Island hockey, NHL 12 Be a GM

[Dynasty]

Press conference with GM Garth Snow

Hello and welcome everyone, thank you for gathering. As most of you know it has been a rough time here both on and off the ice, we have not only struggled to put up wins and points and ultimately reach the playoffs, but we have also failed to generate revenue for our club, add to that searching for enough interest here to build a new arena.

Last season, though we started coming around in the last quarter, was again a loosing year in which we posted 73 points. I have to stress that I believe in the club, and the system we have in place here in New York, we have many great players here and I think our fans know that.

It's time that we bring that greatness onto the ice and mould it into points, there are things that can not be helped in the NHL, don’t get me wrong. Injuries have played a large part here and as we begin a new season on Long Island we are hoping the injuries will be left behind and we can focus on the long season.

As I said we believe in the system in place, as such we will be moving ahead with the staff and players we have on hand here, as the season unfolds we will make the decisions that need to be made that will include player movement, or the lack there of.

Moving forward into the 11/12 season we will continue to lean on Tavares to continue his growth into a premiere NHL talent, and our Captain, a healthy Mark Streit, supported by young guys like Grabner and Okposo, Moulson and Parenteau.

Like I said earlier we will stand pat with what we have here for now, but that doesn’t mean that I will remain idle at my desk and let fate have its way with us, I plan to be addressing the current performance of our players on both the NHL and AHL levels while assessing league interest in our assets and potential player availability.

I believe that there are areas that we can strengthen here and areas that do need some attention.

As such yesterday we sought out free agent Evgeny Artyukhin and signed him to a three year two way deal worth .850M per season. We believe Evgeny is a perfect fit here to add grit and toughness to our club who we felt at times was getting push around on the ice.

For more info on the season opening game with the Florida Panthers I hand you over to head coach Jack Capuano.

Capuano

What I want most of all from our guys on the ice is to build themselves an identity out there, I want them to get out on that sheet and work hard every shift and earn their spots, earn their ice time I don’t think we can succeed as a group until that happens.

I have been asked a lot about Niederreiter and where he will play, after posting no points and a -2 rating in the pre season I think it's best for Nino to head back to junior at this point and continue to develop there.

There is no question that we are excited about having a guy like Nino, he just isn't ready for the NHL yet, so with Nino heading down that left an open hole in our lines and we felt that Artyukhin was the best solution available for filling that hole.

He's a big body guy that isn’t afraid to get into the dirty areas and also has the ability to score a key goal.

Here is the line up that will face the Panthers tomorrow:

Line one
Kyle Okposo John Tavares Michael Grabner

Line two
Matt Moulson Josh Bailey P.A Parenteau

Line Three
Jay Pandolfo Frans Nielsen Brian Rolston

Line Four
Trevor Gillies Marty Reasoner Evgeny Artyukhin

Defense one
Travis Hamonic Mark Streit

Defense two
Mark Eaton Andrew Macdonald

Defense three
Steve Staios Milan Jurcina

Starting goalie
Evgeni Nabokov

Rick Dipietro

I really think, like MR. Snow has said that we have what it takes in our organization right now, there are a few areas that need improvement but what we have right here, right now can make a good hard run at the playoffs and it all begins tomorrow night.

Key Player Progression
C John Tavares 21 years old 87 overall B/B/B potential
D Mark Streit 33 years old 87 overall C/C/C potential
RW Michael Grabner 23 years old 83 overall B-/B-/B- potential
RW Kyle Okposo 23 years old 83 overall B-/B-/B- potential
D Calvin De-Haan 20 years old 74 overall B/B/B potential
LW Nino Niederreiter 19 years old 72 overall A-/B-/B- potential
C Ryan Strome 18 years old 70 overall B/B-/B potential
LW Kirill Kabanov 19 years old 69 overall B/B/B potential

***Note: Management wants 38 wins this year and depending on injuries I think I can do it.

Obviously i'm playing on PS3, I am using Tazers sliders as a base set then tweaking form there, updated rosters GM firing is off and i’m on the hard GM setting. I will make trades as I need to, to improve the club but that wont be for a while yet as I have to get a good feel what the team needs, pretty obvious that its defense and goaltending but we shall see how it goes. Hope you all enjoy***

[Tazer19]

Good luck! Here's to a nice long dynasty, dynasty.

