Carolina’s Cam Ward, New Jersey’s Zach Parise and Chicago’s
Duncan Keith.

Comebacks: The Dallas Stars rebounded from a 4-0 first-period deficit to defeat the Los
Angeles Kings 5-4. By doing so, the Stars become the first team in NHL history to
overcome a deficit of four or more goals to win its opening game of the season.
Elsewhere, the New York Rangers trailed 3-1 in the second period at Philadelphia but
scored four unanswered goals to win 5-3. The Nashville Predators trailed 2-1 entering
the third period and tallied twice in the final frame to defeat the San Jose Sharks, 3-2.

Late-Game Dramatics: After playing to a tie following regulation and overtime at
Toronto, the Ottawa Senators captured the first shootout in League history. In addition to
the Ottawa-Toronto shootout decision, there were eight games in which the gamewinning
goal was scored in the third period. Seven of those goals came in the final 10
minutes of regulation time.

Record attendance: A total of 275,447 fans, the highest single-date figure in NHL
history, attended the 15 games, an average of 18,363 per game and 98.1% of capacity.
Eleven games were sellouts. The biggest crowd was in Tampa Bay, where 22,120 fans
filled the St. Pete Times Forum as the Lightning raised their 2004 Stanley Cup banner
prior to their game against the Carolina Hurricanes.

Summary
Games: 15
Goals: 95 (6.3 per game)
Shots: 849 (56.6 per game)
Power Plays: 204 (13.6 per game)
Power-Play Goals: 27 (13.2%)
Face-Offs: 914 (60.9 per game)
Hits: 441 (29.4 per game)
Blocked Shots: 344 (22.9 per game)
Penalty Minutes: 511 (34.1 per game)

Results
Montreal 2 at Boston 1
NY Islanders 4 at Buffalo 6
NY Rangers 5 at Philadelphia 3
Columbus 2 at Washington 3
Atlanta 0 at Florida 2
Ottawa 3 at Toronto 2 (SO)
Pittsburgh 1 at New Jersey 5
Carolina 2 at Tampa Bay 5
St. Louis 1 at Detroit 5
San Jose 2 at Nashville 3
Anaheim 5 at Chicago 3
Calgary 3 at Minnesota 6
Los Angeles 4 at Dallas 5
Colorado 3 at Edmonton 4
Phoenix 2 at Vancouver 3

This entry was posted on Saturday, October 25th, 2008 at 1:44 pm and is filed under Pregame skate. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.