The Utica Comets Thread | Part 39

[denkiteki]

Thanks for your effort but you would be incorrect. Kunyk/Cassels/Virtanen have not been together for a while now. Cassels is being moved all over the place. In the last 4 games he has centered Archibald and Grenier, Clark and Bancks, LaBate and Bancks, and Kunyk and Virtanen.

Valk has been the main center for Kunyk and Virtanen during that time span.

Green broke up the Valk line quite a few games ago trying to get scoring from other lines. Last night was a reunion of that line.

If you want to number lines that has become very difficult with all of Green's shuffling. Vancouver made much of the shuffling a necessity. When altogether Valk's line was #1, Pelletier's was #2, Cassels #3, and Hamilton's #4. However, when the 3rd rolled around and a goal was needed Cassels was replaced with a rotation of players at center, primarily Valk and Zalewski. When protecting a lead that entire third line saw less ice time and the Hamilton line became #3.

As to Cassels as a 4th line NHL center, Gaunce is already way ahead of him on that count.

Bachman wasn't too shabby in his 2 Vancouver starts, 3 goals in 2 games. He and Thatcher both rode their own hot streaks. This is Thatcher's second and he will continue to get the starts as long as it lasts even when Bachman returns. This reminds me of the Marstrom/Eriksson tandem. As the year wound down Marky took over even though Jokie had been good when Marky was in Vancouver or injured and their win/loss numbers were very similar. Before this current run, his numbers were not as good as Bachman's, but Bachie was cooling off so we might have seen most of what's happened here anyways as Thatcher was heating up at that time.

Well the times i watched, its what i saw... haven't been watching Utica as often lately (or hockey in general, march madness/NCAA is a bit more interesting at this time).

As far as Gaunce goes, he has a chance of being gone next year (at least top 2 depending on who you ask, some think he's almost guarantee to be gone on this board).

From a numbers prospective... Demko's number suffered due to a poor start and then the way Green played him. Demko played poorly in Dec - Feb because he got hurt, but after he recovered, he didn't really get a chance to play (partly due to Bachman being hot). If you play once in 2 weeks, its hard to not be rusty (which is why NHL backup deserves more credit than they get, its not exactly easy to play once every 2 weeks). The poor start is also expected since it happens with a lot of goalies including CS/Eddie Lack (didn't happen with Markstrom here because he isn't exactly a rookie).

Bachman isn't a bad goalie at all. He is an AHL starter but that really is all he is. The problem really is, we have a blue chip prospect/goalie who should be developed not to play behind an AHL vet (of course the main reason Bachman got another contract was due to Vegas' expansion draft). The other problem with Bachman is we signed him to a 2 year, 1 way deal... which is poor money management (considering we had Markstrom under contract at that point for over a million, and extended him of course... also Miller under contract the entire period). That's basically 575k in Utica that can be spent elsewhere (probably should be spent on forwards). Next year Bachman will cost 450k next year (in his 2 way deal), which is a lot for a 1B/backup AHL goalie (for Demko's development next year, he should have a 60/40 split or a 70/30 split next year).

 

[PG Canuck]

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