Soundin' Off

Liveblogging again from the living room again. We’ll have Ken Cail up and will follow Jamie and the Monarchs’ feeds on Twitter.

Jamie tweets says the recovering DiBenedetto and Gillies and Haddad appear to be scratched again, along with the injured de Haan, Colliton, Langkow, and Gallant, with Olson a scratch on defense with the new guys in. (the new Jon Landry is assigned No. 7.)

Note from up top: Arthur Staple reports a sports hernia for Rick DiPietro that will need surgery and probably will end his season.

Noted elsewhere: Nutmeg Hockey dug through the draft rankings better than I did: Alexander Gonye at 194 is from New Canaan.

And a neat bit: Webster Bank Arena announced today that Alfredo Serrano, who works in maintenance at the barn, will be honored before Sunday’s game. Serrano came to the aid of a woman being attacked in Bridgeport just before Christmas.

More in a bit.

–Nilsson vs. Zatkoff.

–Jamie’s tweets and yesterday’s practice indicate something like:
F: Ullstrom-Cizikas-Rakhshani
Haley-Romano-Backman
Howes-Mouillierat-Riley
McNeely-Frischmon-Marcinko
D: Donovan-Oleksy
Gentile-Ness
Landry-Wishart
(Olson-scratch)
G: Nilsson
Riopel

Box should be here in a moment. Jon McIsaac to work it. Bridgeport hasn’t won a game with him yet. Game on.

–Frischmon early for high-sticking, and Brandon Kozun scores from Dwight King to end Bridgeport’s string of 26 consecutive penalties killed. 1-0 Monarchs.

–In 10 minutes since the goal, McIsaac has put Manchester on a power play twice, and twice shortened that power play with a Monarchs penalty.

–You were curious which games McIsaac worked, weren’t you? (No, of course you weren’t. But anyway.) He had the early Adirondack game, with the boarding majors-turned-match penalties on Donovan and Haley; he had the home Hershey game, when he and Jamie Koharski gave Bridgeport eight power plays to Hershey’s two but Koharski disallowed the late DiBenedetto goal; he had the latest game at Hershey, working with Cozzan; and he had the two in Norfolk, when he and Mark Lemelin combined to call 30 power plays in two games. He has handed out six in all so far with about two minutes left in the first period.

–(I should amend that. A linesman may have called one of those power plays in Norfolk, the Trevor Smith spear.) 1-0 Manchester after one. Shots 8-8.

–Prescout in the meantime. Bruins outshot sizeably but scoreless after one.

–Bridgeport played 44:37 short-handed without giving up a power-play goal before Kozun’s. That’s coincidentally three minutes shorter than their only other 26-for-26 streak, which is tied for the team’s fifth-longest streak.

–Brent Thompson said he might change up the lines, and he wasn’t kidding: Jamie says McNeely is back with Cizikas and Rakhshani, with Ullstrom joining Howes and Mouillierat. Sounds like the Romano line is still together, which implies Riley back with Frischmon and Marcinko.

–Bridgeport carries things early before a good Manchester shift, but then Johnson is called for slashing Riley at 6:47.

–After the power play, Rakhshani ties it from the slot at 9:04 of the second. The radio guys are praising him as the best player on the ice.

–They note on the radio that Landry is getting lots of ice. He’s in de Haan’s spot at even strength and on the power play, at the least. The Bridgeport pair for the power-play goal was Donovan-Wishart, for what it’s worth; late in the kill, tough to know what the pairs were/had been. Anyway. On the sheet right now, with 8:00 left in the second, shots are 11-3 in the period and 19-11 in the game for Bridgeport.

–The Monarchs use their time out on an icing with 6:20 left in the period. The Monarchs seem to escape off the draw.

–With Jordan Nolan locked away for boarding Aaron Ness, Ullstrom sneaks in, takes a pass from New Jon Landry and scores on the power play to give Bridgeport a lead late in the second. Bridgeport will go back to the power play in a moment.

–That’s a goal in eight consecutive road games for Ullstrom in the AHL, which thank goodness appears in the league’s expanded report (it’s the longest in the league this year). That’d be a heck of a thing to try to dig up, but I’ll see if I can find some sort of record.

–Bridgeport controls the second and leads 2-1 after two.

–As the third begins, I’ve got to look through 2008-09 and 2009-10, but in the other seasons, I don’t see a longer Bridgeport road goal-scoring streak than eight games. For what that means, separated by a month and a half. (I was hoping Dave Roche had a long streak around his Cincinnati exile, but no dice.)

–Czarnik ties it off King’s pass from behind the net.

–But quickly, Bridgeport answers, McNeely after a shot hits a man in front and caroms to him.

–Those goals were 22 seconds apart, 3:24 and 3:46. Now Bridgeport to its seventh power play (and fifth in a row).

–They just mentioned on the radio that the Monarchs had just three shots in the third. I flipped back to my last refresh of the box, which was around the Campbell penalty seven minutes in: three shots. About four minutes later, they’re still there. Just under eight to go.

–The Monarchs swap goalies late in regulation; they’re speculating Martin Jones is faster to the bench for an extra attacker. I’m betting it’s a non-time-out time out.

–Rakhshani buries an empty-netter to make it 4-2.

Three points for Rakhshani, two for Donovan, Bridgeport 4, Manchester 2, final.

–Shots on the sheet right now, over the last two periods: 30-9, Bridgeport. That’s 38-17 in all. Major edit: They added a shot for the Monarchs. 30-10, 38-18.

–I don’t see a streak of road scoring in those two years remotely close to eight games, so I’ll assume Ullstrom’s is a team record.

–Seven-game scoring streak for Cizikas; six-game streak for Rakhshani.

–Thompson thought the start was “a little rusty,” but as things went on, “the intensity level picked up. We got back to the things that made us successful. … I’m proud of the kids, the leadership.” He was impressed with the defense all around, Wishart’s leadership, the way Ness and Donovan picked up their game, the way the PTOs played. Asked about Landry because they’d singled him out on the broadcast: “I thought Landry stepped in, obviously there on the power play, I think, with good vision, moving the puck. He did a great job there. Gentile, a defensive-minded guy, he played in some key situations.” He said Ullstrom was controlling the puck more as the game went on.

–A point in all three games at Verizon Wireless Arena. Seventh season in which Bridgeport has played more than one game at Manchester; first time Bridgeport has won two games in a season at Manchester. (Except, you know, that time in the playoffs.) It is, in fact, the Sound Tigers’ first winning streak there. (Except, again, you know.) They were 1-0-1 there in 2003-04. (That’s a tie.) (I miss ties.) The Sound Tigers are, in essence and converting two shootout losses to ties, 7-13-4 all-time at Manchester in the regular season, and three of those wins are overtime wins. (Collins, Gleed and Hamonic.)