Many believed the hiring of Darryl Sutter would mark the beginning of the end for Johnny Gaudreau as a Calgary Flame.
On Saturday, the new coach added credence to that theory.
Or did he?
Hours before the 27-year-old Flames winger was slated to suit up for his 500th NHL game, Sutter was asked for a cursory quote on the struggling star’s milestone.
“If you’re just basing it on his 500th game tonight, hopefully he has more energy than in his 499th game,” said Sutter.
Next question.
In terms of background, it must be pointed out that Sutter has long used the media as a tool to take regular shots like that to try firing up players.
This one felt cheap though.
Unnecessary.
So much so the Flames omitted it when rebroadcasting the coach’s Zoom call on their website.
It wasn’t a good look.
But, pardon me for asking, did it work?
By night’s end, Gaudreau had his first assist (he had a second one taken away after the game) since Sutter joined the team ten games ago.
He drew a penalty, set linemate Brett Ritchie up for two great scoring chances and looked like his old, freewheeling self as the game progressed and the Flames broke a 2-2 tie to snap a four-game losing skid with a 4-2 win over the Winnipeg Jets.
While he would never come out and say the coach’s comment motivated him, he certainly admitted it caught his attention.
“Ya, I heard it — didn’t think much of it,” shrugged an unusually talkative Gaudreau, clearly proud of his game log.
“I’ve been playing hockey for 24, 25 years now, and I know when I haven’t played well and when I have played well. Personally, I’ve been going up and down throughout the season and obviously not finding the net sometimes. I try to work as hard as I can each night for the 23 guys in that locker room. I played for a long time with a lot of those guys in that locker room and I’m sure a lot of them are really happy for me after tonight. It was a special night. It was a great night to win, playing my 500th game.”
It’s no secret the struggles Gaudreau has had this season and last have been compounded by Sutter’s arrival.
The growing pains were inevitable given Sutter’s demand for defensive details and dreaded dump-ins.
He’s taken just as many hellacious hits (two, thanks to Neal Pionk and Justin Holl) as he has scored goals since Sutter was hired, albeit in three minutes less ice time nightly than Geoff Ward afforded him.
The coach has urged him to shoot it more, which has proven to be troublesome in a tighter defensive system the five-foot-nine, 165-pound winger has been uncomfortable adapting to.
He admitted as much last week while being a good soldier by adding that regardless of his obvious adjustment period, the coach’s word is gospel.
Give him credit, as a gifted playmaker who has accrued the bulk of his 472 points from the perimeter, he seems focused on trying to satisfy the coach in ways he hasn’t before.
“All coaches are different — whether you tell me personally or the way I heard it tonight, I take a lot out of my game,” said Gaudreau.
“I look at it and try to play as hard as I can each night. I’m an offensive guy and sometimes the numbers aren’t there and that looks bad on me. But I try to be smart defensively. I try to do the right things and I feel like I’ve been getting better at that throughout my years here. Tonight was a big win for us and that’s what I can take out of it.”
Where the relationship goes from here is anyone’s guess, as Sutter has a long track record of being unrelenting on his top players, forever insisting they need to give more.
How Gaudreau responds may play a role in his fate this summer.
But then, it might not.
When asked after the game about his pre-game suggestion Gaudreau lacked energy his last outing, Sutter doubled down.
“I didn’t suggest it – it was a fact,” said Sutter, who regularly lit similar fires under Jarome Iginla.
“He was much better tonight. His pace was better. Quite honestly it was his best game he’s played since I joined the team. He’s an elite-level player in this league, so he has to try to have his best game every game for us.”
Message received.
Response delivered.
Midway through the first period, Gaudreau earned stick taps from his teammates as the undersized fourth-round pick was saluted on the Jumbotron for a half-century of games that have him sitting tenth in NHL scoring since the Hobey Baker winner joined the Flames in 2014 with a goal on his very first shot.
His victim? Jacob Markstrom, for you trivia buffs.
He’s since had 30 game-winners, posted a 99-point season, won a Lady Byng and proved countless doubters wrong.
It certainly seemed he deserved better than to have his accomplishments brushed aside Saturday morning by a coach whose only focus was getting the most out of his marquee man.
Or was it exactly what he needed?
NOTES: Juuso Valimaki and Dillon Dube were made healthy scratches for Saturday’s game. “They’ve got to be better players. Okay’s not okay in this racket,” he said of the young duo. They were replaced by Brett Ritchie and Michael Stone. The Flames host Winnipeg Monday night.
GUADALAJARA, Mexico – Canada’s Marina Stakusic fell 6-4, 6-3 to Poland’s Magdalena Frech in the quarterfinals of the Guadalajara Open tennis tournament on Friday.
The 19-year-old from Mississauga, Ont., won 61 per cent of her first-serve points and broke on just one of her six opportunities.
Stakusic had upset top-seeded Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia 6-3, 5-7, 7-6 (0) on Thursday night to advance.
In the opening round, Stakusic defeated Slovakia’s Anna Karolína Schmiedlová 6-2, 6-4 on Tuesday.
The fifth-seeded Frech won 62 per cent of her first-serve points and converted on three of her nine break point opportunities.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
TORONTO – Alejandro Kirk’s long single with the bases loaded provided the Toronto Blue Jays with a walk-off 4-3 win in the 11th inning of their series opener against the St. Louis Cardinals on Friday.
With the Cardinals outfield in, Kirk drove a shot off the base of the left-field wall to give the Blue Jays (70-78) their fourth win in 11 outings and halt the Cardinals’ (74-73) two-game win streak before 30,380 at Rogers Centre.
