Draft day round One: Fuck my team!

Halifax traded Gabe O’Connor to Rouyn Noranda to get a pick a meager 4 spaces higher in the draft, so they get both a 19th and 15th pick. So much for our strong Gabe based blueline. Here we are bragging about the strength of our blueline with Gabe being our #1 guy and then we trade him. I am pouting. I am glad he got that goal with us, his very first goal in his very last game as a Moosehead. Gabe, you shall be sorely missed. kisses.

1. Val d’Or - Olivier Archambault

2. Shawinigan - Yannick Veilleux

3. Lewiston - Francis Beauviller

4. Val d’Or - Jean-Francois Leblanc

5. Moncton - Raphael Bussieres

6. Chicoutimi - Rock Regimbald

7. PEI - Jimmy Oligny

8. Shawinigan - Jonathan Racine

9. Victoriaville - Phillip Danault

10. Saint John - Pierre Durepos

11. Lewiston - Jean-Francois Plante

12. Gatineau - Benjamin Laliberte

13. Chicoutimi - Gabriel Vermette

14. Montreal - Xavier Ouellet

15. Halifax - Brent Andrews (a forward) an NCAA blowhard* (I only say that because I think the NCAA threats are bullshit…maybe its his parents or agent who is the actual blowhard). What a fucking crock of shit this is then. Why trade up to pick a guy that no one was going to pick because they thought he was going NCAA ? According to Wuest we don't even have a firm commitment from the kid. Couldn’t the Moose have gotten him with the 19^th pick? Why pick a forward and trade away your top defenceman when the aim this year was to build from the net out?

Remember this picture heading from the Metro: “Moosehead general manager Cam Russell cites Gabriel O’Connor as the type of player he wants to acquire.” Little Andrews dude better have some totally fantastic fucking eyebrows or I quit!

Worse yet is the fact that Gabe went to the draft to rep the team and the fuckers traded him. Apparently he was stunned. Like no Duh!!!! I guess we wanted an O’Connor but not THE O’Connor. Uhhhh wasn’t he supposed to be captain? Oh FUCK MY TEAM.

OK. I am a little upset, and by a little I mean…a lot upset. Why must girls always let emotion get in the way of the logical human-boy slave trade that is CHL hockey?

16. Moncton - Dillon Donelly

17. Chicoutimi - Robin Gusse

18. Saint John - Jonathan Huberdeau

*edit -admittedly the term blowhard is unnecessarily harsh. I am just excessively emotional right now and sometimes I take it out on the wrong people. It happens when you juggle lots of men. Sometimes one boy gets to feel the wrath of my anger that should be directed towards another boy. Don't worry kid. My calling you a blowhard hurts a lot less than being suddenly, shockingly and unwillingly uprooted from your home of 3 years and having to move away from your friends and girlfriend(s) at a moments notice. Don't blame me... blame the CHL for that one. If you come here and you are 'all balls' I might change my mind. It does happen - just ask Jessyko Bernard.

A perfect opportunity for sexual harassment

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For everyone else...playoffs start today

I don't know if you noticed but I seem to have gone missing. I don't know if I checked myself into a mental institution or spent my week in a drunken stupor. Perhaps I have been working hard and then spending my evenings in a drunken stupor. I may have been mourning the end of my hockey season and also the loss of the AUS championship by the UNB Varsity reds and that lustworthy thing in the UNB nets. Five goals allowed in the final game does not make me bitter... no not at all.

When you have no hockey there is not much to say. That is unless you want to spend your time analyzing this year's team and next year's team and verbally fellating Piette. But I don't need to do that because that is what we have "reporters" for. Just look at the hockey headlines that were in the paper this week:


Wuest:
Potential favorites for herd fans left in the post season lurch
2009- 2010 roster at a glance
mailbag: we're No. 1 right? Wrong.
Mooseheads player-by-player year-in-review
Q & A with Cam Russell
Plans for Czech stars still unclear
Piette seized his opportunity from rebuilding Mooseheads, (and has great eyebrows)
Mooseheads still face obstacles after rebuilding year

Cochrane:
Next Moose rebound not immediate
Back to Hockey Basics

Palov:
Finding a silver lining
Screaming Eagles, Wildcats among first-round favorites

Apparently, in Moose Country, the off season is much more exciting than the regular season.


