Soundin' Off

Today was an optional, as the nine forwards/four D/one goalie alignment probably would’ve told you. Brent Thompson reiterated “day-to-day” on the injured David Ullstrom, Jon Landry and Trevor Frischmon, and said they’d probably get tomorrow off, too, though he said Ullstrom might give it a try. We’ll see. Anders Nilsson got back on the ice for the first time, but “it doesn’t look like he’ll be practicing anytime soon with us.” Jeremy Colliton remains out.

Justin DiBenedetto on his Saturday altercation with goalie Michael Hutchinson: “Just the heat of the moment. It is what it is … Emotions run high.” He said he hadn’t heard anything about anything further from his last-five-minutes instigator penalty, which at least by rule carries a one-game suspension.

….

So a quick playoffs reset (and hey, tickets are on sale):

–Bridgeport can’t finish fourth anymore (can’t catch Wilkes-Barre without winning the division), could mathematically but probably won’t finish second (by winning out while St. John’s loses out in regulation), has a slight chance of finishing fifth (lose the division to Hartford while gaining one more point than Hershey over the final three games). Still the most likely finishes: either third (the magic number remains three points after the Whale’s win Sunday at Hershey) or sixth (gaining fewer than three points while Hershey gains the same or better and the Whale wins the division).

The Sound Tigers’ possible opponents are down to the Whale (as either the third or sixth seed), Wilkes-Barre (as that unlikely fifth seed), Hershey (as the third if the Bears slip behind the Whale), Syracuse (as the third or that unlikely second), Manchester (ditto), and three other teams only as the second seed: Portland, Adirondack or Providence (Bridgeport would have to beat the Bruins in overtime Friday for that to have even a chance of happening).

–The Penguins need one point gained by them or lost by Hershey to clinch fourth. Otherwise, they’re fifth and Hershey’s fourth; no other team can be fourth. The Bears can slip no lower than sixth, which may be unlikely but isn’t impossible; they’re pretty injury-/call-up-ravaged, they’re on a five-game winless streak, they’re definitely without the tiebreaker against Bridgeport, and they’re down the season-series tiebreaker against the Whale if Hartford wins two more games in regulation this week than they do, making up the necessary four points.

–The Whale clinched their spot on Sunday but could still finish third or anywhere from fifth (that Hershey scenario) to eighth, but if — let’s just put it as “their magic number against Syracuse is three, and it’s two against Manchester” — they’ll be no worse than sixth.

–Norfolk’s 1. St. John’s is a point away from 2.

–Syracuse has a tiny bit of breathing room but probably doesn’t want to play with tiebreakers; it could finish anywhere from sixth to 11th. Manchester has good news and bad news: It has four games to play, and it has to play four games (though the first is Tuesday; two days to rest after a short ride).

–Only two games mid-week in the known conference: Manchester at Worcester on Tuesday (a Monarchs point would eliminate Worcester: if there’s a tie at Worcester’s max of 78/31, it could only be among Worcester, Manchester and Springfield, both of whom beat the Sharks in the season series), and the Whale at Portland on Wednesday.

And then a big weekend.

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We’ll chat tomorrow at 1:30. Box at the bottom.

Edit: Norfolk’s Jon Cooper was voted AHL coach of the year, the Louis A.R. Pieri Award. Imagine Brent Thompson was a candidate on some ballots.

Former Lock Monsters and River Rats coach Tom Rowe is the new coach of Lokomotiv Yaroslavl.

Poking through the Central Scouting draft rankings to look for locals; Deerfield’s/New Canaan’s Alexander Gonye is 103rd, and Brunswick’s/New Canaan’s Kevin Duane is 145th among North American skaters. If you know of any others, let me know. Enfield’s Robbie Baillargeon is 50th. At 111th, Kristoff Kontos is the son of former New Haven Nighthawk Chris Kontos.

Mike Vaccaro on hockey fans.

I somehow managed to miss the Ozzie Guillen firestorm this weekend; not sure how, but still. I try hard not one of those who believes that if your political views differ from mine, you must be a jerk/idiot/reprehensible human being. That said: Jeez, Ozzie.

And finally, I don’t know, which jacket fits Bubba Watson better?

(Just to disclaim, that’s not my own copy under my name there; may be AP. I had tossed up a short bulletin on his win, and someone else updated the post.)

Playoff intensity, playoff crowd, almost playoff weather*, and now they’re matching lines like it’s May.

