Derek Dorsett got the visitors on the scoreboard first, with a goal at the 4:09 mark in the first period. It was just Dorsett’s second of the season. The goal was assisted by Fredrik Modin and Mathieu Roy. St. Louis tied the game with just :02 remaining in the period, as David Backes picked up a power play goal, assisted by T.J. Oshie and David Perron. The goal for Backes was his 11th of the season.

The second period was marred by penalties, with 36 total, including a 10 minute misconduct by the Blues’ Brad Winchester. The lone goal in the period was scored by Blue Jackets Fedor Tyutin. It was his third of the season, and it came via the power play. Rick Nash and R.J. Umberger assisted on the goal.

Andy McDonald tied the game in the third period at the 18:25 mark, scoring his 17th goal, also a power play. Erik Johnson and Eric Brewer helped with an assist on the goal. In overtime, Kris Russell picked up his sixth goal of the season, with assists from Derick Brassard and Marc Methot.

All in all, there were 42 minutes of penalties in the game. Columbus was out shot 27-19. Goaltender Mathiew Garon picked up the win to improve to 8-8-3 overall. The Blue Jackets will now wait until Tuesday when they travel to Denver to take on the Avalanche. St. Louis’ next game will be Wednesday against their rival team, the Chicago Blackhawks.

To have any chance at making the playoffs this squad is going to have to make some changes, some sacrifices. Clever t-shirts with slogans like “It Starts Now” aren’t going to cut it.  It isn’t just the players on the ice that need to make the changes, the sacrifices, but the coaching staff and the front office as well. Tonight’s game is number 42 for the Blue Jackets, the official start of the second half of the season. Making changes for New Year’s, or the new season as the Blue Jackets would like to treat it, certainly isn’t a new practice. So without further ado, the Blue Jackets 2010 New Year’s resolutions.

Scott Howson: The Blue Jackets are still without a legitimate number one center or defenseman. Derick Brassard was supposed to be the number one, but clearly he wasn’t ready to take it. Maybe, just maybe, it wasn’t the best idea to sign kid with 48 career games in the league, coming off an injury, to a four-year contract extension with a $3.2million annual cap hit. If the club is confident that he is capable of becoming a bonafide first-line center, why not have him playing with Rick Nash? If they’re not, then they need to start the searching now. On the defensive front, not a single player on the team is a top defenseman, and one could argue that there isn’t a no. 2 among them. John Moore isn’t going to blossom into a top defenseman in just a year. Something, or rather someone will need to be added through a trade or free agency. Ownership has claimed that they are willing to spend money to be competitive, time to make them pony up, and preferably before summer.

Ken Hitchcock: For starters, how about winning significantly more games in 2010 than in 2009? To do so it’s going to require a bit of philosophy change and negotiations. Hitchcock has historically been very hard on young players, while being slightly more lax on veterans. Unfortunately, that sort of mentality simply cannot cut it with the youngest team in the league. If he wants to be in Columbus by this time next year, he’ll need to become an equal-opportunity stickler. Yes, young players make mistakes, but so do veterans. Hitchcock may be starting on this resolution a little early as mistake-prone Mike Commodore appears to once again be a healthy scratch this evening; he was kept out of the lineup in favor of newly-acquired Milan Jurcina Tuesday night.

The next step is benching mercurial winger Kristian Huselius and there’s a laundry list of players perfectly capable of reevaluating their game in the press box. This organization has more depth than it has ever had and if veterans are not playing to the level they need to be at, there are numerous young guys waiting in the wings dying for a shot. Give the young guys chances and allow them to make and learn from their mistakes. It is crunch time, but there needs to be accountability throughout the locker room. The divide between veterans and youngsters needs to be broken down to get everyone playing their best and this team headed in the right direction.

Rick Nash: Nash needs to stop trying to do everything by himself, whether in the locker room or on the ice. Nash has been held to just 12 points in the last 21 games, 18 of which have been losses. He needs to do more and produce more, but he makes himself much easier to take out of the game by failing to utilize his teammates. He plays like the biggest, strongest, most skilled kid on the peewee hockey team. The only problem is, in the NHL other teams recognize that and can shutdown one elite player. In his defense it is tough to build chemistry when you’re playing with different players each night, but it’s even harder to score on a one-on-three.

