GDT: #3 & 4 Bridgeport Soundtigers @ Charlotte Checkers | Broctober 11th/12th | 7 PM/ 6 PM| F/W 4-2 L 1-4

[Rengi]

GAME PREVIEW: SOUNDTIGERS vs CHECKERS


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Bridgeport Sound Tigers at Charlotte Checkers

WHEN: Friday, 7 p.m.; Saturday, 6 p.m.
WHERE: Bojangles’ Coliseum, Charlotte, N.C.
WEBCAST: www.soundtigers.com
RECORDS: Bridgeport 0-1-1-0; Charlotte 1-1-0-0
SEASON SERIES: First meeting of four. The teams split eight games last season.


LAST MEETING: Bridgeport won 2-1 at home March 30.

ABOUT THE SOUND TIGERS: Bridgeport is winless in the first two games of the season for the first time since 2003-04. ... LW Matt Lorito has a goal in each of the first two games, one on a power play, one on a penalty shot. ... G’s Jared Coreau and Christopher Gibson each got a start on opening weekend. ... C Otto Koivula and RW Steve Bernier both sat out of practice early in the week, listed day-to-day with upper-body injuries. ... Before the start fo the ECHL season, D Mike Cornell was sent to Worcester, where he serves as captain.

ABOUT THE CHECKERS: Charlotte raises its Calder Cup championship banner on Friday. ... The Checkers had the offseason turnover of most AHL teams — one of the departed, RW Nick Schilkey, is a Sound Tiger — but key players like G Alex Nedeljkovic, D Roland McKeown and LW Janne Kuokkanen are back. ... Former Quinnipiac D Chase Priskie begins his pro career with Charlotte. Former Sound Tigers RW Colin Markison is also with the Checkers.

HEAD TO HEAD

Previous Season
	4-4-0-0		4-4-0-0
Current Season
	0-0-0-0		0-0-0-0
Last 5 Seasons
	7-9-0-0		9-7-0-0

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TOP SCORERS

Bridgeport Sound Tigers	Charlotte Checkers
#14 Matt Lorito (2-0-2) #16 Oliver Wahlstrom (1-1-2) #20 Kieffer Bellows (0-1-1) #12 Otto Koivula (0-1-1) #10 Ryan Bourque (1-0-1) [TBODY] [/TBODY]	#3 Roland McKeown (0-3-3) #19 Morgan Geekie (1-1-2) #24 Jake Bean (0-2-2) #17 Brian Gibbons (0-2-2) #23 Janne Kuokkanen (1-1-2) [TBODY] [/TBODY]

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LAST 5 GAMES

Bridgeport Sound Tigers	Charlotte Checkers
3-4 L @ Hartford (2019-10-06) 1-5 L @ Springfield (2019-10-05) [TBODY] [/TBODY]	4-2 W @ Springfield (2019-10-06) 3-5 L @ Hartford (2019-10-05) [TBODY] [/TBODY]

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MATCH UP

Bridgeport Sound Tigers	Charlotte Checkers
Season Record	0-1-0-1	1-1-0-0
Last 10 Games	0-1-0-1	1-1-0-0
Streak	0-1-1-0	1-0-0-0
Last Game	3-4 L @ Hartford (2019-10-06)	4-2 W @ Springfield (2019-10-06)
Home Record	0-0-0-0	0-0-0-0
Away Record	0-1-0-1	1-1-0-0
Goals For	4	7
Goals Against	9	7
Power Plays	1/4 (25%)	3/6 (50%)
Power Plays (Home)	/0 (0%)	/0 (0%)
Power Plays (Away)	1/4 (25%)	3/6 (50%)
Penalty Killing	1/8 (12.5%)	1/11 (9.09%)
Penalty Killing (Home)	/0 (0%)	/0 (0%)
Penalty Killing (Away)	1/8 (87.5%)	1/11 (90.91%)

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Click to read more...