[Dynasty]

Ten game update: Creating a buzz on the island

Team record: 5-2-3 / 16th in NHL / 8th in East


Bailey, Moulson and Parenteau hook up for a goal

The Islanders have come charging out of the gate (as far as the Islanders are concerned) and have claimed 13 out of a possible 20 points and only suffering two regulation losses in the first ten games.

Islanders GM Garth Snow has been away from the club during this stretch on buisness (scouting) it is reported that Snow has been spending time in Chicago, Nashville, Calgary, Detroit, Dallas and Columbus.

While Snow has not given any hints to what he is up to, the end result is his activities plus the Islanders favourable start to the seaosn has created a buzz around long Island.


Moulson, Tavares and Grabner combine for a goal

Coach Capuano on the opening ten
Yeah it's been great so far, our top guys have been our best players and everyone has really adopted the team philosophy that I have been preaching.

We win as a team we loose as a team, its great when you got guys like Tavares and Grabner who will block a shot if they can get in front of it, all because they believe in their team and themselves.

Our goalies are doing a good job of keeping us in games and our top six is putting up the points needed to win, as it stands we are going to move forward with the current set up we have.

The things we need to work on are initial passes and clean passing, we have struggled with passing percentage so far and were going to spend some time with our centres the next few practices and work on face-offs, which is another stat we are failing in.

It's been a really good start for us here and were going to try and keep that ball rolling into the next ten games, we all know that in today’s league you can loose a season at the start of it if your not playing good hockey, so far we have given ourselves a chance, and that's all I ask of our guys.


Okposo, Grabner and Tavares open up space to get a goal

New York Islanders Stats - 2011
Skaters	GP	G	A	PTS	+/-	GW	PIM	SOG	SPCT
Michael Grabner	10	6	5	11	10	1	0	35	17.1%
Kyle Okposo	10	5	6	11	8	1	2	28	17.9%
P.A Parenteau	10	4	5	9	-1	2	2	24	16.7%
John Tavares	10	3	6	9	11	1	2	34	8.8%
Josh Bailey	10	1	7	8	0	0	4	13	7.7%
Matt Moulson	10	5	3	8	0	0	0	36	13.9%
Mark Streit	10	2	3	5	5	0	4	16	12.5%
Marty Reasoner	10	1	3	4	-2	0	7	10	10%
Travis Hamonic	10	2	2	4	7	0	2	8	25%
Andrew Macdonald	10	0	3	3	-3	0	0	6	0%
Frans Nielsen	10	1	2	3	-3	0	2	12	8.3%
Brian Rolston	10	1	2	3	-2	0	4	31	3.2%
Steve Staios	10	0	2	2	4	0	0	4	0%
Evgeny Artyukhin	10	2	0	2	-2	0	12	15	13.3%
Milan Jurcina	10	0	2	2	1	0	2	9	0%
Trevor Gillies	10	0	1	1	3	0	14	11	0%
Mark Eaton	9	0	0	0	-4	0	0	3	0%
Goalies	GP	W	L	T	GAA	TOI	SV	SV%	SHO
Evgeni Nabokov	8	4	4	0	2.58	489	228	.916%	0
Rick Dipietro	2	1	1	0	2.44	122	49	.924%	0

Things have been going well so far, my top two lines have pulled together really well and play as a team; we play an opportunistic style that relies on defense first. We take that the opposition gives us and capitalize when we can.

In particular line one relies on speed and skill, line two is more hard work and shooting ability, line three is well... not much to talk about and line four the only player I want to actually keep is Artyukhin.

