After Arthur Staple reported yesterday* that Kirill Petrov has a broken foot and is out four to six weeks, I took a peek back. On Petrov’s last shift, in between the last two Hershey goals, he kind of spun awkwardly in front of Bridgeport’s bench and — it was the end of the shift — went straight to the bench. Was that where it was?
Nope, Brent Thompson said: It happened in warmup.
“Tough Russian,” Thompson said with a smile. “I give him a lot of respect, playing with a broken foot the whole game.”
So a tough loss. Obviously lots of options, even with Taylor Beck up, but Petrov’s spot with Joe Whitney and Bracken Kearns fell to James Wright for today at least.
“He’s a big body, skates very well, hopefully can get in on the forecheck,” Thompson said. Thompson likes him defensively in that spot, too.
Carter Verhaeghe was in Wright’s former spot between Justin Vaive and Ben Holmstrom and was working with the power play as well.
Bridgeport sent Andrew Rowe, finally healthy, to South Carolina yesterday, and today Matt Finn is going to Missouri. “Finn needs to play games,” Thompson said. “He’ll go down, play a couple of games and be back next week.” Similar to Verhaeghe and Leduc; Leduc returned with a game Thompson liked on Wednesday, and Verhaeghe appears set to get in as well.
(Speaking of Wednesday, I thought I remembered Bridgeport having Peter MacDougall as a ref before. Nope. Former Canisius and pro player.)
Mike Halmo got his assist added from the Utica overtime save.
The Falcons come in tomorrow night… from Maine. Fun ride. They picked up Keith Aulie, the veteran Toronto, Edmonton and Tampa Bay defenseman, on a PTO yesterday.
Language corner: John McIntyre on why “descriptivist” isn’t a dirty word, and via that, Geoffrey Pullum on the “misplaced” only. And Atlas Obscura on the Southern Italian turned Northeastern American Italian accent. (See also pasta fazool.)
*-The days you can’t go to practice are always the days something happens.**
**-That’s probably not strictly true, but it feels like it.