Weekend Update

All of Europe is officially underway or at least the leagues I am following.  To my enjoyment it is starting out physical as well.  So where did we leave off?

KHL:  Ilya Kovalchuk started off very slow in his return to Russia.  His team however did not.  Well a few more games are in the book and Kovy has himself two goals and two assists and the team is 5-0.  Guess that really wasn't much of a surprise.  Medvescak started off their rookie season in the KHL with a bang.  It was such a bang I made a story about it.  Well just like Philadelphia Eagles fans I might have jumped the gun a bit after only one game.  Medvescak has since lost their last four games.

Austria:  In all likelihood the European point leader will come out of this league.  Two players already have seven points.  Chances are this will also be the league that sees the most fighting.  Former Edmonton player Alex Plante got into two fights on Saturday in a very heated game.  This league is probably one of my favorites.

Swiss:  It is early on but this league has also stepped up in the roughness department.  Any guess on how many regular season fights there were last season in this league?  I'll let you think.  Jim Vandermeer didn't get the memo as he had a go of it already in his European debut after 695 NHL and AHL games.  You're done thinking.  The answer was two.  Two fights in the season.  Through the first weekend they have one.

Germany:  Once again it is very early in the season.  There have only been two days of playing so it is hard to see who the better teams are.  The one thing the German league does a bit differently is not giving out a lot of fighting penalties.  I honestly don't even know what qualifies.  I've seen guys circle around and start throwing get double roughing calls and other times a minor altercation leads to majors.  Either way the league is still physical.  8 misconducts were already handed out and more than one game has ended in large scrums.

JUNIORS 

I'm not going to get to in depth with junior reports.  More than anything I will show clips or highlight a future prospect.  There is clearly going to be multiple players who record at least 100 points so that number can tend to be skewed.  And penalties in this league are a whole different game one of which I won't even participate in until the season is over.  In a quick intro into this reasoning it is because for whatever reason and in whatever year they started to not include misconduct penalties into the PIM total.  I don't know why except maybe because they give them out more frequently than other leagues.  It doesn't matter to me.  The player still sits for ten minutes except that ten isn't included in the total at the end of the season.  Well it does in my book so for record purposes I have to add it at the end of the season so it matches with the final numbers from the league.

The OHL and WHL both start this week.  In seeing the Quebec league in action which is normally a bit short on fighting comparatively speaking I can say that the increased rules in attempt to combat fighting are doing basically nothing.  Players receive a lot more penalties for getting involved in fights whether it is from removing their helmet, "staging"it off a faceoff, or getting into two fights in a game.  In many cases they are ejected.

In Sunday's Gatineau-Sherbrooke game, under standard hockey rules, there were 179 penalty minutes.  Hockey will always be hockey.  Not sure what they think they can change.

QMJHL from Friday:





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The NHL preseason also started this weekend and wouldn't you know we already got a guy suspended for leaving the bench to get into a fight.  After seeing his teammate take a big hit Paul Bissonnette raced over to start an altercation.  I wouldn't expect anything different from the Phoenix enforcer.  He is quick to stick up for players and in this case his emotions took over.  I'm fine with that.  He gets a ten game suspension when the year starts which is generally the automatic suspension for leaving the bench.  Biz will be back and ready to go.

OVERTIME

Overtime is precisely what it took to get an opening night win for Wait For It in the SAHL last night.  Battling back from three one goal deficits the teams went into overtime tied at three.  With roughly two minutes left in OT Anthony Tartaglia positioned himself in front of the net and chopped in a backhanded pass from Ryan Groth to secure the win.  The goal proved to be the icing on the cake after a quick turn of events.  Shortly after jumping on for their first overtime shift, Groth shattered his stick while forechecking in the offensive zone.  With tired forwards on the bench the only option was to grab one of their sticks and continue on.  After a quick regroup Wait For It made their way back into the offensive zone, won a battle behind the net and another in front to get the winning goal. 

We were not able to get highlights but the winning celebration looked something like this.




Four different players scored in a balanced attack and with a goal and two assists Groth was named the most awesomest awesome player of the game.