Rookies Are Showing Veteran Presence

NHL rookies have traditionally served one purpose: buying dinner for their teammates.

But an impressive number are making an impact this season, suggesting they will be seen and heard for a long time.

“It’s nice to see young guys make an impact. It’s fresh air and fresh legs for the team,” said Michel Goulet, vice president of player personnel for Colorado. “Maybe with the salaries going up, teams are looking for more kids. And you’re going to have years where sometimes the draft is better than other years.”

Colorado has 1999 Calder winner Chris Drury and third-place finisher Milan Hejduk; this season, Avalanche goalie Marc Denis, left wing Alex Tanguay and defenseman Martin Skoula are Calder contenders. No team has had consecutive winners since 1966-67 and ‘67-68, when Boston’s Bobby Orr and Derek Sanderson won.

“Drury and Hejduk were really a force for us and they got better as the year went on,” Goulet said. “I don’t believe in the second-year jinx, and I think they will continue to get better. Skoula and Tanguay are the same type of guys. They’re smart players and will improve as they get more confidence.”

Colorado’s newcomers face formidable competition. Buffalo goalie Martin Biron, groomed as Dominik Hasek’s successor, has played well while Hasek recovers from a groin injury. John Grahame, son of former NHL goalie Ron Grahame, has been so effective, the Bruins kept three goalies after Byron Dafoe signed a new deal.

Center Scott Gomez, an Alaska native and the first NHL player of Latino heritage, leads the Devils in scoring with three goals and 18 points. Left wings Steve Kariya and Peter Schaefer have been catalysts in Vancouver’s early success and St. Louis center Jochen Hecht has earned a regular spot.

Defensemen are represented too. Frantisek Kaberle, 26, has made a smooth transition from Sweden to the Kings’ top four, and 26-year-old Brian Rafalski is a regular with the Devils after six years in Europe. San Jose’s Brad Stuart, 20, may be the best of the bunch, playing more than 21 minutes a game and contributing on offense.

“With expansion, teams have lost players who would have been their ninth through 12th forwards and fifth to seventh defensemen, and they’re giving that time to young players who can play,” King General Manager Dave Taylor said. “With salaries nowadays, teams are paying a lot of money to first-round picks and they’re good players, so they want to play them.”

Taylor praised Gomez as “very skilled, very good with the puck.” He also likes Kariya and Stuart. “Kariya’s not very big, maybe 5-6 and 160 pounds, but he does have quickness, even if he doesn’t have [older brother] Paul’s high speed,” Taylor said. “He’s creative and he works his tail off. The ones that are succeeding are the ones with good skills. [Stuart] has lots of tools. He’s an offensive-minded defenseman.”

No rookie will duplicate Teemu Selanne’s 76-goal, 132-point rookie season with Winnipeg in 1992-93, but the talent of this class bodes well for the future.

STATE OF THE UNION

The number of suspensions and games missed by perpetrators haven’t increased since last season, despite such rulings as the 10-game suspension to Mighty Duck defenseman Ruslan Salei. Colin Campbell, the NHL’s director of hockey operations, hopes that means the league has made a point.

“We like tough hockey, contact hockey. We like collisions, but we want fair collisions,” he said Monday. “I think the message is getting through about elbows and hitting from behind, but hopefully, the message is getting through about the hits that deserve suspensions.”

Campbell has heard the theory that illegal hits result from a lack of respect among players, but he said that’s no excuse:

“You see these teams not as often as in the past. In the six-team league, it was necessary to have respect because you’d see a team 13 times, and if you see a team once a year, it’s not the same. But it’s an easy thing to cop out. There are a lot of things involved, but I don’t think you can peg it to lack of respect.”

Scoring was up slightly in the first 243 games, from 5.27 goals a game to 5.43, but interference and obstruction-related fouls decreased from 382 to 227. Penalty minutes were down to 27.8 a game, from 37.4, and fighting majors were at 264, compared to 335 last season and 376 in 1997-98.

In addition, NHL spokesman Gary Meagher said the league is aware “there’s a problem” in understanding the regulation-tie category in the standings and will study how to clarify it. Under new rules, teams get a loss and a regulation tie if they lose in overtime, which can create confusion over how many games a team has played.

