Storm Advisory 2/26/18: NHL News, Rumors, Links and Daily Roundup

TL;DR

If you would like to make a donation to the Staal Family Foundation, you can do so by searching for Canes Country on Venmo. We will pool the donations and send a check to the Foundation on behalf of our Canes Country community at the end of the week. And please help us spread the word through social media!

First, A Word From Our Sponsor

I still remember the phone call, the date, the time, where I was, everything.

It was Friday, March 8, 2013. After years upon years of trying, countless doctor’s visits, medicines that cost the equivalent of a mortgage on a small house, my wife and I were - finally - expecting our first child.

As I was driving home, about 5:40 that afternoon on Marks Creek Road just outside Knightdale, my phone rang, and time stopped.

It was my wife, who I could barely hear through the tears. Something had gone wrong. We needed to call the doctor right now, and follow that up with calls to our parents and our pastor in some order.

I was about 15 minutes from home and I think I bent the space-time continuum to get home as fast as I could. We couldn’t believe it. After everything we had gone through, this? Seriously? It was so unfair.

I will remember that feeling until I take my final breath on this Earth. It’s one I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy.

Now, our story has a happy ending, as evidenced by our now four-and-a-half year old daughter, who is a true miracle in every sense of the word. But when I first heard yesterday about what had happened to Jordan and Heather Staal, all of those emotions - that familiar, haunting, horrifying, stomach-turning feeling - came flooding back. I was eating lunch at the time, and I couldn’t finish.

As if the first ton of bricks wasn’t enough, there was a second one.

My own daughter’s name? Hannah.

I knew, in that moment, that I needed to be there for the Staals in the same way so many of our friends, family and loved ones were there for us almost five years ago. And one of the lessons I took from our ordeal to try to grow our family was that no matter how dark things seem, you are never, ever alone.

Which brings us to our plan. You’ve probably seen Mike Sundheim’s tweet from last night about how you can support the Staal Family Foundation:

Since the Staal Family Foundation doesn’t take donations from the United States except by check*, we want to make it easy for you to donate. You can make your donation through Venmo by clicking here or by searching for Canes Country on your Venmo app. We’ll pool all the donations together (we’ve turned privacy on for our Venmo account, so you won’t be identified) and send one check to the Staal Family Foundation on behalf of the Canes Country community in Hannah’s memory.

We’ll also have a link up on the CC home page through the end of the week, so if you can’t get around to it today, you can do so whenever it’s convenient.

Thanks so much for your generosity.

*Update 11:15 am: The Staal Foundation web site states US donations should be made by check. However, we’ve been informed credit card transactions are indeed being accepted (through PayPal) for those who prefer to donate directly.

Reading Assignments

• It was a busy trade day, headlined by Rick Nash joining the Boston Bruins. [CBS Sports]
• Mark Letestu (which, if you’d forgotten, is French for “the testu”) is returning to Columbus three years after he was dealt away. [Columbus Dispatch]
• The Maple Leafs and Canadiens made a trade to send Tomas Plekanec to Toronto, and...wait, both teams are happy about this? [Eyes On The Prize]
• Brian Gionta, fresh off captaining Team USA at the Olympics, signed with the Bruins. [ProHockeyTalk]
• Mike Fisher’s new deal with the Predators should be finalized today. [TSN]
• Are the Hurricanes interested in picking up Ryan Hartman? (Narrator: of course they are, he’s a Chicago Blackhawk.) [Second City Hockey]
• This time of year, you hear a lot about trade calls. What goes into them, and why did they become a thing in the first place? [Sportsnet]
• And finally, here is Jeff Skinner doing a double axel in hockey pads.