Soundin' Off

Via Elite Prospects and insomnia, Joel Martin has signed to play for Herlev in Denmark, the team announced. (Herlev is outside of Copenhagen, and apropos of nothing, this bridge/tunnel looks pretty cool.)

Streaks ended today:

–Games without a win, 8 (tied for third in team history; three of the team’s four longest such streaks have happened since Jan. 1)
–Road games without a win, 13 (second in team history)
–Appearances by a goalie without a win, 12, Joel Martin (since Jan. 22, coincidentally the last road game)
–Games without a goal for Tony Romano, 28

Among others, surely.

A solid effort, all around, particularly with five defensemen (Mark Wotton could have played, wanted to play, Pat Bingham said, but the team held him out), and at the end of four-in-five on the road, and with half a roster arrived in the past week, and with, of course, that whole three-wins-in-30-games thing hanging over them.

“It’s been tough. We’ve had a lot of injuries,” sniper Brett Gallant said. “We’ve had so many guys coming in, we’ve just got to come together as a team. We’ve got to communicate.”

A solid game for Gallant, who was in the slot to deflect Steve Tarasuk’s shot home late in the first and get the Bridgeport offense going. Gallant had fought Colby Cohen earlier after a hit on Mark Katic near the Bridgeport bench. Later on, Gallant drew a penalty, too.

“It’s just nice when (the goal) happens,” Bingham said. “It was pretty textbook. We’ve been talking about it: on and off (the defenseman’s) stick, one-timing pucks, and that’s exactly what Steve Tarasuk did. Gally was in the right spot. … It’s nice to see. Any time a guy who’s popular with his teammates, who sticks up for them, scores a goal, it’s a nice boost.”

They went into the second with a lead after Rakhshani found a loose puck behind the goalie. Then they scored three power-play goals in the second. Around those, they killed three penalties in the first, then they killed four penalties in the third.

“(The PK) was unbelievable,” Martin said. “We’ve had a tough go with that for a couple of games, but to kill them like that today was great. It was probably the difference in the game.”

For the first time on the road in a month and a half, it was the difference in the game in their favor.

….

Bingham wasn’t sure if they’d be making any moves right away. Team is off tomorrow before a Tuesday practice and then another four-in-five.

Lots of special-teams play. Some interesting calls, both ways. The Bodnarchuk delay-of-game penalty was one that I wondered about. Given how slow the Bruins were to the box, I guess they did, too. Couldn’t tell what variety of d.o.g Keith Kaval called, to be honest, in part because we have a better view of Fall River from here than we do of that end of the ice. Anyway, Romano scored quickly on it off a perfect Figren pass, and Bridgeport was up 3-1, and they kept it going from there.

Here’s to Hall of Famer Darlene Love.

Here’s the Sabres’ brief statement on Rick Martin’s death. The players made a different kind of statement.

And RIP, Hugh Martin.

Just a little bit later than this is when Rhett Rakhshani showed up last year, so he has an idea of what some of these new names are going through.

(And as Ty Wishart notes, there are two lines of new names for him, not to mention that he and Katic were coming back from the NHL themselves this week.)

“It’s tough,” Rakhshani said. “There’s a lot of things you have to adjust to, the style of the game. But a lot of these guys have experience at this level. They’re fitting in. They’re working hard.”

Some of them have experience, anyway. At one point on a four-on-four, the unit was Dale-Schepke (who played together a bit on the penalty kill, in fact)-Wotton-Tarasuk. Wotton indeed has experience. The other three guys combined for three AHL games coming in.

Familiar faces or not, the first period didn’t get much done. Bridgeport had a couple of early chances, put a couple of shots wide on the power play, then didn’t get a sniff for about 15 minutes. Mikko Koskinen kept them in it until he got hurt at the end of the second period.

“We didn’t match (Providence’s intensity). We weren’t close,” Pat Bingham said. “We got to (the first) intermission just down one, and the team decided collectively to really start doing a better job executing the game plan.”

They started moving the puck quicker, something Bingham has been harping on since November. They got two on the power play, got the third with the extra attacker, and… well, they got only one point. But it was a gutsy one point.

“If we play like we did in the second half of this game,” Rakhshani said, “we’re going to win some games.”

