Report: Maple Leafs, Zaitsev ‘working towards’ 7-year extension

The Toronto Maple Leafs are reportedly "working towards" a long-term extension with rookie defender Nikita Zaitsev, according to TSN's Bob McKenzie.

Sportsnet's Elliotte Friedman adds that the deal would average $4.5 million annually, and that the two parties are "closing in" on an agreement.

More to come.

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Zetterberg becomes 7th player to record 900 points as a Red Wing

Some good news in a lost season.

With a second-period assist Thursday, Detroit Red Wings captain Henrik Zetterberg hit the 900-point mark for his career, putting him in some stellar red-and-white company.

Zetterberg, a Red Wing his entire career, is only the seventh player in franchise history to make it to 900. The other six guys were kind of good:

Player Points
Gordie Howe 1809
Steve Yzerman 1755
Alex Delvecchio 1281
Nicklas Lidstrom 1142
Sergei Fedorov 954
Pavel Datsyuk 918
Zetterberg 900

The assist gave Zetterberg a team-leading 64 points this season. At 36, he's still going strong, bouncing back from a down 2015-16, when he averaged 0.61 points per game - the second-lowest mark of his career.

He has 325 goals and 575 assists in 995 regular-season games.

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Marner sets Leafs’ rookie record in assists

Another game, another franchise record broken for the Toronto Maple Leafs' incredible crop of rookies.

Just two days after Auston Matthews broke Wendel Clark's rookie goal record, Mitch Marner set a mark of his own.

With a secondary assist on James van Riemsdyk's first period goal Thursday night, Marner established a new franchise record in assists by a freshman (41), eclipsing the previous mark set by Gus Bodnar in the 1943-44 season.

The helper also pushed Marner into a tie with William Nylander - the other prominent figure in Toronto's rookie triumvirate - for second in team scoring with 58 points on the season.

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Mantha done for season with fractured finger

Anthony Mantha's solid rookie season is over.

The Red Wings forward sustained a fractured finger Thursday against the Tampa Bay Lightning and won't play in Detroit's remaining five games, general manager Ken Holland said, according to MLive.com's Ansar Khan.

That means the kid will miss Detroit's final game at Joe Louis Arena on Sunday, April 9.

Mantha finishes his freshman NHL campaign with 17 goals and 36 points in 60 games. He averaged 16:09 in ice time and did most of his damage on the road, with 14 goals and 24 points in 33 games as a visitor.

The 22-year-old was drafted 20th overall in 2013 and will be relied upon heavily in the coming years to make the Red Wings great again.

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Watch: Marchand sets new career-high with scramble goal vs. Stars

By no means was it his prettiest goal of the season, but Brad Marchand's first-period tally Thursday versus Dallas was certainly a memorable one.

The Boston Bruins winger was able to bank his 38th goal of the season off the pad of Antti Niemi, establishing a new career-high in the process.

The goal also put Marchand in a tie with Nikita Kucherov for second place in the "Rocket" Richard race.

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Isles fans apoplectic on Twitter after team’s horrific start in Philly

Must-win game on the road, No. 76 out of 82, playoff chances about as slim as they can get, and the New York Islanders simply didn't show up to play Thursday against the Philadelphia Flyers.

Ten minutes into the game, New York was stuck four. It was 5-0 at the end of the first period. Nightmare.

Islanders fans did what any respectable supporter would do: Tweet.

Here are some of the better ones:

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Weise, Simmonds record Gordie Howe hat tricks in 1st period vs. Islanders

Dale Weise came ready to do a little bit of everything Thursday.

The Philadelphia Flyers forward opened the scoring against the New York Islanders at the 4:30 mark of the first period, assisted on his club's third goal at 8:06, and fought Travis Hamonic at 8:28.

Gordie Howe hat trick, just like that. Impressive.

Thomas Greiss started for the Islanders but was pulled after he was beat three times on eight shots. Jaroslav Halak came into the game and made one save before Jordan Weal made it 4-0 Flyers less than a minute later.

By the time the first period ended, Wayne Simmonds had himself a Gordie Howe hat trick, too, after assisting on Weal's tally, scoring his 30th to make it 5-0, and fighting Anders Lee.

The Islanders came into the game four points back in the Eastern Conference wild-card race, and their season may have gone down in flames in under 10 minutes.

Also impressive, but in a bad way.

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Kucherov sick, out vs. Red Wings

Huge blow for the Tampa Bay Lightning.

Nikita Kucherov is sick and won't play against the Detroit Red Wings, the club announced 30 minutes before puck drop.