In the locker room Nash has an equal amount of work to do. The first thing he needs to do, if not already, is to ask for help. Last season the veteran presence of Michael Peca helped lessen the leadership burden that comes with the “C”. He served as a mouthpiece for Nash in the locker room as well as a player that helped teach the Hitchcock system to the youngsters. With Peca is gone and players like Rostislav Klesla and Fredrik Modin out for large portions of the season, the leadership burden has fallen almost solely on the 25-year-old. He doesn’t need to, nor should he have to shoulder the load on his own. If that means calling Michael Peca for advice, so be it. If that means reaching out to newly-acquired winger Chris Clark (four-year captain of the Washington Capitals) and asking him to help fulfill a leadership role on the team, do it now rather than later. There is no time to spare.

Steve Mason: For the reigning Calder Trophy winner, 2009 has been bittersweet. Steve Mason took home some serious hardware for his performance during the year. Yet, this season he has looked far cry from the Mason of the last. His poor play has been exaggerated by the porous defense that has been in front of him most of the season but let’s be clear. Mason is in the midst of a sophomore slump. One of the things Mason needed most has already been done for him. He was stripped of the starting role. While that may not have been in his personal interest, it taught him a very tough lesson that needed to be learned. Nothing is given in this league. It’s earned.

The move is hoped to unleash the competitive monster that dwells inside Mason. You begin to recognize how much of a competitor he is when you speak with the kid, more so than with most professional athletes. He’s had to compete for every role he’s ever held be it with two different junior teams, Team Canada in the World Juniors or the AHL. Lest we forget that he was an injury call-up last season whose competitive edge made it impossible the Blue Jackets to send him down. However, going into the season as the undisputed starter and franchise goaltender, Mason appeared to become a little too confident and much too complacent.

Since Hitchcock announced the “Win and you’re in” policy, Mason has played extremely well and cut down in the areas that have hindered his play the most this season: bad goals and the reaction that follows, positioning and rebound control. One need not look further than Tuesday night in the first period when Mason allowed a relatively soft goal against the Islanders. Earlier in the year, it would be no surprise to see the Isles come down and spot two or three more on Mason. He went on the turn away every remaining shot and kept the Jackets in the game, only to fall in a shutout. He’ll need to continue to play with that competitive edge for the rest of the season if he wishes to truly reclaim his net.

These resolutions only address a few of the major issues this team is facing. Feel free to share your resolutions for the team, coaching staff and management.

Happy New Years from the FTC Staff!

-Bart Logan

bartftc@gmail.com

Twitter: BartFTC

The Union Blue came out and peppered Labarbera with 13 shots in the first period but managed only a single goal. The Jackets had a four-minute power play to end the first after Scottie Upshall’s high stick on Marc Methot drew blood.  Brassard buried the rebound off Russell’s point shot through traffic. But less than 30 seconds, RJ Umberger took a swing at James Vandermeer after the whistle, then tried to cover it up by throwing off the gloves and starting a fight. When it was all done, the Jackets lost out on a power play to finish the rest of the period. It was a bad penalty from RJ and foreshadowed the sort of undisciplined play that would lead to Jackets’ fourth loss in their last five.

It all came crashing down in the second and third periods. Both teams traded chances but the ‘Yotes capitalized on scoring chances and out-worked the Jackets for the last 40 minutes. Phoenix got a power play goal from Martin Hanzel, his first of the year, at the 10:33 mark in the second. Rusty Klesla did his best to defend a Phoenix counterattack with the rest of PK dogging it down the ice. Mike Commodore was the last one back in the zone and knocked Hanzel into the net after Hanzel had knocked a rebound past Chris Mason. Another bad penalty after the whistle for Columbus

Vandermeer added another goal, his first of the year, a little over three minutes later off a shot from the point with Mason screened. Zybnek Michalek and Robert Lang added power play tallies in the third to quash any hopes of a Blue Jackets comeback.