….

Koskinen popped his head out of the training room long enough to say he was “OK.” Looked as if he took the brunt of that collision in the head. Bingham said he’ll be out tomorrow; who’ll be the second goalie is TBA. Joel Martin came in and at least stopped his losing streak at nine, though his and several team winless streaks continue. “Joel Martin stepped in and played really hard. He’s a hard-working guy,” Bingham said, wishing they’d gotten him a win. “The guys like playing for him.”

Bridgeport was convinced Anton Khudobin threw his stick on at least one of two shootout attempts. Wishart tried to go around Khudobin, but the goalie’s forward thrust with the pokecheck disrupted the move, and the stick came out. On the last attempt, with Bridgeport needing a goal (Robin Figren had made it 2-1), Tony Romano tried to go backhand, and Khudobin swept the stick to the right and again let go. The penalty-shot rule says the goalie can attempt to stop the puck in any manner “except by throwing his stick or any object” or knocking the net off, “in which case a goal shall be awarded.” No avail there.

“Colliton always goes to the front of the net,” Rakhshani said. Yep. Rakhshani should wind up with a goal and two assists for the second game in a row, by the way. It looks on the sheet as if they changed the wrong assist on the tying goal: Katic dump-in, Figren retrieve to Rakhshani in the left corner to Colliton.

Prescout. The Monarchs, trailing the Pirates in points percentage for a while, fell behind in points, too.

(Rushing out in hopes of not getting locked in the garage. More tomorrow.)

Jesse Joensuu punished himself on the bike after the game, went in, showered, dressed, and walked past Pat Bingham as the coach talked to the assembled reporter.

“Sorry, coach.”

Bingham almost laughed. “For what?”

They played a game of attrition this weekend, losing Jean Bourbeau and Benn Olson yesterday, then three more today, and thankfully it sounds as if it could’ve been worse for Brandon Svendsen.

Around that scary moment, Rob Hisey took a check to the head — first use of Rule 48 we’ve seen — late in the second after David Ullstrom suffered an injury in the first. They were down to nine forwards for the third, and on occasion eight with players in the box. They started with five defensemen, and the occasional penalty dropped them to four.

The parade of penalties led to 17 or 18 power plays and — maybe I’ve seen it before, but can’t remember it — three major-game misconduct combinations.

You always hope against hope to see something new when you come to a game. Spearing majors have become rare enough that it’s always funny to see them (as long as guys aren’t getting hurt, at least). You had Jordan Smotherman getting called for, well, something; it was announced as “illegal equipment,” and someone down the press box said he’d played with the goalie’s stick, but now it’s listed as “throwing the stick.” (Which, come to think of it, maybe he threw Khudobin a stick? I’m totally speculating. It was in the Providence zone, so if he threw a stick at the puck, it’d be a penalty shot.) Either way, there, you’re going back to the first year, when The Other Jason Goulet of Milwaukee got a penalty for playing with two sticks as he tried to bring a stick to his goalie.

But it’s sickening to see the backboard come out, especially as quickly as it was called for. We’ve been through this with Pascal Morency (precaution, thankfully), with Blaine Down, indirectly with Kevin Colley (sadly not just precaution). Here’s hoping it is more like Morency.

….

Louis Liotti went right back to Reading. “It was a one-game deal,” Bingham said. “We appreciate him coming in. He played hard. He got thrown into the fire pretty good.” They’re taking tomorrow off, and I guess they’ll see where they are Tuesday.

Joel Martin, with (no) help from those two decisions in relief, now has a couple of unfortunate team records, losses in nine decisions in a row, 10 appearances without a win (tied with Koskinen).

Jonathan makes a good point about the Tangradi/Johnson situation.

Prescout. Tough come-from-ahead loss. (Denis Hamel with 20 goals. Nah, he can’t help anybody.)

We’ll update on Svendsen tomorrow if available; otherwise, practice Tuesday, and we’ll chat at 1:30.

When they counted down in Times Square, the New York Islanders had five goalies.

Tomorrow, 40 days later, it looks like only one of them will remain standing in Uniondale.

