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UNDATED (AP) _ A former member of the Phoenix Coyotes hockey team was among those killed when a Russian jet carrying a top ic hockey team crashed just after takeoff Wednesday, killing at least 43 people and leaving two others critically injured.
 

Among those killed was the team's coach, Canadian Brad McCrimmon, who took over in May. He was most recently an assistant coach with the Detroit Red Wings, and played for years in the NHL for Boston, Philadelphia, Detroit, Hartford and Phoenix.
 

The Russian Emergency Situations Ministry said the Yak-42 plane crashed into a riverbank on the Volga River immediately after leaving an airport near the western city of Yaroslavl, 150 miles northeast of Moscow.

Statement from Coyotes:

Phoenix Coyotes General Manager Don Maloney issued the following statement regarding the tragic plane crash in Russia today. 

“We are deeply saddened by the tragedy that took place today in Russia involving the Lokomotiv Yaroslavl (KHL) hockey club. 

 "On behalf of the entire Phoenix Coyotes organization, we would like to express our sincere condolences to the families and loved ones of those who perished.

“The Coyotes lost two members of our family in Brad McCrimmon and Igor Korolev, and our thoughts and prayers are with their families as well. Brad and Igor were part of the Coyotes inaugural season in the Valley and we will forever remember the great contributions they made to our community on and off the ice. They will be greatly missed."

 

Greg Jamison, former San Jose Sharks president and CEO, has put in a new ownership bid for the Phoenix Coyotes that would keep them in Arizona.

He is expected to work the the NHL, which currently holds the Coyotes, next week.

Read more from the Phoenix Business Journal

PHOENIX (AP) _ A person close to the situation says Chicago businessman Matthew Hulsizer is out as a potential buyer of the financially troubled Phoenix Coyotes.
      

The person, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the matter, says Hulsizer has withdrawn for good from talks with the city of Glendale over a new lease.
      

Hulsizer's decision leaves no publicly identified potential buyer  for the franchise, which was purchased by the NHL out of bankruptcy in the fall of 2009.
      

Glendale recently committed $25 million for the second year in a row to keep the team playing at Jobing.com Arena for the upcoming season.
      

The Phoenix Business Journal first reported that Hulsizer had pulled out of the Coyotes deal.

------------------------

Statement from Coyotes:

"The City of Glendale and the National Hockey League continue to negotiate with other interested parties to secure new ownership for the Phoenix Coyotes. The objective continues to be to transition ownership of the Club to an interested purchaser in the coming months"
 

From FOX TV Houston:
"The Coyotes announced the [Reliant Stadium] event on their website, but they jumped the gun big-time."

Read the whole story here

The Coyotes have hired former Abbotsford Heat Head Coach Jim Playfair - he taking over for the departed Ulf Samuelsson as Associate Coach.

Intense guy, eh?

-LUKE LAPINSKI, Radio Host for Phoenix Coyotes Hockey
(twitter: @LukeLapinski)

It’s officially time to close the book on the Ilya Bryzgalov Era in Phoenix. Whenever I have to do something like this, I take a moment to make sure I’m thinking straight before I put my thoughts out there. I don’t want to let emotion get the better of me, causing me to irrationally lash out at random people. So I’ve waited two days and here’s the conclusion I’ve come to: this is all Rick DiPietro’s fault.

See here’s the thing, the Coyotes went into this summer hoping to get a deal done. Under no circumstances did Don Maloney head into the offseason thinking “ok, first order of business: get rid of the guy who nearly took home the Vezina a year ago and has the ability to take over a game from the crease. He’s gotta go.” But, by all accounts, Bryz simply left them no choice. He wanted an extremely long term deal and he wanted to be paid like one of the top players in the game, not just an elite goalie. A deal like that only makes sense for a few teams in today’s NHL. The Coyotes – a group built around a well-rounded team concept – aren’t one of them. And for once, that has nothing to do with who the owner is. Do you really want to pump that much of your team’s payroll into one player? Granted, maybe if the ownership situation had never been an issue, they could’ve gotten a deal done before it ever came to this. We’ll never know. But once this offseason hit, it became a harsh reality that there was simply no way to re-sign the Russian Bear. And this is where DiPietro comes in. When he inked his 75 year, $200 trillion deal with the Islanders back in 2006, he changed the landscape of the negotiating process. Goalies believe they can get extremely long term deals now because the precedent has been set. It’s like going to a car dealership where the guy before you just offered the dealer $80,000 for a Honda Civic. I’ve got news for you: if you happen to want to buy a Civic, the price just went up considerably. And you can’t really blame Bryzgalov for this. If you were him and had the opportunity to cash in for a long time, wouldn’t you take it?

