Soundin' Off

Dmitry Chesnokov referred on Twitter to this sport.ru report that Kirill Kabanov may join Salavat Yulayev (KHL) next year. One of the tags on the post says something like “possible transactions,” so I’m guessing it’s rumor, albeit strongly worded. I got a reply from the Islanders similar to the one Arthur Staple got.

Oh, and if you read the story link, make sure you scroll down to a comment from “Max99″ that references South Park. Beautiful. Crossing cultural boundaries.

Game 7 Alert: Wilkes-Barre forced a deciding game with a 4-2 win on the Rock. They’ll play it Saturday night in St. John’s.

That’s the only series left going in this round. Richard Panik came back from a puck to the face to score on a breakaway at 13:01 of overtime and knock out the Whale in Game 6 in Norfolk. Cam Talbot, ho hum, 44 saves. His line after a brilliant playoffs: 5-4, 2.10 goals-against average, .938 save percentage (307/327), two shutouts to start it all off.

Milford’s/Fairfield Prep’s/Yale’s Mark Arcobello had the first goal, an assist on the second and an assist on the winner as Oklahoma City advanced to the Western Conference Final in five games, winning the last four. Here’s the Western Final schedule.

At worlds: a little bit of “are you kidding me?” yelled at my TV this morning, but the U.S. pulled out an overtime win over Kazakhstan. Justin Faulk’s second goal, with about 22 seconds left in overtime, won it off a Max Pacioretty assist.

Canada trailed by two twice but came back to beat Finland. Russia scored six unanswered to beat Sweden. The Czechs scored three power-play goals and a short-handed goal to beat up on Italy. Think that eliminates Kazakhstan from medal-round contention (it can’t finish with more than seven points, and either Switzerland or Slovakia is guaranteed at least eight); Italy is barely alive.

And tip of cap to Steve Moria. Gerry Cantlon had him as the last of the active New Haven Nighthawks, 20 years later.

Despite an early goal and assist from Oklahoma City’s/Milford’s/Fairfield Prep’s/Yale’s/the world’s Mark Arcobello, San Antonio came back to take Game 1 of the series in OKC, 6-4. The Rampage scored the last four goals in their first-ever second-round game. Toronto also came back from an early deficit, scoring the last five in a 5-1 win to even its series with Abbotsford before the cross-country flight.

Whale-Admirals Game 2 on Friday. The Whale put out a Game 5 FAQ mostly geared toward their fans and season subscribers, but more notable down here, tickets will be $15-46 with $12 youth tickets. Doesn’t appear they’re on sale yet, but I could just be missing them.

Ak Bars Kazan announced it had re-signed Kirill Petrov (h/t: Dmitry Chesnokov). On Twitter/Sulia*, Chris Botta suggested it’s not (yet) a final answer.

Alaska is done. Las Vegas and its assorted former Sound Tigers move on to face the Eastern Conference champ. Florida has a 3-1 lead.

The Worlds begin Friday, early in the morning here. The IIHF announced it’ll stream every game on YouTube, but it also says the United States is blocked because of exclusive media agreements here (USA games are on NBC Sports, the old Versus/Outdoor Life; schedule here (h/t: Chris Peters)). Will have to take a look and see what, if any, video we get.

And hoping only the best for Mariano Rivera. (The video’s just… Ow. Man.)

*-Maybe I’m missing the point and/or huge amounts of money, but seems to me that Twitter and a single archived blog post could cut out the Sulia middleman without a problem. So please tell me it’s huge amounts of money that’s forcing me to click on all these links.

“Give Worcester credit,” Brent Thompson said. “They threw everything at us.”

“The first period, there’s no excuse,” Justin DiBenedetto said. They didn’t get a lot of bounces, he said, but “we were sloppy.”

And then this happened.

I mean, if you turned this game off in disgust at 4-1, you’ve got to be excused. This was shaping up into their second clunker against Worcester in the past couple of weeks, a messy first period turned into, well, whatever it was going to turn into in the second and third.

Blair Riley got them one back, but then the Sharks capitalized again, with John McCarthy driving to the net and driven into Kevin Poulin. (And they did get some bounces to build that lead. The second goal, Kennedy’s power-play goal, was a de Haan attempt to clear the puck to the corner that bounced off Frischmon’s skate, right into the net. The third one, early in the second, they were denied a couple of times before McCarthy came in and got it.)

But then Steve Oleksy, diving for the puck, sets up Scott Howes. The power play comes through — “it continues to get better,” Thompson said — for DiBenedetto’s first of two. Kael Mouillierat scores a pretty one on his own rebound. They get another power-play goal in the third, with help from that awful delay-of-game, puck-over-glass rule. And they’re back in first place.

Figure this game out.

….

