General managers approve visors, hybrid icing
BOSTON — They may not be dramatic, but changes are coming to the NHL.
The league's general managers endorsed recommendations put forward by the NHL Competition Committee during a day-long meeting Wednesday in Boston.
The headline move will be the mandatory use of visors for all new players to the league starting next season. Hybrid icing will get an experimental debut in the 2013-14 pre-season, with both recommendations first needing to pass a vote by the NHL Board of Governors next week.
The visor rule would come into effect for all players who have less than 26 games in the league. Hybrid icing, meanwhile, would be voted on by the players after they experience it in pre-season.
"The players want to use it in an exhibition and see if they're agreeable to it," said Colin Campbell, the NHL's senior VP of hockey operations. "If they are, it'll be game on."
WINGS ON THE MOVE?
Detroit’s Downtown Development Authority has outlined a plan to construct a new $650-million events centre that would include a new arena to house the Detroit Red Wings.
The proposed 18,000-seat arena would sit somewhere near Comerica Park and Ford Field, the homes of the Detroit Tigers and Lions, NBC-affiliate Local 4 reported Wednesday.
Red Wings owner Mike Ilitch, who also owns the Tigers, has long mentioned his intention to move the Wings away from their current home, Joe Louis Arena.
“The Joe,” as it’s called, is the fourth-oldest active NHL arena after the New York Rangers’ Madison Square Garden, the New York Islanders’ Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum and the Edmonton Oilers’ Rexall Place.
The plan is still subject to approval by the county.
DAMPHOUSSE CLEARED
The Crown has dropped domestic-violence charges against former Montreal Canadiens captain Vincent Damphousse, but his ex-wife is still in trouble with the law.
The Crown plans to pursue its case against Allana Henderson for armed assault and theft under $5,000.
The estranged couple filed criminal charges against each other following a March 2011 altercation that resulted in six charges against Damphousse, 45.
Henderson, 42, is accused of committing assault with her vehicle and stealing a briefcase. She’s scheduled to stand trial in January 2015.
In a statement Tuesday, Damphousse said he’ll return to his job as a hockey analyst this fall.
Damphousse won the Stanley Cup in 1993 with the Montreal Canadiens and served as captain from 1996-99.
He also played for the Toronto Maple Leafs, Edmonton Oilers and San Jose Sharks between 1986 and 2004.
AVS PASSING ON JONES?
The Colorado Avalanche went public with their draft plans Wednesday.
Avalanche executive Joe Sakic said the team will most likely not choose Seth Jones, a potential franchise defenceman, according to the Denver Post.
"If we do pick first, we're leaning more toward one of those three forwards," Sakic said, adding the draft's elite forwards are "just too good to pass up” in the June 30 draft.
The Halifax Mooseheads' dominant duo of Nathan MacKinnon and Jonathan Drouin, along with Finn Alexander Barkov, are the three forwards he's referring to.
Almost all scouting services have ranked Jones as the No. 1 prospect available in New Jersey later this month. Most of those who haven't, however, have MacKinnon slotted in the top spot.
Jones, son of former NBAer and old Sakic chum Popeye Jones, also has strong ties to the city of Denver.
The elder Jones played 11 sea- sons in the NBA, including a stint as a member of the Denver Nuggets where he famously approached then-Avs captain Sakic about hockey, a sport he knew nothing about but his kid was fascinated with.
BRIEFLY
The NHL will likely move to ban spin-o-ramas in shootouts next season, according to TSN … The New York Rangers will hold a press conference on Friday at Radio City Music Hall to announce former Vancouver Canucks boss Alain Vigneault as their new head coach.