 

[Rengi]

News and Notes:
Holmstrom Makes Debut: Swedish forward Simon Holmstrom made his North American debut with the Sound Tigers on Saturday and showed immense promise and potential on the left wing. The Islanders 23rd overall pick in the 2019 NHL Draft did not register a point, but had four shots-on-goal and played solid minutes on a line with Tanner Fritz and rookie Mason Jobst. In addition, Holmstrom became the youngest Sound Tigers player ever by making his debut at 18 years, four months and 10 days old (three months and one day younger than Parker Wotherspoon in 2016). Prior to coming to North America, Holmstrom won a gold medal for Sweden at the 2019 Under-18 World Junior Championships.

200 and Counting: Fourth-year forward Travis St. Denis played his 200th professional game on Sunday, all of them in the AHL with the Sound Tigers. He became the 17th player in team history to reach that mark. He also reached an early milestone last season, scoring his 50th goal with the franchise.

Feels Like the First Time: Ohio State University product Mason Jobst is the latest player to make his professional debut with the Sound Tigers. He joined the club late last season on an amateur tryout contact (ATO), but didn’t make an appearance until Saturday’s season opener in Springfield, where he recorded two shots. The Speedway, Ind. native spent each of the last four seasons at Ohio State, serving as team captain the last two. He was selected as a finalist for the Hobey Baker Award (top NCAA player) last Spring.

Quick Hits: Matt Lorito scored the first two goals of the season for the Sound Tigers, including one on a penalty shot…It was the first penalty-shot goal for the team since March 4, 2016 (Bracken Kearns)… Five players made their Sound Tigers debut on Saturday, the most since the 2014-15 season….This is the first time in more than a decade the Sound Tigers have dropped their first two games of the regular season… Kyle Burroughs was named team captain last Friday.

Jared Coreau made his Sound Tigers debut in the season opener last Saturday (30 saves)...Chris Gibson is third on the team's all-time wins list (66), three behind Kevin Poulin (2010-15)... Steve Bernier is tied for fifth on the club's all-time goals list (61), 10 behind Jeff Tambellini (2005-09)...Tanner Fritz is 10th on the all-time points list (129), one behind Justin Mapletoft (2001-05)... The Sound Tigers season-opening roster consisted of six former first-round picks, 10 AHL rookies, five veterans, 4,814 games of combined AHL experience and 1,442 games of NHL experience.

VIEW FROM CHARLOTTE
Led by first-year head coach Ryan Warsofsky, the Checkers are looking to defend their 2019 Calder Cup title this season with a drastically new roster. Names like Aleksi Saarela, Nicolas Roy, Andrew Poturalski, Trevor Carrick and Patrick Brown are not back in 2019-20, but Julien Gauthier (called up to Carolina this past week) and 2019 AHL Most Outstanding Goalie, Alex Nedeljkovic, are returning. Nedeljkovic led the AHL in wins (34) and GAA (2.26) last season - both franchise records - and helped the Checkers not only win the title, but also the Atlantic Division and Eastern Conference championships. Like Bridgeport, the Checkers split a two-game series on the road last weekend against Hartford (5-3 loss) and Springfield (4-2 win).

 

[Rengi]

LINE-UPS

BRIDGEPORT SOUNDTIGERS

still in a vacuum | TBA

CHARLOTTE CHECKERS

STARTING GOALIES

 

[eoin92]

I need to find my fire stick remote. If I do, I think I’ll get this AHL package. My wife will be very excited

 

[IslesCLT]

Going tomorrow with our Islanders Meetup group. Looking forward to seeing our prospects in person!

 

[Rengi]

Going tomorrow with our Islanders Meetup group. Looking forward to seeing our prospects in person!

That is pretty cool! So you are with the Carolina MeetupGroup also today in Raleigh?
Actually will be interesting to hear tomorrow about your real eye test of our youngsters!

 

[Rengi]

I need to find my fire stick remote. If I do, I think I’ll get this AHL package. My wife will be very excited

I hope you find it! So it will be even more hockey to watch some exciting hockey along with your wife.

 

[steveat]

I wonder. Is Ryan Borque that bad that he can't even get a callup or can even get a PTO with the Isles?

 

[IslesCLT]

That is pretty cool! So you are with the Carolina MeetupGroup also today in Raleigh?
Actually will be interesting to hear tomorrow about your real eye test of our youngsters!

Yeah, couldn't make it tonight but at our meetup last week the guy that runs it said we we approaching 200 tickets sold in our section for tonight. Watch for section 109 in the corner where the Isles shoot twice!

