Fun little practice today, in which the lines and pairs were as they’ve been with the addition of one Matt Lashoff, paired with Loic Leduc. At the end they went to a drill, one net on each blue line, top three lines (including Sebastian Collberg, still in red, which Brent Thompson said surprised him a bit; thought he’d not be no-contact today) against the fourth line and the defense (which, since the fourth line is now in the “Argentina” light blue and the defense is in a darker blue, is basically just “the blue team”). They go two-on-the-goalie, first pair to score two goals earns their team a point. Both goalies made some out-of-their-gourds saves. The forwards and Kevin Poulin took a 3-0 lead, blew it but won 7-5.
Had a good chat with Lashoff and will write it for the paper. Thompson said they’ll see how these couple of days go for him before deciding whether they’ll toss him into the fire this weekend.
Elsewhere, Mark Arcobello in the past little while has gone from Edmonton to Nashville to Pittsburgh. The trajectory has to flatten out a bit from here.
Brad Ross received a 20-game suspension for performance-enhancing substances. Here’s Dave Nonis’ statement.
And when Bridgeport visits Hartford on Jan. 30 coming back from the all-star break, it’ll be the start of Hartford Hockey Heritage Weekend up in the capital. A poster for the first 3,000 fans that night. Calder Cup in the house.