hockey

With a new season starting Thursday night against the Minnesota Wild, the Blue Jackets are setting their sights on success.

The Columbus Blue Jackets season opens Thursday night after the tragic and unexpected loss of star player Johnny Gaudreau in August.

The Flyers tapped their sticks in appreciation of Guy Gaudreau, a former hockey coach at Hollydell Ice Arena and Gloucester Catholic High School in New Jersey, when he hit the ice to assist with drills during practice. The Flyers shook Gaudreau’s hand at the end of the skate in appreciation and thanked him for helping out.

One of the worst teams in the NHL last season, the Blue Jackets must find a way to move forward with a new general manager and new coach and with a huge void left on and off the ice by the death of the 31-year-old Johnny Gaudreau.

Hearing the familiar sounds of clacking sticks and pucks banging off the boards and glass while watching Columbus Blue Jackets prospects from the stands of a cold rink on a warm late-summer afternoon was not enough to wash away the lingering residuals of grief for Don Waddell on Saturday.

The driver charged with killing Columbus Blue Jacket Johnny Gaudreau and his brother Matthew as they bicycled on a rural road had a blood-alcohol level of .087, above the .08 legal limit in New Jersey, a prosecutor said Friday.

Dozens of current and former players from around the league, or their significant others, are listed among the more than 7,600 donors, including $3,000 from the family of New York Rangers forward Artemi Panarin and $2,013 from Matt Duchene of the Dallas Stars, for a total of $546,172 — well beyond the initial $30,000 goal.

New Columbus Blue Jackets general manager and head of hockey operations Don Waddell said he has a roadmap for his new job and hopes to find success with his new team.

Joy Dunne scored the only goal of the match with 7:12 remaining to spark top-seeded Ohio State to a 1-0 victory over defending-champion and second-seeded Wisconsin in the final of the women’s Frozen Four.

New Head Coach Mike Babcock said in a statement that a hockey podcast commenting on his actions was a “gross misrepresentation of those meetings and extremely offensive.”