Ross Johnston’s three-game suspension stemmed from his coming on the ice on a legal line change. Things simmered, all hell broke loose, he fought, and Bridgeport had six guys on the ice. He’ll do his time. “Can’t deny it,” Brent Thompson said. “He was in the mix. He’s learned his lesson. Unfortunately now he misses the first three playoff games. That’s huge for us.”
Asked Thompson if Bridgeport was looking for anything on Albany from the league. “It was an edgy, physical game,” Thompson said. “Discipline was a factor on both sides. For me, the league needs to know, protecting our goalies, we sent in clips making sure our goalies are protected. It’s part of hockey. We always talk about winning the hard areas, and that night, they did.”
A little more from Johnston in the paper tomorrow, with a few other notes.
That leaves the Sound Tigers with only one extra forward. It seems likely they’ll do something about that before the weekend, though what that something is, that’s to be determined. They’re also bringing up Parker Milner from Missouri.
Thompson reiterated day-to-day on Kyle Burroughs.
Thought 1 from a day off: This admittedly risks the obvious “playing without your best players is bad? What a concept,” but: With Alan Quine and Joe Whitney both in the lineup, Bridgeport was 15-8 (.652; that included one shootout win and one overtime win, or a .609 winning percentage after regulation). With only one of those two dressed, it went 23-16-4-3 (.576; after regulation, 16-16-14, .500). With neither for a couple of games in January and at the end, it was 2-5 (.286). Whitney has the cast off, but…
Thought 2: Bridgeport’s minus-11 goal differential is the second-lowest to make the playoffs since the schedule dropped to 76 games in 2011-12. Oklahoma City was minus-17 in 2013-14 (minus-12 taking out the shootouts; Bridgeport stays minus-11 that way, but falls to minus-13 without three-on-three OT). The Barons went out in three games to the Texas Stars. The Sound Tigers are the 10th negative goal-differential team to make it in that span. Four of them did it in 2011-12, which included the only two wins for any of those nine teams. (In fact, the third-worst GD team, San Antonio, was one of those winners, taking out Chicago in five. The Rampage were minus-7, minus 10 without shootouts.)
Before this era, three notably-negative-goal-differential teams made the playoffs in 2009-10, including a Manitoba team that was minus-34 without the shootout. That trio also included the Sound Tigers, who were minus-19 (-20 without shootouts) and only had to face the juggernaut Hershey Bears, with their plus-144 goal differential. (This year’s Toronto team is a mere plus-103.)
Here’s the Springfield Republican story on the Falcons’ departure.
And RIP, Doris Roberts.