The second-to-last tie in Sound Tigers history was a scoreless game here, April 10, 2004 against the Philadelphia Phantoms. (Clinched the division for Philly, sent Bridgeport to Wilkes-Barre, and history is history from there.)
The Phantoms and Sound Tigers come in today on five-game losing streaks. Unlike almost 11 years ago, someone’s got to get credit for a goal today.
Alan Quine’s not back quite yet, but Andrew Rowe will make his season debut (against the franchise with which he broke in). The middle two lines are shuffled a tiny bit; not the Kearns line, which seemed to be driving things in the third last night, nor the fourth line, apparently, with Sebastian Collberg looking like the last scratch. Bridgeport is wearing camo sweaters that are pretty cool, unless you need to identify players at a glance, because there are blue numbers on a blueish base. Even that bad batch in 2005-06 that put black numbers on the Blue-Star sweater wasn’t this bad. But it’s for a good reason, at least.
First game here for that guy in 13 in orange, Lehigh Valley’s captain, since last Feb. 7. First game here for that guy in 47 in orange, wearing an A, since April 18, 2010, which, yes, means Bridgeport hasn’t won a playoff game since the last time he played here. (First in the regular season since Nov. 29, 2009.)
BRIDGEPORT
F: Verhaeghe-Kearns (A)-Beck
Rowe-Wright-Halmo (A)
Vaive-B.Holmstrom (C)-Florek
Gomes-C.Jones-Markison
(Collberg-scratch)
D: Cullity-Graham
Burroughs-Pulock
Czuczman-Leduc
G: Milner
Gibson
LEHIGH VALLEY
F: Leier-Brent-McDonald (C)
Conner-Cousins-Gagner
Goulbourne-Goumas-Rehkamp
Martel/Bardreau
D: MacDonald (A)-Lamarche
Morin-Alt
Drewiske (A)-Hagg
Marti
G: LaBarbera
Stolarz
R: Miller, Leblanc. L: Ernst, Galvin.
Bridgeport scratches (believed healthy unless noted): Johnston (lower body), Quine (lower body), Whitney (lower body), apparently Collberg, Carkner.
With Rowe’s actually wearing 46 now, the lowest number now worn just once is 48, Cameron Wind, 2010-11.
First home game after the death of David Bowie, whose music has been part of the presentation here forever. Pre-warmup mix included “Under Pressure” and “Rebel Rebel” back to back.