Very much looking forward to tomorrow, we also get to go to the tunnel to greet the player back onto the ice after the first period.

The checkers and canes front offices have been super cool to us and making tickets available so we can all sit together

 

[Rengi]

Here are the game notes of Michael Fornabaio, the Soundtigers beat writer:

Game notes: A bit of follow-up from Sunday (and it’s partly geeky). We’d expected, and thought we saw in warmup atop the XL Center, Bridgeport to send out lines reminiscent of what they had started Saturday with, notably Matt Lorito on the left of Otto Koivula and Oliver Wahlstrom, and Kieffer Bellows with Travis St. Denis and Nick Schilkey.
Then they announced starters, and they announced Bellows-Koivula-Wahlstrom.
Um.
Then the teams lined up for the Anthem: Lorito-Koivula-Wahlstrom.
Um.
Before the draw, though, Lorito skated off, Bellows went on, and that’s how it stayed.
Brent Thompson said Tuesday that Bellows-Koivula-Wahlstrom was his intention all along. He was fortunate to notice Bellows at the bench and avoided the minor for improper-starting-lineup (you better believe I was watching the Hartford bench at the first whistle).
“I wanted to have that group together,” Thompson said. “They did a good job last year in the playoffs. There was a little bit of chemistry there, Kieffer, Wally and Koivy. They generated some offense for us through last year’s playoffs. Seeing that, the skill set, as far as their offensive instincts with each other, thought that might be a good line, and they did a pretty good job.”
The semi-interesting part, and we really don’t have the backup to it from Wednesday’s practice, is that with Koivula out Tuesday, it was sort of status quo ante, with Lorito opposite Wahlstrom (with Jeff Kubiak in the middle). See how they run tonight (and who’s in, with Koivula and Steve Bernier both termed day-to-day a few days ago).
(We will likely not see how they run until late this evening.)

 

[Rengi]

Yeah, couldn't make it tonight but at our meetup last week the guy that runs it said we we approaching 200 tickets sold in our section for tonight. Watch for section 109 in the corner where the Isles shoot twice!

Very much looking forward to tomorrow, we also get to go to the tunnel to greet the player back onto the ice after the first period.

The checkers and canes front offices have been super cool to us and making tickets available so we can all sit together

That is really huge in Raleigh and also in Charlotte that the front offices are so corporative! Have a great day tomorrow!

 

[Rengi]

Line-ups of the Checkers and starting goalies above!
I am sorry, that I have not received any lines for Bridgeport yet...

 

[buud]

Let's go you kids!

 

[Rengi]

Bellows - St. Denis - Schilkey
Wotherspoon-Burroughs first line to start.



Gibson with 3 stops in 1st minute...

 

[SI90]

1-0 Charlotte

Geekie with the goal

 

[Rengi]

1-0 Charlotte

Geekie with the goal

It has been 2 consequutive PP for the Checkers, Gibson stood tall before.

 

[Rengi]

Lorito ties it at 1-1 on a one-timer after a feed from Kubiak, his 3rd goal of the season.

 

[Rengi]

 

[Rengi]

 

[Rengi]

 

[Rengi]

Not much going here so far in 2nd period as well, also no real connecting passing from both teams.

 

[Rengi]

Ahooooo makes it 2-1 Soundtigers with a wrister from the hash marks!

 

[Rengi]

SCORING

1st
5:56		Eetu Luostarinen (1) Morgan Geekie (2), Chase Priskie (2)	(PP)
18:27		Matt Lorito (3) Jeff Kubiak (1)
2nd
16:04		Sebastian Aho (1) Kieffer Bellows (2)

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PENALTIES

1st
02:00		Tanner Fritz Interference, 2 min PP
04:31		Thomas Hickey Tripping, 2 min PP
07:38		Eetu Luostarinen Delay of game, 2 min PP
14:07		Clark Bishop Interference, 2 min PP
2nd
08:16		Mason Jobst Hooking, 2 min PP
18:06		Oliver Wahlstrom Tripping, 2 min PP

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[Rengi]

We're onto the third period!

 

[Rengi]

After trading chances the Checkers tied the game at 2-2 through a point shot from Forsling over the glove hand of Gibson.