Nothing made itself apparent tonight as far as transactions, though the Islanders announced that Evgeni Nabokov left tonight’s win in Pittsburgh with a lower-body injury. Arthur Staple noted at one point that David Ullstrom wasn’t on the bench, and indeed Ullstrom apparently didn’t play in the third period after scoring a goal in the second, but I didn’t see anything further on that.

I wasn’t entirely clear on the whole sequence of events on that early-third disallowed goal, but the fact is that the replay system isn’t supposed to be used to review a kick. So there’s that.

Oleksy played another solid game up front, moving back on the penalty kill (“our defense penalty-killed very well,” Thompson said). Almost got that disallowed goal. “He’s a leader,” Thompson said.

The lines were all over the place. Everywhere. “I had to change the chemistry,” Thompson said. ” I was juggling like I’ve never juggled before, to generate some kind of chemistry, some kind of energy.” The defense pairs settled into de Haan-Wishart as usual, but Donovan-Landry and Ness-Sinkewich.

DiBenedetto scored his 20th goal in just his 48th game. He had 19 last year.

Romano becomes the seventh player to score four assists. (Colliton did it twice.)

Islanders prospect defenseman Brenden Kichton is out for the year after surgery on a broken jaw, the Spokesman-Review reports.

Yannick Riendeau was named ECHL Player of the Week.

ECHL transactions say Brandon Gentile was returned to Alaska, though Charlotte didn’t have its half of that transaction on the official books before tonight’s game.

And finally, have you waited patiently for three years to see Mikko Koskinen take a couple of swings at a guy and get a right hand to the chops for his troubles? Thanks to Lighthouse Hockey, wait no more.

4:15 edit: Micheal Haley and Mike Moore were suspended three games apiece. Haley can return next Tuesday against… Worcester. Moore will serve his third game that night.

With one more Persson than usual. (One more Clarke, too.)

Meanwhile, Graham James gets two years in prison. Terry Jones and Jesse Spector sum it up pretty well.

…

Edit: To break out some newsy stuff, some of which broke in-chat:

–John Persson is in on an ATO, and he’ll likely play tomorrow in Binghamton. Skated with Trevor Frischmon and Sean Backman today. With Anders Nilsson out, Quinnipiac’s Dan Clarke signed an ATO.

–The Islanders quietly traded for former Providence defenseman Yury Alexandrov. (For what it’s worth, that is how it was transliterated on Providence’s roster last year. You’ll see “Yuri.” Not inaccurate.) Alexandrov had four points in his first five games against Bridgeport and was utterly robbed of a goal by Kevin Poulin at least once, which is probably part of why I remembered the name. He’s back in Russia this season. This site notes that he signed a two-year deal to play in the KHL after leaving halfway through a two-year entry-level contract with the Bruins.

–Arthur Staple reports that Anders Lee is staying at Notre Dame, which leaves open the possibility that he could become a free agent next summer, like Jason Gregoire and Blake Kessel last summer.

–And Mario, I feel bad. Just making a joke off “tonight” that came out jerky. Sorry.

In warmup, Romano was saucering a puck across the ice. He missed and lofted it over the glass.

It was that kind of night. They played two of the weirdest periods you’ll ever see, picked it up at the end of the third, but haven’t won a game since that bad hop to Kris Newbury two weeks ago.

The way Worcester was coming and the way Bridgeport let it come, it was a matter of time. The way Worcester finally scored, twice in a blink, just added to the chaos. A goalie change, then a goalie injury (with a guy left unbelievably wide open at the top of the crease as two Sound Tigers went to the initial shooter), then a bad change…

Last week, even in losing, they didn’t look like this. They were in every game to the last. Last night, from all accounts, a bounce or two and it’s a different night. This one…

“Something we’ve been proud of all year is consistency, 60 minutes in a game,” Thompson said. “Tonight, we faced a bit of adversity, and we shut it down.” There’s time to turn that around, and they did pick it up again late.

“Character rises to the top,” Thompson said.

He feels it’s there. It’s what he’ll be looking for. It’s what they’ll need.

“We played 90 percent of the game,” Calvin de Haan said. “If we had an effort consistent for 60 minutes, it’d make a difference.”

….

Anders Nilsson turned an ankle, and apparently it’s not as serious as they initially thought. Thompson said his plan was to come back with Poulin for the third, to see if the change could spark Bridgeport a bit after they got down. Odd turn of events.

Haley on his assorted fights, including the one on the way back from the penalty box: “That’s hockey.”

Erik this afternoon was wondering about John Persson; no immediate confirmation from here of a report that Persson’s coming.

The Whale won a see-saw game in a shootout and moved two points ahead. Meanwhile, Manchester is only three points back, though the Monarchs have played a couple of more games. Slacker Yalie Brian O’Neill was apparently on spring break and didn’t score, stuck on one goal in two games.

Prescout. Senators had a 2-0 lead and couldn’t hang on.

