On the Tampa Bay Lightning and Jonathan Drouin …
Joe Smith of the Tampa Bay Tribune: Not many expected Jonathan Drouin to be back in a Tampa Bay Lightning jersey after he requested a trade and later walking out on their minor league team.
Drouin wouldn’t comment on whether his trade request is still on the table and what his future with the Lightning will be. Coach Jon Cooper after Drouin was recalled.
“Jo Drouin earned this callup,” coach Jon Cooper said. “(The trade request) is what he felt he had to do. He’s a big part of the Tampa Bay Lightning and a big part of us. Do players look at him differently in the room? Not at all. Do coaches look at him (differently)? No. He had a belief in something, and he stood by his ground. Can’t say anything is wrong with that.”
Drouin on if he has any regrets with the way he handled the situation.
“It’s hard to say right now,” Drouin said. “I’ve said that before. Maybe looking back in a couple years, I might want to do a few things differently.”
On the Detroit Red Wings and Pavel Datsyuk …
Chris Nichols of Today’s Slapshot: Darren Dreger on TSN 960 on the Detroit Red Wings and Pavel Datsyuk.
“Well, it’s certainly up in the air. I feel like he will, and that’s just based on some of the intel that I’m getting from the Detroit Red Wings. I know that they’re not grilling Pavel Datsyuk game in and game out, week in and week out, to see whether or not he’s going to honor the final week of his contract. They hope and believe that he will, and they have no reason to think that he’s not going to do that.
…
“I don’t think that Pavel Datsyuk knows that for sure. If I were betting, I would still lean to some degree on him returning, and I think that’s how the Red Wings feel. But I’m sure that there’ll be a pretty difficult discussion at the end of this season. It may take a little bit of time. Again, traditionally what they do in Detroit – like a lot of clubs, they allow their veteran players, particularly when they’re from Europe, or in this case Russia, to go back and spend a little time at home before they reconnect to say, ‘Okay, what are your views. What’s going on here.’