Kyle Dubas: Top pairing D-man TJ Brodie was on Toronto Maple Leafs' radar ‘for a long time’ - TSN | Canada News Media
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Kyle Dubas: Top pairing D-man TJ Brodie was on Toronto Maple Leafs' radar ‘for a long time’ – TSN

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TORONTO — The Maple Leafs landed a coveted right-side defenceman on the opening day of NHL free agency – and no, it wasn’t Alex Pietrangelo

Toronto instead landed TJ Brodie on a four-year, $20 million contract, effectively putting to rest what level of interest they had earlier in the day on landing free agency’s biggest prize.

“[We were] not very close [on Pietrangelo]. This has been our major focus,” Dubas told reporters on a Zoom call Friday night. “This is where we were locked in on, and we were set on going down this path and so it was one thing that we worked on from [the start] with [Brodie’s camp]. Though the market has a lot of players on it, there aren’t a lot of defencemen that are capable of playing in the top four that have the exact skill set that we need. So we felt we needed to act and so we’re excited to do so.”

It was just over a year ago, on the opening day of free agency in 2019, when the Leafs nearly had a deal in place with the Calgary Flames to trade for Brodie. That didn’t end up materializing, but the Leafs got their man eventually. 

In deciding on Toronto as a free agent, the 30-year-old Brodie is joining just the second club of his NHL career,  having played all of his 634-game career with the Flames while notching 48 goals and 266 points. 

Known as a dependable defensive defenceman, the left-shooting Brodie has played almost exclusively on the right side throughout his career, making him an ideal partner potentially for Morgan Rielly on Toronto’s top pairing.

“TJ has been on our radar for a long time,” Dubas said. “The thing that we’ve liked about him is he’s played with an elite partner in Mark Giordano for a number of years now, and they’ve had a lot of success as a pair. And as we’ve tried to find a partner for Morgan and/or Jake Muzzin now that could complement them and boost the results of our team, TJ and the style and way that he plays, and the way that he operates on the ice and his skill set defensively and with the puck, just always seemed to fit with what we were looking for.”

Dubas clarified as well the deal includes a partial no-move clause in the first year and a partial no-trade provision in the second, third and fourth seasons.

For Brodie, who grew up about three hours from Toronto in Chatham, Ont., the chance to play near his home, for a team that so obviously pursued him, was just too good to pass up.

“I’m pretty excited. It’s a great team, close to family,” Brodie said. “I’m excited to see what happens. Everyone knows about last year and the trade that was close and the fact that they wanted me [so much]. I feel like it’s a good mix and hopefully I fit in.”

While the trade last July didn’t go through, the seed of Toronto’s interest stuck around in Brodie’s head long term.

“Those situations, it’s part of the business where you don’t want to get traded [and] it didn’t happen last year, but to know going into this year that Toronto was interested last year and they were still interested this year, it definitely gives you a boost of confidence to sign,” he said.

Brodie even has a unique connection to the Leafs, dating back to his minor hockey days played throughout Ontario. Back in 2002, an 11-year-old Brodie was invited to participate in the Leafs’ team skills competition, and ended up nailing all the targets in his shooting contest. Mats Sundin and Darcy Tucker did the same. 

“I feel like that whole situation was sort of a dream,” Brodie now says of the competition. “It’s definitely cool to be that close to the players and guys that you see on TV at that age and now to have come sort of full circle it’s sort of surreal.”

While it’s not common for players to end up on their off-side for most of their careers, Brodie said moving to the right also came by design at a young age. 

“I started playing right side in junior, mainly because we had all left-handed defencemen,” said Brodie. “I realized if I could play both sides, it opens up more opportunities for you. If you’re more versatile, there’s more opportunity to play. I just tried to be as best I could at both sides.”

And if he now gets to parlay that into skating alongside Rielly, all the better. 

“He’s a great player. He’s similar to [Giordano]. He’s one of those guys who’s good at everything,” Brodie said. “He’s physical, he’s good defensively, offensively, and I just hope if I play with him that I make him better.”

Bringing Brodie in does put the Leafs about $1.093 million over the $81.5 million salary cap, and that’s before they’ve inked new deals for restricted free agents Travis Dermott and Ilya Mikheyev. NHL rules allow for teams to operate at 10 per cent above the cap until the regular season begins, so there’s time for Toronto to figure out its next step. 