Roloson to Tampa Bay. Lawson to a sprained knee. DiPietro to a left hand. And now Kevin Poulin to a knee injury in warmup that’ll be evaluated tomorrow.

Mikko Koskinen made his NHL debut and lost to the Leafs. Joel Martin raced off to the Island to back up. And we’ll see where things go from here. Lawson reportedly skated Tuesday morning, but we’re at the short end of that two-to-four weeks.

(The answer to the obvious question is Italy.)

Meanwhile, Bridgeport announced it has released Olivier Labelle.

Edit: The Islanders tweeted after the game that Jeremy Colliton suffered a rib injury that will be evaluated tomorrow.

The gamer’s about the Whale’s second goal (short version: Koskinen said Chris Brown told him it might not have counted if Koskinen had stayed down after getting kicked in the face, and Koskinen had been hoping for a whistle because he “was, like, out for a while” — but then he tried to get up), so let’s go here with Pat Bingham’s upset rant about all the myriad things his team has done to itself over 13 losses/non-wins in 14 games.

Early goals? Check, at 3:22, with three guys facing the two guys in the corner and nobody facing the 22-goal scorer who’d waltzed into wide-open position in the right circle. Um, make that 23-goal scorer. In 14 games since New Year’s Day, Bridgeport has six times given up a goal in the first five minutes.

Different reason most times. Still.

Justin DiBenedetto (who could have had three if not for Chad Johnson) battles in front and draws a penalty. He goes right back there off the draw and whacks once, twice, three times. The third one goes in. Tie game.

Goal soon after? Check, this time 55 seconds later. It’s the seventh time since New Year’s Day (twice in one game) that Bridgeport has given up a goal less than 150 seconds after scoring one of its own.

And OK, after Jeremy Williams scores that goal, the Sound Tigers put together a pretty good first period. Johnson stole a bunch of possible goals and earned first-star honors right there. But most of the second period winds up in Bridgeport’s end. And though they’ve had some better seconds periods lately, they’re 3-7-4 in third periods since New Year’s Day.

“The whole month of January, really, we haven’t been able to play 60 minutes. That’s a problem,” Bingham said. “We’ve not been able to play a winning style, to carry momentum for 60 minutes. That’s why we’re coming up short by one every night. … Mistakes lead to some turnovers, and now you need a whistle, something to swing momentum back in your favor, and sometimes it takes minutes and minutes.”

Since New Year’s Day: 1-10-2-1.

…..

And all that said, if Johnson is a bit more human on DiBenedetto’s two shots from the slot, on Olivier Labelle in the slot off a Brett Motherwell steal, or on Brady Leisenring’s shot off a bouncing puck on a two-on-one led out by Dylan Reese… maybe this thing ends differently. Or maybe not; it has been that kind of five weeks.

Both goalies and Bingham professed not to know what might happen with the goaltending situation tomorrow. Meanwhile, Joel Martin on his NHL contract: “It’s awesome just to have this opportunity, just to be able to help the team win. … They just said it could be an opportunity. That’s the way I’m looking at it. I’m really excited to get this chance.”

This is the sixth five-game regulation-time losing streak in Bridgeport history.

Bruce Berlet had some good reaction from Jyri Niemi on scoring his first goal against his former future teammates, which I’m sure’ll be on the Whale site shortly.

ECHL transactions say Mike Sellitto is assigned to Kalamazoo.

Prescout. Springfield only scores one; Trevor Smith remains out; Bridgeport has no offensive weapons like noted playmaker Brian McGrattan.

Sami Salo was good in Wilkes-Barre.

Here’s a press release with Centerplate comment on the proposed change in Webster Bank Arena management. I traded voicemails today with a Centerplate media contact with unfortunately no connection.

All right. Enjoy the snow. It’s been a while since we’ve seen any of that.

Announced from the bus: The Islanders signed Joel Martin to an NHL deal today after the DiPietro news broke. The Islanders had a few NHL contracts to play with, anyway: If they want Koskinen playing here and they need a goalie, they can call Martin up. (They’ll presumably need a goalie tomorrow.)

Meanwhile, Koskinen will try to end his seven-game losing streak tonight. Romano indeed sits out, but Dustin Kohn is giving it a go. Brett Motherwell begins up front for the second time. And the other lines are yesterday’s changed-up version, echoing the power-play units.

