ST. PAUL, Minn. - The Bruce Boudreau era has begun for the Minnesota Wild.

For the players, the demands will be many. The expectations will be as straightforward as can be. The experience also promises to be a lot of fun.

''Sometimes he doesn't even know what's coming out of his mouth when he's talking,'' forward Charlie Coyle said.

The rotund new head coach, well-regarded for his regular-season success, well-known for his profane rants and well-liked for his down-to-earth and self-deprecating manner, formally took over Friday for the first two practices of training camp. The squad split into two groups and, in addition to plenty of time with the white board picking up Boudreau's defensive scheme, went through a grueling conditioning test during which skaters had to complete several laps around the rink under certain times.

The drills were no joke, but Boudreau made sure to keep the mood light even while barking encouragement to the participants.

''We're huffing and puffing,'' Coyle said, ''and he's still making us laugh.''

NHL training camps began about a week later than usual because of the World Cup of Hockey, and six Wild players were given a break for the first three days in their transition back home from competition: forward Zach Parise and defenseman Ryan Suter from Team USA, forwards Mikko Koivu, Mikael Granlund and Erik Haula of Team Finland and forward Nino Niederreiter of Team Europe. Only Niederreiter's team is still alive in the tournament, so he could be delayed further.

The learning process won't wait, though.

''We want to ramp it up as quick as we can. We want to have a lot of pace in our practice. It's a real mixture, because we have to teach at the same time. It's not going to be like a practice in December,'' Boudreau said. ''At the same time, we don't want anything slow. We want a lot of moving parts.''

The first exhibition game is on Monday against Buffalo in State College, Pennsylvania, and the season opener is Oct. 13 at St. Louis. That's less than three weeks away. Hence the hard work on the first day, even though players train year-round these days and don't typically need to get back into shape.

''Everyone's just excited to get this thing going and start playing some real hockey,'' defenseman Matt Dumba said.

There will be differences in style, for sure.

''I think they're still trying to figure me out. `What's this guy like? He seems to be smiling a little too much.' Or, `He's joking around with me. Is he really joking or is he sarcastic?''' Boudreau said. ''I think it takes a little bit of time for guys to get to know me.''

Impressions are there to be made for the players, most of whom have never played for Boudreau before.

''Everyone's here to get a job and knock people out of their jobs, so everyone came prepared,'' Coyle said. ''It's good to see that intensity and that competition right away.''

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TORONTO - Brooks Laich has seen top draft picks blossom in the NHL.

With the Washington Capitals, he watched Alex Ovechkin burst onto the scene in 2005. Now with the Toronto Maple Leafs some 11 years later, he has a ringside seat for Auston Matthews' debut.

The 19-year-old forward, the No. 1 overall pick this summer, turned heads at the World Cup of Hockey on a Team North American line with Edmonton's Connor McDavid and Winnipeg's Mark Scheifele.

''It puts a big smile on your face,'' Laich, a 12-year veteran, said about watching Matthews. ''I see a lot of little things in his game, habits that you don't generally see in young players.''

Those include his positioning, the way he competes for the puck and his shot release. From Scottsdale, Arizona, Matthews played last season in Switzerland.

Leafs center Nazem Kadri has also seen Matthews play from the Air Canada Centre stands.

''(He's) obviously high-level skill,'' he said. ''(He) can skate, he's big. So he's only going to get better. Obviously, with that 82-game season, it's going to be a little difficult but I think he's going to be more than ready for it.''

Leafs management already likes what it sees.

''There's no question he has a bright future,'' GM Lou Lamoriello said. ''It's just exciting to see him play. But I think the most exciting thing is to know he's ours.''

Laich reminded reporters asking about Matthews that the team comes first.

''This isn't an individual sport,'' he said. ''This isn't a tennis or a golf where everything comes down to one person. Auston's a great player from what I've seen. But there's also going to be 22 other great players in this room.

''So as a young guy, he's got enough pressure on himself. He puts, I'm sure, enough pressure on himself. You don't get to be where he is already without having an internal drive like that. So we don't need to put anything else on him. We want to make him a member of the team, we want to treat him like the other 22 guys.''

''The logo comes first. I'm sure Auston will tell you that.''