Which brings me to a quick side point. If you took a second in the last couple weeks to break down all the possible destinations for Bryz outside of Phoenix in the NHL, Philadelphia was the clear frontrunner - a team with plenty of talented scorers that doesn’t already have a lot of money and time locked up in a netminder and might actually be willing to unload a boatload of cash on the guy in goal because they feel it’s the only piece they’re missing. Of course, we don’t know for sure that he’ll end up in with the Flyers because there’s not a more daunting task on the face of this planet than trying to figure out what Bryz is thinking and I’m sure there are KHL teams making some huge offers as well. But I’m guessing Philadelphia wouldn’t have dealt for his rights if they didn’t think they at least had a chance to sign him and – if that’s where he stays - the NHL Network needs to jump all over the opportunity to film a reality show about Bryzgalov living in the City of Brotherly Love. They could call it “Ilyadelphia”. That’s potential comedy gold, somebody needs to get on this, and I want royalties.

So where does this leave the Coyotes? It’s not as bad as you might think. Sure they lost a big time player on Tuesday, but they did the right thing. And I think we’re all at the point where we trust whatever Don Maloney does. His track record more than speaks for itself, and if anything goes wrong, he’ll somehow fix everything at the expense of the New York Rangers anyway, so it all works out in the end. You and I both know he made every effort to make this deal work. He considered Bryz a top ten goalie (usually worth $4.5-$6 million a year) and offered him a contract accordingly. Bryz was looking for much, much more. So much more, in fact, that they apparently never even got close to a compromise. Again, I don’t blame Bryz for wanting to test the market – that’s business. Just remember, it’s not like the Coyotes decided to up and trade him – they simply had no option. He wasn’t coming back. Better to get something instead of absolutely nothing, right? (By the way, could someone pass that last sentence on to whoever is negotiating the NFL labor dispute? Two sides fighting over $9 billion, willing to give up everything if they can’t have everything to themselves, rather than cut their losses. If Don Maloney was involved in the NFL negotiations, we’d have a football season right now. In the middle of June somehow.)

Bottom line, this team can be successful without Bryzgalov - but they have to be smart. They already re-signed Jason LaBarbera, though Maloney has said he doesn’t necessarily want to lean on him as the #1 goalie. They have impressive prospects like Mark Visentin (last year’s OHL player of the year) in the system, but I sincerely doubt they want to press any of them into live NHL action right now. That leaves free agency or a trade. The free agent netminder with the clear cut best track record out there is Thomas Vokoun, who is bound to be the happiest man in America because, well, no matter where he goes, he won’t be in net for the Florida Panthers anymore. Beyond Vokoun, there are a number of up-and-comers available around the league and with Dave Tippett’s strong defensive minded system in place and Sean Burke’s ability to take a netminder to the next level, Phoenix is suddenly a very appealing destination for a goalie. On top of that, the Desert Dogs have some money to spend now. If they do this right, they could even land another consistent goal scorer or two. It might not be the ideal situation, but this franchise has gotten good at rolling with the punches and succeeding anyway. In fact, the real loser here is the world of social media. Now that he’s not sharing a locker room with Paul Bissonnette, who’s going to step up and finally talk Bryz into getting a twitter account?