BRIDGEPORT
F: Haley (A)-Ullstrom-Figren
DiBenedetto-Hisey-Joensuu
Leisenring-Marcinko-Svendsen
Motherwell-Friesen-Labelle
D: Kohn-Wotton (C)
Katic-Reese (A)
O’Neill-Klementyev
G: Koskinen
Martin

HARTFORD
F: Grachev-Kennedy (A)-Kolarik
Dupont-Newbury (A)-Jeremy Williams
DiDiomete-Tessier-Jason Williams
Soryal-Garlock-Eizenman
D: Redden (A)-Nightingale
Niemi-Bickel
Valentenko-Kundratek
G: Johnson
Grumet-Morris

R: C. Brown. L: Spannaus, Galvin.

The Whale are in their official home whites. I miss the green already.

Traffic, a mess, kept Bridgeport on the road for about two hours. The Sound Tigers arrived at about 5:45. We appear to be on time for a 7 p.m. start, though.

Dustin Kohn scores three points last night and gets scratched today. Not good enough, clearly. (Can only assume they’re bringing him along slowly coming back from being banged up.) Wes O’Neill also did not make the trip.

So Dustin Friesen gets back into the lineup on defense after signing a new pro tryout after his first one expired last night.

Only see one ‘A’ out there for Bridgeport, and the Falcons’ hyper-red-sleeved warmup jerseys don’t have any. Got to update with the Bridgeport scratch anyway, so check back.

BRIDGEPORT
F: Bourbeau-Ullstrom-Svendsen
Pitton-Hisey-Joensuu
Haley (A)-Marcinko-Figren
DiBenedetto-(Romano-scratch)-Labelle
Leisenring
D: Motherwell-Wotton (C)
Katic-Wishart
Friesen-Klementyev
G: Martin
Koskinen

SPRINGFIELD
F: Sestito (A)-Wilson-Byers
Mayorov-D’Alvise-Kubalik
Tarnasky-Guite (C)-Regner
Harvey-Frischmon (A)-Goertzen
D: Sigalet-Ruth
Holden-Savard
Moore-Goloubef
G: LeNeveu
Wesslau

R: T.Koharski, Binda. L: Patry, Briggs.

So the Sound Tigers have scored five or more goals six times. Three are against Worcester. Two are against Springfield. A Massachusetts thing? Bring Lowell back. (The other was the 6-5 loss the second night in Charlotte.)

“It was a nice gift,” Jesse Joensuu said. “But I’ve had gifts taken away from me before.”

Gift 1: A chip-out comes to the Sharks’ blue line, toward Jay Leach with Joe Loprieno there as well. Leach falls. The puck gets behind both. Joensuu, on the move, gets it, has a breakaway, scores. 3-2 Worcester.

They tie it in the last minute of the second as Rob Hisey goes in for a Joensuu rebound, so even going to the third. Then, Gift 2: Joensuu comes up the left wing, gets down near the goal line.

“I had space. I was looking for my linemates, but they were not there. I thought if I’d go back to the net (the defender) was going to hit me. Maybe if I hit the pads, it’d go to Hisey or Pitts.” The shot instead hit Alex Stalock’s stick, popped up over his right shoulder, hit the crossbar and bounced into the net for a 4-3 lead.

“That was more of a ‘smile’ goal than a ‘get pumped up’ goal,” Joensuu said.

It’s the game-winner, the second of two goals that basically turned into the streak-breakers. Maybe you could forgive him if he got a little pumped up.

….

I’m racing a dying battery and no power here, so apologies if stuff pops up later.

Joel Martin (39 saves) was a late decision, Pat Bingham said. Mikko Koskinen “has a little nagging something. We just decided it was the right call.” He didn’t say what, but before you ask, I have no reason to suspect the hip. Martin’s goals against were on a rebound after a double-deflection, and two shots off iron and in.

Solid game for that line. Fewer turnovers all around.

Bingham gave a tip of the hat to Micheal Haley for the fight after the third Worcester goal. “The fact that Micheal Haley stepped up and tried to give the team a big boost, fighting, that was huge,” Bingham said. “It was a lot of little things, when you add it all up.”

