CANTLON: HOCKEY OFF-SEASON NEWS AND NOTES VOL 39 

BY: Gerry Cantlon, Howlings

HARTFORD, CT –  The LANAH (Ligue Nord Americaine de Hockey) (North American Hockey League) a six-team, Quebec-based, minor professional circuit,  announced it will not move its 25th season start date in 2020-21 due to provincial restrictions in place from the coronavirus (COVID-19). The league has not ruled out a round-robin tournament to be played from March until May if conditions improve to allow for games to be played.

Meanwhile, the Western Hockey League (WHL) one of the three Canadian major leagues, with 17 teams North of the border and five within the United States, announced a further delay to the start of their 2020-21 season. They scuttled the proposed season start on January 8, 2021, and did not set a new date.

The QMJHL season is on pause until after the New Year. The OHL is slated to begin their play on February 4, 2021.

The Ligue de Hockey Junior AAA du Québec (LHJQAAA) (Quebec Junior Hockey League), one of the ten leagues in the Junior-A Canadian Junior Hockey League, has delayed the start of its 2020-21 regular season.

The 13-team league played some pre-season games but was unable to begin a delayed start to its season earlier this month. The LHJQ has added a 13th team for the new season called the Condors de Cegep Beauce-Appalaches, while the Predateurs de St-Gabriel-de-Brandon relocated to become the Predateurs de Joliette.

WJC TOURNAMENT

The World Junior Championship tournament is set to begin it’s first two days of play on Christmas Day and Boxing Day.  All of the teams have arrived and completed their Canadian government-mandated 14-day quarantine in Edmonton.

Eight of 10 teams have several Connecticut and New York Rangers names on several teams.

Austria – Senna Peeters (Selects Academy at South Kent Prep).

Canada – Dylan Garand (Kamloops-WHL), Braden Schneider (Brandon-WHL) both players are Rangers draft picks, and ex-Pack Jason LaBarbera (goalie coach), who has a new job awaiting him when he is done with his responsibilities with the Canadian team, after having signed a deal with the NHL’s Calgary Flames to be their goalie coach. The Team Canada CEO is former Rangers coach, Tom Renney.

Samuel Poulin (the son of the Hartford Whalers’ Patrick Poulin) was cut. Rangers draft pick, Matt Robertson, was dropped from the team as a result of testing positive for Covid-19.

Czech Republic – Goalie, Nick Malik (HC Frydek-Mistek Czech Republic Division-2) is the son of former Whaler, Ranger, and Beast of New Haven, defenseman, Marek Malik.

Finland – Brad Lambert, the nephew of former New Haven Nighthawk player, and Bridgeport Sound Tigers head coach, Lane Lambert.  is presently the New York Islanders Assistant Coach

Russia – Yan Kuznetsov (Calgary/UCONN) and Vladislav Firstov (Minnesota/UCONN)

Slovakia – Rayen Petrovický is the son of former Whaler, Róbert Petrovický, who plays for TUTO Turku (Finland Division-I). His father is the head coach for the Slovak WJC team.

Sweden – Simon Holmstrom (Sound Tigers).

Karl Henriksson,  a Rangers draft pick, was sent home after testing positive for COVID-19, and Simon Robertsson, the son of ex-Hartford Wolf Pack,  Bert Robertsson, was among the last cuts.

United States – Goalie, Spencer Knight, (Darien/Avon Old Farms) is a Florida Panthers draftee and the number one goalie. Trevor Zegras (Avon OId Farms) signed in the summer with the Anaheim Ducks after leaving Boston University after his freshmen year.

Jake Sanderson, and Ottawa Senators draft pick (University North Dakota-NCHC) is the son of Whalers great, Geoff Sanderson.

Forward, Brett Berard, a Rangers draft pick in October, is from Providence College (HE). He is the son of one-time UCONN assistant coach (AHA years) David Berard, who’s currently the head coach Holy Cross (AHA).

John Farinacci, (Harvard University-ECACHL), presently playing with Muskegon (USHL) because of Harvard canceling its season, is the nephew of ex-Wolf Pack and Sound Tiger, Ted Donato (Harvard heads coach),  one of Team USA’s assistant coaches.

