Blues fire coach, hire Rivermen coach

[Big Mike]

I didn't see this coming......Rick Wamsley goes from goaltending coach to Rivermen Head Coach!

http://www.pjstar.com/sports/x1793469280/Rivermen-head-coach-Payne-takes-over-in-St-Louis

http://www.stltoday.com/blogzone/morning-skate/uncategorized/2010/01/blues-fire-andy-murray-name-davis-payne-interim-head-coach/

[Da Coach]

Rather surprising to see the Blues pull a coaching change now with slightly more than half the season remaining. I didn't think the Blues had the talent to compete this year anyway, especially in one of the best divisions in the NHL, but apparently the management thinks they should be. The Western Conference is loaded with so many good teams that even the Detroit Red Wings, as good as they are, right now are sitting in 10th place and out of the playoffs if they started now. The Blues are 17-17-6 and in the 12th spot. What's surprising is how well they play on the road and how poorly they are at home. They are 11-4-3 on the road (2nd best winning % in the NHL), but just 6-13-3 at home (worst winning % by far in the NHL).

New coach Davis Payne's first game is tonight, and it won't be an easy one. They host the best team in the NHL, the Chicago Blackhawks, tonight at the Scottrade Center.

[KillerB]

As an avid Blues fan I am not suprised at all. Although I like Murray, he is considered very tough on young players. Had the home and road records been reversed you might have saved his job. But the team has gone from one of the best on the PP last year to one of the worst this year. And Murray seemed to put the blame on the young guys, not the under performing veterans. This also may be a move to shake things up as much as anything else.

Rick Wamsley makes a lot of sense to me to coach the Rivermen. The Blues like him and I am sure they hope he can speed the development of Ben Bishop.

By the way, if you are a hockey fan, you need to watch some of the moves David Perron has. He his fantasic skating with the puck.

[Chico]

As an avid Blues fan I am not suprised at all. Although I like Murray, he is considered very tough on young players. Had the home and road records been reversed you might have saved his job. But the team has gone from one of the best on the PP last year to one of the worst this year. And Murray seemed to put the blame on the young guys, not the under performing veterans. This also may be a move to shake things up as much as anything else.

Rick Wamsley makes a lot of sense to me to coach the Rivermen. The Blues like him and I am sure they hope he can speed the development of Ben Bishop.

By the way, if you are a hockey fan, you need to watch some of the moves David Perron has. He his fantasic skating with the puck.

But the important thing is, how many penalty minutes does he have.

[Big Mike]

Blues lose to Blackhawks 6-3 under new coach Davis Payne.

[BradleyJD]

Blues lose to Blackhawks 6-3 under new coach Davis Payne.

awful effort by the blues tonight

[bugregshu]

awful effort by the blues tonight

Or the Blackhawks are just that good

[DUBrave5]

Or the Blackhawks are just that good

I just got back from the game and I think it could be both. The Blackhawks are just flat out good, but the Blues had a ton of opportunities and couldn't cash in.

But the team has gone from one of the best on the PP last year to one of the worst this year.

Which brings me to why I quoted this. The Blues had a 7 minute power play in the 1st and a 3 minute power play in the 3rd, along with a bunch of other regular 2 minute power plays throughout the game but never took advantage the way they could have. If this team can start scoring some more, they could be dangerous in the future.

I gotta give a lot of credit to the Blackhawks though because I am not sure how many teams could keep up with them. I caught myself thinking in the first period, when the scoring seem to come early and often, that if the game turned into a high scoring affair, I gotta give the advantage to the Blackhawks because they just have so many threats. Look at Kopecky who had 1 goal coming into the game and then he knocks in the first two.

The Hawks are a lot of fun to watch and honestly it could be an extremely interesting end to the season if they keep playing that way.

[Da Coach]

I was thinking of going down to see this game in person, but I stayed home and watched it on TV.
I will stick with my opinion that the Blues have no better than the 4th best talent in the Central Division. And their goaltending with a couple of 33 year old, average NHL goalies, isn't as strong as the other teams in the upper half of the Western Conference.
I though Andy Murray did a tremendous job last year to get the Blues into the playoffs after their terrible record in the first half of last season. They were 16-22-3 in the first half, and an NHL best 25-9-7 in the second half. And they hadn't been to the playoffs for 3 years before last year.
He even got some consideration for Coach of the Year. But now he is fired a half year later. I really doubt Murray was the problem, but when you can't win at home, and the fans get angry, the team has to change something. It remains a mystery why they play so well on the road (Conference best 11-4-3) and so poorly at home (NHL worst 6-14-3).

The only problem I had last night with the Blues under new coach Davis Payne, is that the message apparently was to play tougher, take cheap shots at the Blackhawks, and try to give the fans some entertainment by getting into fights, even if you can't beat the other team. The Hawks skated circles around the slower and less skilled Blues all night, and the outcome was never in doubt.