The Leafs begin on-ice activities at training camp Friday in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

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TORONTO - Daniel Sedin knows the World Cup of Hockey may be his final chance to represent Sweden at a best-on-best tournament along with twin brother Henrik.

With that in mind, there's no shortage of motivation for the 35-year-old Vancouver Canucks forwards heading into Sunday's semifinal meeting with Team Europe.

''We realize as we get older there's not going to be a lot of these tournaments moving forward,'' Daniel Sedin said. ''We don't know about the (2018) Olympics yet, but we're enjoying this. We're having a lot of fun and getting a chance to play in the semifinals, it was tough getting here.

''We're enjoying every day and we'll have some fun on Sunday.''

The last time Sweden won gold at a best-on-best tournament was the 2006 Olympics in Turin. Sweden lost to Canada in the gold medal game at the 2014 Sochi Games.

Sweden won its round-robin opener at the World Cup 2-1 against Russia on Sunday and blanked Finland 2-0 on Wednesday before falling 4-3 in overtime to Team North America on Wednesday.

The Swedes are hoping to learn from their loss against the Under-23 team moving forward. They were thoroughly outplayed early, quickly going down 2-0 before rallying to force overtime.

''I think we can definitely learn (about) being ready when the puck drops, those first 10 minutes were pretty embarrassing from our part,'' said defenseman Niklas Hjalmarsson. ''The Europeans have some speed in their lineup as well so we have to be ready when the puck drops. We weren't ready for Team North America, but somehow we managed to a big comeback there.''

After losing the first two pre-tournament games by a combined 11-4 score to the North Americans, Team Europe bounced back to defeat Sweden 6-2 in its final tune up game.

''They surprised us a little bit in the exhibition game, but they won't surprise us on Sunday,'' Sedin said. ''They wait for you to make mistakes, and then they create offence from that. We've got to be careful on Sunday. We can't just go on offence like we did in that pre-tournament game.

''I think our defense was jumping a little bit too much and got too involved in the offense. I think we have to respect their forwards.''

Team Europe, made up of players from eight different countries, stunned the Americans 3-0 in the tournament opener and defeated the Czechs 3-2 in overtime before falling 4-1 to the Canadians on Wednesday.

European captain Anze Kopitar pointed to the second period of the pre-tournament game against Team North America in Montreal as the turning point for the team of players unfamiliar with playing with one another.

''I think the first period in Montreal really opened our eyes and we really showed ourselves how we don't want to play,'' Kopitar said of the second pre-tournament game. ''After that, we kind of realized how we have to play: smart (and) with a lot of patience, there's no flash to it. We're playing a boring style of hockey, but it's turned out to be a pretty successful one so we're obviously proud in doing that and we're going to continue doing that.''

The winner of Saturday's Canada-Russia semifinal will play the winner of Sweden-Europe in a best-of-three final beginning on Tuesday.

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TORONTO - The NHL has gotten almost everything it hoped for so far at the World Cup of Hockey.

In holding the first World Cup since 2004, the league and players wanted a festival of hockey that showcased the its best players. Two losses and an early exit by the United States isn't what anyone wanted for the sake of interest, but the 23-and-under Team North America put on a show and captured the attention of fans, coaches and players around the tournament.

Team North America and the U.S. are out, with Canada and Russia meeting in one semifinal Saturday night and Sweden and Team Europe in the other Sunday afternoon. The quality of play has already been Olympic-level high and should only get better with at least four and potentially five games left.

''The winners here have been the fans,'' North America coach Todd McLellan said. ''They've watched some really good hockey in September and that doesn't happen very often.''

The NHL was panned initially for the North American and European all-star teams, but the youngsters' speed, skill and scoring won so many people over that merchandise bearing the ''NA'' logo was almost entirely sold out at Air Canada Centre. Europe won people over by winning, beating the U.S. and the Czech Republic to advance.

Two-time Olympic champion Canada has rolled, going 3-0 and outscoring opponents 14-3 along the way, and Sweden has leaned heavily on goaltender Henrik Lundqvist. North America's games against Russia and Sweden were two of the most exciting end-to-end games in recent international history.

Commissioner Gary Bettman is proud of how the NHL and NHLPA ''revived the World Cup in world-class fashion.''

''It's been sensational. It's exactly what we expected,'' Bettman said. ''We wanted this to feel like and be a major event. We predicted that the competition would be better than any international tournament to date, that it would have a big-event feel.''

