Kisses to Abeltshauser...

...right on the jaw, or the pink cheeks or on the teeth in the mouth. Our little big defenceman may have a broken face. According to Wuest, teeny-tiny agitator Shrembi was about to put a hit on some bitch Eagle when he accidentally hit Abeltshauser in the 'head region' with his helmet. Abeltshauser has a concussion fo sho and may be all messed up in his kissing zone.

Abeltshauser was leading our rookie defencemen in the preseason with 2 points in 3 games. Boo on our unfortunate luck and Boo on Shrembi's short-ass self.

The Mooseheads lost 5-3. The Eagles KILLED - getting 4 out of 5 goals on the power play. Please remember that is CB WITHOUT their top 7 players. Oi. The Mooseheads power play was far less impressive - 1/6 with a goal by Cheremetiev, assisted by Bernard and Andrews.

The other two Moose goals were by Randell, and Stoddard.

It seemed good to start. I was all full of hope when the Moose were defeating the Eagles 3-0 only 11 minutes into the first. It was all downhill from there.

Mathieu Corbeil was in nets for the Moose and allowed 5 goals in 28 shots (this may not be correct - Q stats coming from the forum are shifty). Wuest's twitter reports it as 5 goals on 30 shots. It is OK. I am getting really used to seeing 5 goals against. Can anybody say lowered expectations?

Read Wuest's full report here. It is informative.

Season opening roster

The Moose have established their season opening roster.

Minus:
Most recently gone are 2009 draft picks 16 year old defenceman and ginger haired poster boy for this year's draft - Jamie Bishop (19th overall), 16 year old forward Matthew Boudreau (49th overall) and 18 year old forward Justin Belanger. Belanger was not drafted but was instead added to the Mooseheads protected list early in his 17 year old season after having gone undrafted for two years.

Bishop and Boudreau are apparently still too baby faced and Belanger will be playing for the Halifax Lions so he will be around should the Moosehads need a booty call.

Veteran defenceman Scott McDonald, whom the Moose received from the Saint John Sea Dogs at the beginning of the 08-09 season, was cut and because he is a 19 year old he will have to be put on waivers.

3rd string goaltender Randy Chisholm was also sent down.

Plus:
Then the Mooseheads went and picked up 19 year old forward/agitator Chuckie Schembri off waivers. He was immediately added to the roster.

Shrembri is small... like 5'9, 166 lbs small*. He played a few games with the Wildcats but is mostly an affiliate player who played for the Dieppe Commandos of the MJAHL where he had 17 goals and 21 assists in 108 career MJAHL games.

But ...
If the Moose picked up 19 year old Metcalfe for toughness, thus stealing a spot on the blueline which could have been occupied by a developing youngster, why did they also go and pick up 19 year old Schembri for toughness? It also just takes up a roster spot at forward which could have been used to develop a youngster. It is not like either of these guys will fit into our plans as 20 year olds...will they? At the tender age of 19 Schrembi has only 5 QMJHL games under his belt, Metcalfe has 29 in the OHL and 25 in the QMJHL. In those 54 CHL games he had 1 goal and 2 assists.

Seven 19 year olds on a rebuilding team? How desperate... again.

Sometimes I don't get where we/they are going with all of this. Somewhere so low that the Eagles will be able to fly by and poop on us again with 9-2 games? - with Greer on their roster no-less. *shudder*. Let's not forget that they got Greer for free. If they keep him it will be so revengey. Not cool.

So the current roster consists of (newbie's marked with *):
Forwards
Yuri Cheremetiev (20)
Linden Bahm (20)
Tomas Knotek (19)
Gerrad Grant (19)
Charles Bety (19)
Matthew Stoddard (19)*
Chuckie Schrembi (19)*
Jessyko Bernard (18)
Travis Randell (18)
Guillaume Pelletier (18)
Jordan Costello (18)*
Gabriel Desjardins (17)
Alex Lemieux (17)*
Carl Gelinas (17)*
Brent Andrews (16)*

Defence:
Alexandre Brunet (20)*
Pascal Amyot (19)
Spencer Metcalfe (19)*
Alex MacDonald (18)
Garrett Clarke (17)*
Steve Gillard (17)*
Konrad Abeltshauser (17)*
Sawyer Hannay (17)*