Hawks get down and dirty against Blues

Enforcing the issue: Blackhawks don't back down vs. Blues

This writer goes even a little farther than I would in ripping the Blues for their thuggish tactics last night-
....my biggest issue with Gary Bettman's NHL is the inconsistencies between the way the game is marketed and the lack of integrity his referees displayed during tonight's contest. Jackman's raised elbow to the face of Kane at center ice is an infraction that needs to be called everytime. Call me a homer if you must, but allowing shots to the head will only snowball into greater calamities as the game ensues. As an example, late in the third, Janssen was clearly headhunting with a raised elbow aiming for Sopel's skull.
The Hawks showed again tonight that they can respond to tough scenarios, yet the Blues showed they are nothing more than a low-class organization willing to go the cheap route to get in their kicks.
While games like tonight's are entertaining to watch, the NHL has fairly successfully elimated the Blues' style of hockey. Credit the Blackhawks for their character and refusal to drop their standards to level of the Blues. While Hawks' captain Jonathan Toews displayed his team's toughness by dropping the gloves with the Blues' David Backes, Weaver showed St. Louis' true pussy nature by refusing to engage with a swinging Barker. After Campbell shocked Hawks fans with a clean hit that leveled Oshie, Tkachuk responded with a cheap shot on the Chicago defenseman. The Hawks were more than willing to throw down with the Blues. Instead, St. Louis prefers to work cheap and dirty. Sounds like an apt description of their city.
Hawks outclass Blues in old-fashioned slugfest

By the way- the first article says this-
Keith Tkachuk deflected in a power-play goal for the Blues while catching a stick in the face from Huet. Tkachuk was rushed off the ice for treatment before the final seconds ticked away.

But that's completely wrong. It suggests Tkachuk purposely deflected the puck in for the goal, and that Huet was responsible for Tkachuk's injury.
In actuality, the puck was shot from the point by the Blues' T.J. Oshie, and hit Blues' star Keith Tkachuk directly in the face and inadvertantly deflected to the ice next to Huet, and slowly rolled into the goal, while Huet was concerned about Tkachuk's injury. He was not hit with Huet's stick. Tkachuk got credit for the Blues' 3rd goal, but he was helped off the ice bleeding profusely from his facial wound.

[DUBrave5]

I was thinking of going down to see this game in person, but I stayed home and watched it on TV.
I will stick with my opinion that the Blues have no better than the 4th best talent in the Central Division. And their goaltending with a couple of 33 year old, average NHL goalies, isn't as strong as the other teams in the upper half of the Western Conference.

The only problem I had last night with the Blues under new coach Davis Payne, is that the message apparently was to play tougher, take cheap shots at the Blackhawks, and try to give the fans some entertainment by getting into fights, even if you can't beat the other team. The Hawks skated circles around the slower and less skilled Blues all night, and the outcome was never in doubt.

By the way- the first article says this-
Keith Tkachuk deflected in a power-play goal for the Blues while catching a stick in the face from Huet. Tkachuk was rushed off the ice for treatment before the final seconds ticked away.

I wouldn't be surprised at all if the Blues call up Bishop from Peoria near the end of the season to start getting him ready for the NHL. Bishop is the goalie for the Rivermen and after watching some games at Carver, he has the capability of being very good. If Conklin doesn't start playing better, maybe Bishop gets a call sooner than later.

I expected a physical game too because if memory serves me correctly, the last game against the Blues ended very violently. I didn't notice it but my buddy told me that the hit on Sharp should have been called a penalty because the guy left his feet which is a no-no in hockey. The Blues did take every chance they got to lay a hit on the Hawks and it definitely kept their crowd in the game, at least until the Hawks scored their 5th and 6th goals and then their crowd all began to find their way to the exits. And what better retaliation by Sharp, for getting hit like that, than to score two goals in the 3rd period and rub in the victory.

The puck going off of Tkachuk's face was scary. It all happened so fast but afterwards they kept showing the replay on the scoreboard and every time there was a collective cringe from everyone still in the stands. I haven't heard any injury reports yet and I couldn't find them online when I tried googling it, but hopefully Tkachuk isn't badly hurt because at that just isn't a way that you want to score a goal and that could really cause a serious injury.

[KillerB]

Post Dispatch Commentary on the coaching change:
Blame game Murray takes hit, but veterans are accountable.
By Bernie Miklasz
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
Sunday, Jan. 03 2010
A few months ago, Andy Murray was heralded for his work as a turnaround
specialist for the St. Louis Blues and recognized as a finalist for the NHL
Coach of the Year award.