“Every team has key guys,” Jeremy Colliton said. “We’re playing a team game. Everybody has to be responsible defensively.”

Colliton’s line and Trevor Frischmon’s line drew a lot of the defensive responsibilities this weekend, Frischmon against the Falcons’ big line Saturday and both (mostly Colliton, but both) against Wolski on Sunday. The Whale got one goal, when they were working to get the personnel off against the wrong matchup and then back on when Wolski hopped off the bench and stole the puck.

Bridgeport tied it soon after, won it much later. In between, it was a whole lot of Jon Landry and Ty Wishart against Wolski-Newbury-Zuccarello.

“It’s fun to be lined up against the top line,” Landry said. “Those three, they’re a pretty talented group.”

“Those guys are great hockey players,” Thompson said. “They’ve played in the NHL. … Wishart has played in the NHL. Landry’s a big guy who can move the puck.”

Thompson liked, too, that it gave Cizikas’ and Mouillierat’s line a chance against other guys.

“I really don’t care who plays against who. You get to the next level, you’ve got to be solid defensively.”

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Speaking of the next level… Nobody saying anything, but there were signs Ty Wishart could be getting a call up. Not necessarily relatedly, ECHL transactions say Benn Olson is coming back. Olson had no points, was a minus-2 and had 46 penalty minutes in 11 games with Alaska.

Replay Scoreboard: Second use, 37 seconds of overtime. David Ullstrom shot goes in over Chad Johnson’s glove and off the back bar. Mats Zuccarello heads to the scorer’s table and asks for a review; Jon McIsaac obliges. The monitor has to come up from under the table. They take a moment to cue up the video. McIsaac confirms the play and comes out after about five minutes pointing to center ice.

(They are, as Dave Andrews said last month, working out the kinks.)

Sound Tigers shooters are back to .500 on penalty shots, 11-for-22, after Scott Howes’ miss. They’re 1-for-3 this year, Tyler McNeely stopped at Springfield on Nov. 12 and Nino Niederreiter’s goal at Hershey the next day.

Speaking of, Thompson said McNeely’s X-rays were negative.

Ullstrom now has three points in overtime, tied for 12th all-time in team history.

Cizikas’ point streak ended at eight.

Attendance was 7,693, three short of the season high and 15th all-time. Nine of the top 16 crowds have come on visits from teams from Hartford.

New Canaan’s Jack Downing has a goal in four of the past five games for Binghamton.

Haven’t read it yet, but I’m sure this is going to be great stuff on Steve MacIntyre from Jonathan Bombulie.

And birthday boy Matt Bain headed out quickly. Smart man. Though there was a conspiratorial little huddle in the hallway after he left, something about what was going to happen to his room…

*-I take that back. It has been fine out there, but it’s pretty darn cold tonight.

Not in Portland tonight, so we’ll liveblog from the living room again. Tossing the post up a little early because there’s a bit of afternoon news.

Bridgeport let Jon Landry go from his PTO, apparently so he could sign an AHL deal with Worcester. (Worcester hasn’t sent out an official announcement of this, but the transaction has been in the system since about 1 p.m., before Bridgeport had announced his release.) Unclear at this writing what it means for tonight’s lineup. O’Neill had said he was a no-go for the trip. Reese was likely to go, but it wasn’t clear that he was ready to jump back in. There was no move on the ECHL transactions. (Then again, Chris Roy just tweeted that the Pirates might be short-handed tonight, so maybe we party like it’s 2007 and go with 17 for both teams.)

Elsewhere: Rookie Taylor Hall is done for the year with a high ankle sprain, so Edmonton called up Alex Giroux. OKC signed Bryan Helmer to a contract through next season.

I think Phil was headed up there, so that’s the feed off which we’ll work. Back for more around 6:30, or updates in the meantime as warranted.

–Scheduled referee, working a Bridgeport game for the first time, is Chicago-area-native Jarrod Ragusin.

–Tonight is (assuming he wasn’t quietly released so he could sign with Worcester) the final game of Brandon Svendsen’s second pro tryout. For as much physical punishment as he has taken, for as many practice days he has needed to take off, for as many times as he has been banged up repeatedly, tonight will be his 50th game: He hasn’t missed one yet. Not bad at all.

