SCOTT TAYLOR ’ S NOTEBOOK
Bowman Talks St . Malo ’ s Travis Hamonic
By Scotty Bowman
Photo by Jeff Miller
TAMPA , Fla . -- Travis Hamonic , from St . Malo , Man ., is one of those defensemen who is now among the game ’ s elite . He ’ s a player who brings consistency to the rink every night . He is a good solid player who defends well and is strong physically . He can skate and that ’ s now one of the most important attributes for a defenseman in the NHL . The way the game is played now defenseman have to have so many more skills than they used to , because they now mean so much to the attack . The end zone is bigger and they defend it a lot differently than they did , say , 10 years ago . If you get that defensemen coming in late , he seems to get the scoring chances that many of the forwards aren ’ t getting . The problem is , when you get a good defenseman you might overplay him and he ’ s not as fresh as he should be . We see these top defensemen around the league like Hamonic and another Manitoban , Michael Stone , getting 27-28-30 minutes of ice time a night and that might be too much . These days , you need your best defensemen to be fresh so they can follow up the play and still be in position to get back if there is a turnover . It ’ s been tough for Hamonic this season because of injury and because the Islanders don ’ t play the same way as they did last year . They used to be an attacking team and this year they seem to play far too long in their own end . They lost two pretty good forwards this year in Okposo and Nielsen and if you lose two of your Top 6 , that ’ s a lot . That ’ s why a player such as Hamonic , a guy who is big ( 6-foot-2 , 210 pounds ), experienced and smart , yet only 26-years-old , is so important to the Islanders . He ’ s really good around the net , really smart and he ’ s a guy that would be ideal for any team in the NHL because of two things : Consistency and the fact that ’ s he ’ s so physically strong . When you get that combination , you have the kind of NHL defenseman who can play anywhere , with anybody . He ’ s an elite player .
William Scott ( Scotty ) Bowman , OC , was born on Sept . 18 , 1933 and holds the record for most regular season wins by a head coach in the NHL with 1,244 and most playoff wins by a head coach with 223 . He has 14 Stanley Cup victories , second all-time by any player , coach or executive ( Jean Beliveau has 17 ) in history . He is currently the Senior Advisor of Hockey Operations for the Chicago Blackhawks and still regularly scouts the Tampa Bay Lightning games for the Hawks . He is a member of the Game On Magazine editorial board .
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