Announced 9,803 for IceCats night. (And if I didn’t call them that in the gamer, I’ll be happy.) Eric Boguniecki in the house, among others. Worcester Hockey Hall of Fame inductions. Nice night. As noted on Twitter, they picked the wrong team for it: Bridgeport won its first four here against the IceCats and five out of six overall.

The Nabokov fun takes another turn with the idea that the Islanders could ask the league to, as Bob McKenzie says, “toll” the contract: Make him fulfill it next year, a la Alexei Yashin and the Senators a decade ago. If nothing else, we’ve all studied the waivers rules pretty intently the past few days, no?

Prescout. The Rangers called up Grachev and Del Zotto afterward, from what I’ve seen on Twitter.

Jeff Smith called zero penalty minutes in Hamilton-Adirondack tonight.

And yes, I would totally name my kid after the president of the galaxy.

So the drama continues on the Island. They claimed Evgeni Nabokov this morning, and a couple of hours later came reports that Nabokov wouldn’t report.

(They’re the Islanders, of course, so they’re damned if they do and damned if they don’t.)

So while we await a resolution to that — if he doesn’t show, do you let him rot? Do you put him back on waivers and say thanks for dropping by, buddy? — and to Nathan Lawson’s injury, Joel Martin starts tonight for the Sound Tigers. O’Neill’s out, with Kohn returning into his spot with Klementyev. Bridgeport has one to scratch, but Leisenring didn’t join in the rushes.

Some pregame festivities, and a long first intermission tonight for the Worcester Hockey Hall of Fame inductions. Maybe we’ll live-tweet ‘em.

Edit: Fixed below; Marcinko in, not Friesen.

BRIDGEPORT
F: Bourbeau-Ullstrom-Svendsen
Pitton-Hisey-Joensuu
Haley (A)-Marcinko-Figren
DiBenedetto-Romano-Labelle
(Leisenring-scratch)
D: Motherwell-Wotton (C)
Katic-Wishart
Kohn (A)-Klementyev
G: Martin
Koskinen

WORCESTER
F: Henderson-Desjardins (A)-DaSilva
Cheechoo (A)-Trevelyan-MacIntyre
Mashinter-Zalewski-Wingels
Del Monte/McLaren
D: Leach (C)-Schaus
Irwin-Braun
Pederson-Loprieno
Lannon
G: Stalock
Hutton

R: T.Koharski. L: J.Millea, Paquette.

And in big Central Massachusetts Division 3 action, Marlboro 4, defending district champion Hudson 1. Hawks outshot Marlboro 30-20. (No, sadly, can’t update you on #cthk. One of those days.)

Round 2 from Norfolk. Again, radio feed with Pete and Pat.

Curiosity got to me last night: Mikko Koskinen’s six-game losing streak ties the longest for a Bridgeport goalie. Dieter Kochan lost six consecutive starts in March 2004, all in regulation. Frederic Cloutier lost his last six decisions in 2005-06, including one in overtime; curiously enough, two of those decisions came in relief (the nutty 6-5 game against Binghamton at the end of February, and the season-ender at Hartford, when Wade Dubielewicz came out after only one period); he also made a no-decision relief appearance during the streak.

Not happy history, but history nonetheless. If Koskinen appears tonight, he’ll join a five-way tie for the second-most consecutive appearances for a Bridgeport goaltender. (Well, third-most, technically. Dubielewicz made it to 10 twice in 2005-06.)

If not, Joel Martin will put his 2-1 career AHL record on the line. It’d be his first AHL start since April 5, 2007, but he did have one start before that in Norfolk, for the Admirals, a win on Valentine’s Day of the same year. (Took me a while to figure out how he didn’t get a loss in his second Norfolk start that year, two days later. But apparently he played the first and third, and Corey Crawford played the second — and thus gave up the fourth Rats goal.)

Anyway. Too much information while we await warmup, which should begin around 6:40, and then we’ll see which of those sets of information is more immediately relevant.

–Hmm. Ads’ Web site says a 7:15 start. The gamesheet now says 7:30. If the latter, warmup probably starts closer to 6:55, which might explain the silence from Scope so far.

