AJC > Sports > Thrashers > Blog > Archives > 2007 > October > 22
Monday, October 22, 2007
Toronto should be interesting
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Now we know the extent of Kari Lehtonen’s injury (4-6 weeks), and Bobby Holik summed it up best: “We can’t sit around and wait for him.”
Johan Hedberg will take over for the time being, with Ondrej Pavelec waiting in the wings. Ideally, the team would like to see Hedberg get hot and not need to turn to the rookie, but Pavelec will play during this road stretch - it’s too much of a grind for one guy.
But there’s more. All indications point to a complete restructuring of the lines for Tuesday’s game against the Maple Leafs. It looks like Slava Kozlov and Marian Hossa will be split up, for really the first time since I’ve been on the beat. Look for Hossa to play in Haydar’s spot on the kid line. So it’s not really the kid line anymore. I kind of feel for Haydar, since he’s been playing pretty well with Little and Sterling, but at 1-7 you can’t keep rolling out the same lines. If the Kozlov, Hossa and Perrin line is blown up, look for Perrin to land in Slater’s spot on the Kovalchuk/White line. That bumps Kozzie down to the third line with Holik and Dupuis.
We’ll see how they look at the morning skate in Toronto, but that gives us something to talk about today anyways, right?
Don Waddell still hasn’t contacted any candidates about the coaching opening, but he’s sharpening his list. He spent a lot of Sunday reaching out to his contacts around the league to get a feel of what people thought of the guys he’s looking at. While Don is refining his short list, I’m in elimination mode. While I was in Tampa, I found out Mike Sullivan’s contract won’t allow him to leave during the season, so that eliminates one guy who I thought might be a good fit. I had also mentally eliminated Pat Burns because of his health issues, but now reports are surfacing that he’s interested in getting back into coaching. I think Wolves coach John Anderson will get a fair shake for this job, which is really all he wants. He’s definitely interested. And just because Waddell is behind the bench, don’t cross Brad McCrimmon off your list. Everything with Hartley happened so fast, I think Don wanted to get a first-hand look at what was going on. McCrimmon ran practice today since Waddell obviously has a lot going on.
Other than Lehtonen, this team is pretty healthy. They face a Toronto team in nearly as much turmoil as the Thrashers. There’s a goalie rotation, when there probably shouldn’t be. Fans are already calling for the head of GM John Ferguson. And I wonder when the heat will start to build on head coach Paul Maurice, if it hasn’t already. It should be an interesting trip.