Tenderness:
Mathieu Corbeil (18)
Joel Grondin (17)*


Notes:

• We only have one behbeh - Brent Andrews.
• I changed my mind about Gillard when I saw his tiny picture. OMG face! OMG eyebrows = love. Also, Newfie = love. Therefor i am willing to give him a chance. Do I have a choice?
• Average age of team = 18.12 years.
• Mooseheads pre-season stats from the QMJHL.
• Andrews** leads the pack of new guys with 6pts (2G, 4A) in 4 games.
• Schrembi is here. This team is going to be a total pussy tease.
• EDIT - mooseheads Twitter says that either Schrembi or Costello will occupy the last open roster spot on forward.
  

Newslinks:
Wuest (metro):
It's do-or-die time for trio of blue-line hopefuls
Thrashing from Screaming Eagles makes roster decisions 'easier'
Mooseheads pluck Wildcats agitator off waivers

Mooseheads finalize season-opening roster

Willy Palov (Chronicle Herald):
Yuri ready for more
Eagles humble Moose
Mooseheads pare roster to 25

*please remember that Bishop, who is 6'0", 167 lbs is just too small for the team. Hmmmmm. Behbehs must have softer bones.
** oops mistake. I had originally said Bishop. I had Bishops on the brain.

A warning to boys

Even Konrad Abeltshauser doesn't need to know English to understand this

The Chronicle Herald has some player interviews from after last night's game.

"Once everyone starts getting more comfortable with each other, the chemistry will be there. We’re seeing it already," said Cheremetiev. "I think with any team, when you’ve got a good bunch of guys together for a long period of time you’ll get better as a team.

"But I think we look better than last year. I remember watching our team last year and not being too sure of what to expect. But this year we’ve brought in a lot of really good rookies and I think we’re going to have a lot better team than last year. I think we’re going to surprise a lot of teams."

Rookie netminder Joel Grondin also played well, putting him in good position to secure the backup job

"I faced a lot of shots and I tried to keep the team in the game as best I could," Grondin said in his native French. "I think I was more comfortable than I was the other night in my first pre-season game. I felt good about the way I kept my focus during the game.

"I think I have a good chance to make the team. That’s what I’m here to do and it’s been two weeks now so I hope I’m getting close."

Used to be moose:

Alexis Piette had his first goal for the Mainiacs today in a win over Shawinigan

Finally, former Mooseheads invisible defenceman Richard Greer has moved on to Cape Breton Eagles camp after being dismissed early from the Montreal Jr's training camp. He played fro the Eagles in last night's game against Saint John. He had no points and was a -2. He is also playing tonight's game against Saint John and so far has no points but spent a little time in the penalty box.

2nd preseason win

We need a hair cut or a head cut. There are 37 boys remaining on the roster. After tonight's game we should be able to get that down to at least 30. Sorry boyos but we have almost two teams worth of players here. While I think that 37 cuddly boys could keep me very warm in bed I also think that it could be so crowded that I would never get to sleep. Also, I would probably get stabbed by too many inappropriate teenage boners (awkward).

Moose vs Moncton:
Get your news and game lineups from Matthew Wuest at the Q-files or from his twitter feed. Live twitter feeds are excellent when you are too chicken to brave the rain to go to a hockey game alone. Did I mention rain. Alone. Yeah. I need hockey friends.

I think I may have already made my boyfriend jealous of Joel Grondin and Gatlin Burt. So cheek pinchingly embryonic. If I keep this up he may never accompany me to hockey again.

Burt and Grondin

The Moose defeated Moncton in the shootout with final score of 4-3. Moosehead goals were by Cheremetiev (x2) and Gelinas with the winning shootout goal going to Matthew Boudreau. Yuri Cheremetiev, Bahm, Lemieux, Nickerson and Knotek all had assists. Knotek, who wore the C tonight, also had a goal in the shootout.

The Moose power play appears to be coming along shittily: 0/9 on the PP tonight following last night's 1/9 performance. Not to dis completely - shots were up but faceoffs are still looking sketchy and the boys are not hitting. The faceoffs are only up because we had veteran centremen Cheremetiev and Knotek in there. I am afraid that the behbehs are not fairing so well at the dot.

