Chirps from Center Ice

A fan blog about the AHL's Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins

Category Archives: The AHL

Captains Set Sail

1 Comment Posted by on July 3, 2013

The Syracuse Crunch have signed away Wilkes-Barre / Scranton defenseman and Captain Joey Mormina, it was announced today.

It was a two year, AHL contract.

The search for a captain will be on again in the Fall.

The thing about Joey Mormina is that you hate to play against him and love to have him on your team. Ask anyone in Norfolk, Hershey, Binghamton, Wilkes-Barre (when Mormina was with Adirondack) or any other AHL team.

Mormina is a huge character fellow, as well. He was Wilkes-Barre’s Man of the Year nominee.

There is another captain off to new territory, as Hershey’s Boyd Kane will join Mark French in the KHL next season. You can read a fantastic sendoff by Bears voice Scott Stuccio here.

Back of the envelope, Binghamton re-signed G Nathan Lawson.

The 2013 Offseason Moves List has been updated appropriately.

More, lots more, Friday which is the start of Free Agency.

The AHL, WBS

Are You Qualified?

Comments Off on Are You Qualified? Posted by on July 2, 2013

According to this report, here’s who received qualifying offers from Pittsburgh today:

The only name not on the list was Keven Veilleux. The oft injured Veilleux didn’t do himself any favors using a slur in an ECHL stint and wasn’t even on the “black ace” squad this Spring. The writing has been on the wall for him for quite some time.

I’d be shocked if any of those qualified didn’t sign for next season.

There’s other stuff to touch on also.

The Maine Hockey Journal has a piece on Pittsburgh Penguins sixth round pick Blaine Byron, who will attend the University of Maine this Fall.

Draft guru Jesse Marshall broke down Pens second round pick G Tristan Jarry.

The Capitals qualified a bunch of guys today too. Among them was Penguin killer Tomas Kundratek, who wasted no time in re-signing today.

Ex-Penguins Tim Wallace and Brandon DeFazio are free agents again, as neither were qualified by their clubs.

There probably won’t be a Thursday update, unless one of those above qualified re-sign with Pittsburgh or some other move of significance is made. That said, you will want to check out the blog this Friday, the start of free agency.

I’m planning a “live blog” of sorts, with an assist to Twitter, as I will have a list of all the AHL East Division teams, their NHL parents, the beat writers that cover those AHL teams, plus any team employees that regularly offer commentary on said team as well as yours truly. If a move happens and a team tweets it, if you are following here on the blog you will see it in real time. At some point I will tweet out the link to the list so even if you are away from your computer and still want to follow along on Twitter, you can. I got you covered.

Business is about to pick up.

Pittsburgh, The AHL, WBS

Not Hibernating

Comments Off on Not Hibernating Posted by on June 27, 2013

(In case you missed it from this morning: Philippe Dupuis has himself a new home)

—

Welcome to the offseason Thursday blog update. Our neighbors to the south have been very active these past couple of weeks. They have:

1) A new coach in Mike Haviland. But you knew about this last week.

2) Jeff Taffe returning. You knew about this a few weeks ago too.

3) Joel Rechlicz will be back next year as well. Let’s hope we see more of this with he and Steve MacIntyre next season.

4) Dane Byers will also return. Byers was a trade deadline acquisition from Oklahoma City last season. He will be joined by Kelly Cup Champion T.J. Syner as well.

5) Not returning is Dany Sabourin. The veteran Bears goaltender is eyeing Finland as his next destination. Since The Great Sabou is so beloved in the Wyoming Valley, something worth keeping an eye on, as well as who the Bears will select to backup Philipp Grubauer next season.

6) Also not returning for the Bears will be assistant coach Troy Mann, who took a coaching job with the ECHL’s Bakersfield Condors.

Elsewhere….

The Broome County Veterans Memorial Arena will look different from the inside in the Fall.

Wilkes-Barre has been pretty quiet. Other than the Alex Grant news earlier this week and the six guaranteed dates that were announced last week. That’s all that has come out of Coal Street in the past week. On the six dates, we are probably opening on the road with the home opener on October 12 and are definitely playing on my birthday in December.

Here are the season ending SendToNews Highlights of the Year.

The NHL Draft is this Sunday. I am no expert in this venue. I’ll probably drop a blurb Sunday night or Monday on the haul that Pittsburgh got. I’ll continue to keep my eye on the Europe wire for anyone who bolts overseas and keep my eyes peeled for any big East Division trades or news.

Free agency opens July 5. Planning something big for coverage that day. Just haven’t ironed out the details yet. Stay tuned.

The AHL, WBS

Certainly Not a Day Late…

Comments Off on Certainly Not a Day Late… Posted by on June 19, 2013

Consider this your Thursday Weekly Offseason update a day early….

— The Grand Rapids Griffins are the Calder Cup Champions. They closed out the Syracuse Crunch in Game 6 last night. Here are my words for Bob Howard’s blog from Game 5 and Game 6.