Kirk enjoyed a two-hit, two-RBI outing.
Erik Swanson (2-2) pitched a perfect 11th inning for the win, while Cardinals reliever Ryan Fernandez (1-5) took the loss.
Blue Jays starter Kevin Gausman enjoyed a seven-inning, 104-pitch outing. He surrendered his two runs on nine hits and two walks and fanned only two Cardinals.
He gave way to reliever Genesis Cabrera, who gave up a one-out homer to Thomas Saggese, his first in 2024, that tied the game in the eighth.
The Cardinals started swiftly with four straight singles to open the game. But they exited the first inning with only two runs on an RBI single to centre from Nolan Arendao and a fielder’s choice from Saggese.
Gausman required 28 pitches to escape the first inning but settled down to allow his teammates to snatch the lead in the fourth.
He also deftly pitched out of threats from the visitors in the fifth, sixth and seventh thanks to some solid defence, including Will Wagner’s diving stop, which led to a double play to end the fifth inning.
George Springer led off with a walk and stole second base. He advanced to third on Nathan Lukes’s single and scored when Vladimir Guerrero Jr. knocked in his 95th run with a double off the left-field wall.
Lukes scored on a sacrifice fly to left field from Spencer Horwitz. Guerrero touched home on Kirk’s two-out single to right.
In the ninth, Guerrero made a critical diving catch on an Arenado grounder to throw out the Cardinals’ infielder, with reliever Tommy Nance covering first. The defensive gem ended the inning with a runner on second base.
St. Louis starter Erick Fedde faced the minimum night batters in the first three innings thanks to a pair of double plays. He lasted five innings, giving up three runs on six hits and a walk with three strikeouts.
ON DECK
Toronto ace Jose Berrios (15-9) will start the second of the three-game series on Saturday. He has a six-game win streak.
The Cardinals will counter with righty Kyle Gibson (8-6).
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
CALGARY – Mired in their first four-game losing skid in 20 years, the Calgary Stampeders are going back to Jake Maier at quarterback on Saturday after he was benched for a game.
It won’t be an easy assignment.
Visiting McMahon Stadium are the Eastern Conference-leading Montreal Alouettes (10-2) who own the CFL’s best record. The Stampeders (4-8) have fallen to last in the Western Conference.
“Six games is plenty of time, but also it is just six games,” said Maier. “We’ve got to be able to get on the right track.”
Calgary is in danger of missing the playoffs for the first time since 2004.
“I do still believe in this team,” said Stampeders’ head coach and general manager Dave Dickenson. “I want to see improvement, though. I want to see guys on a weekly basis elevating their game, and we haven’t been doing that.”
Maier is one of the guys under the microscope. Two weeks ago, the second-year starter threw four interceptions in a 35-20 home loss to the Edmonton Elks.
After his replacement, rookie Logan Bonner, threw five picks in last week’s 37-16 loss to the Elks in Edmonton, the football is back in Maier’s hands.
“Any time you fail or something doesn’t go your way in life, does it stink in the moment? Yeah. But then the days go on and you learn things about yourself and you learn how to prepare a little bit better,” said Maier. “It makes you mentally tougher.”
Dickenson wants to see his quarterback making better decisions with the football.
“Things are going to happen, interceptions will happen, but try to take calculated risks, rather than just putting the ball up there and hoping that we catch it,” said Dickenson.
A former quarterback himself, he knows the importance of that vital position.
“You cannot win without good quarterback play,” Dickenson said. “You’ve got to be able to make some plays — off-schedule plays, move-around plays, plays that break down, plays that aren’t designed perfectly, but somehow you found the right guy, and then those big throws where you’re taking that hit.”
But it’s going to take a team effort, and that includes the club’s receiving corp.
“We always have to band together because we need everything to go right for our receivers to get the ball,” said Nik Lewis, the Stampeders’ receivers coach. “The running back has to pick up the blitz, the o-line has to block, the quarterback has to make the right reads, and then give us a catchable ball.”
Lewis brings a unique perspective to this season’s frustrations as he was a 22-year-old rookie in Calgary in 2004 when the Stamps went 4-14 under coach Matt Dunigan. They turned it around the next season and haven’t missed the playoffs since.”
“Thinking back and just looking at it, there’s just got to be an ultimate belief that you can get it done. Look at Montreal, they were 6-7 last year and they’ve gone 18-2 since then,” said Lewis.
Montreal is also looking to rebound from a 37-23 loss to the B.C. Lions last week. But for head coach Jason Maas, he says his team’s mindset doesn’t change, regardless of what happened the previous week.
“Last year when we went through a four-game losing streak, you couldn’t tell if we were on a four-game winning streak or a four-game losing streak by the way the guys were in the building, the way we prepared, the type of work ethic we have,” said Maas. “All our standards are set, so that’s all we focus on.”
While they may have already clinched a playoff spot, Alouettes’ quarterback Cody Fajardo says this closing stretch remains critical because they want to finish the season strong, just like last year when they won their final five regular-season games before ultimately winning the Grey Cup.
“It doesn’t matter about what you do at the beginning of the year,” said Fajardo. “All that matters is how you end the year and how well you’re playing going into the playoffs so that’s what these games are about.”
The Alouettes’ are kicking off a three-game road stretch, one Fajardo looks forward to.
“You understand what kind of team you have when you play on the road because it’s us versus the world mentality and you can feel everybody against you,” said Fajardo. “Plus, I always tend to find more joy in silencing thousands of people than bringing thousands of people to their feet.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