In a game that was supposed to be a shot at redemption in front of the home fans after an awful road trip, the Blue Jackets still looked like their western swing selves. The game was probably best characterized on the Hanzel goal. The Blue Jackets PK was plain beat down the ice and the ‘Yotes did the little things to outwork and out-compete the Union Blue. The win mattered more to Phoenix.

In a post game interview Marc Methot said this result was “scary” because the team had already ironed out the issues with the penalty kill. This is obviously not the case. The aggression that forced turnovers on the forecheck and backcheck, that clogged up opponent passing lanes, that led to short handed opportunities (through 6 games the CBJ had 3 SHG and given up 1 PPG) was still nowhere to be found. The zone coverage was shaky at best.

The Coyotes were able to dictate the game despite being out shot by a margin of nine. Don’t let the 32 shots fool you, the CBJ had about a half dozen quality scoring chances. The Phoenix defense forced Columbus to take most of their shots from low scoring areas to the outside. Labarbera had more rubber in his stomach than the Michelin Man.

The Blue Jackets have a lot to work on and not a whole lot of time to remedy it. They will be seeing the scoring elite from the East this weekend with Pittsburgh coming to town Friday and Washington Sunday. If the Blue Jackets don’t return to the style of play that was winning them games early this season, it could be a very long weekend.

NOTES——-

Jan Hejda insists that he is ahead in his rehab and may be ready to return to the lineup as soon as Sunday.

Anton Stralman finished second among defensemen in ice time last night with 20:22. Only Fedor Tyutin saw more ice on the blue line. Stralman wasn’t just limited to power play special teams time; he also logged some PK minutes and at times looked like the most solid D in the lineup.

Mathieu Roy was returned to Syracuse. Had Roy played a couple more games, it would have nullified his emergency recall status and he would have had to return to the Crunch through the waiver wire. Someone would have snatched him up.

Rick Nash was held off the score sheet last night for just the third time this season. Nash tied for seventh in league in scoring with 15 points through 11 games.

The Blue Jackets are expecting upwards of 19,000 for Friday night’s clash with the defending champs. The Blue Jackets set a regular season attendance record last season when Pittsburgh came to town.

The new FTC Power Rankings will be out next Monday.

——-

bartftc@gmail.com

Twitter: BartFTC

Against this backdrop, the Jackets 5 – 1 thumping of the Minnesota Wild in the Columbus home debut was just what the doctor ordered. Coach Ken Hitchcock put out the projected top line of Rick Nash, Derick Brassard and Kristian Huselius, and was rewarded with a combined seven points. Raffi Torres added a goal and an assist, Antoine Vermette tallied a short-handed breakaway, and defenseman Grant Clitsome put home a laser beam feed from Brassard. In all, the offense showed speed, chemistry and the ability to maintain possession in the offensive zone for extended periods of time. Alexandre Picard and Maxim Mayorov showed lots of energy and good speed. Andrew Murray, likely the front-runner for the fourth line center slot, showed early energy, but faded as the game went on. His chief rival, Michael Blunden, failed to impress. Agitator Jared Boll looked slow and out of shape in contrast to the others on the ice – he is definitely in a battle for a job.

In goal, Steve Mason went the distance, allowing only a late wrap-around goal after a defensive breakdown behind the net. He showed the energy and agility that brought him the Calder last season.

Defensively, the Jackets overcame a first period of scattered play in their own zone to turn in an overall solid performance. Kris Russell, Jan Heda ,Marc Methot and Rusty Klesla were quietly efficient, if unspectacular. They are still getting accustomed to some new pairings, and sometimes displayed the hesitation and imprecision you might anticipate as they adjust to each other.

One defender who did not appear plagued by uncertainty was rookie phenom John Moore. The Jackets’ first round pick this year, Moore displayed a sense of calm that belied his 18 years of age. He put in some significant minutes, worked on the power play, and showed speed, precision and the ability to make quick, accurate passes to trigger the transition game. He showed his substantial speed, and was unafraid to carry the play deep in the offensive zone. This is a skill that the Jackets have lacked, and their search for an offensive defenseman has been well documented. More on this in a bit. Grant Clitsome was given extended minutes tonight, and played credibly.
Eric Belanger, who delivered the controversial hit on Chimera back in Minnesota, was wisely held out of this contest. Nonetheless, there was a tacit hostility in the air all night, and it boiled over in the third period, with 42 minutes of fighting and roughing penalties handed out in that frame alone.