Eight German players, and two Swedish staff members, all tested positive in the Edmonton bubble, so the entire scheduled exhibition games were scrapped on Saturday. Every team will now start the tournament cold on Christmas and Boxing Day. 

PLAYER MOVEMENT

Ex-Pack, John Gilmour, leaves the Rochester Americans and signs a contract for the rest of the year with CSKA Moscow (Russia-KHL).

Markus Hännikäinen, who split last year between the Tucson Roadrunners, and the Cleveland Monsters, signs with Jokerit Helsinki (Finland-KHL).

Patrick Curry, of the Grand Rapids Griffins, is loaned to HC Devta (Slovakia-SLEL).

Roland McKeown leaves the Charlotte Checkers after signing a one-year, two-way deal with the Carolina Hurricanes paying $700K (NHL) and $100K (AHL) and then was loaned to Skelleftea AIK (Sweden-SHL).

Ryan Johnston of the San Diego Gulls hooks up with Iserlohn (Germany-DEL).

Bridgeport Sound Tigers’ Jared Coreau, signs with Bratislava (Slovakia-IceHL).

Lance Bouma of the Ontario Reign heads to IK Oskarshamn (Sweden-SHL).

Pavel Shen of the Providence Bruins heads to HK Sochi (Russia-KHL).

Finally, last year’s Chicago Wolves sees, Valentin Zykov, receive an offer from CSKA Moscow (Russia-KHL) making 212 AHL’ers to sign or be loaned to European teams. 31 players to head to Russia and all 31 AHL teams at the end of the 2019-20 season have lost at least one player by signing or loan to a European team.

A few more AHL’ers are off to the ECHL to start the season.

Ben Thomson, of the Sound Tigers, signs with the Orlando Solar Bears (ECHL).

Ex-Sound Tiger, Nic Pierog (Canterbury Prep), signs with the Indy  Fuel (ECHL).

Goalie, Callum Booth (Salisbury Prep), leaves Providence to go to the Jacksonville Icemen and Jack Badini (Old Greenwich/CT Oilers-EHL) goes from San Diego to the Tulsa Oilers (ECHL).

While that is happening the roster spillover has reached down to the SPHL who have just five of its ten teams playing.

The Birmingham Bulls training camp announced six players who all had initially signed ECHL deals, including former Kent School product, Brendan Soucie, who has graduated from Army (AHA).

Birmingham also signed an interim assistant coach in ex-Nighthawk, Jerome “Boom-Boom” Bechard. He played for the ECHL Bulls from 1992-1996, compiling 1,734 PM, and is presently the head coach for the Columbus (GA) River Dragons (FPHL). The league has not announced a start date yet. Bechard has coached in Columbus for the last 15 years in three leagues. Bechard was a 1989 sixth-round (115th overall) draft choice of the Hartford Whalers.

Birmingham head coach Craig Simchuk played for Bechard in Columbus for three seasons when the team was known as the Cottonmouths

Jason Kalinowski, (Ridgefield/Salisbury Prep/CT Oilers-EHL) graduates Endicott College (UCHC) and signs a deal with the Macon Mayhem (SPHL).

Ex-Sound Tiger, Frederic Cloutier, goes from Asiago AS (Italy-AlpsHL) to the HC Bolzano Foxes (Italy-IceHL).

Ex-Sound Tiger and Wolf Pack, Chris Langkow signs with HC Kosice (Slovakia-SLEL).

Nikolai Goldobin, one of the earliest AHL players this year to head to Europe, by mutual agreement has terminated his contract with CSKA Moscow (Russia-KHL) and is heading to Metallurg Magnitogorsk (Russia-KHL) the rest of the season.

The KHL Game of the Week was Jokerit Helsinki (Finland) against AK Bars Kazan (Russia) played 1,900km (1,180 miles) from Helsinki. The home team’s opening lineup had some strong AHL past flavor. The opening game forward line was ex-Pack, Niklas Jensen, ex-Sound Tiger, Jesse Joensuu, and Peter Regin (Binghamton) and former Springfield Falcon, Alex Grant, on defense,

AK Bars Kazan has ex-Pack, Nigel Dawes, who was on the ice to start the contest and scored the game-winning goal on a five-on-three power play. The now 35-year-old forward led his team to a 4-1 win. His teammate is former AHL’er, Stephane DaCosta, who had a goal and two assists.