Now Murray is out of a job, replaced by someone named Davis Payne. In case you
are wondering how long it takes to go from genius to goat in this league, the
answer is 40 games. This was fast. The cerebral Murray went from esteemed
professor to nutty professor with the speed of Brad Boyes blasting a shot wide
of an open net.

Murray's first move as ex-coach should be to visit a neurologist to discover
the cause of his alarming fluctuations in IQ. Presumably Murray was a much
smarter coach away from the 63103 zip code; the Blues have the NHL's
second-best winning percentage (.694) on the road this season. But apparently
Murray lost his mind as soon as he walked into Scottrade Center. Go figure.

Murray's firing was inevitable. The coach always gets the blame in the NHL. A
Blues locker room that's devoid of courageous, caring veteran leadership was no
longer fully committed to playing for Murray. Not enough, and not all of the
time. The players and their mood swings gave management a ready-made excuse to
justify running Murray, and Blues president John Davidson jumped on it.

Davidson said the Blues needed "a new voice," and "Davis will provide that."

Coach Payne was promoted from the Blues' minor-league affiliate in Peoria. This
could work, at least for a while. Other NHL teams have gotten good results
after summoning younger coaches from the American Hockey League.

How long Payne remains behind the bench will be decided by the Blues'
supervisory board. There's vice chairman Mike McCarthy, president Davidson,
executive VP Al MacInnis, outgoing GM Larry Pleau, and GM-in-waiting Doug
Armstrong.

As soon as I figure out who exactly is in charge, I'll get back to you on
Payne's future.

So why is Murray gone ??” other than the frequent collapses on home ice?
Obviously, Murray's stewardship of the Blues' young players was a key factor in
his removal. The supervisory board didn't like seeing Patrik Berglund and Erik
Johnson banished to the press box, or seeing David Perron seated during power
plays.

The Blues, a low-revenue franchise, won't be stalking big-ticket free agents.
So if the kids fail, the Blues are in deep trouble on the ice. And the
organization also built their marketing campaign on selling the youth movement.

"We really need to get our young people to be better players," Davidson said.
"The one thing that we've promised to fans is 'Come grow with us.' Davis has
done a nice job this year with the young kids in Peoria. All are getting
better. We need that here."

The young players are precious commodities, and Davidson clearly believed that
Payne can better relate to them than Murray did. Payne is 39 but looks 29. And
the early indication is that he'll tap into the energy of the next generation.
Payne advocates an up-tempo style, with an aggressive forecheck and swift
transport of the puck into the offensive zone.

And that fastbreak hockey was on display early during Saturday night's home
game against rival Chicago.

"I believe our style is one that's going to force you to deal with our play,"
Payne said. "We're going to force you to deal with the pace that we come at
you. I don't want to spend a lot of time picking our way through to the
offensive zone ??” we're going to get there as quick as possible and force teams
to deal with our game in that area. We expect to be a physical team. We expect
to eliminate people by using the body. The basic premise is that we want to
defend hard and play at you."

Welcome to The House of Payne.

We saw scenes of that Saturday night although Chicago won. The Blues were
determined to smack any Blackhawk within striking distance. It seems that the
young head coach prefers old-school hockey. Payne will likely keep things
simple.

That's only part of it. During Saturday's press conference, much of the talk
concerned the progress of the youngsters. But the play of the veterans should
not be ignored. Their erratic play and frequent indifference is unacceptable.
It's a given that Payne will set the young ones free and turn them loose. But
the more important question is how Payne will deal with the veterans.

That was about the only real criticism I had of Murray; he punished the kids
but wouldn't seriously take on underachieving veterans. And they're the real
problem. (You want names? Here you go: every single one of them.)

The veterans got their wish; Murray is out. And if they can't devote themselves
to the rookie coach, then get them the heck out of here, one by one. Go all-in
with the youth movement by giving more opportunities to the likes of Alex
Pietrangelo, Lars Eller, Jonas Junland, Tyson Strachan.

Moreover, the Blues don't have a leader. Eric Brewer is a fine fellow but a
low-key gentleman who shouldn't be the captain. I suspect there are some
players who want to assert themselves in the locker room, but they hold off out
of respect to Brewer.

Brewer was Murray's captain. The new coach should immediately put his mark on
the team by empowering one of the younger veterans instead. Give the "C" to
David Backes, the new Olympian. It would send the right message: the
youngbloods are the present and the future, and this is your team, this is your
time. Take charge. Take over. And deliver the word that it's time to be men by
holding yourselves accountable instead of blaming the coach.

[Fyrebyrd]

Word is Keith Tkachuk lost multiple teeth and suffered a gash above the mouth requiring several stitches. He's headed to the oral surgeon

Per Andy Strickland's twitter...A NHL writer who followes the Blues

[Big Mike]

The Blues gamble on too-many small veterans who are always hurt, (McDonald, Kariya, etc)