Hamonic and Streit have been a really strong pairing, Jurcina has been my physical force but beyond them its garbage, Streit is the only guy that can be relied upon to make a clean pass or shot, and skating ability is just pathetic, constantly get beat to pucks. I have to play them team as a 5 man defensive unit because of the lack of quality skating and passing from my D (minus Streit of course)


Okposo finds Tavares for a goal

NHL League Leaders - Updated: Oct 5, 2011
Goals		G	Assists		A
	1. Patrick Kane	12		1. Martin St. Louis	16
	2. Steven Stamkos	9		2. Olli Jokinen	16
	3. Derek Roy	9		3. Dave Bolland	13
	4. Ryan Malone	9		4. Duncan Keith	12
	5. Jakub Voracek	9		5. Mike Ribeiro	12
Points		PTS	Penalty Minutes		PIMS
	1. Olli Jokinen	20		1. Chris Neil	56
	2. Steven Stamkos	20		2. John Scott	45
	3. David Bolland	19		3. Matt Carkner	42
	4. Jarome Iginla	18		4. Jared Boll	42
	5. Martin St. Louis	17		5. Zenon Konopka	40
Wins		W	Goals against average (5+ GP)		GAA
	1. Corey Crawford	11		1. Corey Crawford	1.40
	2. Antti Niemi	8		2. Antti Niemi	1.62
	3. Ilya Bryzgalov	7		3. Ryan Miller	1.68
	4. Henrik Lundqvist	7		4. Pekka Rinne	1.69
	5. James Reimer	7		5. Jimmy Howard	1.79
Save Percentage (5+ GP)		SV%	Shutouts		SO
	1. Corey Crawford	.948%		1. Corey Crawford	2
	2. Antti Neimi	.947%		2. Antti Niemi	2
	3. Cam Ward	.943%		3. Ryan Miller	2
	4. Ryan Miller	.943%		4. Jimmy Howard	2
	5. Nikolai Khabibulin	.942%		5. Henrik Karlsson	1

Not hard to tell what team is leading the league with those stats. I generally like how the team is playing up to this point, were doing well as far as the Islanders are concerned, I need to improve our defense and depth scoring if I really want to make noise this season.

[johnnyrocks]

Tavares is a great player! Sweetness, and I can bet 100% you'll pick Yakupov the next draft, so lol!

[Dynasty]

Islanders GM Garth Snow announced earlier today that goaltender Al Montoya was claimed off waivers by the New Jersey Devils earlier today. Montoya was being sent down to Bridgeport as the goaltending on the Islanders has been strong this season.

Montoya (HYB) 26 years old 1.21M 1 year remaining on his contract 77 overall B-/B-/B- potential

Snow also said that Montoya was a great player and a guy who had helped the Islanders through many struggles, he had intended on keeping Montoya on the NHL level this season but needed a roster spot for their most recent free agent signing.

The Islanders have signed D Bryan McCabe (OFD) 36 years old 2.7M 1 year deal 83 overall C-/C-/C- potential

Snow said that he really felt that the Islanders defense needed another guy who could move the puck up to their speedy forwards faster, and adding McCabe also supplies them with a heavy shot from the point, something that has been also lacking all season.

The Islanders employed Rolston at the point on the second power play unit to add that element, and McCabe will join him there at least to begin his tenure here on the Island.

McCabe offered only a coy smile when being asked how he felt about possibly finishing his career with the club that brought him into the league (Islanders drafted McCabe in the second round 40th overall in 1993) and went on to say that he was glad he would be able to help any team contribute in the league and was excited to get on the ice.

This definitely should help the Islanders in all aspects of one ice play, McCabe plays a good enough all around game to boost the Islanders even further, sporting a 6-3-3 record at the time of this signing, it isn’t like the Islanders were in trouble, or under producing but GM Snow obviously felt having McCabe was better then not having him.

With McCabe coming in, Veteran Steve Staios has been named a healthy scratch the 38 year old Staios has 2 assists in 12 games and a +4 rating.

[Dynasty]

Quote: Originally Posted by johnnyrocks

Tavares is a great player! Sweetness, and I can bet 100% you'll pick Yakupov the next draft, so lol!

Yes I have been really happy with his play, he has been more of a play maker so far for me, but he has the raw ability to do it all, the goals he has scored have all been important goals and very well placed.

Quote: Originally Posted by Tazer19

Good luck! Here's to a nice long dynasty, dynasty.

I see what you did thar.


As always guys I appreciate you following and commenting.

[bthomp05]

Excellent star Dynasty, to bad you lost Montoya... What the hell, McCabe.....

[Tazer19]

Quote: Originally Posted by bthomp05

Excellent star Dynasty, to bad you lost Montoya... What the hell, McCabe.....