During Friday night's game Brent Andrews lost 14 of 20 faceoffs and Guillaume Pelletier lost 12 of 15. Andrews had less face offs tonight but made up for last nights abysmal performance (only in the circle....he was all balls at the net) by at least winning both that he took.

Fighting guy Metcalf actually had 2 fights. With his complete lack of fighting thusfar, I was beginning to believe that I would bring more toughness to the rink. I sometimes dress like I'm in the Russian military - so I at least look tough...and stylish.

Someday Moncton's Louis Boileau-Domingue will destroy us all - 0 goals on 17 shots *le sigh*. The shootout loss goes to Wendell Vye. Corbeil and Grondin split time in the Moose net with Corbeil getting the win in the shootout after allowing only one goal (Allain Saulnier) in three attempts.

So informed/ so winning/ so-long Benny Boy

Things need to change. New defence, new jersey, new goalie coach... new blog layout and format(?). Yeah, I'll get on that eventually. So if the blog vanishes for a short period of time over the next couple of days it just means that I am reformatting it.

I will have to get rid of the banner since that jersey is right out. I will have to get rid of Benny and Alexis in the side panel because those boys are also right out.

When games start I will bring back the cookies, which is essential because Mathieu loves cookies and I do whatever goalies tell me (telepathically) to do. No really, I do whatever goalies tell me. It is sad. I am also considering keeping track of cookie-worthy players on a game by game basis in the side bar - until I have 68+ cookie receptacles listed.

I really will get on that you tube page so that I can post the most embarassing intermission interviews online. Like this one:



Let's get to business:
For those who are not in the know- Ben MacAskill has been released from the Mooseheads and will not be occupying one of the limited 20 year old roster spots. Nineteen year old goaltender Justin Collier of the Yarmouth Mariners has also been released.

Meanwhile Forward Maxime Belanger and defenceman Jonathan Clarke have broken up with us. Clarke didn't want to be the "other" Clarke on the blueline. It is bad enough that we had a McDonald and a MacDonald, but to have two Bernards and two Clarkes would not help ease the confusion.

But Collier, Belanger and Clarke are irrelevant. Benny is the boy of interest here. I am sad to see him go.


When my girlfriend A.N. needed a Mooseheads boyfriend I assigned Ben to her. Given her string of shitty relationships she needed someone nice. She totally fell (except she still has a real boyfriend - ugh). She once said "MacAskill is the cheese on my Mac and Cheese". Maybe she should have said "Ben is the Mac in my Mac and cheese", it is slightly more punny that way.

She also once said "Ben, Oh how my heart flutters for thee... I wasn't sure our relationship was going to work, with so little to offset your unfortunately obvious misaligned chin. Although your eyes tell me you are a pure and innocent angel, I also secretly hope you are terribly naughty in bed. But for now I suppose I'll have to settle for slick on the ice.... sigh :D
(Also, I don't like reading, but it's totally hot that you do.)"*

The boys say Ben is nice. To top it off he is smart and if he ever needs lab experience in Neuroscience/ Psychology at Dal I can totally hook him up.

I was a firm believer in Ben and instead of dwelling on the negatives I always like to point out when Ben got things right in a game. His smart moves were not uncommon. Once, during a game of pick-up hockey he even got a goal off a pass from my boyfriend (shhhhh, that's kinda a secret).

I wish Ben the best of luck in his future hockey endeavors and future science endeavors and I am serious about that lab position in Neuroscience. My boss keeps filling the lab with pretty girls. It is about time he gave back and got us a boy. We are all tired of hanging out with 60 year old men.


PEI still suck:
This is why the Moose were able to defeat them 6-4 in the preseason game at the forum. I confess I was not in attendance. My parentals were visiting and I was forbidden from getting my skank on with one of those long, hard, wooden (oh my) benches at the Forum. For more information on the game see Matthew Wuest's write up for the Metro or Willy Palov's write up for the Herald.


* she is going to kill me for that

My own twist

Why Duma Why? *on knees shaking fists at my no-god* DUMA!!!

So Stefan Dumaresque was cut. Fine. I guess I will just have to settle for Grondin. He is spriggin'. It is just, well, he is a little young for me. If we keep Grondin then my team has no goaltenders of legal drinking age. It makes me feel dirty...like when Yetman and Kennedy were both 18. You can't tag team THAT.