The World Cup achieved big-event status in Toronto, with a mostly full arena and buzz around the city. The same can't be said on U.S. TV, as ESPN reported that approximately 770,000 people watched Canada beat Team USA on Tuesday night, the most watched game so far.

Executive vice president of programming and scheduling Burke Magnus called the Americans' disappointing showing ''a lost opportunity.''

''That's the beauty of live sports,'' Magnus said by phone Thursday. ''That's what makes sort of the unscripted nature of what we do so much fun. We obviously were counting on them to get out of pool play, but they weren't able to do it. But this is the best players in the world.''

Canada looks like it still has the best collection of players in the world, even without North America's Connor McDavid and Nathan MacKinnon, who orchestrated a magic show on ice. Even the most grizzled old-school fundamental hockey people had to appreciate the way McDavid, MacKinnon, 2016 top pick Auston Matthews and Co. played.

McDavid said North America ''definitely turned heads.'' Canada coach Mike Babcock called it ''a great way to showcase the NHL'' of the future.

''The North American kids have been a home run for the NHL,'' Babcock said. ''This North American team is a pump in the arm for hockey. It's fantastic.''

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WASHINGTON - The NHL is revamping its concussion monitoring system for the upcoming season.

Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly says the league will have four concussion spotters watching all games from a centralized location in either Toronto or New York, as well as spotters at each game to check for visible symptoms. Those spotters will have the authority to have players removed from games.

Previously, there had been team-affiliated concussion spotters in each arena and they could recommend but not require players be removed from a game.

Daly says the new concussion policy goes into effect for the eight-team World Cup of Hockey, which begins Saturday in Toronto, and that the NHL will release more details closer to the start of the regular season.

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GLENDALE, Ariz. - The Arizona Coyotes have hired Dawn Braid as skating coach and say she is believed to be the first full-time female coach in NHL history.

Braid has a long association with the NHL.

She worked part-time for the Coyotes last year and has served as a skating consultant with the Toronto Maple Leafs, Anaheim Ducks, Buffalo Sabres, and Calgary Flames.

Braid also spent seven years with the Athletes Training Center as director of skating development. Among the skaters she worked with there is New York Islanders center John Tavares.

The hiring is the latest in a series of breakthroughs for women in men's sports.

Last year, the Buffalo Bills made Kathryn Smith the NFL's first full-time assistant coach. Smith is the team's quality control coach.

The NBA has had two female assistant coaches - Becky Hammon of the San Antonio Spurs and Nancy Lieberman of the Sacramento Kings.

A year ago, the Arizona Cardinals made Jen Welter the first woman to hold a coaching position of any kind in the NFL when she served as an intern in the preseason.

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Veteran forward Kyle Chipchura is resuming his hockey career in the Kontinental Hockey League.

Chipchura, who played for three NHL teams during his nine-year career, signed a one-year contract to play for HC Slovan Bratislava on Monday.

The 30-year-old is the second player from the Arizona Coyotes to head to the KHL in as many days, as Viktor Tikhonov agreed to terms with SKA St. Petersburg on Sunday.

Chipchura collected four goals, eight assists and 38 penalty minutes in 70 games with the Arizona Coyotes last season.

The 18th overall pick of the 2004 draft, Chipchura scored 31 goals, set up 73 others and had 376 penalty minutes in 482 career games with the Montreal Canadiens, Anaheim Ducks and Coyotes.

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Veteran forward Kyle Chipchura is resuming his hockey career in the Kontinental Hockey League.

Chipchura, who played for three NHL teams during his nine-year career, signed a one-year contract to play for HC Slovan Bratislava on Monday.

The 30-year-old is the second player from the Arizona Coyotes to head to the KHL in as many days, as Viktor Tikhonov agreed to terms with SKA St. Petersburg on Sunday.

Chipchura collected four goals, eight assists and 38 penalty minutes in 70 games with the Arizona Coyotes last season.

The 18th overall pick of the 2004 draft, Chipchura scored 31 goals, set up 73 others and had 376 penalty minutes in 482 career games with the Montreal Canadiens, Anaheim Ducks and Coyotes.

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LAWRENCE, Mass. - Former Boston Bruins star Ray Bourque is expected to appear in a Massachusetts court to try to resolve a drunken driving charge.

