NHL halts Hurricanes at Wild due to COVID

ST. PAUL, Minn. — The Carolina Hurricanes became the latest NHL team hit by a coronavirus outbreak Tuesday as four more players were placed in the COVID-19 protocol, prompting the league to postpone their game at Minnesota.

The call came a little more than five hours before the scheduled start time in St. Paul, where several Hurricanes were lined up for testing in the arena hallways before their morning skate at Xcel Energy Center. The NHL did not immediately announce a rescheduled date.

The Hurricanes became the fourth NHL team this season to have games postponed due to a COVID-19 outbreak. Last month, Ottawa had three games postponed and the New York Islanders had two postponed.

Bishop confirms end of career:

Ben Bishop’s 2½-year saga with an ailing right knee is ending with the Dallas Stars goalie believing he did everything possible to get his career going again.

He is still not quite at peace with the fact that he couldn’t.

Bishop confirmed Tuesday what Stars general manager Jim Nill said three days earlier: The 35-year-old’s playing days are done because of a degenerative issue in the knee.

“I guess one of the hard things is, I get out there and I still feel pretty good in some of the practices and you still feel like you have the skill to play in this league,” said Bishop, whose last NHL game was in the 2020 playoff bubble in Canada 15 months ago. “But then when your knee tells you you can’t, it’s tough.”

It’s not officially a retirement because Bishop is. under contract through next season and will still be around the team.

Bishop was 222-128-36 with a 2.32 goals-against average and .921 save percentage in 413 games over 11 seasons with five NHL teams.

Wild GM to run U.S. team: Minnesota Wild general manager Bill Guerin was promoted to take over the men’s U.S. Olympic hockey team, two months after Stan Bowman’s resignation in the wake of the Chicago Blackhawks’ sexual assault scandal.