Newbies Yannick Riendeau and Marc Cantin hadn’t yet arrived when the Sound Tigers practiced Tuesday at the Wonderland of Ice. They should be in later today and practice Wednesday, Brent Thompson said. They’ll join a pretty full house; there were 14 forwards and eight defensemen out there. Thompson said he plans to keep everyone around until Clear Day on Monday and then see how things shake out. “I believe in the group we have,” Thompson said. “I don’t want to change anything.” Hey, 18-1-0-2 in the past 21, hard to blame him.
All hands on deck, otherwise. Mark Katic is ready to go, practicing on a defense pair with Brandon Gentile. Rhett Rakhshani, skating with Justin DiBenedetto and Jeremy Colliton, appears ready as well. Brett Gallant is cleared, so it’s just a matter of getting in game shape. (The coaches put the returning trio through some hard work after practice.) That leaves an injured list of… nobody. Boy, is that weird to say. The organization’s list is Rick DiPietro and Dylan Reese, and that’s it. Been a while. Friday would be the first game without losing a man-game to injury since Oct. 10, 2009.
All the best to Jean Beliveau and family.
The Whale and Worcester are playing a game this morning, headed to the third period at this writing. Mike Vernace has an assist in his Hartford debut.
Mike Busniuk and the Ferraro brothers are going into the Binghamton Hockey Hall of Fame.
And RIP, Jan Berenstain.
Reminder: We’ll chat Wednesday at 1:30. Probably on this post.