Road game: Bridgeport at Springfield

• Does democracy work: LOL, no, but a last friendly reminder that the Fake Team Awards are underway for the 14th year, and at least the third year that I’ve threatened will be the last. Voting still open until tonight at 11.
• The Fake Team Awards Electoral College: Now we’re getting somewhere. Where were we?
• Who, when, whatever: Bridgeport at Springy, MassMutual Center, Friday, 7 p.m.
• Watch: AHLTV pay-per-view
• Listen: Mixlr audio
• Twitters: Alan / the Sound Tigers / the ThunderCougarFalconBirds / Ryan Smith / Matthew Wiernasz at Northeast Hockey News / Christopher Berry
• Box score: There is (R: C.Brown!, Sheehan; L: Tobias, Galvin).
• Storyline: A Bridgeport-Hershey series could be set by the end of the night. Actually, if you just want a Bridgeport-Hershey series and don’t care who has home ice just yet, it’s easy: If Hershey wins in Hartford and the Bruins lose in regulation to Lehigh Valley, the Bears will guarantee themselves a finish above the Bruins, setting a BST-HER first round. If that happens and Bridgeport gets at least a point in Springfield, then it’ll be set, (2) Bridgeport vs. (3) Hershey. But, if pretty much anything else happens, the 3/4 seeds won’t be set yet. That said, if the Sound Tigers get at least a point tonight or if Hershey loses, any flavor, at Hartford, then Bridgeport does clinch second place, everything else be darned. Meanwhile, in boring non-standings stuff, we’ll see what the lineup looks like. Tied up on other things the past couple of days. The gameday notes a couple of statistical possibilities the next couple of days, including the all-time appearances list getting a little turned over:

*-coming into Friday; #-second-team AHL All-Star, but we’ll get to that

• So that’s kind of neat. Meanwhile, Springfield hasn’t been a House Of Pain for Bridgeport since my boss stopped letting me go there; two Sound Tigers wins in a row there. Coincidence? Obviously not. For the T-birds, Bobby Farnham is suspended, and, well, that’s no fun.
• That wasn’t a new list item: Yeah, but the table did something funny within the list item and I didn’t feel like figuring out why, so I just made it two lists.
• How has your knowledge of HTML increased over the past 22 years: Um
• Meh, what else is going on: Much scoreboard watching around the league as the seeds come into focus. Carter Verhaeghe was named the AHL’s first-team all-star centerman, a fine choice by the voters (Lindsay Kramer on him); Aaron Ness only made the second team, which, I’ll admit my bias and say a team too low. Can’t go crazy over any picks, though, though I had a few things different (most notably two different left wingers, with Paul Carey on top; Providence became a different team when he showed up). Pretty sure I forgot to link to the all-rookie team the other day. Jake Bean the only Atlantic Division player on there. In international play, the United States women have reached the semifinals at the World Championship. And the U-18 men’s team (so, the boys team) features Darien’s Spencer Knight in net. Oh, and does the Big Club have a game tonight or something?
• Aren’t you supposed to be doing something else: Kinda. (PODCASTS) Heck, I sort of am right now.
• If this were a regular blog post, what word or phrase would most likely follow “More” at this point: Later, maybe?

Apparent BRIDGEPORT lineup, though things got mixed up early with a lot of special teams:
F: C.Bourque-Koivula-Wahlstrom
Bellows-Lorito-Bernier (A)
St. Denis-Stevens-Carpenter
Eansor-Jones-B.Holmstrom (C)
D: Wotherspoon-Casto
Aho-Hutton
Helgeson (A)-Burroughs
G: Smith
Gibson

Bridgeport started Wotherspoon-Burroughs, at least according to the sheet. It may actually be St. Denis-Carpenter-Stevens. (Edit: It’s not; Carpenter’s changing as the right winger, though he took a right-circle draw.) Don’t know why those changes specifically. But that’s every healthy forward who’d been here who sat out Wednesday getting back in the lineup tonight, and one of the two defensemen who sat out.