— The Hershey Bears have a new bench boss. His name is Mike Haviland. He’s won everywhere he has been. He started in the ECHL, won two league titles there, moved up to the AHL with Norfolk and was named AHL’s Coach of the Year in 2007, moved on to Rockford and coached the IceHogs in their maiden AHL season. The IceHogs haven’t won a playoff game since. He’s most recently been an associate coach with Admirals this past season on Hampton Roads.

— Chris Bourque is going back to Russia, with Ak Bars Kazan of the KHL.

— The Wheeling Nailers and the rest of the ECHL announced their 2013-2014 schedule today.

— 107 days to opening night. Probably 100 days till we get our schedule. Heh.

Keeping my eye in the transfer wires as more and more guys are jumping the pond to Europe and beyond. If any Penguin makes the jump, I’ll blog about it. If not, see you next Thursday!

Not AHL, The AHL

Hey, Look! A Comet!

Comments Off on Hey, Look! A Comet! Posted by on June 15, 2013

We interrupt the severe lack of blogging to bring some news which has broke since this past Thursday:

— There’s a new team in town. They are the Utica Comets, a Vancouver Canucks affiliate. Read all about it here, and check out the logo and jerseys here. One thing that was not announced was in what conference / division the Comets will play. Although you can probably bet on the Penguins facing them a few times this upcoming season.

— The Bears have re-signed Jeff Taffe. Taffe had an arrangement to play in Sweden next season but decided to come back to play another year in Chocolatetown. Taffe and his wife had twins last October, so the culture shock of taking newborn children overseas with you to play hockey probably weighed heavily in Taffe’s decision to return to Hershey for another season. Can’t say as though I blame him.

— Dylan Reese is the first Penguin to jump the pond and sign elsewhere. Looks like Amur Khabarovsk is the destination in the KHL. The 2013 Offseason Moves List has been updated accordingly.

— The Syracuse Crunch are still alive after winning last night 3-2 in Game 4. Here are my words for Bob Howard’s blog. I would be lying if I told you I expected a sweep in the series. Game 5 is Saturday night in Western Michigan.

I’m off to go jump in my pool. To pay tribute to the newest AHL team, I may do a few cannonballs uh, cometballs.

The AHL, WBS

Dusting off the Keyboard

Comments Off on Dusting off the Keyboard Posted by on June 13, 2013

Haven’t blogged in a while. But I have been busy! Thursday is our offseason blog day, so here goes…

I have been keeping my fingers spry and have freelanced for Bob Howard and the Power Play Post Show’s website during these Calder Cup Finals. In case you haven’t heard who is leading the series, please click here for the Game 1 recap, here for the Game 2 recap and here for the Game 3 recap.

Have you read them all? Hope so, because I don’t want to ruin the rest of the entry for you.

Grand Rapids can put it away Friday night. They seriously don’t make mistakes. Syracuse is good. Really good. But they look lost vs. a Griffins team that just runs them around and finally out for the past three games.

Nothing much doing on Coal Street, although congrats to Teddy Richards for his recent promotion to Pittsburgh.

The parent club extended Dan Bylsma and crew for two more years. With the Penguins getting swept and only scoring two goals in the series, debate amongst yourselves on whether this was a good move or not.

Big day for the Vancouver Canucks as their AHL franchise was apparently approved by the AHL Board of Governors today from reports all over the Twittersphere this afternoon. They will set up shop in Utica, NY next season and ensure another season of 30 AHL teams for 30 NHL teams.

Unless news breaks between now and next Thursday, expect the next blog update then.

Pittsburgh, The AHL, WBS

Thursday’s are for Blogging….

1 Comment Posted by on June 6, 2013

There isn’t really much to write about after the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins season ended last Saturday. The exit interviews are over, the team has disbanded and are headed home.

So here I sit, twiddling my thumbs and watching the world go by.

There’s a couple of topics that happened since the last time I blogged. If you already knew about these, I’m sorry. I’ll try to keep up the blog regularly as the content allows. At least once a week, why not Thursday’s?

— Jeff Zatkoff was the only call-up from Wilkes-Barre on Monday. Before he left town, he talked with Mike O’Brien about the season that was.

— On the other side of the goal post, Mike O’Brien caught up with Brad Thiessen in this podcast.

— Mark French, late of the Hershey Bears, is off to Russia to coach another kind of Bears.

— Syracuse gets Grand Rapids in the Calder Cup Finals, which start Saturday in Central New York.

— Speaking of, you can watch the Calder Cup Finals for FREE on AHLLive.com using the promo code “CALDER2013”

— Finally, I don’t know if you have noticed, but the 2013 Offseason Moves tab is up and active at the top of the page. I plan on keeping this updated as the summer wears on. If you spot any errors or omission, please let me know in some form of social media.

See you next Thursday?

The AHL, WBS

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