WORKING OVERTIME

The Calgary Flames opposed the switch to a four-on-four overtime format, but they have profited from it. All five of their victories have been recorded in overtime, and they also have two ties.

Winger Valeri Bure attributed the Flames’ overtime success to their fitness and style.

“We skate a lot and do a lot of skating drills, and when we get into overtime, I think we have a lot of juice left,” he said. “We have a really good skating team. Our club is really skilled and we’ve got a good mixture. [In] four on four, you’ve got to be able to skate really well because it’s open-ice hockey.”

MUCK AND MIRE

When the Rangers play the Bruins on Thursday at Boston, they might have a new coach.

John Muckler apparently saved his job when the Rangers won at Chicago on Nov. 7, but a 4-3 loss to Ottawa put him back on the hot seat. The Rangers rallied to beat Washington last Thursday, but a listless home loss to Boston on Saturday might have sealed Muckler’s fate and set up the promotion of John Paddock from their Hartford farm team.

The Rangers are 34-44-15 at Madison Square Garden since 1997-98, awful even in an era when home ice isn’t the advantage it once was. And it’s the home games the corporate suits attend and care about most.

The Rangers apparently don’t realize spending a lot isn’t the same as spending wisely. Winger Valeri Kamensky has been hampered by problems with the arm he broke last season, Theo Fleury has found the going tougher in the East, and defenseman Kevin Hatcher played himself out of the lineup. Petr Nedved lacks the character to be a first-line center and few of his teammates are self-starters.

Who’s in charge may not matter. The Rangers have some young talent, but Muckler hasn’t allowed it to develop. As a team, they lack the finesse to play a skill game or the tenacity to be scrappy. General Manager Neil Smith has been living off the team’s 1994 Stanley Cup triumph too long.

SLAP SHOTS

Calls for the dismissal of Canadien General Manager Rejean Houle continue, despite the team’s consecutive victories last week. Even in winning they lost. Center Saku Koivu, who missed five games because of a shoulder injury, re-injured it and is out again. A poll in the Montreal Gazette asked fans who they’d want as general manager and coach, and the winners were Glen Sather and Jacques Lemaire, respectively. Not much chance in either case.

Penguin Coach Kevin Constantine is also under fire, and unfairly. He has worked wonders with a team that lost Mario Lemieux, Ron Francis and Kevin Hatcher and has done without goalie Tom Barrasso for long stretches. It’s not his fault Martin Straka has one goal, German Titov has three or that the club’s financial woes led to the dumping of Hatcher’s salary. Constantine is in the last year of his contract, but General Manager Craig Patrick doesn’t give extensions in that situation.

After losing grinder Kirk Maltby for two months because of abdominal surgery, the Red Wings spent about $2.5 million to sign pesky winger Pat Verbeek. That’s short of the $3.2 million he earned last season with Dallas at the end of a three-year deal, but more in line with what he can do.

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The Top Rookies

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Player, Team Games Goals Ast Pts +/- *Time Scott Gomez, New Jersey 17 3 15 18 +5 15:02 Peter Schaefer, Van. 17 7 7 14 0 15:41 Jochen Hecht, St. Louis 17 3 9 12 +5 17:16 Michael York, NY Rangers 19 7 4 11 -6 16:14 Alex Tanguay, Colorado 17 5 6 11 +2 15:43 Steve Kariya, Vancouver 17 5 5 10 +4 13:46 Brad Stuart, San Jose 21 3 6 9 +1 21:17 Petr Buzek, Atlanta 13 4 5 9 -2 17:39 Brian Rafalski, N.J. 17 1 8 9 +3 19:19 David Legwand, Nashville 16 4 3 7 -1 14:47

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Goalies, Team Games Min. W-L-T GAA SV% John Grahame, Boston 8 488 3-3-2 1.72 .938 Martin Biron, Buffalo 8 425 6-2-0 2.54 .900 Marc Denis, Colorado 4 250 2-1-1 2.40 .933

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*Average ice time.

Note: Through Sunday