The 23-year-old Russian sniper is Tampa Bay's most productive player this season, with 38 goals and 80 points in 68 games, but the Lightning will have to find a way without him Thursday at home.

The good news is the opposition is Detroit, officially eliminated from the playoffs for the first time in a generation. Tampa Bay, on the other hand, is three points back of the Boston Bruins for the second wild-card spot in the East, with a game in hand.

With Boston hosting Dallas on Thursday, and likely to take those two points, Tampa Bay needs to win to stay within three.

Kucherov has three goals and five points in three games versus Detroit this season.

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Karlsson to miss 1st game of season vs. Wild

Ottawa Senators captain Erik Karlsson will not play Thursday versus Minnesota, the team announced.

Karlsson was injured after blocking a shot Tuesday in Philadelphia, and while no specifics of the injury have been reported, the Sens' top defenseman will miss his first game of the season, ending his personal streak of 324 consecutive contests.

25-year-old Jyrki Jokipakka, who was acquired from the Flames in the Curtis Lazar trade, will make his Senators debut in place of Karlsson.

Karlsson, of course, has been a workhorse for Ottawa this season, registering 68 points in 75 games while logging an average of 26:52 of ice-time per game.

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NHL looks at China as a ‘very long-term relationship’

China wants to get its hockey program up to par before hosting the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing. The NHL is using that as a starting point for a long-term vision to turn the country into a hockey nation.

The league is making the country of almost 1.4 billion people a top priority internationally. The Los Angeles Kings and Vancouver Canucks will play exhibition games in Shanghai and Beijing in September, and the games and the Olympics are only the beginning of what the NHL hopes is a bigger investment.

''The way we're looking at it is it's really not about 2022. It's about 2032 and '42 and so on and really building the game,'' NHL executive vice president of media and international strategy David Proper said by phone from Beijing. ''It's doing a disservice ultimately to the building of hockey in China to just target a five-year range and not be looking past that.''

At a news conference announcing the exhibition games, commissioner Gary Bettman called them ''the beginning of what we believe will be a very long-term relationship.''

The upcoming Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea, next year has created conflict for the league, which has expressed reluctance to stop its season to play 13 hours ahead of Eastern Time in a place that isn't necessarily a hockey market. The NHL may yet decide to go to Korea because of players' interest but also in part because of the lure of Beijing.

The NHL looks at the NBA, which has had a foothold in China for decades, as a blueprint for the future. But before there's a hockey version of Yao Ming, Chinese fans need to learn more about the sport.

Andong Song, the first Chinese player drafted by an NHL team, said most people in his homeland didn't know much about hockey even when the New York Islanders took him in the sixth round in June of 2015. Song was part of China's presentation to the International Olympic Committee alongside Yao and said getting the Games in 2022 got people buzzing about hockey and other winter sports.

From the initial meetings with Chinese government officials, the league and NHL Players' Association saw untapped potential.

''The exciting thing is you're starting from a baseline of zero, so any effect that we have is going to be a positive effect,'' NHL chief revenue officer and executive VP of global partnerships Keith Wachtel said by phone from Beijing. ''The question is just how much, and that's going to be about the dedication of resources that we have.''

While the exact financial investment the league is making in China was not revealed, it's substantial.

Proper said the league will put on at least 15 clinics in China this year in addition to what teams might also be doing. The Canucks, Kings, Boston Bruins, Montreal Canadiens, New York Islanders, Toronto Maple Leafs, and Washington Capitals have already conducted camps for young Chinese players.

As China aims for 2022, Proper considers it a ''perfect storm'' of a motivated government and private sector combined with a league that wants to spread out far beyond North America and Europe.

''When somebody comes to you and says, 'We are committed to 300 million people playing winter sports and hockey is one of the primary winter sports we want to focus on,' you have to make that country a priority and you really have to kind of figure out how to help them as best they can to achieve their goals,'' Proper said.

The NHL is getting a lift from goaltender-turned-billionaire Zhou Yunjie, chairman of metal can manufacturing company ORG Packaging, in making strides in China. The league signed a multiyear deal with ORG Packaging and will use some of that money to help refine Chinese hockey infrastructure while trying to increase exposure, sell jerseys and make an impact.

The ultimate goal is talent development, which will spawn fandom and interest if a Chinese player turns into an NHL star.

''We think that it's only a matter of time till we're able to get a Chinese national into the NHL,'' Wachtel said. ''That will be the proof point when millions of kids are playing the sport in China and one day that you see one of those kids that was in a clinic that was run by the NHL and ORG and all our other partners that that kid is playing in the NHL.''

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