–Jamie on Twitter says Martin leads them out. (We’ve seen that twice before, but if Jamie’s calling it, we’ll go with it.)

–Dustin Tokarski seems to be going for Norfolk, which is a shame, because Desjardins would have been a… rematch.

–From Jamie, Hisey in, Romano out. Hisey takes back his spot with Ullstrom and Svendsen.

–Pregame ceremonies take it to 7:30, so a good cause for a 7:30 start. Should be under way in a moment.

–The A’s remain on O’Neill and Haley.

–As Jamie tweets, Leisenring takes Romano’s spot; Pitton-Friesen-Bourbeau stay together, and the Line That Needs A Nickname plays its 40th game together.

–Harju with a big hit on Motherwell prompts a scrum. Meanwhile, Jamie just tweeted that Svendsen left with Mike Schroeder. Bridgeport power play coming up: Harju for roughing… And Figren scores on the power play, his 11th.

–That appears to have been Bridgeport’s first shot after five for the Admirals. Katic, with an assist, has a point in four out of five.

–About a minute after they say Haley’s a more offensive guy despite the PIMs, Haley goes after Fornataro for a hit on Wotton.

–Norfolk power play coming. The Ads’ Twitter feed says 2-5-10 for Haley and 5 for Durno — instigator on Haley.

–At least according to the scoresheet — which I never linked to, did I? It’s here — Bridgeport still has just that one shot with about nine minutes left in the first.

–Svendsen is apparently back, because he’s going for a hook.

–Shots are 13-2 before Milam takes a penalty to even it up with about three minutes left in the period.

–Martin stops Angelidis, I think it was, on a two-on-one. Pat Shetler wonders why Martin hasn’t played more often.

–End of one, shots 15-3 Norfolk, goals 1-0 Bridgeport.

–Some discussion on the way off the ice, apparently. If I remember correctly, to an even greater extent than they do in Bridgeport, the teams have to cross each others’ paths at Scope to get to their dressing rooms. Always fun.

–On the Island, John Tavares has a natural hat trick after Buffalo took a 1-0 lead. In Norfolk, second period gets going in a few moments. Haley has 5:19 to serve.

–Angelidis scores on the move to tie it at 1:21 of the second.

–Sounds like the goal shook Martin not a bit; a couple of good saves followed. Shots 21-5, Pat mentions.

–Shots 31-7 now, midway second. Good gravy. Martin’s hanging in.

–A Twitter pop for Martin’s rebound control.

–Bourbeau hard into the end wall as Bridgeport goes to the net, but it draws the Sound Tigers’ third power play with 7:29 left in the period.

–And right off the draw, Bridgeport scores on a rebound.

–It’s Motherwell in front of the net, apparently. (Wrong about that right-off-the-draw, too. Sorry. Was 22 seconds into the PP.) Goals in back-to-back games for Motherwell; Katic and Figren both have two points.

–Chris Durno deflects in a Gudas shot to tie it.

–Figren for a hook with 3:12 to go in the second. Norfolk was 3-for-4 on the PP last night; it’s 0-for-2 going to its third now…. and Marc-Andre Bergeron cancels it with a hold on Hisey after losing the puck. Long four-on-four.

–Shots 37-13 after two (22-10 in the second). Tied, 2-2.

–Records are within hailing distance: shots against, 55; saves, 52. (And in case you’re wondering: different games, and both in regulation.)

–The third begins.

–In Hershey, Ben Walter, wearing the C for Lake Erie, tied it late with an extra attacker on the ice. Meanwhile, 8,103 is the attendance at Scope. (About 1700 more at Giant Center.)

–Walter had an extra-attacker goal for Bridgeport. Fun coincidences: Jan. 11, 2008, at Binghamton. Delayed penalty coming. Off the pass of Kyle Okposo, who made his pro debut. But scoring goals for the Senators on either side of Walter’s? One Greg Mauldin. Anyway, back in modern times, shots are 41-15, per Jamie’s tweet, with 15:25 left.

–Durno holds Motherwell’s stick, and in fact has his and Motherwell’s, which Pete and Pat note is like getting caught with your hand in the cookie jar. Bridgeport power play is 2-for-4.