There’s opportunity to first move a few players – namely Nick Robertson, Rasmus Sandin and Timothy Liljegren – to the minors, and free up about $300,000 in cap space. It would appear from there like the Leafs would almost certainly have to offload a contract or two via trade, but Dubas said that may not be the case, thanks to assistant general manager (and salary cap whiz) Brandon Pridham.

“You may look at it and say, ‘how are they going to do that?,’ Dubas admitted. “I can assure you that Brandon has carved out a number of ways that we can dance as it pertains to being compliant on opening day without having to necessarily move somebody that people would normally look at and say, ‘well they’re going to have to move this player at this salary.’ Brandon’s done all the work on that and we’ve gone through it, it feels like hundreds of times.”

As far as free agency goes, the Brodie signing is the last “big splash” the Leafs plan to make according to Dubas, unless the trade market suddenly opens up other opportunities for Toronto. But if Dubas is satisfied for now in how Friday played out, with the signing of hard-nosed winger Wayne Simmonds and then Brodie, Toronto is nowhere close to done tinkering. 

“I think we’re content with the work here today with Wayne and with TJ, but I still think that we have a long ways to go and to continue to address the roster,” Dubas said. “And not just the roster but what we do to continue to improve the way that we play and what we expect out of our guys so I think it’s a good start. I think we also know that we’ve got a long ways to go as an organization to meet the expectations that our talent dictates should be there.”​

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Washington Capitals 3-2 win ends Dallas Stars’ winning streak

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Tom Wilson, Dylan Strome and Taylor Raddysh scored to help the Washington Capitals end the Dallas Stars’ season-opening winning streak at four with a 3-2 victory Thursday night.

Wilson’s goal was his third in three games, Strome his second of the season and Raddysh his first since joining the team in free agency last summer. Charlie Lindgren made 22 saves as the Capitals wrapped up this early homestand with back-to-back wins.

The Stars fell from the ranks of the league’s unbeaten teams despite a short-handed goal by Colin Blackwell and one at even strength from Jason Robertson. Rookie Oskar Bäck set up Blackwell for his first NHL point.

Casey DeSmith was screened on two of the three goals he allowed on 26 shots.

LIGHTNING 4, GOLDEN KNIGHTS 3

TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — Nikita Kucherov scored the winning goal with less than a minute to play just 1:27 after Brandon Hagel had tied it and Tampa Bay rallied to beat Vegas.

Kucherov’s second goal of the game with 55 seconds left was his sixth of the season.

Janis Moser had a goal and two assists for the Lightning, who remain unbeaten. Andrei Vasilevskiy made 22 saves.

Brayden McNabb, Pavel Dorofeyev and Ivan Barbashev had goals for Vegas. Adin Hill turned aside 21 shots.

Jack Eichel, with two assists on Thursday, now has 10 points this season in five games and reached reached double-digit points faster than any other player in Vegas history. He is the 10th U.S.-born player to accomplish the feat.

After Barbashev put Vegas up 3-2 early in the second, Hagel pulled Tampa Bay even at 3 with 2:22 remaining in the third.

BLUE JACKETS 6, SABRES 4

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Kirill Marchenko and Mathieu Olivier each had a goal and an assist and Daniil Tarasov made 21 saves to help Columbus to a win over Buffalo.

Yegor Chinakhov, Adam Fantilli, Zachary Aston-Reese and Damon Severson also scored for Columbus, and Zach Werenski added two assists.

Ryan McLeod, Owen Power and JJ Peterka scored for Buffalo, and Jiri Kulich added his first NHL goal. Devon Lev stopped 19 shots for the Sabres (1-5-1), who have lost two straight road games and five of their first six overall.

CANUCKS 3, FLORIDA 2, OT

SUNRISE, Fla. (AP) — J.T. Miller scored 2:09 into overtime and Vancouver got their first win of the season, beating Florida.

Teddy Blueger and Quinn Hughes had goals for Vancouver, with Kevin Lankinen stopping 26 shots.

Anton Lundell got his fourth goal in the last three games for Florida and Jesper Boqvist also scored for the Panthers, who got 30 saves from Sergei Bobrovsky.

Florida remained without forwards Aleksander Barkov (lower body) and Matthew Tkachuk (illness).

DEVILS 3, SENATORS 1

OTTAWA, Ontario (AP) — Jacob Markstrom stopped 30 shots and lost his shutout bid in the final minutes as New Jersey beat Ottawa.