–Jamie tweets that it looks as if Bridgeport will dress 13 and five, though he disclaimed that he’ll confirm in warmup. That would imply Colliton plays. Here are yesterday’s lines (minus Landry and O’Neill), with letter-guesses and a note that Colliton was in green with the rest of the Ullstrom line:

BRIDGEPORT
F: Rakhshani-Hisey-Joensuu
Bourbeau-Romano-Figren
Taylor-Marcinko-Gallant
Svendsen-Ullstrom-Castonguay-Colliton (A)
D: Motherwell-Wotton (C)
Olson-Frank
Kohn (A)
G: Koskinen
Martin

–Koskinen vs. Leggio (Enroth is up).

–Chris Roy tweets that Portland’s Mark Mancari has been called up.

–Jamie’s tweet has Colliton on left wing and Svendsen with Marcinko and Taylor on the rushes, with Gallant as the extra.

–Game on.

–Paul Byron gives the Pirates a lead on a power play off Gragnani’s set-up. Mark Parrish gets the second assist at 7:43.

–It’s still 1-0 after one. The Sound Tigers killed another penalty. Jean Bourbeau stepped off a half-minute early with Mike Schroeder off to join him.

–As Period 2 begins, Jamie notes that neither Bourbeau nor Schroeder are at the bench.

–But then Phil calls Bourbeau’s name early.

–Castonguay ties it early in the second off a Colliton steal. 1-1.

–A brief five-on-three for Bridgeport on back-to-back penalties, Lagace trip/Byron slash. That passes easily after a Pirates clear, but the Sound Tigers will have a chance on the second minor.

–Just 23 seconds out of the box, Byron rushes up the right wing and scores high on Koskinen for a 2-1 Portland lead.

–And just 12 seconds after that, Portland gets it quickly up ice, and on a second chance, rookie Luke Adam scores his 20th. 3-1.

–And now a penalty to come on Bridgeport. And now a long five-on-three. Ullstrom rough, Hisey hook.

–But now Byron high-sticks Wotton to make it a four-on-three for 47 seconds.

–T.J. Brennan scores on the four-on-three to make it 4-1 Portland. Three points for Mark Parrish.

–And back and forth, Colliton to Ullstrom, right before the power play ends, Bridgeport cuts it to 4-2. Colliton and Castonguay have two points.

–Actually, the time is officially 13:35, exactly two minutes after the Byron goal, which I think makes it not a PPG regardless of what’s on the penalty clock. We’ll see if I remember right.

–Colin Stuart scores on a Castonguay tripping minor. Gragnani has three points now. It’s 5-2. And then it gets rough.

–Those penalties manage to offset. But then Gallant goes looking for trouble, and then Tuzzolino gets the only penalty. One minute of power-play time for Bridgeport in this period, then one more in the next if they don’t score.

–It’s 5-2 after two.

–Third about to begin.

–Figren draws a quick penalty, and then Rakhshani scores on a rebound eight seconds into the five-on-three. They’ll have almost two minutes on Stuart’s hooking minor.

—Stuart scores off a turnover to make it 6-3, just about three minutes into the third.

–Marcinko and Tuzzolino tussle. Roughing penalties. Phil notes that he doesn’t see Benn Olson anywhere. By the way, Joensuu’s last AHL fight before tonight was April 5, 2009. His opponent? Benn Olson.

–Ullstrom (who, the tweets note, turned the puck over on the second Stuart goal) goes for hooking with 14 minutes left. The Pirates are 3-for-5 on the power play.

–Bridgeport kills that, but right off the draw on a Wotton interference penalty, Adam scores. It’s 7-3 with 11:04 to go.

–And right after that, Chris Frank goes for a high-stick. The Pirates are 4-for-7.

–And Derek Whitmore scores Portland’s fifth power-play goal, a Bridgeport team record. It’s 8-3, and Mikko Koskinen’s night is over. Eight is one short of the Bridgeport team record. Actually, 11 combined goals is one short of Bridgeport’s team record, too.

–This thing mercifully ends: Portland 8, Bridgeport 3.

–”There are a lot of things we’re doing well,” Pat Bingham said. “The PK isn’t one of them, and keeping the puck out of our net isn’t one of them.” He said he wanted to look at the video before he called out what brought all those goals about tonight. He didn’t sound thrilled with Ragusin. He expects Olson to be out tomorrow (undisclosed, of course); they’re looking for bodies. He had nothing to add on Landry.

More from up there.

Anton Klementyev is out, and Dylan Reese sits again without even a warmup twirl tonight. So Rob Kwiet makes his Bridgeport debut against his old mates, and Jon Landry returns in No. 51.

Bridgeport has one to scratch; Gallant went the first time, and Pitton went the second. Didn’t see a second ‘A’ out there.