In QMJHL news:
Rimouski boyfriend Keven Veilleux is the offensive player of the month. Kevin Marshall (Remparts) gets defensive props and Marc-OlivierMimar (Drakkar) gets rookie props and children's digestable cookies.

The finalists have been announced for the golden puck awards.

Nicola Riopel (Moncton Wildcats) is the ADT CHL goaltender of the week. He is also the league defensive player of the week. I probably should have mentioned that on, oh, I don't know....Monday. Joel Champagne gets offensive props for his pretty face... and the weird way he has no jawline and his face just melds into his neck. It confuses the enemy. Especially the part where we think that despite the face/neck merge he is still whole worlds of dreamy.

Gabriel O'Connor not only hogs the cookies but he also hogs the Academic player of the month award for February too. Our Ex boyfriend Guillaume Monast (Remparts) was also deemed adequately intelligent for the month of February. I wonder if I were to text them and they replied- would I be able to understand what they were trying to say? Are they smart enough to spell most words correctly?

Hazaa

Let it be known that in their last game of the season the Mooseheads defeated the Acadie-Bathurst Titan by a score of 6-3.

Everybody scored - including Gabriel O'Connor who finally got a goal from the point. The bench erupted in an orgy. For you see, Gabriel is a defensive defenceman and in his three years with the team he had yet to register a goal. Congrats are in order.

Stransky, Desjardins, Pender, O'Brien (who was long overdue as well), and Louis-XVI also scored for the Moose.

I will have more to say later. For now I'll just say congrats to the boys on the win and for keeping it entertaining - yes three fights, and 2 in the first eight seconds of the game IS entertaining. You were on it like Elisha Cuthbert on an NHLer. That means you were really really on it.

I am going to post one of Rikk's video's here just to make this more entertaining, and to show you how much hair Eric has. Damn!!! I am entering him into the fro-off that is currently taking place between my boyfriend and my friend Dave. Also, because I know that Hammer thinks that Eric is pretty so I thought that maybe she might also like to see him being studly.



To the old guys: Pender (who knew you were so sensitive?), Bona and Yetman. Bon voyage and good luck with all your future endeavors. May you remain studly as you age, because trust me... it is all downhill from 22. I get a funny feeling in my nether regions every game during the second period. If any of you can figure out why I'll buy you a beer. You are right - it's a trap! Sorry, but I had to try.


Team awards were also given out at this game. I have listed the winners below:
Rookie: Gabriel Desjardins
Most Improved: Alexis Piette
Unsung Hero: Linden Bahm and Charles Bety
Best defensive Forward: Travis Randell
Fan's Choice: Tomas Knotek
MVP: Tomas Knotek
Best Defenceman: Gabriel O'Connor
Director's Choice: Mark Yetman
Community involvement: Scott McDonald
Playa's Playa (Sportsmanship): Graham Bona
Academic: Ben MacAskill

I hope I have not forgotten anyone

News links:
Matthew Wuest - Mooseheads end sour Season on a sweet note

Dance Monkey Dance

Honestly! A five on three for a whole minute and not once was there a guy with his ass parked in front of the net. What the fuck is wrong with this scene?

The Mooseheads lost 5-4 to the Saint John Sea Dogs in the shootout. They blew a first period 3-1 lead. They want to torture me. WHY DO YOU HATE ME?

For that I blog about nothing but my bitterness and extreme frustration. This fits perfectly into the frustration ball I am building as a result of all of my other wretched life situations and defective bits. The QMJHL game summary should be of some use in figuring out what happened. See? Mooseheads on the bottom, Sea Dogs on top. You can recognize the Mooseheads because they have unbelieveably high proportion of sharp angle shots, hence the 14 in 45.

Since both Lewiston and Val d'Or were defeated tonight it means that the Mooseheads are still in the playoff race, only 2 points from tying it up with these other two epic losers.

