Livebloggery here, Bridgeport in Manchester. We’ll be listening to Ken Cail (audio link on Manchester’s site/pay-per-view). The Monarchs are on the Twitter at @MonarchsHockey, Ken’s at @KenMonarchs, and Paul’s at @thesoundtigers.
Mini stick night at Verizon Wireless Arena! Hustle up there.
The box should be here, and I think this’ll be the Hartford prescout. Hartford will be without J.T. Miller after the passing of Chris Kreider’s grandfather.
More closer to gametime.
–Computers are being pains, but it’s Poulin vs. Berube. Looks like Courtnall, Persson and Pelech scratched. Leggio is backing up.
Appears to be:
BRIDGEPORT
F: Mouillierat-Quine-Collberg
Halmo-Stretch-Zolnierczyk
Gillies-Sundstrom-McDonald
Gallant-Langkow-Vaughahn
D: Ness-Pulock
Reinhart-Mayfield
Czuczman-Graham
G: Poulin
Leggio
–Bridgeport puts a rebound in, but ref Fred Leblanc had blown it dead.
–No score after one. Manchester will carry 19 seconds of a Chris Langkow hooking penalty, defending against a rebound, into the second. The Monarchs outshot Bridgeport 17-9.
One shot from the D, by Graham, which I’m guessing came with the Stretch line. That’d make shots by line Stretch’s 6, Sundstrom’s 2, Langkow’s 1. Last weekend, the third and fourth lines may’ve had some of Bridgeport’s best even-strength shifts.
BTW, McDonald took the power-play shift rather than Collberg.
–Manchester controls the first couple of shifts after that power play and puts one in as a pass catches Pulock a bit up-ice and O’Brien scores on the two-on-one. 1-0 Manchester early.
–After a four-on-four, Manchester spends about two minutes in the Bridgeport end, forcing an icing. Brent Thompson takes his time out with 5:34 left in the second. Each goalie’s got a big point-blank save, Poulin on Sean Backman, Berube on Alan Quine on that four-on-four.
–Berube robbed Gillies after a turnover, and if I could understand their color guy screaming over Ken, Brian O’Neill may’ve blocked Colin McDonald’s wraparound try. (corrected spelling in there)
–My computer goes down, so hopefully nothing interesting happened in the last 1:30 of the period. It’s 1-0 Monarchs after two, and shots were 14-6 in the period, 31-15 overall. Poulin’s been good and had to be.
–Quine’s got the only shot for his line, and that on four-on-four (though I think Pulock had his shot with that group. Only two shots for D, too). Seven for Stretch line (four Halmo), two Langkow’s (both Gallant), four Sundstrom’s (two apiece for his wingers). I’m mentioning only because I counted.
–Auger rushes past Reinhart on the left wing, goes to the net and goes around Poulin’s left skate to make it 2-0 at 3:45. Sundstrom goes for a penalty soon after. McDonald seems to be up with Mouillierat and Quine again.
–The power play gets negated by a hooking penalty. Berube loses his stick on the four-on-four, and playing with a skater’s stick, Colin McDonald appears to pop in a rebound on the power play. … and then a moment later Zolnierczyk gets in alone and ties it on the breakaway. Didn’t catch who led him, but tie game with about 14 minutes or so to go.
–(It was more like 12 and a half minutes to go, but… And if the primary is to be believed, it was Stretch who sent Zolnierczyk ahead) Haven’t caught Gallant or Collberg in the third period. Don’t think Langkow had a shift at even strength until about midway, and that on right wing.
–Manchester high-sticking penalty with just under four minutes to go. Czuczman on the power play where Reinhart usually is.
–Czuczman had an early shot but otherwise a mostly quiet power play.
–The Monarchs bat in a rebound with under a minute to go. The Sound Tigers argue it was with a high stick. Leblanc will take a look. I can’t imagine reviewing for a high stick is fun or effective with the overhead look. We’ll see.
–No goal. Play on. 2-2.
–Looks like Shore knocked down the popup rebound above the crossbar.
–Overtime. #pointsforall #dryscrape #etc Have not noticed Reinhart in a while, actually.
–Yann Danis shut out the Wolf Pack tonight on 35 saves. Hartford was a man short with J.T. Miller called up.
–Oof: Bridgeport with too many men 57 seconds into overtime.
–Bridgeport got through it, Poulin with a couple of saves, Czuczman a block, Langkow a block. Back at four-on-four, Halmo’s stoned, and Poulin stops a Backman partial breakaway. They go to three-on-three, and off that faceoff, O’Brien to Dowd, and on Manchester Shot No. 50: Manchester 3, Bridgeport 2, final (OT). Second time in three games Bridgeport loses at three-on-three.
–I have no idea why I always want to call Brian O’Neill “Bryan.”
–Reinhart indeed was missing: upper-body, per Brent Thompson. I think I caught him for one shift after the tying goal. “We were down to five D. It was difficult, especially one of your top guys who can shut people down.”
Thompson thought they played hard all night and well in the third. “Puck possession was a big thing,” he saidd. “They’ve got a very fast group.” There were some things he’d have liked to improve here and there. He talked later about the hard areas: Taking away Manchester’s secondary chances, “then trying to get to the hard areas and generate secondary chances. We didn’t shoot the puck nearly enough.”
They shortened the bench a bit in the third; he wanted to get Collberg into the mix but didn’t find the right spot.
“The game was a good, hard-working game,” Thompson said.
But three-on-three, it’s not playoff hockey. (He actually said “real” hockey this time. Either way.)
More tomorrow, when we’ll see what both teams’ defense corps look like.