Edit: In tricky fashion, after switching off its left wingers, Bridgeport scratches the right winger, Leisenring.

BRIDGEPORT
F: DiBenedetto-Ullstrom-Castonguay
Svendsen-Hisey-Rakhshani
Bourbeau-Romano-Figren
Gallant/Pitton-Marcinko-Leisenring-scratch)
D: Katic-Motherwell
Kwiet-Wotton (C)
Kohn (A)-Landry
G: Koskinen
Martin

PROVIDENCE
F: MacDermid-Whitfield (C)-MacDonald (A)
Reich (A)-Hamill-Caron
Sauve-Arniel-Ling
Smotherman-Roussel-McGrattan
D: Bartkowski-Cohen
Valabik-Bodnarchuk
McIver-Alexandrov
G: Schaefer
Hutchinson

R: Sullivan. L: Simeon, Galvin.

Another new referee, Joe Sullivan. Young guy from St. Louis, apparently. He worked the ECHL All-Star Game this year.

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Dan Sernoffsky of the Lebanon Daily News died early today after a valiant battle with cancer. He was just 61.

Dan was always welcoming for me in the Giant Center press box, in the East Division days. Friendly, funny (the past few years, always told me to watch out for the deer). Covered at least one game for us. He’ll be missed — he’s missed already.

The AHL sent out this statement from Dave Andrews: The American Hockey League is saddened by the news of Dan’s passing today. He was well respected by his peers for his coverage of the Hershey Bears and the AHL, and you’d be hard pressed to find a writer more dedicated to his beat than Dan was, right up until the end.

Our condolences go out to his wife Jan, his entire family and his friends and colleagues.

We share those sentiments.

We usually do something on Tuesday, don’t we? Oh, yeah.

1:30. Swing by. Hang out. Talk hockey. And maybe high school football. You never know.

Edit: Went out without thanking those who stopped by. Thanks.

As promised, Pat Bingham on letting Jon Landry go:

“It’s a sad day for me. He did everything you’d expect, everything you could ever want. He’s a guy who attended training camp with us, and it so happened it was the training camp I ran when Jack was still on Long Island. Out of that camp, he was the No. 1 call-up guy. There were a couple of young defensemen who made a good show of it, too, but as far as just being a little older, with a little more experience, he was the guy. He didn’t disappoint. He was a terrific practice player. He was a terrific guy in the locker room. He was on our power play. He’s gone, but not forgotten. If the opportunity arises, he’ll be back here again.”

Edit2: All-star voting has begun.

“Complete-game shutout” is redundant in June. Not so much in November.

Against the first-place Pirates, the Sound Tigers couldn’t have done much better. They caught that bounce they wanted last night. They scored on the power play. They rode Kevin Poulin.

And everything else was pretty solid. Chip-it-in. Chip-it-out. Don’t make mistakes.

Pin them deep when you can. There were a couple of times when they kept it deep for a couple of shifts at a time.

“When we get it low, behind the net, we’ve got net-front, we’ve got to get the cycle going,” Robin Figren said.

Four games in six nights: Keep those shifts short. And make good changes. Pat Bingham was talking about making smarter changes: If you’re not sure you can get up and down the ice, “get it deep and get off the ice,” Bingham said. “I’ll hold them to that.”

There were six guys out there who were in the ECHL when the month began. And, like Nathan Lawson said last night, you probably can’t tell that.

“The philosophy behind it all is a five-man defense,” Bingham said. “Our forwards need to backcheck, to track the puck, and to backcheck all the way to the house … to help with the defense and the secondary chances. That’s what they’re doing.”

There weren’t many rebounds floating around Poulin’s crease, either.

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So, Portland has been here twice and has lost to Poulin twice.

Figren said he guesses Enroth thought he was going behind the net, or to wrap the puck around, after he faked the shot from the right side. Instead, he figured, he’d throw it on net and see where the rebound went, with his teammates probably headed there as usual. Instead it banked in. Winner.

No further prognoses on the injured. They’re off until Tuesday.

Wotton wasn’t supposed to be in. Stuff from Bingham in the gamer.

Less success up top: 13 in a row.

Big deal in the East Division: Patrick Maroon and David Laliberte to Anaheim/Syracuse for Danny Syvret (back with the Phantoms) and Rob Bordson. Lindsay Kramer and Tim McManus have more.

And finally, Jonathan Bombulie passed referee Jeff Smith after today’s game. See what almost happened next.