Bah humbug.

Cookies go to O'Connor. I saw him do some nice defensive things.

Stars go to

1. SNB - Pard, Nicholas
2. HAL - Randell, Travis
3. HAL - Desjardins, Gabriel

Randell for missing the net twice and Desjardins for his lovely 1st goal in which he drove the net to pot his own rebound. That sirs is how you get goals.

Dear Cam,
Please try someone new in the shootouts. I don't know, maybe someone like Desjardins, Bety, or Bernard. What is that? It is too late! Well Fuck you too!
xxooxox,
Me

News Links:
Wuest- Mooseheads eagre to avoid setting new record in futility (now with studmuffinly picture of Bona)
Pender hurt in bout with top fighter
Lineup: Sea Dogs at Mooseheads - the lines make NO SENSE.
Game notes: Sea Dogs 5, Mooseheads 4 (much more informative than this blog post)
Mooseheads still alive despite loss

Also, Liske has been interviewed for the Marcel Robert smarty pants award. You should check it out.

Go Banana!

We lost ... again... because our motto for late 2008 was "never two in a row". But all that is about to change in 2009. Right? "Go banana", oops I mean "Go Mooseheads". We shall not continue to be the Ralph Wiggums of the QMJHL.



So yeah, clearly I am not on the ball with this post, since the game was last night. A pre-game wine, a game-time beer and some post-game Baileys has a tendency to do that to a girl...especially when she has to drink to keep it fun because that game was a snoozefest. This is coming from a NJ Devils fan.

To sit though all of that only to lose on a lucky bounce and wrap around goal from Brandon Street, for PEI, with 20 seconds left in overtime - it drained everyone. I mean everyone. It is like we in the crowd don't even care anymore. The funnest part of the night was an older gentleman leaning over the railing at the end of the game yelling at Simon Olsson to "eat something and grow".

The game program was the second funnest - Jessyko is apparently hairy like a puppy, which means my moniker for him is fitting.

Some of the boys made new Years resolutions: Mark Yetman is going to prevent his brother from scoring on him when the team plays Shawinigan - well there is a challenge, seeing as Brad is a stay at home defenceman with only 2 goals to his name in 75 career games. Yes, aim high, little buddy. Corbeil is going to cut back on the cookies (I haven't been giving him that many cookies) and Piette is aiming for the full Dick Dastardly.

It looks like the parents made the boys shave over X-mas so they will all have to start re-cultivating their moustaches.

But the game...
As I said it was boring. Mooseheads lost 2-1 in OT, giving us a point but we maintain our position as the second worst team in the league just 2 points ahead of Val d'Or, one back of Baie Comeau. It tastes like burning.

My eyes kept wandering to Bona and O'Connor, who were playing in a very calm and collected manner. When I sit near males all I ever hear is "bitch bitch bitch Bona". When I sit near females all I hear is "Bona does not panick, he is so calm". So take your pick Bona, take your pick. I prefer Bona as calming presence, not the thing that makes males behind me scream in my ear "God damn Bona". Last night they were screaming God Damn MacAskill instead, so it was a bit of a reprieve.

Ditto O'Connor. So fucking smooth last night. I was going to give O'Connor the cookies but I felt that Mathieu has been on such a bad run lately that maybe he could use the cookies, and especially now before the new years resolution kicks in. Mathieu Corbeil made 34 saves on 36 shots in the loss last night, including a save midway through the second that saw him flash the leather with cat like reflexes. He made a pad save which bounced off of a Rocket player and quickly came back to him, high on the glove side. No goal - followed of course by massive applause (and it rained cookies).


Also...
1) Where was Bobby Nadeau? We only have 4 dates all year and the bastard stood me up. Instead I get Evan Mosher, oh how that boy can stretch (in warmups). He didn't really have to make any big saves, hence why he got the win, and hence why I must remind my team "go banana"
2) No goals for PEI on the power play = Go orange
3) Randell - control the puck before you try to shoot it, shots into the mesh do not count - Go banana
4) We were out-hit by a team of midgets: 54 to 11. That pretty little Olsson girl had 6 hits. Bona, O'Connor, McDonald, Pender, and MacAskill combined for NO hits. Go banana.
5) ohhh faceoffs. Once again, apart from Piette, the Mooseheads were a big "go banana".
6) Stransky getting a game misconduct 5-6 minutes into his home debut. WTF? At least someone was trying to hit, albeit in a shifty and evil way.


