Matt Zaba has an undisclosed injury that will keep him out for “about a week,” according to team sources. As a result, Pack general manager Jim Schoenfeld announced today that the team has recalled goaltender Maxime Daigneault from its ECHL affiliate, the Charlotte Checkers.
Daigneault has appeared in one game this year for the Wolf Pack, logging 38:40 of relief duty February 8 in Lowell. He allowed two goals on 21 shots in that contest and absorbed the loss in a 5-3 defeat. In 23 games with Charlotte, Daigneault is 11-10-1, with a 3.29 goals-against average and an 89.8% save percentage, and is 10-4-1 in his last 15 decisions.
The 25-year-old, 6-3, 203-pound Daigneault signed an AHL contract with the Wolf Pack prior to the start of this season. He split last season between the Milwaukee Admirals of the AHL and the Cincinnati Cyclones, with whom he won an ECHL championship. Daigneault was 4-5-0 in nine games with Milwaukee, with a 2.53 GAA and a 90.9% save percentage. Two of his four wins were by shutout. In 14 games with Cincinnati, the St.-Jacques-le-Minuer, Quebec native compiled an 11-3-0 record, a 2.62 GAA and a 90.5% save percentage, with one shutout.
A second-round draft pick (59th overall) by the Washington Capitals in 2002 out of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League, Daigneault has appeared in 57 career AHL games, with the Wolf Pack, Portland, Hershey and Milwaukee. The fifth-year pro’s overall AHL record is 30-15-3, with a 2.65 GAA, a 90.9% save percentage and five shutouts.
It would not be underestimating it to say that given the level of play that Zaba has inspired in the play of the Wolf Pack, that the amount of pressure on Miika Wiikman, who admittedly has struggled this season after having such a remarkable year last season, has more than exponentially multiplied. The Pack have three huge games this weekend, two on the road (Friday and Sunday) with Worcester and the final meeting of the season with Bridgeport Saturday at the XL Center.
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