Fight night?
In a Sound Tigers game?
This is preseason, so it’s not that unusual. Except in Bridgeport. Heck, they even played a fight-free preseason two years ago. Could find only one exhibition game with more than four fights.
That was in 2003-04 at Philadelphia, with seven fights, one more than tonight. Things have been pretty quiet around here since then. You get the feeling nothing’ll be quiet if Pascal Morency’s around. But we’ll be running some stuff on Morency in Friday’s paper, so on to the rest of it.
This was a pretty good one for Bridgeport. Hartford was bigger (but slower), but the Sound Tigers kept coming, outshooting the Pack 26-15 in the final two periods. They were sacrificing the body — anybody else cringe when just about the only roster-lock on the ice tonight, Trevor Smith, blocked a shot off the foot in the first few minutes? — and working hard. Pat Bingham, who was on the bench with Bernie Cassell, was impressed with the way they did everything necessary to keep the momentum going. The goalies did their jobs, mostly; Zaba was Hartford’s best player. Cavosie-Smith-Labelle controlled the ice, as you might expect, and Labelle did some hitting.
Bridgeport killed a five-on-three in the first five minutes (when Smith blocked that shot), limiting scoring chances. Morency drew three power plays early in the second, including both ends of a five-on-three; Scott Ford scored on a shot that was deflected in by Jake Taylor, as Sean Offers collected the first of two assists. Rob Sirianni saved a goal late in the period. Tommy Pyatt scored from the right-wing boards on the power play 27 seconds into the third. At 8:06, Aaron Slattengren fed a back-door pass to Sirianni on the power play for the winnner. Smith scored on a two-on-one with 7:36 to go to lock it up.
So what now? They’ll probably begin to cut down in the next couple of days, and I don’t know that this made any decisions any easier. The threat — although it’s a threat you hear a lot this time of year from just about every team — is that they’ll take the best 13-7-2 or 12-7-2 or 12-8-2 or whatever they decide to keep around.
“For us to be able to send quality players to Long Island, the players are going to have to want to be Islanders,” Jack Capuano said Tuesday. “There could be some tough decisions to be made in the days ahead.”
We shall see soon if any were made any easier.
Box score, lineups and closing notes on the jump:
Hartford 0 0 1–1
Bridgeport 0 1 2–3
First Period — No scoring. Penalties — Morency, Bpt (holding), 1:44; K.Johnson, Bpt (interference), 2:10; Maslonka, Hfd (holding), 4:57; Maslonka, Hfd, major (fighting), 7:34; Haley, Bpt, major (fighting), 7:34; Kozak, Hfd, major (fighting), 16:27; Labelle, Bpt, double minor-major-misconduct (slashing, instigating, fighting), 16:27.
Second Period — 1, Bridgeport, Ford (Offers, Morency), 3:32 (pp). Penalties — Hartwick, Hfd (cross-checking), 1:49; Barthel, Hfd (cross-checking), 3:13; Poulsen, Hfd, major (fighting), 6:33; Ford, Bpt, major (fighting), 6:33; Maslonka, Hfd (boarding), 7:20; Fritz, Hfd, major (fighting), 9:46; Haley, Bpt, minor-major-misconduct (instigating, fighting), 9:46; Taylor, Hfd (unsportsmanlike conduct), 14:05; Morency, Bpt (unsportsmanlike conduct), 14:05; Maslonka, Hfd, major (fighting), 17:13; Morency, Bpt, major (fighting), 17:13; Busto, Hfd, major (fighting), 19:40; Woods, Bpt, minor-major (roughing, fighting), 19:40.
Third Period — 2, Hartford, Pyatt (Baranka), :27 (pp). 3, Bridgeport, Sirianni (Slattengren, Offers), 8:06 (pp). 4, Bridgeport, Smith, 12:24. Penalties — Hartwick, Hfd (tripping), 7:05; Kozak, Hfd (roughing), 9:25; Morency, Bpt (holding), 9:52; Kozak, Hfd, misconduct, 19:31; Taylor, Hfd (hooking), 19:31; Morency, Bpt, misconduct, 19:31.
Shots on goal — Hartford 10-7-8–25. Bridgeport 9-14-12–35.
Power play opportunities — Hartford 1 of 6, Bridgeport 2 of 7.
Goaltenders — Hartford, Zaba (35 shots-32 saves). Bridgeport, Bucchino (11-11), Jaeger, 9:36 second (14-13).
Attendance — N/A. Referee — Hache. Linesmen — Spannaus, Demers.
LINEUPS
BRIDGEPORT
F: Marc Cavosie-Trevor Smith-Olivier Labelle
Matt Scherer-Derek Damon-Tyler Haskins
Keith Johnson-Micheal Haley-Pascal Morency
Rob Sirianni-Aaron Slattengren-Mitch Woods
D: Jeff Dwyer-Jordan Hart
Andy Sertich-Martin Frechette
Sean Offers-Scott Ford
G: A.J. Bucchino
Brett Jaeger
HARTFORD
(out of order, but these were the lines)
F: Brodie DuPont-Greg Moore (A)-Bruce Graham
Patrick Bordeleau-Tommy Pyatt-Jordan Owens
Rick Kozak-Mike Ouellette-Neil Poulsen
Mitch Fritz (A)-Eric Hunter-Ryan Murphy
D: Mike Hartwick-Jake Taylor (A)
Ivan Baranka-Milan Maslonka
Clayton Barthel-Michael Busto
G: Matt Zaba
(Chris Holt)
(first names ’cause, y’know…)
If we hadda pick three stars… I dunno. 1) Morency; 2) Smith; 3) Sirianni. (Unsung hero… how about Slattengren for the back-door pass.)
The big club didn’t do much except fight (organizational thing, maybe?), but Gordie Dwyer scored the one for the Islanders.
Big props to the person who stuck the theme from Nintendo’s Ice Hockey into the between-periods sound effects.
Late catch: Ryan O’Marra to Springfield.
And finally: The Phillies’ magic number is six.