Erik Haula, Nathan Bastian and Paul Cotter scored for the Devils, who won for the third time in four games and improved to 5-2-0.

The Senators, who were coming off an 8-7 overtime victory against Los Angeles on Monday, struggled to beat Markstrom.

Brady Tkachuk was the only scorer for the Senators, beating Markstrom, with a power-play goal with 65 seconds remaining in the third period.

Anton Forsberg, making his second straight start and hoping to rebound after getting pulled Monday, made 32 saves in the loss.

Haula opened the scoring early in the second period and Bastian added a short-handed goal, giving New Jersey a 2-0 lead after 40 minutes. Cotter scored midway through the third.

RANGERS 5, RED WING 2

DETROIT (AP) — Artemi Panarin had his eighth career hat trick and New York rolled to a victory over Detroit.

Panarin became the first Rangers player to have multiple points in the first four games of a season. He scored twice on the power play. Vincent Trocheck also had a power- play goal and assisted on all of Panarin’s goals.

Jonathan Quick made 29 saves in his season debut. Victor Mancini also scored.

The Rangers have won the last five meetings, including twice this week. New York had a 4-1 home victory over Detroit on Monday night.

Moritz Seider and J.T. Compher scored for Detroit. Red Wings goalie Cam Talbot was pulled in the second period after allowing five goals.

KINGS 4, CANADIENS 1

MONTREAL (AP) — David Rittich made 26 saves a night after being benched in the second period in Toronto, helping road-weary Los Angeles snap a three-game losing streak with a victory over Montreal.

Los Angeles improved to 2-1-2 on a season-opening, seven-game trip necessitated by arena renovations.

Rittich rebounded after allowing four goals on 14 shots in a 6-2 loss to the Maple Leafs. Alex Laferriere, Mikey Anderson, Andreas Englund and Adrian Kempe scored.

Justin Barron scored for Montreal (2-3-0). Sam Montembeault stopped 28 shots. He made a save on Kevin Fiala on a penalty shot.

BLUES 1, ISLANDERS 0, OT

ST. LOUIS (AP) — Joel Hofer made 34 saves and assisted on Jake Neighbours’ goal at 2:04 of overtime in St. Louis victory over New York.

Hofer had his second career shutout in his and the team’s second overtime victory of the season.

Philip Broberg carried the puck into the New York zone and made a centering pass to Neighbours for the winner.

Islanders goalie Ilya Sorkin made 29 saves.

Blues defenseman Nick Leddy sat out because of a lower-body injury, the first game he has missed this season. Leddy played in all 82 games last season.

OILERS 4, PREDATORS 2

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Brett Kulak scored twice and Connor McDavid added his first goal of the season to lead Edmonton to a victory over reeling Nashville.

Jeff Skinner also scored and Calvin Pickard made 25 saves for the defending Western Conference champion Oilers, who have won consecutive games after beginning the season with a three-game skid.

Filip Forsberg and Jonathan Marchessault scored and Juuse Saros made 32 saves for Nashville (0-4).

Forsberg’s goal midway through the first period gave Nashville its first lead of the season. That lasted less than six minutes before Kulak tied it.

Kulak sealed it with an empty-netter in the final minute for the defenseman’s first career two-goal game.

BLACKHAWKS 4, SHARKS 2

CHICAGO (AP) — Tyler Bertuzzi and Nick Foligno each scored a power-play goal, and Chicago beat San Jose.

Taylor Hall and Jason Dickinson also scored for Chicago. Connor Bedard and Teuvo Teravainen each had two assists.

Hall, who missed most of last season because of right knee surgery, put the Blackhawks in front 4:20 into the first period. It was Hall’s first goal since Nov. 5 and No. 267 for his career.

Tyler Toffoli and Fabian Zetterlund scored for San Jose, which trailed 3-0 early in the second. William Eklund and Mikael Granlund had two assists each.

The Sharks dropped to 0-2-2 under Ryan Warsofsky, who was promoted to head coach in June.

Petr Mrazek had 20 saves for Chicago, and Vitek Vanecek made 23 stops for San Jose.

KRAKEN 6, FLYERS 4

SEATTLE (AP) — Eeli Tolvanen, Jordan Eberle, and Shane Wright scored three goals in less than three minutes in the second period and Seattle held off a Philadelphia rally in a victory.

