OH, WAS THERE A GAME PLAYED? 

  VERSUS  

All the talk in coverage about Saturday night’s 4-1 loss by the Hartford Wolf Pack to the AHL’s best team, the Manitoba Moose has been around Sean Avery. Yes, Avery was playing in his first game since November 30th since being ridiculously and unceremoniously dumped by the Dallas Stars after they had signed him to a four-year $15.5 million contract. What were they expecting of him? Was he suddenly supposed to transform from being the classless irritant they knew he was, into some sort of a mix between Miss. Manners and Fred Astaire? When he made his “sloppy seconds” comment about Elisha Cuthbert and Rachel Hunter there has never been a more feigned, self-righteous indignation in the history of the planet than when NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman and Stars owner Tom Hicks carried on the way they did about it. If Hicks was so disgusted, why did he allow his co-GM, Brett Hull to sign him to such a ludicrous contract in the first place? Had he never seen or heard of Avery that he should be so surprised that he did what he did? Give us all a break! 

So where did that leave all of this? Well, it left an opening for Glen Sather to once again ride in like some sort of Dr. Drew to the rescue and turn the Hartford Wolf Pack into the hockey version of Celebrity Rehab. Had the Rangers themselves been playing like the first place team he envisioned when he signed the players he did, does anyone think this would be going on? Remember the comments Sather made about Avery in his arbitration hearing?

Sather was quoted as having stated that Avery was “a reasonably effective player as well as a detriment to the team."

In his response to the New York Post, Avery told Larry Brooks that,  "It's hard not to take something like that personally and not to be emotional about it," He said. "I know this is part of the business, I know this is part of the process, but it's extremely disappointing to read something like that coming from Slats [GM Glen Sather] and not to be offended by it.

"They talk about me taking, 'unnecessary penalties,' and make a lot of references about me that I don't want to go into but that I don't think are fair. I certainly don't think I was a detriment to the team."

Some time off and some therapy and he's the savior of the Rangers season this year and for the next three years too? Avery is going to fix Wade Redden's inability to do much more than collect $6m/year? Avery is going to remind Scott Gomez how to play center? Avery is going to stop Michael Rozsival from giving it away more than a drunken Paris Hilton? On top of all of that, Avery is going to be a model citizen both on and off the ice?

What made Avery so effective is that he was such a mental case on the ice…now he's not? If Avery is going to bring magic to New York, this comment said to the press afterwards should frighten you. "I was just happy to be out there. I didn't really comment. I had a few
comments, but nothing that was too drastic or something maybe the old Sean would
say."

Does this sound like Sean Avery?

"Yeah, a couple of guys said something… nothing that I could probably
repeat," he said. "Just typical stuff, typical guy stuff. Nothing that got me
going. And there were a couple of older guys like Keaner (Mike Keane) and
Krogger (Jason Krog) that said, 'Good luck with everything, have some fun,' so
that was nice."

If he's not going to play like the "old Sean" then what is he going to do to lift this Rangers team for the next three seasons?

But for now, Avery is in Hartford. Wolf Pack head coach Ken Gernander has his hands full already dealing with keeping his young team focused and trying to get them to play with consistency. Gernander can now add the media circus that seems to follow Avery wherever he goes to his responsibilities in leading his already struggling team through the maze that is this huge distraction.

So, with a chance at tying for first place in the Atlantic, and playing the best team in the AHL, we get, “The Avery Game” and apart from a couple of nice passes, he was essentially a non-factor.

With 5,899 in attendance at the XL Center they actually played a game.

Some of the bad blood that lingered from Wednesday night’s 4-2 loss to the Moose lingered as just four seconds into the contest, Dale Weise and Alexandre Bolduc dropped the gloves in an event at center ice that was more of a wrestling match than a fight.

When the smoke had cleared, they got down to business and just 3:29 into the game, the Moose struck first. Pierre-Cedric Labrie put what seemed like a typical shot-on-goal at Hartford (27-22-2-3) starter Miika Wiikman (22 saves). The puck hit Wiikman and came back into the slot where Dusty Collins beat Pack defenseman Michael Sauer to the puck and fired it from the middle of the slot right back and beat the Finnish netminder over the stick for a lead the team would never relinquish.

Avery did cause a ruckus behind the net on his second shift that saw Pack’s Jared Nightingale and the Moose’s Nathan McIver square off. McIver initially wanted nothing to do with tangling with the 6’3” defenseman. However as he skated backwards to square off with McIver, Nightingale stumbled for a moment. That inspired McIver that maybe he could take him. That was a mistake. Nightingale regained his balance before McIver got to him and then put a pretty solid beat-down on the Moose defenseman sending him to the ice with a solid right hand to the jaw.

As the first period was coming to a close, Bolduc got a breakaway opportunity and was stoned by Wiikman who made a terrific save ending a rather evenly played period.

The first half of the second period was much like the first, a lot of territorial battles and tough defense by both sides. That all changed at 11:18 when the intensity of the game rose as Avery set up Weise in front of the Manitoba (his hometown) net only to see the Moose’s Karl Goehring (26 saves) make a sliding stop, the first of many outstanding saves on the night.

On the next rush up ice, P.A. Parenteau was called for interference by referee Sean Davis on what was clearly a dive by Moose center Greg Rallo. Parenteau and his teammates were incensed as Rallo was not called sending the Moose on a power play.