News Links:
Matthew Wuest - Game notes: Rocket 2 Mooseheads 1 (OT)
Willy Palov - Mooseheads lose in OT

Frankly I like my title better, non? It is so much more informative. It reflects how I, as a fan, feel when I am cheering on this team.

Ich möchte hockey, bitte

My adventure is almost at an end. Soon I shall be home and prepared for awesome (or maybe season-long disappointment) hockey adventures. In the meantime may I just point out that I found this guy wearing #17 in Mannheim. Who the hell is he?


Points of interest:
1) The NHL has a prospect report on QMJHL players that are eligible for the 2009 draft. My baby Simon Despres (Sea Dogs) is there along with David Gilbert (Quebec Remparts; who I presume hates my guts, why else would he refuse to play for my team) and Olivier Roy (Screaming Eagles). They even discuss the Mooseheads Gabriel O'Connor

O'Connor is an intimidating force at 6-foot-2 and 198 pounds and he isn't afraid to use his size. Last season O'Connor had just 3 assists for the Halifax Mooseheads, but his 75 penalty minutes in 58 games showed his physical side.

"He's a big kid in Halifax," Bordeleau said. "He played pretty well last year. He's the type of kid that can develop into a solid defenseman."

Props to Gabe for getting a mention. This will do his spikey hair proud (please stop spiking your hair). What preytell do they mean by saying "he's a big kid in Halifax"? Do they just mean:
A) he's in Halifax and he's big - brilliant assessment
B) he is bigger than other kids in Halifax - not so much, we have a big team. Welcome to the club.
C) he is popular and gets lots of ladies - how would they know, ewwww.

They totes made a mistake with Olivier Roy however by suggesting that Vincent Riendeau is the goalie coach for the Screaming Eagles (it is Scott Gouthro). Dudes, you get paid to get this shit right. Riendeau coached in 2004-2005. It is not hard work - it is right there on wikipedia for christs sake. Or if you really want to expend energy you can check out the Eagles homepage. I can mess up because I am a hobbyist, but when people who get paid mess up it pisses me off.

That being said, I do not put a lot of stock in prospect reports or draft position. Clearly some kids are better than others, fine...but one good performance at a tiny tournament can skyrocket a kid who performed mediocre for the majority of a season (see Jake Allen - below). Then there is that hockey nepotism thing. Angelo Esposito, impact rookie for Hotlanta, or guy that will be sent back to the Q to play for the Montreal Juniors. Don't lock him into your fantasy league team just yet chumps and chumpettes.


2) Speaking of some people who may actually know what they are talking about when it comes to the Q, Nathan Fournier has started up a new MAINEiacs blog entitled "MAINEiacs Post to Post" to make up for the unfortunate death of The Asylum on MVN.


3) My NHL boyfriends, headed up by Big Lou, have added former Moosehead Kevin Cormier to their roster. This is the 4th in a series of family signings for the Devils, who have had the brothers Parise (big brother Jordan is now in Austria), the brothers Gionta, the brothers Pandolfo and now the brothers Cormier (Patrice being drafted by my beloved Debils this summer) . This will make Kevin magically attractive again. Some jerseys just have that special power, ya know?


4) Oh, and the Mooseheads lost 4-3 to the Screaming Eagles in the first game of the season. I don't want to be mean, but Yeti honey, sweetie, baby, you have to step it up. Remember when I said not to allow a goal in the first or second shot. I really really meant it. Don't do that!!! Then don't go and allow two goals with zero dangerous shots. I mean , I did not see the game so I should not judge; maybe they were Vinnie LaCavalier style crazy angle shots- I don't know. Something tells me they were not. What? A puck off a skate? Not this shit again. Sorry my cuddly wuddly goalie, I should never think so harshly of you. Who on our team stole Guillaume Monast's super deflector skates - he needs those for when he is playing with the Remparts.


