Midweek link roundup

A lot has happened in hockey the last few days. A ton of links below the jump:


Indy Fuel/ECHL

• The Fuel have signed three players this week: Center Kenton Miller, winger Garrett Klotz and defenseman Anders Franzon.  
• ECHL news: The Stockton Thunder renewed their affiliation with the Islanders.  
• The Chicago Blackhawks' development camp opens this week. It's very heavy on college players -- as was this year's draft -- but it's a good peek into the rookies and unsigned draftees in the system. The underlined players have been drafted/signed by Chicago, the ones with asterisks are free agent invitees. There's a good chance we'll see a few of these players in an Indy Fuel sweater in the coming years. 

Indiana Ice/USHL

• Former Indiana Ice player Rinat Valiev, the Maple Leafs' third-round pick, signed an entry-level deal on Thursday. Valiev is a 1995 birth-year major junior player, so unless he sticks in Toronto, he will have one more year in Kootenay. 
• Another former Ice player, Anthony Bitetto, has re-signed with the Nashville Predators. Bitetto played for their AHL affiliate, the Milwaukee Admirals, last season. 
• Brent Gwidt, who captained the Ice's Clark Cup championship team in 2008-09, has re-signed with the ECHL's Utah Grizzlies.
• College Hockey Inc. has a list of the college players invited to NHL development camps. The familiar names: Sam Kurker & Dwyer Tschantz (St. Louis), Robbie Baillargeon (Ottawa), Christian Hilbrich (Anaheim & Buffalo), Sean Kuraly (San Jose), David Johnstone (Detroit), Kevin Goumas (Philadelphia), Nick Mattson (Chicago), Ryan Obuchowski (Chicago & Detroit), Brian Pinho (Washington), Jon Gillies (Calgary), Patrick Newell (Los Angeles), Woody Hudson (NY Islanders), Aidan Muir (Edmonton). Hudson, Obuchowski, Newell, Hilbrich & Johnstone are free agent invites. Goumas is under contract with the Flyers. There are a few others who are currently in or came through Canadian Major Junior and therefore not on the list -- Ryan Mantha (NY Rangers), Blake Siebenaler (Columbus), Rinat Valiev (Toronto) and Adam Erne (Tampa Bay) among them. 
• The Calgary Flames had a piece (with video) on former Ice goaltender Jon Gillies, one of their draft picks.  
• Former Ice coach Jeff Blashill had a chat with a Detroit radio station after the Wings' development camp. Listen to it here.

Hoosier hockey

• Should've had this in the last link roundup, but better late than never. The Indianapolis Star had a nice piece on Zionsville native John-Michael Liles, who is currently playing defense for the Carolina Hurricanes.  
• The IU club team has a new coach in former player Greg Benz. The Hoosiers have been a usually-strong program at the ACHA club level.

Elsewhere in hockey

• The big news in hockey was the Blackhawks' extensions to Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane, at an average of $10.5 million per year through 2023. Here's the breakdown, and Bob Verdi's Blackhawks.com column on their re-signings. THN's Rory Boylen says they got paid a fair market price. We weighed in, too, looking at what it means for the developmental system.  
• The St. Louis Blues -- another team with a significant Central Indiana fanbase -- were also active, re-signing Steve Ott for two years, but losing versatile center Vladimir Sobotka to the KHL. 
• The AHL has made some pretty radical rule changes, and given the AHL's role as an incubator, one might expect to see these spread to other levels of hockey soon. The most notable -- and interesting -- is the change to OT. Teams will switch ends to ensure the long change during OT, and the rink will be dry-scraped. OT will extend to 7:00, with the first 3:00 4-on-4. At the first whistle with 4:00 or less showing on the clock, teams will drop a player and play 3-on-3. The USHL experimented with 3-on-3 overtime during the preseason last year, and 8 of the 9 games played in Indy saw a result in the period. Two other changes -- automatic game misconduct for a second fighting major in a game, and the international rule on losing a helmet (automatic minor penalty if your helmet falls off and you continue in the play). 
• Looking ahead to the 2022 Winter Olympics, the three finalists are Almaty, Kazakhstan; Oslo, Norway; and Beijing, China. Whether NHL players play or if it's like the late-1980s/early-1990s tournaments stocked with minor-league and European pro players (resembling the annual World Championships in the spring) but there will be a hockey tournament and we'll be watching. Peyongchang, South Korea will host the 2018 tourney.
• A nice piece on former Boston Bruin Marc Savard, who hasn't been able to play since the 2010-11 season after suffering from concussions. He's found a niche with golf and is playing in a Canadian professional tournament this weekend.
• THN has a pretty cool feature with ticket stubs from some of the biggest events in hockey over the years.
• Condolences to the Peoria Rivermen, their fans and the family and friends of Bruce Saurs. The longtime Rivermen owner passed away Thursday at age 88. Saurs owned the Rivermen through four different leagues, won championships in the IHL and ECHL, and stepped up to save hockey in Peoria this spring when the AHL Rivermen team was moved. He was a key figure in the International Hockey League when the Indianapolis Ice played in the circuit in the 1990s and often went toe-to-toe with Saurs' Rivermen.