Domi Team Canada won the Gold medal last night at the World Junior Tournament and Coyotes prospect Max Domi was named the tournament's top forward, finishing the seven games with five goals and five assists.
Nothing could be better for the Coyotes than to see their top prospect excel on the world stage. The Coyotes picked Domi 12th overall and while that has made some people skeptical of his high-end potential, the fact is he never falls that low if he doesn't suffer from diabetes. Many scouts and teams were scared off by that because it can lead to fatigue and can be difficult for an athlete to manage during games.
Domi, however, has supposedly met and spoken with Bobby Clarke - who also played with diabetes - and it is not considered an issue at this time.
While I was extremely critical of the Coyotes for not bringing him to the NHL this season, it can't be a bad thing to keep him from the constant losing or to have him dominating the OHL, where he currently has 58 points in 27 games. He is averaging over two points per game and would be just behind Connor McDavid for the league lead had they both not missed a bunch of games.
I cannot wait to see Domi in Arizona next year. Who knows, maybe he'll be lining up with McDavid?
--- Doan There are rumours that Shane Doan has asked for a trade. These rumours are unsubstantiated, but I thought I'd point it out that they are out there.
Thanks to friend-of-the-blog Leftcoaster for the tip.
Source within #Coyotes organization saying Shane Doan demanded trade in late November over displeasure with team's on ice performance #NHL
— Arizona Sports Hub (@SportsHubAZ) January 6, 2015I have always thought Arizona Sports Hub was a decent follow, but I don't know ANYTHING about how good his sources are or where he got this information.
He goes on after this tweet to suggest that Doan was "humiliated" by not being granted his request and frankly, without any other people saying this stuff, it does seem a bit dubious to me since Doan told AZ Central that a trade "hasn't crossed my mind yet," in an article dated December 17th. I therefore take it with a grain of salt and await further information to come out. I thought it was worth knowing about, anyways.
Update: Getting lots of tweets telling me that I am right to be skeptical of this rumour. My initial analysis of it as "dubious" stands, although I stand-by posting it since it's out there and it's something to talk about. The bottom line is that we are going to be talking a lot about Doan in the next few weeks anyways so it should be interesting to see how it all shakes down.
I would hate to see Doan traded, but its one of those things where romanticism is only going to hold you back - moving him would get you at least something to add to the rebuild and that is obviously the direction this team is headed.
If Doan requested a trade, or if he requests one, then I think the team owes it to him to do whatever he wants.
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Tonight's game is against the Blues, at home. The Blues are coming off a beat-down of the Sharks that ended the slump they were mired in.
The Coyotes, kicked off the new year with a win last Saturday against the Jackets, after being destroyed 6-0 New Year's Eve against the Stars.
It will be interesting to see which version of the Coyotes shows up tonight, as lately there doesn't seem to be any in-between: just really good, or abjectly horrible.
Smith was in net for the win and gets the start tonight.