–The penalty’s about to expire when Szczechura gets called for hooking Motherwell. That’s at least three times Motherwell has been fouled to create a power play. About midway third, and all these power plays are holding down Martin’s save totals.

–(I can add. The second penalty was almost a minute after the first.)

–Shots 46-19 with 6:05 to go.

–Martin keeps making saves. Elsewhere, Portland trailed 3-2… then won 8-3. Yikes. Five goals in the third.

–Norfolk’s 50th shot goes in: Durno coming in with 1:09 remaining in regulation off a neutral-zone turnover. 3-2 Norfolk.

–Tough way for Martin to lose, but there it is: Norfolk 3, Bridgeport 2, the second-longest winless streak in team history and the longest pure losing streak.

–If I heard right, Martin didn’t get a star. Scoresheet has 51 shots, 48 saves right now.

–Missed the beginning of the list, but Pat Shetler ran down their unofficial faceoff totals, and it sure sounded as if Norfolk dominated the circle, which would help explain the shots.

–The box score is not yet final. It’d be funny if Kaval wasn’t going to sign the sheet until Martin gets a star.

–And almost 40 minutes after that, an hour after the game, it’s still not official. In the meantime, talked to a pretty furious Pat Bingham. The turnover bugged him, but he said Svendsen missed a good chunk of time, and couple that with Haley’s instigator 17 minutes, they had a short bench for a while. “We had the perfect game plan,” he said. “We had a short bench up front … with the fact that we couldn’t win a faceoff, nor were we given a chance to, in my opinion.” Sounded a bit like the game in Worcester where they didn’t get a shot in the second period, after which they didn’t seem happy about enforcement — or lack thereof — in the circle.

Martin? “He played really good. He was solid.” Special teams? “We made the necessary adjustments from the night before. … They had no zone time to speak of, and when they did, we had all the answers.”

They’re on the bus and headed home. Practice Monday.

Only the second time I’m missing a regular-season game in Wilkes-Barre (snow, both times: Jan. 22, 2005, the 13th consecutive loss on the road; it’d reach 15). Very disappointing; it’s like a second home (and in an ancestral way, it’s close). But given some of the travel stories, probably a good call by the boss.

The big non-arterial-highway news this afternoon is…

Actually, it’s probably the Islanders’ announcement that Rick DiPietro was sent home to get the adductor evaluated. Lots of Koskinen for the next few weeks? We’ll see.

The other big non-road news is on the home side: Jesse Boulerice will sit for 10 games for a bump on Francis Charron in Wednesday’s game at Charlotte. Here’s Jonathan’s initial post off the news, with his take on the incident. (Boulerice, of course, has a history, and you can’t help but wonder if that plays into it.)

No Phil, either, so you can listen to Tom Grace and Scott Stuccio here. On Twitter, we’ll be keeping an eye on Jason (the latter of whom said Joel Martin came out first tonight).

Elsewhere: Manitoba will retire Mike Keane’s number. Utterly adorable story from Joe Posnanski.

And RIP, Ryne Duren.

–Jamie tweets that Koskinen starts tonight, that Friesen and Motherwell are playing forward. Justin Felisko said he didn’t see Hisey in warmup (and saw Martin come out first, too — that happened once before, but we’ll see…)

–Grace/Stuccio say it’s Koskinen vs. Curry. Jamie says the fourth line is Motherwell-Friesen-Bourbeau. Hisey out.

–Per Jamie, the lines: Svendsen-Ullstrom-Rakhshani; DiBenedetto-Romano-Labelle; and the usual Haley-Marcinko-Figren. Would guess D pairs remain the same. Kohn has the ‘A’ in place of Colliton.

–Penguins outshooting Bridgeport heavily early. Might have outshot Bridgeport on the Sound Tigers’ own, shortened early power play.

–Wallace scores off an icing faceoff, 1-0 Penguins. Grace says Koskinen would want it back.

–Brett Sterling, one of the best offensive players in this league for a long time, scores on a breakaway: 2-0.

–Sounds as if Bridgeport had a late chance, but the Penguins hold for a 2-0 lead after one. Shots 12-3.

–Former Nighthawk Stan Drulia will be on the Penguins’ broadcast in moments.