At the other end of the standings, Norfolk set the single-season record with its 18th win in a row.

And a hat tip to the retiring Bruce Jaffe at Prep.

The Sound Tigers apparently have lost Dylan Reese for the weekend; as Arthur Staple figured a couple of days ago, he reports tonight that Reese is joining the Islanders in Anaheim.

The Sound Tigers practiced in Portland on Thursday and then went Go-Karting; check out the various Sound Tigers’ Twitter feeds for more. “Rhitt” and “Jean Girard” posted photos with the agate.

Bridgeport and Charlotte are the only two AHL teams off Friday night. The Pirates, in fact, travel while the Sound Tigers hang out in their hometown.

A Sports Illustrated poll ranked Frans Nielsen as No. 9 on a list of underrated NHL players. Fill in the punchline.

The Falcons have deals to stay in Springfield, with Columbus until at least 2014. They also have a deal with Manny Legace, a full-season AHL contract to replace his PTO, according to the AHL transactions.

Hershey and Adirondack meet Friday at Citizens Bank Park. All those questions about what the attendance was at Rentschler last year will immediately become moot when the puck drops.

Well, that was fast: Peter Mannino back up to St. John’s.

San Jose called Tommy Wingels up from Worcester. The AHL Sharks signed an interesting name to replace him: Alex Bourret, the former Hartford Wolf Pack forward (we used to jokingly call him “Pavel,” the way he scored against Bridgeport), who hasn’t been seen in the AHL since 2009. (Interesting set of transactions in which Bourret has been involved.)

The Hockey Rodent has begun the “John Tortorella, We’ve Got Your Back Fund.”

Some kind of championship game at the World Juniors: Sweden outshot Russia something like 458-2 58-17 but were still scoreless after 60 because of Andrei Makarov. (Russia actually had 12 of those shots in the third.) Senators draft pick Mika Zibanejad finally scored the winner at 10:09 of overtime to secure the first gold at this tournament since 1981 for the Swedes, who included Islanders draft pick Johan Sundstrom. Canada earned the bronze with a 4-0 win over Finland. (We’re No. 7, thanks to a 2-1 win over Switzerland on Wednesday; worst finish since 1999.)

And you’ve probably heard the story by now of Jack Jablonski, the Minnesota high school hockey player who was paralyzed after a hit from behind recently. A fund has been set up to help him and his family.

As noted in the chat, Isles draft pick Corey Trivino is off the team at BU after he was arrested Sunday night on some serious charges. The student paper had some strong quotes from Jack Parker, as did College Hockey News’ Scott McLaughlin on Twitter. Here’s the AP story with comment from Trivino’s lawyer.

Brighter news: Binghamton’s Patrick Wiercioch is out of the hospital.

Randomly caught: story on the daughter of Jim Sanca, who you’ll remember was an emergency backup several times for the Sound Tigers.

Injuries to Rick DiPietro and Nino Niederreiter have created NHL opportunities for Kevin Poulin and Tim Wallace, recalled tonight from the Sound Tigers. (The big club also put Andrew MacDonald on injured reserve, right leg, mid-December to early January; they also announced Jay Pandolfo on injured reserve, though he was listed that way on game notes last week at this time). The Islanders say Poulin and Wallace are both emergency recalls.

To be determined what, if anything, that’ll mean for Bridgeport’s roster, but it’s not pressing: Bridgeport doesn’t play until Saturday*. The Sound Tigers had an extra at forward and were hoping that Trevor Gillies will be ready to go this week. Goalie would obviously be an issue if Poulin remains up the whole week, but again, not until Saturday. And lots could change in the meantime: The Islanders play twice before Bridgeport plays again. Nothing on today’s ECHL transactions, for whatever that means.

Isles draft pick Johan Sundstrom is going back to the World Juniors.

The Whale will have several of their games, including three against the Sound Tigers, air on CPTV Sports, tape delayed and edited.

Stan Drulia, former New Haven Nighthawk, moves up from Wheeling to Milwaukee as an assistant to Ian Herbers.

And hey, it’ll be Tuesday before you know it. Chat below at 1:30:

*-Just in case, a reminder that a game originally scheduled for Wednesday was moved some time ago to March 27.

After an afternoon at the DMV, we’re sitting in the living room; we’ll listen and liveblog it. Without Phil, appears you’ll be able to get Adirondack’s Bob Rotruck call here. In addition to Jamie’s tweets, follow the Post-Star’s Tim McManus.

(Spared seeing two banners that dredge up bittersweet memories, anyway.)

Considering what has clogged up various internet searches of mine over the past 60 hours, there are apparently illegal video streams out there. Either that, or there are links all over the place that will virusize your computer. Fear of the latter will certainly keep me on the Phantoms radio network.

