Originally published on EuroReport.com in 2000 By Lucas Aykroyd On a St. Louis Blues squad that boasts such perennial Norris Trophy candidates as Al MacInnis and Chris Pronger, the name of Ricard Persson is easy to overlook. But the shaven-headed 30-year-old defenseman from Ostersund, Sweden knows his value to the team isn’t measured in bone-crushing […]

Originally published on EuroReport.com in 2001 By Lucas Aykroyd By now, most hockey fans know Robert Reichel is back in the NHL. But is the NHL back in Robert Reichel? The cunning center from Litvinov doesn’t enjoy the same sterling reputation in North America as he does in Europe. Since his 1990 debut with the […]

Originally published on EuroReport.com in 2001 By Lucas Aykroyd Maybe Jarkko Ruutu is just a bit of a slow starter. Two years in a row, Vancouver Canucks GM Brian Burke predicted the 25-year-old Helsinki native would crack Vancouver’s opening night lineup. But instead, Ruutu ended up in the minors. He’s made his best-ever impression in […]

Originally published in Eishockey News in 2006 By Lucas Aykroyd As legendary coach Scotty Bowman recently noted, no NHL team has ever had three Hall of Fame defensemen like Larry Robinson, Guy Lapointe, and Serge Savard since his Montreal Canadiens of the late 1970’s. But the Anaheim Ducks come pretty close to that level with […]

Originally published in Prospects Hockey in 2006 By Lucas Aykroyd Before Sidney, there was Mario. And before Mario, there was Pierre. The Pittsburgh Penguins have drafted some of the greatest QMJHL forwards of all time, and in the 1970’s, perhaps only Guy Lafleur and Marcel Dionne outshone Pierre Larouche. Growing up in the northwestern Quebec […]

Originally published in Eishockey News in 2006 By Lucas Aykroyd This season, the Phoenix Coyotes are celebrating their tenth year in Arizona under the slogan of “Decade in the Desert.” But cynics might suggest that this franchise is like the Biblical Israelites who wandered in the wilderness for 40 years, and the Promised Land is […]

Originally published in Eishockey News in 2006 By Lucas Aykroyd Esa Tikkanen and Brett Hull are examples of NHLers who played hard on the ice but exhibited a light-hearted attitude when they took off their skates. However, Dion Phaneuf definitely doesn’t fit that mold. In his second NHL season, the 21-year-old defenseman conducts himself more […]

Originally published in Eishockey News in 2006 By Lucas Aykroyd When Petteri Nummelin was 16 years old, he learned that you should never give up. As the son of Timo Nummelin, the only man ever to be named Finland’s Best Player of the Year in both hockey and soccer, the young Turku-born defenseman faced constant […]

Originally published in Eishockey News in 2007 By Lucas Aykroyd Even though Petr Sykora leads the Edmonton Oilers in scoring in his first season with the Northern Alberta club, that’s not his main concern. The 30-year-old Czech winger, who won a Stanley Cup with New Jersey in 2000, has also experienced the pain of losing […]

Originally published on EuroReport.com in 2000 By Lucas Aykroyd It’s tough to forget the image of a skinny kid from Czechoslovakia marching down from the stands at the 1984 NHL Entry Draft in Montreal to pull on an oversized Habs jersey. But today, Petr Svoboda epitomizes the term “veteran.” Nearing 1000 NHL games played at […]