5) There is a sportsnet 2008-2009 season preview of the QMJHL teams which names the Quebec Remparts as a favorite and the Moncton Wildcats as a darkhorse. There is also a Sportsnet report on Jake Allen, goaltender for the Montreal Junior. Once again hilarity ensues: f'n writers "the home of the Juniors de Montreal, formerly the Fog Devils de St John’s"


6) Last but not least - check out the pre-season CHL Mosiak Mastercard top 10: Why no Sea Dogs? Is it an issue with scoring that has failed to get them ranked in the top 10?

It is spelled MacAskill

The new season is rapidly approaching. Soon I shall have practically a whole new team of cuddle partners to keep me warm over the long, cold Canadian winter. I am going to do a little coverage of what is left of my team, then later I will take a quick look at who is eligible to fill all of those gaping holes.

This is not meant to be an in depth analysis, I don’t have the skills for that. It is just a simple way of showing what the Mooseheads have left – which is not much We are a bare skeleton of a team that needs a huge bowl of Pro-stars cereal to keep from looking so damn anorexic. The sugar-high is nice though.

Forwards:

Returning:
Andrew White – RW – 20
Logan MacMillan – LW - 19
Yuri Cheremetiev – C - 19
Eric Louis-XVI – LW - 19
Tomas Knotek – C- 18
Travis Randell – C -17

Acquired:
Linden Bahm – RW - 19

Rookies:
Matt Snow – LW - 19

We need at least 12 forwards, we currently have 8.

Offensively, Tomas Knotek and Logan MacMillan are most likely to put up the points. By the end of last season Tomas was moved to the 3^rd line and was working on his defensive game a bit more. He will probably be back to centering the 1^st line again this season, which means there will be a lot of pressure on his offensive game. Hopefully he can continue to develop his defensive side.

Logan is the most complete player we have. He is expected to be on the PP, and the PK, all the while logging 1^st line ice time. If I am lucky he will continue to fight and lose his jersey. If I am unlucky he will be weakened by overexertion and miss half the year.

Andrew White is also a complete player. You can stick him anywhere and he doesn’t seem to complain. It will be weird if Andrew is moved up to the first line. I think his offensive productivity last season was mostly due to the fact that our team was ‘so deep’ that players from the other teams did not see Andrew, the little, grindey 3^rd line shut-down guy, as a target – they had bigger Czech fish to fry. Andrew does his best work when he is not a target. We will have to see how he adjusts in going from shifty eyed, unassuming, third-line guy with his jersey tucked in, to 1^st line superstar. He had a bit of time on the 2^nd line last season and he was still able to rack-up points, but I personally like Andrew more for his defensive game.

Yuri Cheremetiev is our faceoff specialist but has played little more than third-or forth line ice time for most of his career. Last season his offensive prowess did not increase with increased playing time or a change in line pairings. Will this season be any different?

Neither Eric Louis-Seize (ELXVI - seen here wearing a suit), nor Travis (ol’ man) Randell had much ice time last season. Randell supposedly has a strong offensive upside which he should be able to develop more this season after being used in a shut-down role for the 46 games he played last season. Please remember that our shut down line was not actually used as a shut down line against the other team's top lines before we make any conclusions about the shut down skills of our shut down players. Wha? Exactly!

ELXVI, despite being 19 this season, has done little more than play on the 4th line and hit people. I guess we cross our fingers and pray that he can do more than hit. Well, I mean everyone else has to pray – I don’t pray… and I thoroughly enjoy nice big hits. If we give ELXVI more ice time for the sole purpose of throwing more big hits, I would probably still be very happy.