Tolvanen’s goal broke a 2-2 tie at the 14:57 mark. Eberle made it a two-goal game with a goal at 17:44. Eight seconds later, Wright scored to give Seattle a three-goal lead.

Jared McCann tied the game at 2-2 with the first of Seattle’s four second-period goals.

Cam York and Jamie Drysdale scored to pull Philadelphia within 5-4 in the third period, but Oliver Bjorkstrand responded with a goal to push Seattle’s lead to two with just over five minutes left in the game.

Scott Laughton scored twice for the Flyers in the first period, while Brandon Montour scored one in for the Kraken.

Chandler Stephenson had an assist in his 500th NHL game. Seattle’s Philipp Grubauer had 21 saves.

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Canada’s Dabrowski, New Zealand’s Routliffe out of Japan Women’s Open after walkover

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OSAKA, Japan – Canada’s Gabriela Dabrowski and New Zealand’s Erin Routliffe are out of the Japan Women’s Open tennis tournament.

Spain’s Cristina Bucsa and Romania’s Monica Niculescu advanced to the final on Thursday by way of walkover.

The fourth seeds were supposed to play the top-seeded Dabrowski and Routliffe in the semifinals.

Bucsa and Niculescu will next face third-seeded Ena Shibahara of Japan and Laura Siegemund of Germany in the final.

Dabrowski and Routliffe defeated Japan’s Shuko Aoyama and Eri Hozumi in the quarterfinals 6-2, 6-4 on Wednesday to advance.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 17, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

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Mountain West commissioner says she’s heartbroken over turmoil surrounding San Jose State volleyball

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LAS VEGAS (AP) — Mountain West Conference Commissioner Gloria Nevarez said Thursday the forfeitures that volleyball teams are willing to take to avoid playing San Jose State is “not what we celebrate in college athletics” and that she is heartbroken over what has transpired this season surrounding the Spartans and their opponents.

Four teams have canceled games against San Jose State: Boise State, Southern Utah, Utah State and Wyoming, with none of the schools explicitly saying why they were forfeiting.

A group of Nevada players issued a statement saying they will not take the floor when the Wolf Pack are scheduled to host the Spartans on Oct. 26. They cited their “right to safety and fair competition,” though their school reaffirmed Thursday that the match is still planned and that state law bars forfeiture “for reasons related to gender identity or expression.”

All those schools, except Southern Utah, are in the Mountain West. New Mexico, also in the MWC, went ahead with its home match on Thursday night, which was won by the Spartans, 3-1, the team’s first victory since Sept. 24.

“It breaks my heart because they’re human beings, young people, student-athletes on both sides of this issue that are getting a lot of national negative attention,” Nevarez said in an interview with The Associated Press at Mountain West basketball media days. “It just doesn’t feel right to me.”

Republican governors of Idaho, Nevada, Utah and Wyoming have made public statements in support of the cancellations, citing a need for fairness in women’s sports. Former President Donald Trump, the GOP nominee in this year’s presidential race, this week referenced an unidentified volleyball match when he was asked during a Fox News town hall about transgender athletes in women’s sports.

“I saw the slam, it was a slam. I never saw a ball hit so hard, hit the girl in the head,” Trump replied before he was asked what can be done. “You just ban it. The president bans it. You just don’t let it happen.”

After Trump’s comment, San Diego State issued a statement that said “it has been incorrectly reported that an San Diego State University student-athlete was hit in the face with a volleyball during match play with San Jose State University. The ball bounced off the shoulder of the student-athlete, and the athlete was uninjured and did not miss a play.”

San Jose State has not made any direct comments about the politicians’ “fairness” references, and Nevarez did not go into details.

“I’m learning a lot about the issue,” Nevarez said. “I don’t know a lot of the language yet or the science or the understanding nationally of how this issue plays out. The external influences are so far on either side. We have an election year. It’s political, so, yeah, it feels like a no-win based on all the external pressure.”

The cancellations could mean some teams will not qualify for the conference tournament Nov. 27-30 in Las Vegas, where the top six schools are slated to compete for the league championship.

“The student-athlete (in question) meets the eligibility standard, so if a team does not play them, it’s a forfeit, meaning they take a loss,” Nevarez said.

Ahead of the Oct. 26 match in Reno. Nevada released a statement acknowledging that “a majority of the Wolf Pack women’s volleyball team” had decided to forfeit against San Jose State. The school said only the university can take that step but any player who decides not to play would face no punishment.

___

AP college sports:

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