GDT April 19, IceCaps vs Bulldogs, 7:30 PM

[dlbalr]

The final stretch of the season begins tonight as Hamilton (28-39-1-5) hosts St. John's (31-35-3-4) in a battle of teams already mathematically eliminated from the playoffs. Sebastian Collberg is expected to make his AHL debut in this one and in doing so, will become the youngest player in the league...surpassing Charles Hudon. Michael Bournival and Patrick Holland both left the last game with injury so I've pulled them from the projected lineup until we hear otherwise.

Projected St. John's Lines:
(based on +/- data from last game)

Klingberg - Jaffray - Sawada

Maxwell - O'Dell - Macenauer

Schnell - Lowry - Ezekiel

Lunden - Tousignant

O'Neill - Melchiori

Ramsey - Arsene

Cuility - Godfrey

Sol

Dekanich

Projected Hamilton Lines:

Hudon - Tenute - Collberg

Archambault - Nokelainen - Leblanc

Kristo - Belzile - Lefebvre

Hagel - Vail - Stortini

Beaulieu - Pateryn
Tinordi - Stejskal

St. Denis - Ellis

Mayer

Puck drop is at 7:30 PM, Funny820 as always will have the play-by-play; click the banner below to listen.

[dlbalr]

Mayer gets the start tonight. Tokarski goes tomorrow on the road while Gervais-Chouinard gets the final home game of the year. I'm not sure that one was fully thought through, why not put the good goalie for the final game as a reward to the likely bigger crowd?

[Lammy]

Mayer gets the start tonight. Tokarski goes tomorrow on the road while Gervais-Chouinard gets the final home game of the year. I'm not sure that one was fully thought through, why not put the good goalie for the final game as a reward to the likely bigger crowd?

Why bother even playing the game....just give the win to the Ice Caps by default now.

[dlbalr]

Why bother even playing the game....just give the win to the Ice Caps by default now.

And yet with 5 minutes left, the Bulldogs are leading by 2. A pleasant surprise I'm sure for you.

[dlbalr]

4-1 Hamilton is the final, at least for one more night this year I get to break out everyone's favourite smiley.

http://theahl.com/stats/game-summary.php?game_id=1010973

[Machine of Loving Grace]

Collberg was the Insurance Premium player of the Game.

[miklin]

I think a few players could have gotten "the hardest working" Bulldog award. Collberg made one major goof by having the puck hit him while while heading to the bench for a change and then not going after the puck which ended up in our end. He should have waved off the change but to give him credit likely didn't know the system. He was even and only had one shot. Beaulieu still gives the puck away a lot even though getting first star tonite. Guess you can't argue with three assists and a +3. Honestly thought the first star and third star were reversed. Nice to see Greg Pateryn back to what we thought he was going to be like before his injury (although Robt had to make two saves on shots Greg made on his own net)

-more random thoughts-interesting the Dogs goals were all different: full strength, shortie, power play and e/n. Referee Dave Lewis called a lot of penalties early and called a couple boarding calls that would have been hard checks earlier in the season. He didn't call obvious charging and I figure he still doesn't like us when Nokie got a double roughing in the SJ end when both players should have got it. Re Stortini's fight-it was instigated by the Ice Cappucinos and Stortini was also speared afterwards yet SJ only got an extra unsportsmanlike. There seems to be a pattern the way the games are called-they must get a memo fron the league as to which penalty to concentrate on early as there seems to be a definite repetitive pattern that is called on both teams. I thought the SJ players were jumping into the play off their bench early all evening.

-re goalies: agree with Brian that the fans deserve to see the #1 or #2 guy at home. Let Chouinard play in Rochester. The Hamilton fans deserve better. I was just sorry that Mayer left Hamilton without ever having a shutout in his career although he came close tonight. It was nice to see that he gave a young fan in section 121 his goal stick post game

-I'm not sure who operates the shot clock but in the first, the Dog's shot the puck at the SJ goalie quite softly on a PK clearing, but he had to stop it. The shot clock judge didn't put it up as a shot on goal. It's my understanding that if it it had not been stopped it (and would as a result gone in), it should be a shot on goal regardless of the speed of the puck. But they will put up "hot dog" saves that are going wide. The mind boggles.

[dlbalr]

-I'm not sure who operates the shot clock but in the first, the Dog's shot the puck at the SJ goalie quite softly on a PK clearing, but he had to stop it. The shot clock judge didn't put it up as a shot on goal. It's my understanding that if it it had not been stopped it (and would as a result gone in), it should be a shot on goal regardless of the speed of the puck. But they will put up "hot dog" saves that are going wide. The mind boggles.

I seem to recall reading a while back that situations like this were not supposed to be counted as shots on goal. If a player were to actually shoot it is one thing but simple dump outs that just happen to hit the net shouldn't be counted. I'm pretty sure that's the way it is in the NHL so I think that was judged correctly.