The Pack fell behind 2-0 on a freak accident of a goal by the game’s Second Star, Bolduc. Shaun Heshka fired a shot from the left point. The puck then did it’s best impression of a pinball as it first hit Raymond Sawada then ricocheted off Nightingale and wound up on the right side of the crease where Bolduc had a simple tap in doubling the Manitoba (37-14-0-5) lead. 

With the Pack shorthanded again after Davis whistled Brian Fahey for unsportsmanlike conduct for firing a shot on Goehring after the whistle had blown, Avery and Greg Moore had a shorthanded two-on-one opportunity that Avery missed shooting wide of the net.

The Pack handcuffed themselves by having one of their fewest offensive outputs of the season by getting only four shots on Goehring, the game’s obvious First Star, in the second period.

Weise, the game’s Third Star, managed to get the home team to within one at 3:58 of the third period. The Pack came out in impressive style to start the period and really took it to the leagues best. But the Moose don’t have the leagues best defense by accident. Manitoba is now 26-1-0-1 when leading after two periods because they simple pressure the puck and fall back and defend the middle of the ice confident in the fact that their goaltenders can stop shots from the outside and bad angles and it’s a formula that has proven effective for them. However, when Fahey’s right side point shot got through to Goehring and rebounded into the crease, Weise beat defenseman Maxime Fortunus to the puck and slid it under the Moose netminder.

The Pack would have two more golden chances to tie the score both snuffed out by Goehring. The fist came at 6:24 when he poke checked the puck away from Moore who had come in on a breakaway and the second buried the Pack when he made a highlight reel stop sliding across the crease to deny a WIDE open Artem Anisimov alone on the right doorstep at 13:28.

Manitoba sealed the deal with just 1:20 remaining, a failed Vladimir Denisov clearing attempt hit Moore and was gift-wrapped for former Ranger Jason Krog who came in unencumbered and beat Wiikman between the legs.

The Pack desperately tried pulling Wiikman for the remainder of the game and it cost them when with just 34.3 seconds remaining Michael Grabner fed Guillaume Desbiens for the empty netter.

Summing up the game for reporters afterward, Gernander stated that he thought, “We played hard and made a few mistakes, and when you’re battling a first-place team, you can’t afford to make mistakes,” He said. “So I can’t fault the guys for their effort, and we’re going to have to shore up a few of those mistakes before we can move ahead.”

For coverage of the game from a reporter who knows what he’s talking about and has seen just about every game since the Pack came to Hartford, read Bruce Berlet at Hartfordwolfpack.com. Miracle of Miracles, the Hartford Courant actually sent someone to the game. But of course not a sentence about the game that doesn’t include the word “Avery” in it. Manitoba has the Winnipeg Free Press also on hand but even Tim Campbell gets little in about the game and all about what’s his name?  There are virtually a zillion stories out there if you want to read about Sean Avery.

GAME SUMMARY and OFFICIAL SCORERS SHEET.

NOTES:

* Sean Avery ate lunch although the rumors of him having SECONDS of a SLOPPY Joe are completely unfounded.

* Sean Avery took a nap before the game and counted 72 sheep before falling asleep.

* Despite all the hullabaloo about Avery being a gigantic draw, the Pack average attendance on Saturday nights is 5,351. They had a Nigel Dawes bobble-head giveaway Saturday night and the total attendance was still only 5,899. Now, if you completely disregard the giveaway, AND the fact of the draw of seeing a team that is VERY rarely in Hartford, then Avery drew an extra 548 fans to the game just as Howlings predicted. The same affect happened when Claude Lemieux played those games in Worcester… a little bump for the initial novelty and then faded away. If as the Courant and others want to ignorantly claim that Avery drew 2,000 extra fans, let’s see the Pack draw that on Wednesday night when there is no giveaway and the Bridgeport Sound Tigers are in town.  If the Pack announce say 2,500 Wednesday night will they blame the drop in attendance on Avery?

* The Pack are 3-16-1-2 when trailing after two periods and 13-12-1-1 when outshooting their opponents and 4-7-0-0 in games decided by three goals.

LINES:

Pyatt – Rissmiller – Weise

Dupont – Anisimov – Parenteau

Avery – MOORE – Zaborsky

DiDiomete – Ouellette – Sugden

Denisov – Sauer

Potter – Sanguinetti

Nightingale – Fahey

Wiikman

SCRATCHES:

Ford – Healthy

Stefanishion – Healthy

Urquhart – Healthy

Byers – Knee -Season

Soryal – Hand – Six Weeks

Owens – Oblique – Day-to-Day

THREE STARS:

1. MTB – 1 Karl Goehring
2. MTB – 49 Alexandre Bolduc
3. HFD – 23 Dale Weise

ON ICE OFFICIALS:

Shaun Davis (31), Referee
Marty Demers (79), Linesman
Paul Simeon (66), Linesman

SCOREBOARD WATCHING:

Providence got a win on the road defeating Portland 6-5 in a shootout, Lowell knocked off Albany 7-4, Manchester crushed Lake Erie at home 6-2, Syracuse doubled up Springfield 2-1 in Syracuse.

Today, Manitoba visits first place Providence, Portland travels to Lowell, Springfield is in Toronto and WB/Scranton Hosts Worcester.

STANDINGS:

NEXT GAME:

Hartford hosts Bridgeport in a GEICO Cup battle. The Pack lead the season series four games to three with three remaining. Game time is 7:05.