Ken Hitchcock’s firing is another blessing for the Vegas Golden Knights

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Lace ‘em up. Time for the Morning Skate.

Nothing like breaking news to go with your morning coffee.

Ken Hitchcock is OUT as the Blues head coach. Mike Yeo, of Minnesota Wild fame, is IN.

This is a move that was going to happen after the season regardless; Hitchcock said he’s moving on and Yeo was hired to learn and then replace. But that it happened now is a surprise, even after a rough January.

Hitch is a great coach and a good dude, so you hate to see his career end like this if he does decide to retire. But if he doesn’t, the NHL coaching market is suddenly flushed with talent.

Vegas could have Jack Capuano, Gerard Gallant, Claude Julien (doubtful) and Hitchcock to choose from. Not many expansion teams have that luxury.

Apparently neither Penguins goalie is happy with the timeshare. And that makes sense. Fleury is a vet who’s owned that Pittsburgh net for about a decade. Murray just led the team to a Stanley Cup. Both (rightly) feel like they deserve more time.

A split is inevitable. But to where?

GM Jim Rutherford is going to benefit from the fact that Ben Bishop has played his way out of a lot of trade talk with the Lightning this season. Fleury jumps right back to the top of the goalie market. And the Flames and Jets feel like decent fits if Brian Elliott and/or the Jets’ combination of Connor Hellebuyck, Michael Hutchinson and Ondrej Pavelec don’t start working out.

Who knows. But the likelihood of a Fleury trade seems far higher than it did two months ago, at least.

We took a look at the road ahead for the Western Conference playoff favorites ...

... and the teams chasing them down over the next two months.

Look for our Eastern Conference status reports tomorrow!

By that we mean that nobody could keep pucks out of their net.

Carolina utterly destroyed the Flyers.

The All-Star Game TV ratings were the best since 2004.

Rangers forward Mika Zibanejad (a Swedish-Iranian) says he’s been affected by President Trump’s travel ban.

Jonathan Toews kind of trashed the World Cup of Hockey.