Jokerit’s, Brian O’Neill (Yale University-ECACHL), who is currently out with an injury, signed a three-year extension with the club.

Nico Gross, drafted in 2018 in the fourth round (101st overall) by the Rangers, has gone from EVZ Academy (Switzerland-LNB) to playing with EV Zug (Switzerland-LNA). Last season he played for the Oshawa Generals (OHL).

Logan Mick, a former Quinnipiac Bobcat goes from Surahammars IF (Sweden-HockeyEttan) to Tyringe SoSS (Sweden-HockeyEttan).

Ex-CT Whale and Ranger, Wojtech Wolski, announced his retirement. In his last season, he played for Kunlun Red Star (China-KHL), HC Ambri-Piotta (Switzerland-LNA) in the Spengler Cup, and ended the season and his career with HC Ocelari Trinec (Czech Republic-CEL).

Stephen Davis, a right-handed defenseman at 6”0, 215lbs., has elected to leave Boston College (HE). He hasn’t played in a game this season and is heading East to play for the Halifax Mooseheads (QMJHL) after the New Year when QMJHL is slated to start-up its season again.

The last two years, the Hingham, MA player, who was born in Tennessee, and played hockey in the South in his early years, is the first player to go major junior from college hockey this year and the seventh of nine players total to head back to Canada to play junior hockey, (six went to Junior A). He played US Junior A last year with the Madison (WI) Capitols (USHL).

Connor Welsh (Greenwich/Brunswick School) has committed to Boston College (HE) for 2022-23. So far this season he has played one game with Sioux City (USHL) and is currently skating with the Mid-Fairfield Rangers (U-16 AAA) and was drafted in the spring by the Cape Breton Eagles (QMJHL).

Goalie, Mike Roberts (Wilton/Taft Prep), commits to Dartmouth College (ECACHL) for 2022-23.

Luke Pearson, a goalie with the Alberni Valley Bulldogs (BCHL), commits to the Yale University Bulldogs (ECACHL) for 2022-23. Pearson’s father is a former NHL’er with the Toronto Maple Leafs, Washington Capitals, and St. Louis Blues, Rob Pearson.

Tanner Schachle transfers from the University of Alaska-Anchorage Seawolves (WCHA) to the NCAA’s new Division-I independent program, the Long Island University (LIU) Sharks. Since the Seawolves program was formally canceled starting in 2021-22, and also elected not to play this year because of COVID-19. He is eligible to play starting a second semester.

Three other players depart by transfer from Alaska-Anchorage for Mercyhurst University (AHA). They are Devon Mussio, Wyatt Head, and Rylee St. Onge,  who can play immediately upon transfer.

That makes for 48 college school transfers this season.

Arizona State’s Filips Buncis left a year early and has signed with Krefeld (Germany-DEL) rather than play at home for Zemgale (Latvia-LHL).

Andrew Peski of North Dakota (NCHC) signs with Providence and assigns him to Jacksonville (ECHL) making 204 Division-I players to sign North American pro deals and 338 total to have North American and pro deals Division-I and Division-III.

The conference breakdown is Hockey East (38), NCHC (36), the Big 10 (34), ECACHL (33), WCHA (32), AHA (28), and Division-I independent, Arizona State (5).

Two grad transfers to UMASS-Amherst (HE) were announced. Matt Baker from Dartmouth College (ECAHL), and Cam Donaldson (Woodbury/Gunnery Prep-Washington) making 22 grad school transfers.

The Sacred Heart University Pioneers (AHA) secures a second-semester player. Forward Cody Hoban, (Guilford/Loomis Chaffe-Windsor) currently skates with the Danbury Jr. Hat Tricks (NAHL).

Ignotas Ragas departs Elmira College (UCHC) and heads home to skate for Kauno Baltu Ainiai (Lithuania-NLRL). He becomes the 82nd collegian in Division-I and Division-III to sign in Europe.