There are rare things in hockey: Winning a championship, scoring a natural hat trick, watching Mike Sheehan call a good game, and finding a long-term goaltender in the SPHL. Teams like Knoxville (Bryan Hince) and Columbus (Andrew Loewen) have been fortunate enough to have found tenders who have stayed several years. The Louisiana IceGators are still hoping that the stars align and they find that quality netminder who will stick around for a few seasons. Today, we'll look at a list of experienced A-level goalies (in alphabetical order) who are in situations where they could possibly be available for another team.
Pisano's game is that of a stay-at-home defenseman, and not the kind of player who will pinch up in the offensive zone. He describes his game very simply, "I bring a physical presence to the game. If someone gets between me and my teammate’s goals, I tend to pull their jersey over their head and punch them in the face a few times."
A Few Times? Here's a few examples of the newest IceGator's handiwork. Anthony Pisano's Career Stats
In a couple of weeks, the SPHL will release the schedule for the 2015-16 season. However, for hockey junkies trying to get their off-season fix, we will stop at nothing to give you an idea what the schedule may look like for the upcoming season.
Tentative Dates
Note: These are tentatively scheduled dates. Dates and opponents are subject to change.
UPDATE: Schedule released on July 17th. The remaining three home dates have been added.
The Louisiana IceGators know how to make a splash. They partnered up with the Peoria Rivermen and sent their top-scoring winger Adam Stuart up north for the tough-as-nails center Alex Hudson. Stuart put up a team leading 32 assists and 53 points to go along with his 21 goals in the regular season. The Calgary native also racked up 141 penalty minutes, with many of those minutes coming by way of misconducts for chirping enthusiastically to the referees.
In return, Hudson led the Rivermen in assists with 26 on his way to a 39 point season, to go along with a team high 172 penalty minutes. IceGators fans should be familiar with Hudson's performance in the playoffs, as he put up 2 goals and an assist while hitting everything in a green sweater. The Lowdown
The IceGators needed to upgrade their defensive zone game, and they have landed the man to help out. A bruising two-way player, Hudson's arrival will give the IceGators a formidable center trio with Hauswirth and Boyer, allowing coach Omicioli the ability to roll three lines. He should be projected to anchor the top penalty killing unit, and should get most of the face-off work late in close games. An experienced player at the ECHL level with stints in Bakersfield, Alaska, and Colorado; Hudson may also be tapped for a leadership role in the locker room.
Alex Hudson's Career StatsIn October, the Southern Professional Hockey League will welcome back a familiar southern hockey destination when the Macon Mayhem begin play. Macon returns to the SPHL by way of Augusta, when the Riverhawks were forced from their arena during the 2012-13 season due to an ice plant failure. Macon was one of the charter cities of the SPHL, with the Macon Trax playing their only season in the league's inaugural year. That season saw the Trax put up a 33-23 record in the regular season and an impressive playoff run that sent them to the SPHL finals before losing to Columbus. The Trax franchise had two previous seasons in the SPHL's forerunner leagues, the Atlantic Coast Hockey league in 2002-03 and the World Hockey Association 2 in 2003-04. The city's hockey history is most known for one of the most colorful team names in professional sports, the Macon Whoopee, which was the moniker of three teams: the short-lived Whoopees of the Southern Hockey League in 1973-74; the CHL Whoopee, who played from 1996 through 2001; and the ECHL Whoopee, which lasted through the 2001-02 season before relocating to Lexington, Kentucky. The Mayhem's home ice will be the 7,000-seat Macon Coliseum, and are owned by the same couple who owned the Augusta Riverhawks, Bob and Dianne Kerzner. Mark Richards remains the general manager, and has named Kevin Kerr as head coach. Kerr has had a long playing career in minor-league hockey, with notable seasons in the AHL, IHL, and ECHL; playing as a hard-nosed enforcer and energy player with offensive skills. Fans unfamiliar to Kerr can classify him as a player similar to Cottonmouths coach Jerome Bechard. On May 3rd, the first six Mayhem players were named in an expansion draft. The players, selected from a pool of unprotected players of the other eight SPHL teams are:
The SPHL released the protected lists for its teams on June 5th, including the IceGators. Here are the rules regarding how the protected list works (H/T to Knoxville coach Mike Craigen):
Last week, Coach Drew Omicioli and GM Lou Dumont made the difficult decision to trim down the roster to the thirteen man limit. There's almost six months before next season begins. However, it's never too soon to discuss what the IceGators need to do to improve - both on and off the ice - for the 2015-16 season. 1. Sign this guy. There's no guarantee that he's going to make it through next season without getting called up to the ECHL, but Scott Diebold has the skill set and the attitude to not only be a quality netminder, but the media presence to be the face of the franchise. Update: Diebold decided to use his RPI degree in the private sector, and will not return to hockey. On 8/19, the IceGators acquired Adam Courchaine from the RiverKings for LW Benji Rubin. 2. Sign this guy. Jake Hauswirth is the best 1st line center in the league. He's a huge presence in the middle, can run the power play, and can score from anywhere on the ice. If he played a full season in Lafayette, he could rack up 70-75 points. 3. Help this guy out. It's no coincidence that Drew Omicioli turned the corner as a coach when GM Lou Dumont joined him behind the bench late in the season. An assistant coach is no longer a luxury item in this league, but a necessity. Find someone who Drew can work well with, and put him behind the bench. Defensive experience preferred. 4. Replace this guy. It's almost a certainty that Shawn McNeil has played his last game as an IceGator. He's been the captain of this team for four seasons, and a player of his caliber and character is going to be difficult to replace. If I can think of someone who can hit the ground running, it would be a good idea to tune up the game in Australia over the summer... 5. Defend this thing. The IceGators defense took a step backward last year, allowing 1,757 shots on goal (4th highest in the league) and 184 of those found the back of the net (2nd highest). This team has some of the best shooters in the league, and has led the SPHL in shooting percentage the past two years. Improvements need to be made to backcheck consistently, breakout cleanly, minimize d-zone turnovers, and minimize odd-man rushes. Defense wins championships. 6. This bus. I'm not saying that a quirky bus is a hindrance, because it's part of the minor league hockey experience. However, the team racks up the second most road mileage in the SPHL and has three destinations which are 10+ hours away. There have been too many road trips over the past two seasons that had to be completed with outside assistance. 7. Filling the seats. The front office did an admirable job in attempting to break the SPHL single-game attendance record, and 6,887 people joined in for the attempt. However, attendance last year dropped off slightly from the '13-14 season, from 2,372 to a league low of 2,336. A couple of months ago, I was venting about the lack of local hockey coverage in Lafayette. Since the SPHL came to town five years ago, hockey has been covered about as well as elementary school dodgeball games. This was a town where 20 years ago (my goodness, has it been that long?) the ECHL IceGators played to sold-out crowds in the 11,000 seat Cajundome. Last season, the SPHL IceGators were last in the league in attendance.
So I complained. Loudly. That's when it was brought to my attention that the people in the print and broadcast media who originally covered hockey during the ECHL IceGators era moved to other media markets once the team folded in 2005. Since then, internet-based and social-based media have proliferated at the expense of traditional news formats. This is not just an isolated situation. The nine teams in the SPHL have - at best count - two or three professional reporters who regularly cover the league, and neither of them are in Lafayette. So our mission is simple - provide the passionate hockey fans in Louisiana with local hockey news and increase awareness of hockey. We aim to accomplish this - one step... one post... at a time. It also makes a great beer bottle opener. |
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