On special teams, the Jackets showed a very strong penalty kill, but once again struggled on the power play, cashing in on only one of seven chances. While that one was well-executed, they could not find the solution the balance of the time, and looked slow and uncertain in a squandered 1:19 of 5-on-3 time. Players away from the puck are spending too much time watching, and are not making those small movements necessary to create passing lanes and clear shooting alleys.

Just as it is unwarranted to become overly distraught for perceived pre-season shortcomings, so too is it unwise to get too excited about warmup victories. However, the speed and the skill were impressive, and the psychological boost was well timed. While Modin is out for as long as six weeks, Chimera has been characterized as day to day, and Sestito also appears to be better than first feared. Torres caused a brief wave of panic when he did not play in the third period. It turns out that he was experiencing back spasms, and the staff decided to have him ice his back, rather than play and risk injury.

With three games left before the season opener against the same Minnesota Wild, the Blue Jackets face a number of key decisions. In no particular order, they are:

• How Much Moore? The 18 year old has wowed everyone with his skill, speed and composure. When drafted, he was headed to Colorado College. After consulting with the team, those plans changed, with Kitchener becoming his designated destination in juniors. Now, it is clear that he will be around throughout camp, and speculation is rampant that he might start the season with the big club, much as Nikita Filatov did a year ago. As with Filatov, Moore might play eight games and then be shipped to AHL Syracuse, instead of Juniors. Complicating the equation is an institutional reticence to rush young players along, a kind of backlash against the prior Doug MacLean administration, who brought an untested Rostislav Klesla directly to the NHL, probably well before he was really ready. While a nice problem to have, it represents just another uncertainty that GM Scott Howson faces.

• Offensive Defense – Assuming that Moore does not stay with the big club, Howson still faces the lack of a strong shooting, puck moving defenseman that can engineer the power play. Kris Russell and Fedor Tyutin will get their opportunities, but nobody else (short of Moore) has distinguished themselves as a likely candidate for this role. Rumor has it that Toronto is willing to shop Mike Van Ryn cheaply. He has the requisite right hand shot, and good size, but injuries have limited him to 47 games over the past two seasons. Vancouver also has a glut of defensemen. With Chimera on the mend, Howson still has a glut of wingers, which he could leverage into something, if he is so inclined. Although professing he is ready to move into the season with the current hand, word on the street is that there is some active shopping underway.

• Sorting out the Wings — While the top two lines are likely set (Nash, Huselius, Brassard, Umberger, Vermette, Voracek) there are numerous contenders for the remaining six slots. Pahlsson clearly has the third line center slot nailed down, and Raffi Torres appears to have one of the wings claimed. Murray and Blunden are the likely contenders for the fourth line center slot. This leaves Chimera, Filatov, Mayorov, Picard, Dorsett and Boll to contend for the final four slots, together with Modin, once he returns from injury. Most consider Filatov as a likely member of the big club come opening day, and a contender for a top six slot before long. While some depth can be maintained, due to two way contracts, it would not be surprising to see one or two of these players move in a deal before the end of camp.

With a plethora of young talent, combined with some key veteran leadership, Ken Hitchcock and Scott Howson have problems most coaches and GM’s in the league would love to have.

There isn’t a more passionate or knowledgeable person that I could be co-hosting with me and it should be a lot of fun and informative. Matthews has been the voice of the CBJ since day one of the franchise and has been up close and personnel for the entire ride. If you want to call in and ask George something, I encourage you to do so. If you can’t make it and want to fire me an email, I will do my best to get it asked on the air.

Blue Jackets 1st round draft choice, John Moore will be joining us on the podcast to talk about his experience in his first NHL camp. Also, Allan Walsh, Antoine Vermette and Derick Brassard’s agent, will also be calling in to discuss what has become a very busy few weeks for him in Columbus.

Fire The Cannon!

