Providence HOME liveblog

Looks ugly out there; actually, the postgame forecast looks uglier. Be careful if you’re out there too. I’ve been called off, so if you say “forget it” too, hang out here. We’ll listen to Phil and follow Corey and see what excitement comes.

If you had tickets for this one, the team said this morning it’ll allow you to exchange them for seats to games Dec. 21 (ManchVegas), Dec. 22 (Albany, so that one’s dicey) or Dec. 26 (Hartford in the traditional back-from-Christmas game). The Pink Rink Night jersey auction will carry on to that Dec. 26 game. Awesome: Bid ’em up.

Did the math this afternoon: Bridgeport has basically no appetizing and viable makeup dates available this season; there were maybe nine that could work against Providence, a slew of midweek games plus Easter.

So anyway. Box’ll be here. We’ll check back closer to gametime.

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It’s a year ago tonight that Brock Nelson broke his jaw in Norfolk. Which I only remember because so much of the rest of that day seared itself into my head. Thoughts with the families and friends of those 26 angels.

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A night after beating Bridgeport 6-1, Albany leads Hartford 3-0 after one. The Devils came into today with the third-best record, by percentage, in the conference. New Jersey’s AHL affiliate has made the playoffs just once since 2000 (2010, when Lowell and Bridgeport were head-to-head to the wire, and that last loss gave the Devils the fourth seed in the Atlantic and sent Bridgeport to the East to play Hershey); its last finish this high was 1998-99.

–Whoa wait what — I seem to be getting the Islanders at home tonight. Not typically supposed to. Huh. Awaiting lineup tweets from Bridgeport.

–Pretty much color-on-color tonight, it appears from Corey’s tweet of Anders Nilsson in the Pink Rink sweater. It’s black with pink trim. The Bruins are in their home yellows golds.

–Kevin Duffy on the decision to play football today.

–Haven’t seen lines or anything yet. Mark Divver tweeted this morning that Nik Svedberg starts for the Bruins. The lineup on the box doesn’t include Jon Sim or Sean Wiles but does include Andrey Pedan (doubtful; don’t believe he’s been skating) and Marc Cantin (much more plausible) and Riley Wetmore and Kirill Kabanov (healthy scratches last night as far as we know).

Lines from Corey:
Lee-Sundstrom-Halmo
Bouchard-Quine-Kabanov
Wetmore-Langkow-Bruton
Gallant-Lowry-Johnson
D: Donovan-Cornell
Keenan-Mayfield
Jackson-Vaughan
G: Nilsson
Reiter

–Robins-Bruton early on; it ends with a quick Robins left.

–Lowry wins a left-circle draw, and Cornell fires it through Svedberg to make it 1-0 Bridgeport at 11:52. It’s Cornell’s second as a pro, and Lowry’s first AHL point in his 14th game.

–Phil says Johan Sundstrom went off with a towel to his face a few shifts after the goal.

–Quine takes his time and tees up a blocked shot that caroms to him, pretty much wide open in the slot, to make it 2-0. All that teeing up kind of froze the Bruins’ defenders, it appeared. Good start.

–2-0 after one. Bridgeport outshoots Providence 16-7.

–By the way, disappointing: Someone at the cable company must’ve figured out we weren’t supposed to get the Islanders. Went out just before the game.

–Two notes at the second-period opening faceoff: Sundstrom takes it, so he’s OK; and Subban in goal for Providence. Phil keeps saying he was told Subban would start, but Mark Divver tweeted Svedberg’s start this morning. Anyway.

–Subban put an early rebound right on Chris Bruton’s stick: goes wide.

–Scout Night, I guess. Shame about the weather. Providence had a really good shift, pinning Bridgeport (with the long change) for about two minutes, but not long after that Tommy Cross holds up Brett Gallant. Two Bridgeport PPs in the first half of the second period.

–The great-name pairing of Dallas Jackson-Scooter Vaughan reminds me: our girls swimming all-star team today had a Pond and a Poole. Awesome. Anyway, still 2-0 after two. Good period for Nilsson, who had to be good on some of those extended shifts.

Prescout. Manchester’s up big. Who has the worse ride, the Monarchs from Glens Falls or Bridgeport from home?

–If I caught it correctly, what I think you’d call the second unit started all three power plays so far. Could be coincidence (this time, Donovan ran the left point instead of Keenan to start).

–Phil says he won’t use the ‘S’ word. I will: Nilsson’s two shutouts, the first was a 26-save deal against Albany, and the second was a 25-save game against Manchester. At last refresh, Providence has 22 shots.

–Flick’s left-circle shot is blocked by Bruton right to Florek at the bottom of the right circle to break up the shutout with 12.6 seconds left. But Nilsson wins it, anyway: Bridgeport 2, Providence 1, final (though Anders Lee can’t pull a Ryan Strome and beat the buzzer with an empty-netter).

–Didn’t wrap this up, but as you’ll probably guess, another one of these tomorrow from Manchester. See you then.

Michael Fornabaio