Note: We are at the conclusion of the first week of the Team Illegal Curve Beard growing competition as Ezra and Drew help support the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Manitoba in conjunction with the Festival du Voyageur in the 31st annual beard growing contest. Every Friday we will be giving readers an update on the beard progress and here you go:
Note II: Don’t forget to tune into the Illegal Curve Hockey Show on TSN Radio 1290 from noon to 3 pm on Saturday. Guests: Bobby Holik (former New Jersey Devil, currently Holik on Hockey), Corey Pronman (ESPN).
Jets & Affiliate news:
Winnipeg Free Press: Lockout tough, but cold weather won’t chill this Scandinavian. Jokinen has been quiet on the lockout front but has diligently worked out at the IcePlex on a daily basis.
Winnipeg Free Press: A star in the making. Redmond is having a break out season in the AHL as he is making a lot of the brass take notice of his play.
Winnipeg Free Press: Prospects. A quick glance at how the Jet draft picks over the last two years are developing.
TSN: Mark Scheifele 1-on-1 (video). The Jets first pick in 2011 talks about playing with Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and the chemistry they’re building.
Illegal Curve: More Jets games cancelled. In case you missed the news, the NHL cancelled games through January 14th, which will impact 5 Jets home and 2 away games. This likely brings us to the final round of game cancellations as the drop dead date is believed to be the middle of January.
Global Winnipeg: Jets merchandise a hot gift despite lockout. While you cannot expect sales to be of 2011 levels, it appears that Winnipeg’s appetite for all things Jets continues to be substantial.
CBA news:
CBC: NHL’s next cancellation will be the season. As expected the final twist in this long winding road has occurred and it is either a cruise straight ahead to a deal or right off a cliff and a cancelled season.
USA Today: Lockout has chilling effect on business. Here are the real people who are impacted as a result of this lockout. How can they be ‘made whole’?
TSN: Holidays won’t be an impediment to labour talks. Why should holidays be any different than any other day of the week when neither side is meeting?
Sportsnet: Backlash over NHL’s latest cancellation. Twitter was a flutter with the latest news of games being cancelled.
World Juniors:
National Post: Canada taking nothing for granted. A loss, even if a tune-up game, will tend to do that. If it doesn’t than your team has some significant problems.
Vancouver Sun: Country-by-country look at the 2013 world junior hockey championship. In case you’d like a quick refresher on the teams playing in the tournament.
CBC: Discipline at forefront of Canada’s pre-world junior loss. On a positive note, the Jets Mark Scheielfe scored a goal in the loss.
TSN: Seth Jones feels USA is team to beat. You like to see confidence in a young gun who is taking the leadership reins of this team.
Sean Reynolds spends 10 minutes chatting about the Jets.
Over 27 minutes with the GM of the NHL club of Winnipeg.
Bryan Hayes and Craig Button join Gino Reda to discuss.
Recap of the game.
Some good Jets insight from the former bench boss.
Here's what to takeaway from the Jets' 6-3 win over the Rangers