Schedule note: Worcester announced this afternoon that tonight’s game will start at 8 p.m. because of “ice maintenance.”
Down at the bottom, chat at 1:30.
Bridgeport’s:
F (13)–Sean Backman, Casey Cizikas, Jeremy Colliton, Justin DiBenedetto, Trevor Frischmon, Micheal Haley, Scott Howes, Tomas Marcinko, Tyler McNeely, Kael Mouillierat, Rhett Rakhshani, Blair Riley, David Ullstrom
D (7)–Calvin de Haan, Matt Donovan, Mark Katic, Jon Landry, Aaron Ness, Steve Oleksy, Ty Wishart
G (2)–Anders Nilsson, Kevin Poulin.
From the current roster, that leaves out F Brett Gallant, G Riley Gill, F Trevor Gillies, F Tony Romano, D Russ Sinkewich.
The only change that to me wouldn’t have been a big surprise would’ve been if they gave Gillies a spot. The question then becomes whom to knock out.
The annual explainer of What Those 22 Names Mean:
Basically, if those 22 names are healthy and available (that is, not injured, not on recall, not suspended), they’re the only ones officially allowed to play. (There are financial playoff-share implications for the players involved, but we’ll leave that for now.)
Aw, does that mean (Gillies/Romano/Gallant/Sinkewich) can’t play again this year? There’s every chance he can. For each goaltender that isn’t available — say, for instance Anders Nilsson is on recall — another goalie can dress, whether he’s under contract or on a PTO. Thus, say, Riley Gill can dress. If three skaters are unavailable — Casey Cizikas, David Ullstrom and one more, for instance — then a skater who’s not on the list is eligible to dress. For each additional unavailable skater, another skater can dress.
If a team has fewer than two goalies, or if it has fewer than 18 skaters, that’s sometimes said to be “emergency conditions,” or they’re “in the emergency,” in case that word comes up. You can use players who weren’t on your Clear Day list if you’re in the emergency. In theory, then, you’ll always have 18 and 2 eligible to dress, though those 18 skaters may not necessarily be 12 and 6, depending on how you crafted your Clear Day list.
Do teams ever try to get around this? Oh, no, no, they would never do anything like that. Unrelatedly, these three players tweaked a groin this morning and are day-to-day.
What’s that bit about amateur players? An exception to this rule is that amateur players — guys coming from college, or from junior — can play at any time after they sign, regardless of whether or not the team is in the emergency. That includes players signed to amateur tryouts (like the dozen guys who came here last spring, including Donovan, McNeely and Ness) or amateur players who are already signed (like Ryan Strome or Kirill Kabanov, if their junior seasons end before Bridgeport’s)…
…Nino Niederreiter? My understanding is no, for a combination of reasons. The NHL CBA says that if a player is on the NHL roster at the trade deadline, he can’t be sent down. Even if you can find a loophole there, the AHL considers him an NHL player at this point after Clear Day, so no.
Chat 1:30.