Jamie noted that Bridgeport has never defeated the Adirondack Phantoms; two 4-2 losses at home, then two 3-2 shootout losses on the road. I noted that the Sound Tigers have also never defeated the Adirondack Red Wings. But Merkosky and the boys can’t duck the Tigers forever.

OrgNotes: Jeremy Colliton is officially here. Kirill Kabanov’s rights in the QMJHL were traded to Shawinigan. Rick DiPietro has a concussion and is out indefinitely, suddenly putting both teams’ three-goalie logjam a heartbeat away from normality.

Anders Nilsson, tweets Jamie, vs. Michael Leighton. Gallant, Klementyev and Koskinen appear scratched. If practice was indicative, that could mean something like:
McNeely-Ullstrom-Colliton (C)
DiBenedetto-Cizikas-Backman
Haley-Frischmon (A)-Wallace (A)
Romano-Langkow-Marcinko
Donovan-Reese
Ness-de Haan
Olson-Wishart

–From the tweets, switch Marcinko and Romano.

–Jamie points out that, because Bridgeport is wearing white tonight (not sure who’s got the special jerseys), the A’s are on DiBenedetto and Reese.

–The box is here. While we’re there, Prescout.

–Phantoms lead 1-0 on the rush on a Benn Olson delay-of-game minor. Tom Sestito on a rebound.

–Sound Tigers tie it with the fourth line on, apparently a goal Bob Rotruck thinks came from behind the goal line. Langkow from Marcinko and Romano.

–It’s still 1-1 after one. Bridgeport had about a 40-second five-on-three with no results. Tony Romano’s second minor of the period carries over into the second for 56 seconds.

–Former Sacred Heart standout Pierre-Luc O’Brien has the first goal of the ECHL season. He’s with South Carolina again this year.

–Bang: Brayden Schenn scores seconds into the second period. 2-1 Adirondack.

–Tyler McNeely has had a couple of good scoring chances early in the second, to no avail. Bridgeport to the power play, and for the fourth time in five periods, it’s DiBenedetto from Cizikas, tied up.

–Harry Zolnierczyk gets the goal right back, quickly into a Frischmon slashing penalty. 3-2 Adirondack. The Phantoms are 3-for-5 on the power play, six minutes into the second.

–Bridgeport gets a bench minor, unsportsmanlike conduct, in mid-play midway through the second. Wonder what that was all about.

–Adirondack has killed a couple of power plays early in the third period. Meanwhile, Nathan Lawson has a 40-save shutout to spoil St. John’s home opener.

–Dan Jancevski scores from the point to make it 4-2 Adirondack with 11:21 to go. Zolnierczyk has three points. Both teams’ Twitter feeds say the shot went through the net, which led to a moment’s indecision for referee Chris Brown.

–Sounds like a couple of giveaways in short order, and Schenn capitalizes on the second: 5-2. Time out, Bridgeport. Zolnierczyk credited with his fourth point. Tim McManus questions the assists on Jancevski’s goal, and now Bob Rotruck’s questioning those on this one. Either way, Bridgeport down by three.

–Assist change gives Schenn a third point and drops Zolnierczyk back to three. Bridgeport on a PP with about six minutes to go.

–Bridgeport gets one back on that power play. Ness shot deflects on the way in. It’s Colliton on that deflection.

–Schenn puts his third goal into the empty net. It’s 6-3. Four points now for him and Zolnierczyk, and Wellwood has three assists. That’s how it ends: Adirondack 6, Bridgeport 3.

Found dead today at home. Only 27.

….

Given that the Islanders haven’t announced the signings of Brian Day and Shane Sims (not to mention the fact that Sims’ vestigial appearance on the Isles’ NHL.com roster* has disappeared), have to guess they have joined the ranks of the unrestricted free agents. Have an e-mail in to double-check.

And belatedly, RIP, Ernie Johnson Sr.

*-It was left over from his ATO stint in April.

While we watched Shelton National and Seymour slug it out, the Islanders subtly acknowledged receipt of signed qualifying offers from Micheal Haley, Dylan Reese and Ty Wishart. That makes 42 NHL contracts, with only Josh Bailey outstanding as a restricted free agent. (In that, we treat Blake Comeau, headed for arbitration and apparently for the aisle as well, as signed, and we also count Nino Niederreiter and Kirill Kabanov, whose contracts wouldn’t count against the 50 if they were sent back to junior before playing 10 games.)

Binghamton’s fourth line got the Senators a lead, and the Calder Cup Final is tied up after the Sens’ 3-0 win in Game 4. Sounds as if Houston didn’t have much going, and three penalties in a row late in the first period made sure the Aeros wouldn’t get much going. Robin Lehner got the shutout. Game 5 is Saturday night, and Game 6 is now a guarantee for Tuesday.

In the QMJHL dispersal draft, Kirill Kabanov went to Montreal.

And RIP, James Arness and Jack Kevorkian.