Morning Snapshots 12/05

Via: Puckdaddy

• There was only one game last night in the Stanley Cup playoffs, but it was a great one. Brooks Orpik scored his first career game winning goal (regular or post season), to give the Pittsburgh Penguins and 4-3 win and a 4-2 series victory over the New York Islanders. Orpik was an unlikely hero, as he's only scored 12 NHL goals in his nine season career. Give the Islanders credit, they played an excellent game, outshooting the Pens 38-21 and limiting Evgeni Malkin and Sidney Crosby to one assist each. Ultimately it was goalie Evgeni Nabokov who couldn't get it done, stopping only 17 of those 21 shots. He finished the series with a 4.44 goals against average and a .842 save percentage. The Penguins now move on to face the Ottawa Senators in round two.
• The Toronto Maple Leafs got a huge vote of confidence heading into game six at home against the Boston Bruins tonight from none other than Wayne Gretzky himself. The Great One spoke with Pierre Lebrun of ESPN. com and said he feels the Leafs are "legit". He also praised goalie James Reimer, saying, "There was so much talk through the hockey world wondering if their goaltending was strong enough to get them through the season and get into the playoffs, I think their goaltender has answered that question extremely well."
• Gotta love Gretzky for still offering his opinion on the game, but could he sound any more like a politician?
• St. Louis Blues coach Ken Hitchcock called out the young core players on the Blues for not stepping up when they needed to during the playoffs. "If you want to be a champion, it's not good enough", he said before adding "We need the boys we built this (team) around". They have ten players on the roster that were drafted in the first round. They combined for only 8 goals in the playoffs.
• After a disappointing end to the season for the Montreal Canadiens, it was revealed that Carey Price had suffered an MCL sprain in his knee, and is going to need about six weeks to recover. It was also announced that Alex Galchenyuk (USA), Tomas Plekanec (Czech) and Raphael Diaz (Swiss) will all head over to Sweden and join their respective teams playing in the IIHF World Championships.
• While the NHL, NHLPA and IIHF have been meeting in Sweden to work out details for the 2014 Olympics in Sochi, Russia, it seems as though discussing another tournament has been on the agenda. A new player transfer agreement between the NHL and the IIHF includes a provision for the World Cup of Hockey. Saturday morning Vladislav Tretiak, the President of the Russian Hockey Federation revealed the the World Cup will indeed be back.
• The World Cup, which hasn't been contested since 2004, will add another truly best on best competition for international hockey. Early rumor suggests the tournament will take place in August 2016, with the possibility of further tournaments every four years afterwards. 
• And since we're on such an international flair here in the morning snapshots, let's finish with the scores from Saturday at the World Championships: USA doubled France 4-2, the Swiss won again, this time over Denmark 4-1, Finland crushed Austria 7-2, Sweden shutout Slovakia 2-0, Germany beat Latvia by the same 2-0 score, and Norway got past Belarus 3-1. 

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