Eric Smith
JacketsBuzz@yahoo.com

On Tuesday night at a private function in Nationwide Arena, majority owner John P. McConnell and minority owners Ron Pizzuti, Jay Crane, and John F. Wolfe held a fantasy hockey draft in which they each drafted a 16-player team from the Blue Jacket’s training camp roster.

Each team was required to select three centers, seven wingers, and six defensemen. Goaltenders were not drafted but instead will be assigned to a team on a daily basis.

When asked for the motives behind the fantasy draft, Jacket’s head coach and brainchild of the draft Ken Hitchcock cited unequal opportunities in previous year’s camps, and an opportunity for players to meet owners as main reasons.

The rosters for each team were released, but the draft order and order in which players were selected was not. According to the Columbus Dispatch, the teams, broken down by forwards and defensemen, are as follows:

TEAM WOLFE

F
Rick Nash
Derek MacKenzie
Kristian Huselius
Tom Sestito
Michael Blunden
Jared Boll
Daniel Steiner
Andrew Clark
Tim Miller
Jon Mirasty

D
Kris Russell
Mike Commodore
Grant Clitsome
David Savard
Tim Filangieri
Spencer McAvoy

TEAM CRANE

F
Derick Brassard
Sammy Pahlsson
Derek Dorsett
Pascal Pelletier
Trevor Frischmon
Matthew Calvert
David Liffiton
Darren Archibald
Brock McBride
Zak Ray

D
Fedor Tyutin
John Moore
Mathieu Roy
Doug Lynch
Dylan Reese

TEAM MCCONNELL

F
Antoine Vermette
R.J. Umberger
Raffi Torres
Chris Higgins
Tomas Kubalik
Alexandre Picard
Stefan Legein
Andrew Aggozino
Kevin Harvey
Cass Mappin
Matt Caria

D
Jan Hejda
Rostislav Klesla
Brent Regner
Steven Delisle
Cam Brodie

TEAM PIZZUTI

F
Jake Voracek
Nikita Filatov
Jason Chimera
Fredrik Modin
Jared Aulin
Maksim Mayorov
Andrew Murray
Scott Tanski
Ian Duval
Tayler Jordan
Tyler Murovich

D
Marc Methot
Jonathan Sigalet
Andrei Plekhanov
Kevin Roeder
Paul Bezzo

The teams will play a four-team playoff in which the winners of the first game advance to the championship match while the losers battle it out for third place.

The matchups are as follows:

September 13, 10:30 am

Team McConnell vs. Team Crane

September 13, 2 pm

Team Wolfe vs. Team Pizzuti

September 14, 10:30 am

Third Place Game

September 14, 2 pm

Championship Game

“It’s going to be good,” Hitchcock said. “It’ll be fun, and we’ll get a good evaluation.”

We know that it was a snake style draft in which the order reverses after each round. With that being said, we can only assume that Team Wolfe had the first selection since he has Rick Nash listed on his roster. Other than that though, the rest of it is pretty unclear.

I’ll let you decided who has the best team,

Leave a comment with your pick and reasons why.

-Rob Ogden

FireTheCannon.com

Twitter: RobFTC

Now that we are clear on that, I, being a writer on the Blue Jackets and also getting credentials from the team, I feel that it is my duty from time to time to help the Blue Jackets out with some information and education that due to the relationship with their customers they are not always able to deliver in a clear fashion.

So here it goes! The player selected on Friday in the 2009 NHL Entry Draft will not play for the Columbus Blue Jackets next year! There, I said it.

Oh, so some of you think you are pretty smart and already knew this! Then why do I see over and over that the Blue Jackets biggest need is to pick a power play specialist to cure the team’s 30th ranked power play? If the CBJ select a defenseman in the first round, it will be at least 2 years before he will be a contributing factor for the big club. Anybody want to wait that long on the team’s power play?

That is another reason that the rumor of Kris Russell for Alex Auld is completely ridiculous! How bad would the Blue Jackets want their already pathetic power play to get? When you have Mike Commodore on the power play, that should let you know how thin you are when it comes to having a blue line offensive presence.

Am I completely against the Blue Jackets taking a defenseman with offensive skills? Heavens no, but this Service Announcement is to let you know that it won’t cure the ills of the present on the big club.