A spokeswoman for Essex District Attorney Jonathan Blodgett confirmed that the office has been advised that Bourque will be in Lawrence District Court on Wednesday to try to resolve the case.

Bourque pleaded not guilty last week to operating under the influence of alcohol after his Mercedes-Benz rear-ended a minivan in Andover on June 24. No one was hurt.

Police said Bourque had a blood-alcohol level of 0.249, three times the state's legal limit to drive.

Bourque said in a statement last week: ''I am not happy about the situation I put myself into.''

He retired from the NHL in 2001 after helping the Colorado Avalanche win the Stanley Cup.

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Brad Treliving saw the rules for the expansion draft and immediately was in an advantageous position. The Calgary Flames' general manager needed a goaltender, and with Las Vegas set to harvest the NHL for two of them in a year, his colleagues had incentive to make a move.

The Flames got Brian Elliott from the St. Louis Blues for a second-round pick.

A full year before the Las Vegas expansion draft, GMs must plan for the inevitability of losing a player to a team that the league wants to be good out of the gate. Already the impact of the impending expansion draft has been felt with the Flames acquiring Elliott and the Toronto Maple Leafs getting goalie Frederik Andersen from the Anaheim Ducks.

The Ducks knew they wouldn't be able to keep Andersen and John Gibson forever, and the expansion draft expedited a move.

''After starting to hear what the expansion rules could be, you just knew you weren't going to be signing both of them,'' GM Bob Murray said. ''You're going to come out looking pretty stupid if you did that.''

No one wants to look stupid, and that's the challenge over the next 12 months.

Teams will only be able to protect one goalie, so the Tampa Bay Lightning will likely have to trade Ben Bishop and the Stanley Cup-champion Pittsburgh Penguins have to decide what to do with Marc-Andre Fleury before the yet-to-be-named Las Vegas team picks its first 30 players on June 20, 2017.

With the unrestricted free agent market opening Friday and trade winds gusting, teams have to consider the expansion draft as part of their offseason maneuvers.

''Everything will be affected by that,'' Columbus Blue Jackets GM Jarmo Kekalainen said. ''In every decision, we'll have to take into consideration what the rules are and how that might affect our outlook for the expansion draft and ahead of that.''

Each team will be able to protect seven forwards, three defensemen and one goaltender or eight skaters and one goaltender. Any player with a no-movement clause in his contract must be protected, and each team will lose one player.

Players with bloated contracts or who are past their prime will be exposed, but teams could take a serious hit because young and cheap talent will be plentiful.

That's a danger for a team like the Chicago Blackhawks, who have won the Stanley Cup three times in seven years but are locked into long-term deals with their core players. GM Stan Bowman, who has taken Chicago from the brink of cap purgatory back to the Cup, isn't worried about losing someone.

''I think sometimes you can get too worked up about it,'' Bowman said. ''It's a little bit early to be making moves strictly for an expansion draft that's going to happen in about 12 months from now.''

Win-now teams shouldn't get worked up. Penguins GM Jim Rutherford plans to keep Fleury and Cup-winning goalie Matt Murray for now and worry about it later, and making moves for the future alone won't help anyone capture a title next season.

''It's tough to take a player you like out of your lineup right now before the season starts, especially if you want to compete for a championship,'' Washington Capitals GM Brian MacLellan said. ''You try and find that perfect situation where you're protected in an expansion draft.''

Expect some movement once teams have a grip on which players they might protect or have in danger of exposing for the NHL's Las Vegas venture. The Blackhawks have eight players with no-move clauses and the Blue Jackets six, which could necessitate buyouts this week or deals over the next year.

''Nobody could really prepare before they knew what the rules were,'' Kekalainen said. ''Some teams are in better positions just by accident or by luck or whatever.''

Edmonton Oilers GM Peter Chiarelli, who can relax with Connor McDavid exempt because he'll only have two years of pro experience, said teams will have to think differently if they face the potential of losing a significant player. No doubt that's a reality for some, but Treliving doesn't see that flooding the market.

''That idea that now that there's expansion everybody's going to be dying to just give you players, that's not quite the case,'' Treliving said. ''There is obviously a knowledge of what may happen, so people are trying to see if they can be aggressive or if that's going to be something in a year.''

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