from Larry Brooks of the NY Post,

Yesterday’s NHL Players’ Association conference call that included up to 100 participants was less a campaign rally than an informational exercise in which the athletes implored union leadership to continue to request face-to-face meetings with the NHL in an effort to end the lockout that has reached 48 days without an end in sight.

“It’s critical that we have open lines of communication with the league,” Rangers’ player rep Martin Biron told The Post after the call concluded. “We need to meet and be able to discuss all of the issues that stand between us.

“There’s no other way to reach an agreement. We’re ready to talk about everything. The last couple of weeks, the league would only meet with us if we agreed beforehand to all of their proposed changes regarding contract issues.

“That’s not going to happen,” Biron said. “I’d say two or three guys per team spoke on the call — Jeff Halpern also from the Rangers — and there wasn’t anyone who thought we should agree to pre-conditions for meeting ... or to the league’s proposals for contract changes.”

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