Gonna keep this a bit brief; got this project to get back to work on…
–Wrote off of Bentivoglio, who says he’s working on shooting the puck. Today seems to be a case in point. One thing I didn’t put in the story: Even before he started scoring goals, he had a really nice outlet pass up the left wing that set in motion the Marcinko goal.
–In these games, you’d like success from the people you expect to do well. Smith, Bailey, Marcinko, Bentivoglio, Joensuu, Hennigar: They stood out in some way or another, on the scoresheet or not (or both). Yeah, they’re playing against rookies, young’ns, junior kids. But that’s the point. If they were invisible, you’d worry, right?
–Defense settled down nicely. Thought about writing off of Andrew MacDonald instead, but stuck with Bentivoglio. We’ll get to A-Mac. I mentioned somewhere before that Kevin Colley had called him Utah’s best player in last year’s playoffs, right? Good.
–Smith apparently jumped in after Martin took a shot off the leg. The official word is that nothing’s broken.
–Scott Gordon said all the rookie campers except Nikiforov were set to get on the plane tomorrow. If Nikiforov keeps going the way he’s going, he might make some decisions very difficult here in a couple of weeks.
–Our friendly neighborhood off-ice officials and I were glancing through the rule book (note to self — start begging people for a copy)… Indeed, not only are minor penalties in regular-season overtime listed as one-minute minors, but carryover time will apparently be cut in half.
–Good to see Dave Baseggio in the house.
–OK, enjoy Moncton. After a chaotic day tomorrow, I’m technically on vacation for another week. This time, I won’t be going too far, but everything’s gonna be from afar, anyway.
–And finally, RIP, Norman Whitfield.
*-Oops: Wrong assignment. See ya Sunday.