Has to be. And if Juulsen and Fleury are both sent down, the extra defenseman has to be Lamarche.
How I'd love to see the right side in Laval of Juulsen, Fleury, and Brook. And my left side becomes Ouellet, Leskinen, and Olofsson.
I wouldn't want Alzner in Montreal, but I wouldn't care if they call him up if they send Fleury down.
But if they do bring Alzner up to the NHL, they wouldn't have to send Sklenicka down to the ECHL. They could keep him in Laval as an extra with Lamarche.
The only way I see Alzner with the Habs is if Reilly is traded or someone is injured and even then I could see them looking elsewhere. If they send down Fleury and Juulsen is ready,
Ouellet Brook
Leskinen Fleury
Olofsson Juulsen
Alzner
maybe dress 7 D so Juulsen doesn't have to play too much. I would put Fleury on the top pair but I don't think they would put 2 rookies together. You could drop Brook to the 3rd pair but not sure they would want Juulsen to play that much. Maybe rotate Juulsen and Brook on the 2nd pair to keep his ice time down and not have 2 rookies play too much as a pair. But Leskinen has been pretty solid so it might not be a problem. Plus I'm not really a fan of Ouellet and Brook as a pair as Brook has been a little more shaky in his own end then I expected him to be so far and both are offensive guys first and Ouellet scares me at times in his own end.
One things for sure though, if they do get Fleury and Juulsen is 100%, yikes that is going to be one solid blueline from 1 to 7. If you have Lamarche and Sklenickna sitting in the press box, that's some good depth. Not that those 2 are anything special, but for the AHL they are solid 5th/6th types. Of course the big question mark is how much rust Juulsen has and any impact from the injury on how he plays.
On another note I'm waiting to see how the goalie situation plays out. Primeau should get the start tonight since he's been clearly better but he may stick with the rotation for now. I hope he doesn't but with a Friday and Saturday game, both were likely going to play but I'd go Primeau, then Lindgren then Primeau.
starting tonight he next 3 weeks plays out the same, Wed, Fri, Sat, with all as 7-7:30 games with the exception of the last game on Nov 2 vs Marlies at 3:00 whereas the previous night is a 7:30 but at least no travel needed. After that they are off for a week till Friday. So it will be interesting to see how Bouchard handles this and of course if it is Primeau getting more starts, how he fares as I have been saying I think we have one of the top goalie prospects in the world but it's clearly a very big step from the NCAA to the AHL for a 20 year old so we have to see if the hype meets expectations. I think they will and maybe even exceed but last game wasn't that much of a test yet as Rockford has one of the worst offenses in the league so far.