Defence:

Returning:
Graham Bona – L - 20
Justin Pender – L - 20
Ben MacAskill – R -19
Gabriel O’Connor – R - 18
Richard Greer – R - 17

Rookies:
R.D. Chisholm – L - 19

We need at least 6 defence, we have 5. You count 6, but we really only have 5. We also have to make the choice which of Pender or Bona we will be keeping as our overager. If we want to scare people and concentrate on our defence we keep Bona (and we don’t let him shave the back of his neck *shudder*). If we want to make people laugh and have more of an offensive upside with someone to play the point on the PP then we keep Pender. If our future is anything like our past we will have 9 Ds, most of which will be poopy and underdeveloped and the majority of our forwards will think themselves too fancy pantsed to bother helping out on the back-end.

Ben MacAskill is OK when he doesn’t stop to think or smell the roses. Perhaps he should be avoiding all of Cam Russell’s game plans and just clear the puck. We had a bad tendency to hold on to the puck in our own end, trying to do some mysteriously fancy thing with it and then get it would nabbed from us – in the slot. The outcome here is predictable. Sometimes, after a long bout of frivolous fancypantsing Ben would be the only boy to say “fuck this noise” and just clear it out along the boards. If I had one thing to say to our smart, sweet, cuddly Ben it is that deep thoughts will get you nowhere – just clear the puck.

The ghost of Ben MacAskill

You have a secret girlfriend in my girl A.N. She is awesome – you did good! She likes you for your big body, your sciencey brain, your pink cheeks and your seemingly gentle demeanor. Hockey skills? What's that? Remember that time you fell down during the Titan game? Benny fall down go boom. She laughed at you but she still proclaims her love. You are the cheese on her macaroni. Don’t stress about the little mistakes and remember that love is unconditional.

Speaking of Ben, I find it delightfully hilarious that some people (my boyfriend included) can’t spell MacAskill. We live in Nova Scotia, half of the population have a surname of McThis or MacThat (such as my MacBoyfriend). Why on earth would anybody then think to call him Ben MaCaskill, or in the case of one of my fellow scientist MaCeachern; it is spelled MacAskill and McEachern. Dearest boyfriend is not surnamed MaCboyfriend. Honestly, does anybody here know of someone whose surname begins with MaSomethingorother. The answer is a resounding NO.

The only reason Gabe O’Connor got as much ice time as he did in the second half of this season was because of Lund’s injury and management’s kicking Nick Goyens to the curb. Once Gabe started to get some regular ice time he became a better defenceman. I know, go figure hey! Who ever would have thought that actually getting to play the game would make you better at it? This would have been his draft year. All those 1^st round draft picks in this years NHL draft – I am sure they got plenty of ice time over the past two years…because some teams play their defencemen. Now if only Gabe could learn how to keep the puck in the opponents’ zone and stop daydreaming (he is probably thinking of me) when he is standing at that blueline.

Richard Greer – who? 13 games!!! Yeah , that’s how we develop our defencemen. But we were in a ‘going for it year’ which is why little 16 year old Richie had to sit in the press box. Richie (drafted in the second round, #25 overall, is too teeny at 6ft and 170 lbs to play defence for a contending team…he is no 1^st overall pick Simon Despres (Sea Dogs). I mean if Richie could play then Gatineau would have to play Hubert Labrie. Labrie (also 16 last season) was drafted in the second round, #29 overall, is 5’10 158 lbs and only played 69 games on the president’s cup winning team…Oh wait.

Goaltenders:

Mark Yetman – 20

Oh Mark, we have such a love hate relationship don’t we? You are a goalie, my goalie, and it is my sworn duty to love my goalies, but you are so damn butterfly. You need an upside! Most conservative butterfly goaltenders (Mior, Bernier, Riopel) are quite keen on playing the puck. Not you though. Would you please play the puck for me? Play it like it’s a lady. We know you can play the ladies. Show me what ya got!

Ya know what else would be nice:
1) not letting a puck in the net on the first shot
2) being on your game all year and not just in September, October and April.
3) no more over-committing on plays
4) be more careful about what you are trying to usurp. Someone’s place in nets - OK, other unmentionables - not so much
5) stay cute

That gives us:
three 20 year olds
six 19 year olds
two 18 year olds
two 17 year olds
and I thought this was a rebuilding season! Bring on the baybees!!!

Oh, and apparently our Logo is poo! Agreed!