–Sounds like we got a heck of a lot of commercials online instead of the Drulia interview. Oh well.

–Nope, the end of the interview is the best part. Outstanding. (Well, OK, Stuccio mentioned New Haven, and Drulia answered about the AHL more than anything. Oh well.)

–Turnover in front, and it’s 3-0 very early in the second.

–Grace: “This is a dismantling.”

–Sounds like Motherwell working point on PP. Curry stops Figren one-timer with Sill off for goaltender interference a little past midway second. Shots were 19-6 at last mention.

–Sounds as if the Sound Tigers are… and as I type, Grace says it — they’re coming a little more. A couple of scoring chances. Jamie notes a Rakhshani chance in tight.

–Sill called for his second goalie-interference penalty in the last five minutes. Shots up to 19-12.

–Isles announce Kevin Poulin starts tomorrow.

–Broadcasters are stunned: Wallace dumped, Bortuzzo called for a hold elsewhere. Getting late second.
–And it’s evened up a little less than a minute in. If the Penguins don’t score on the power play, it’ll carry over.

–Eric Tangradi scores on the four-on-four and makes it 4-0. Pens have a goal 1:07 into the second and now one with 1:06 left.

–Jean Bourbeau scores his first AHL goal, short-handed, with under 10 seconds left in the second. Cuts it to 4-1 after two.

–Third period has begun.

–Long BPT 4-on-3 coming up here as Mormina called for slashing DiBenedetto. If they’re going to think about getting back into it, with 11:30 left, this’d be a good spot.

–And Potter goes before the combatants (Labelle and Craig, who made it 4-on-4 to begin with) get back. A short 4-on-3, and then it’ll be a five-on-three for a while.

–Bridgeport gets one on the five-on-three. A long way to go on the Potter minor. It’s 4-2. Goal is Katic’s, so he’s on a scoring streak after going into the week without one. Wishart assist is his first as a Sound Tiger.

–Jeffrey hits the post at the end of the power play. About eight minutes left.

–And moments later Nick Johnson scores to make it 5-2, led by Sterling.

–20th time the Pens have scored four or more; eighth time they’ve scored five.

–They’re scoreboard-watching on the broadcast. WBS leads the division by 11 points, by the way, not quite at the midpoint of the season. Penguins to the power play with about five minutes left (edit: actually 6:43).

–Final: Wilkes-Barre/Scranton 5, Bridgeport 2.

–Perpetually amazed how well I know the WBS sponsors. From listening during playoff runs. From TV, radio commercials while out there. It’s the second home, really is.

–Sad story: RIP, Tom Cavanagh, the former Worcester Shark, Monarch and Falcon.

Sorry about the delay; Internet is wonky.

–Patrick Williams noted on Twitter that Mark Flood is at a point-a-game pace over the last dozen.

–They’re planning on bringing in training-camper Brady Leisenring from Kalamazoo; the Wings were in Elmira, and Leisenring had a couple of power-play goals in the third as they tried to fight back from a deficit. Sounds familiar.

–Pat Bingham said he and others tried to prepare them for the way the Penguins were going to come out. “We still came out challenged to match their intensity. … We weren’t bad by any means, but they were coming.”

Bridgeport worked hard to earn power plays, Bingham said. “They really swarm on the PK. They pressure you up the ice. They pressure you inside the zone. The way they kill penalties, there’s a lot of hacking, grabbing, hooking, holding… they push right up to the line, maybe not over. You’ve got to push it, make them pay for being overly aggressive. As the game went on, we started doing that more and more, getting higher-quality scoring chances until we finally scored. If the power play was super-sharp, like it has been, it might’ve made a difference.”

He said Friesen and Motherwell did a good job up front. “Different guys on different lines, a different power play with no time to practice, difficult circumstances: It makes it a difficult challenge, but not impossible,” Bingham said.

“I might’ve tried to overcoach this one. We had a long bus ride, and I thought all through about line combinations, the power play, how we were going to forecheck. I threw a lot at our guys.” Maybe, he thought, less would have been more.

Hisey is day-to-day, gave it a try this morning but wasn’t able to go. He’ll try it again tomorrow.

Me, too. Good night.