Have tried hard to lay low the past few days, but the internal clock has not yet reset: Woke up on time to get to practice two of the past three days. Yeah, um, no availability.
There might be some local games remaining, though. On Facebook tonight, Bruce Berlet reported that the Whale may play at least one second-round home game at Harbor Yard. Edit: Most likely date apparently is May 9. There are a ton of events at the XL Center through mid-May, including four days of the circus May 10-13.
One other team got itself swept out of the AHL playoffs Wednesday night. The Milwaukee Admirals’ seventh penalty cost them the winner tonight at Abbotsford. The Heat’s seventh power play was on a delay-of-game minor; the other six included a too-many-men minor.
So it ends for the Admirals and Vic Bartley (who scored the tying goal late in the second) and Scott Ford, joining Bridgeport and Rochester among the done-in-three. It rolls on, though, for Ben Walter and Darien’s Hugh Jessiman.
Chicago and Hershey staved off elimination, the former forcing a Game 5 on Friday, the latter winning in overtime (at, noted @gonzotherooster, a beauty of a coincidental time; the Bears’ came first). The remaining Eastern Conference division winners both took 2-1 series leads decisively, Norfolk never caught, St. John’s after a quick and early tying goal.
There’ll be three Game 4s on Friday, with three possible Game 5s on Saturday.
As noted in many places on Twitter, the NHL Eastern Conference semis — Washington-Rangers, New Jersey-Philadelphia — are a sweet old-school Patrick Division playoff for those of us old enough to remember. At least from a quick look, the only time under the new format that a conference semi included four teams all from the same old-school, ’80s-into-’90s division: 1995, Philadelphia-Rangers and New Jersey-Pittsburgh. The next year featured Philly-Florida and Pittsburgh-Rangers, though Florida didn’t first play until 1993, when the division names got Atlanticized.
Fun stuff from CapGeek: former Union forward Jeremy Welsh, who signed to play the season’s last game with the Carolina Hurricanes, had a cap hit of a comically absurd amount of money for that one day. (Considering that the cap hit for the day is 1/186th of that absurd amount, which is give-or-take what he really got paid for the day’s work, I guess it’s reasonable.)
The Bluefish turn 15.
Ken Jennings has a Sporcle quiz that notes something I’d never seen: A certain Maritime province bears a certain resemblance to the land of my birth. I guess I’m from Salmon Creek and my Mom’s from Moncton. Speaking of Sporcle, here’s this year’s Do You Remember the 59 Guys Who Were Here This Year? quiz. Second annual, I guess.
RIP, Pete Fornatale.
And it’s six years since this happened. I’ll ask you as usual to buckle up if you don’t.