What my preference and based off of what Scott Howson has said, the Jackets want a center. They have Derick Brassard and Antoine Vermette for the next year. Nikita Filatov is a great prospect and he was drafted as a center but everyone has seen that he is best suited as a winger where he can be less restricted on defensive duties and let his offensive skill shine. The Union Blue don’t even have a warm body in Syracuse to bring up or is just seasoning. The top rated center in the organization, based off of Hockey Futures, is Sean Collins who just finished his freshman year at Cornell! Then there is no one and I mean no one. Kirill Starkov who was another has bolted for the KHL and thus the cupboard is bare.

What I am trying to educate Blue Jacket fans are, when it comes to the draft, don’t look at the Blue Jackets; instead look at Syracuse to find where the needs are for the organization.

The Blue Jackets still have some hope for Andrei Plekhanov who has offensive skill and also possesses a right handed shot that the Blue Jackets are in short supply of on the power play. Also,Cody Goloubef just finished his sophomore year at Wisconsin. Will the Jackets tap him on the shoulder and suggest that he come play for pay? Goloubef is the Jackets top defensive prospect and is offensive also and he too has a right handed shot. As you can see, the cupboard is not bare when it comes to defense. Could it use more prospects, what team couldn’t?

Columbus NHLTweetup Specifics

I am reallly getting fired up for the NHL Draft and the Columbus NHLTweetup. Based off of the Twitter traffic and other things, I can tell you guys and gals are too! I also know that you have some questions about the NHLTweetup and now I hope to clear some of them up.

1. How do I get to the Columbus NHLTweetup – Come to Nationwide Arena like the normal draft party that is being put on by the Blue Jackets. Then look for tables that will have reserved signs on them. I am going to try to get more specifics on where the tables are exactly and let you know on that as soon as I know. I don’t think it will be hard.

2. Will there be WiFi at the NHLTweetup – Come on! Do you think I would let you guys tweet during the draft? Thanks again to the Blue Jackets staff, we will have Wifi. I even have the user name and passwords already!

Username: DraftParty
Password: nhldraft

3. What time does it start? – 5pm on Friday is when the NHLTweetup will start. The NHL Draft won’t start until 7pm. That’s why if you can’t or don’t want to get there right at 5pm to get a good seat, getting your seat reserved for the NHLTweetup is the only way to go.

4. What will be going on during the party? – The best part is that there will be a collection of knowledgeable and passionate Blue Jacket fans all sitting together to talk, debate and brag a little when they guess a pick right. I will also have some contests that I will give out some prizes that I got from the great people at Crimson Cup and 97.1 The Fan. Also, people will be invited to watch live television coverage of the NHL Draft on VERSUS while George Matthews and Bill Davidge, alongside Sports Radio 97.1 The Fan’s Milan Jordan, will anchor the radio broadcast in addition, Jeff Rimer will contribute analysis and interviews direct from Montreal. The Festivities are headlined by player appearances by 2009 Calder Trophy winner Steve Mason, R.J. Umberger (who was also selected in the 16 spot in the first round) and Jared Boll, who will be on hand to sign autographs and participate in the select-a-seat Open House where fans may learn about opportunities regarding full and partial season ticket plans for the 2009-2010 season. A wide range of activities offered during the party include the following: tours of the Blue Jackets and visiting NHL locker rooms, photo opportunities in the penalty boxes, and alongside the cannon and Zambonis, sstreet hockey for kids, merchandise and game-used equipment sale, silent auction of sports memorabilia benefiting the Blue Jackets Foundation and draft party food and beverage specials.

5. Where can I reserve my seat? – go to the NHLTweetup website at NHLTweetup.com and you can make your reservation if you have a Twitter account. If you don’t have a twitter account and don’t want to create one, just email me at JacketsBuzz@yahoo.com and I will get you signed up. Spots are limited and are running out quickly, so don’t wait.

See everyone at the Draft! If you are there but don’t sign up for the NHLTweetup, don’t be shy and come by and say “Hi!” Would love to meet you.

Fire The Cannon!

Eric Smith
JacketsBuzz@Yahoo.com