When all is said and done, Bryzgalov helped keep this team in Glendale and it’s sad to see him go. He’s a quirky guy whose zany antics livened up practice and the locker room. Of course, those sorts of characteristics can rub people the wrong way sometimes too, but it helps when you’re making big saves on game nights. And I don’t buy into the belief that he can’t ever be a big game goalie. I know he struggled in the playoffs the last two years; there’s no denying that. He also had stretches during the regular season where he looked unbeatable. And because all of his playoff games in Phoenix were spent with Tomas Holmstrom running him over while Pavel Datsyuk wizzed shots past his head, it’s tough to get an accurate reading on his ability to step up in big games. If you write off every goalie that has a hard time with the Red Wings, well, there just won’t be many left. That’s said, there were times when the pressure did seem to get to him. If that’s truly the case, the microscope in Philadelphia – where fans have been known to yell obscenities at Santa Claus, throw batteries, and even purposely throw up on each other - might not exactly be what he’s looking for.

One final note: within minutes of the trade breaking on Tuesday, it had become a trending topic on twitter. I understand that twitter doesn’t necessarily rule the world (yet), but this would seem to indicate to me that all of us in Arizona who supposedly don’t know what hockey is somehow still manage to find time to care about what the Coyotes are doing. And that's a good thing because this offseason could get interesting.

GLENDALE, Ariz. - The Glendale City Council votes to pay the NHL $25 million to keep the Phoenix Coyotes in Arizona for another season.

The 5 to 2 vote came a week after the league exercised its option to cash in $25 million pledged by the city a year ago.

It was standing room only -- 300 Coyotes fans showed up to the 3-hour meeting to convince the council to keep the hockey team.

One reason to keep the team is the Jobing.com stadium , which cost the city $180 million that it is still paying back.

The Westgate City Center also factored into the vote. The restaurants and stores depend on the 41 home games to stay in business.

Chicago businessman Matthew Hulsizer wants to buy the team, but the buy has been stalled as the Goldwater Institute Watchdog Group threatens a lawsuit over terms of a lease between the city and the potential owner. 
  
Now, the team has one year to find a buyer or move.

The conservative Goldwater Institute hosted a meeting Thursday on its threat to file suit to stop a deal selling the Phoenix Coyotes to investor Matthew Hulsizer.  The meeting was intended for all parties involved to understand why the Goldwater Institute feels the sale, as outlined in a December agreement approved by the Glendale City Council, is illegal.  Click here for audio and more info from the meeting

Leaders from Goldwater insisted it's an unconscionable, and illegal, use of taxpayer dollars to subsidize the operation, and Hulsizer's purchase, of the team by up to $100 million, while Hulsizer is assuming no financial risk.  Goldwater official Nick Dranius noted that the city of New Orleans provides a $1 million per year subsidy for operation of that city's Superdome.

Goldwater officials suggested that the NHL and Hulsizer assume some or all of the risk covering the team's ongoing financial losses, and/or that the city of Glendale partner with a private entity such as the Tohono O'odham tribe, which has expressed interest in such a partnership.

In comments after the meeting, Glendale mayor Elaine Scruggs said it's in the city's interest to provide whatever subsidy is necessary to keep the Coyotes at Jobing.com Arena.  Otherwise, she said, it would be a devastating financial blow to the merchants in the adjacent Westgate City Center, which would have a "ripple effect" on Glendale and the rest of the west Valley, due to the loss of business that the Coyotes' games bring to Westgate businesses.

Goldwater's Clint Bolick said that even if the city of Glendale were to lose the Coyotes, it would free up approx. 40 nights a year for other activites to be held at the arena.  "Yes, it may not produce as revenue, but it is also going to take no subsidy."

Lacking changes that take the subsidy, and the financial risk, off the backs of Glendale taxpayers, Goldwater leaders said, they will have no choice but to sue.  "The Arizona Constitution is non-negotiable as far as we're concerned," said Goldwater Institute President Darcy Olsen.  "But we have given the city a number of different ideas that could help them to comply with the Arizona Constitution, so we're hoping they might choose to look at some of those options."

The group provided the city, along with Hulsizer and his attorney, with a list of seven proposed changes in the deal that could help avoid a lawsuit.

Hulsizer (pictured below) told reporters he still intends to follow through with his purchase of the team even if Goldwater Institute sues.


PHOTO: Matthew Hulsizer talks with reporters before entering the meeting at the Goldwater Institute.