Chirps from Center Ice

The AHL suspended Zach Sill today for his illegal check to the head penalty (Rule 48) from last Saturday’s preseason game at Hershey. The suspension is two games. He already served one of the games by sitting out Sunday’s exhibition game vs. Adirondack. He will miss Saturday’s home opener vs. Hershey.

The AHL is cracking down on head checks with all of this concussion talk. Rule 48 is actually a new rule in the AHL Rulebook this year. Here it is verbatim, pardon my formatting:

Rule 48 – Illegal Check to the Head

48.1 Illegal Check to the Head – A hit resulting in contact with an opponent’s head where the head is targeted and the principal point of contact is not permitted. However, in determining whether such a hit should have been permitted, the circumstances of the hit, including whether the opponent put himself in a vulnerable position immediately prior to or simultaneously with the hit or the head contact on an otherwise legal body check was unavoidable, can be considered. 48.2 Minor Penalty – For violation of this rule a minor penalty shall be assessed. 48.3 Major Penalty – There is no provision for a major penalty for this rule. 48.4 Game Misconduct – There is no provision for a game misconduct for this rule. 48.5 Match Penalty – The Referee, at his discretion, may assess a match penalty if, in his judgment, the player attempted to or deliberately injured his opponent with an illegal check to the head. If deemed appropriate, supplementary discipline can be applied by the President at his discretion (refer to Rule 28).

All Rule 28 discusses is the Supplementary Discipline policy. I won’t bore you with those details.

Probably a good guess that it will not be the last time we see the term “Rule 48” get tossed around in the AHL.

Elsewhere, Bombulie doled out some bad news today. Keven Veilleux needs knee surgery and is done for essentially the season. Jonathan say six months, but that puts Keven’s return at mid to late April. This was an extremely important season for Keven’s development. He needed to produce this year. Now, he gets the label of a guys who gets hurt all the time.

Finally, Northeast Division Previews are out. Click here or just scroll down. The East Division wraps up the Previews tomorrow at noon.

Let’s Go Pens!