Blake Kessel Named Alternate Captain At UNH For 2011-12

New York Islander Fan Central | 4/20/2011 12:59:00 AM | | |


THNonline.com: Report Islander prospect Blake Kessel was named an alternate captain in 2011-12 for the University of New Hampshire as he enters his junior season.

Mississauga.com: Islander prospect Casey Cizikas comments on his upcoming series while Kirill Kabanov has had a great playoff for Lewiston here.

NYIFC Comments:
Some will recall Kessel was considering an offer recently to turn professional and sign with the Islanders. He can still turn professional and sign but this likely means he has decided to remain in school or this would not be announced.

Oshawa was eliminated from playoff contention. Calvin deHaan is signed, Tony Dehart has to be signed by next summer, however he is older and has seen a brief AHL stint before he was drafted.
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Misc:
Thrilled Grabner got past some writers vendetta's and will be a Calder finalist, my honest viewpoint is Jeff Skinner was the best rookie over six months and Grabner's assist total will hurt vs a player who is a more complete player at a younger age.

Sure Michael Grabner can win, he's dynamic and shows speed like no player in NHL and produced with a center/right wing that barely scored at even strength, what he did was amazing and few games he did not produce great chances in the second half.

I do believe Grabner will be a close second based on assist and the six month body of work and that's no knock on Grabner, who if he puts together six months like this next season will be MVP favorite and be over fifty goals.

Of course I'm hoping Grabner wins.
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Most entertaining thing about new Comcast-Versus-NBC contract will be watching Flyers owner Ed Snider (Comcast) vs Dick Ebersol (NBC-Cablevision/Msg past ties) in a battle of massive ego's where Comcast has final say of how much the Flyers will be packaged and sold as America's NHL team. This was how they already were part of an outdoor game in Boston despite being mediocre overall. Ebersol's need to take over everything (Google Jay Leno vs Conan O'Brien) to get a good idea of what he is about and NYIFC archives has plenty on Ebersol and his past Msg connections.

Comcast and Ebersol are already fighting over next Olympics which is prime Ebersol territory. Snider is now Ebersol's boss with Sam Flood marching to beat of both.

Prediction-Ebersol will be gone sooner than later.

Of course Ed Snider/Flyers/Comcast/NBC merger money is paying the league this two billion which few will note.

Aside from that, it's an incredible financial victory NHL/Bettman and the league owners who no one would pay a few years ago to put on national television and took the risk to dump Espn who treated hockey like Msg hides Islanders/Devils. It will benefit the New York Islanders who will make more revenue off of it.

In term of on-air coverage, Ebersol will not permit Msg local competition to appear on NBC, he would not allow a Devils playoff game on a few years ago. For that to happen Snider's Flyers have to be involved.

National ratings for NY hockey have been horrible regular season and playoffs, among the worst of all markets because of baseball's enormous draw year-round. The media does not need hockey beyond Dolan's newspaper and Knick ad revenue.

Bottom line if you want to hurt another teams ratings, don't watch their games and give them a double or triple rating.

Why do you think hockey playoffs go to Msg+ and Knicks regular season is on Msg? If Islanders/Devils were still playing it would well hidden Msg2+2.
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I'm putting this out there not because of media spin out of Canada, but the way the NHL Board of Governors does things when a league is in the rare horrible circumstance of running a franchise. If the Coyotes do not have a viable owner and financing by the point a new schedule is announced they will be moving by next season.

No chance the NHL is going to run/carry/operate/finance a franchise for a second straight season. No chance the City of Glendale is going to pay the NHL another 25m guarantee to offset losses for another year while league looks for owners again.

I feel terrible for their fans and the spin coming out of Canada to take away their franchise which literally drives away people from going to games and no doubt hurts the club in these playoffs. The Arizona Republic cannot outwork Canadian media or their perception machine.

All the talk/articles/spin aside. A approved sale has to happen now before league sits down to create a schedule or the clock runs out in Glendale.



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