There are 5 goalies remaining at camp. Four if you don't count Corbeil: Collier (19), Grondin (17), Burt (18) and Chisholm (17).

The first preseason home game has been rescheduled for Wednesday at 6:30 at the Halifax Forum. This is my first chance to stare down a goalie in a LOOONG time. Last summer was not so bad: we went to the third round of the playoffs and this was followed by the IIHFs. All I got this summer was fat ball hockey goalies. You will recognize me at the Forum because I will be the small, pasty one who looks like she is suffering from withdrawls.

Yes, I gots the goalie withdraws so BAD that I have been forced to use my Brodeur bobble head as a pacifier. The whole thing fits in my mouth.

With the most recent set of cuts (Dumaresque, B Bernard, Myers, J. Pelletier and Nadeau) the team is now down to 42 players. Five down, 17-20 left to go.


Cherry picking:
Who is likely not going? Well, the team have acquired the rights to forward Matt Stoddard from the Saint John Sea Dogs for a 7th round pick. In addition, Mooseheads 2009 11th round defensive draft pick Stephen Gillard has decided to forgo the NCAA and stay at Moose camp. He had previously committed to the University of Maine Blackbears.

I just have one* thing to say about NCAA prospects. Just because they had decided at some point to go NCAA and then at some other point decided to go back on their word does not make them better than all the other non-NCAA players. Just because they changed their minds it doesn't mean that we have to get on our knees for them. I mean really - where are all the NCAA superstars? Is the NCAA churning out stars en masse? If all these kids decided to go NCAA instead of Q would they have become NCAA stars? If you just answered "not likely" then it is time to get off your damn knees.

With every guy we add to our team my femme-boner softens. I don't feel good about this season. I am sure I will inevitably fall in love with the boys on the final roster...but right now I don't have a lot of hope, not in their ability to play hockey at this level.

For example - remember Matt Snow? The guy who "fell down go boom" - a lot. When Matt left the Moose last year, after playing 25 games (3G, 6A), he went to the Bridgewater Lumberjacks where in 17 games he had 17 goals and 6 assists.

You know who else played for the Lumberjacks? Matt Stoddard. In 17 games he had 6 goals and 11 assists. Not exactly lighting up the MJAHL! Why does Stoddard look so hot in Moose camp? Well, maybe it is because he is playing against a bunch of inexperienced 15 year old Midgit AAA players. Dude is 19.

Matt Snow wasn't good enough for last year's Mooseheads team but Matt Stoddard is good enough for this year's team! Is the Zombie Apocalypse upon us?

Is this really what we want to concentrate our efforts on? He has already failed at the Q level. I don't want him here*. Is that harsh? Do we release one of our veterans just to give Stoddard and some rookies a chance. I would take Charles Bety over Matt Stoddard any day of the week. At least we know what Bety can do in the run of a regular Q season- 14 G, 11 A in 59 games as a 3rd/4th line guy on the worst place team in the league. Stoddard had 7G, 15A in 128 career Q games on a good team. If we dump one of our vets to keep this guy I will scream.

The only other thing I can say is - "prove me wrong Stoddard, prove me wrong"!


A special message from the desk of a girl:
JessyKO Bernard. What the fuck are you made from (my guess is goats cheese)? Why are you injured? - AGAIN!!! At this rate you will be the first to succumb to the zombie apocalypse. Shoulder injury my ass! Toughen up boy. You are like one of those contestants that get injured in warm ups for Dancing with the stars. You are Jewel. Have you seen her dancing? She is no triple threat. At this rate neither are you. Jessyko Bernard: singer, dancer, invalid (?). I don't like the sound of that.


The current 42 zombie roster looks like this. Expect at least two of those 20 year olds to go to parts unknown. The trade deadline was last night and the Moose were seemingly unable to trade anybody.

News:
The Moose are looking to Tomas Knotek for an offensive bump. At this point it looks like the boy may get sucked dry as he is the most prolifically offensive 'well' in the Mooseheads roster - and he had less than a 1PPG average for last season. That is saying a lot.

"I have always been an offensive player so I hope I can score a lot of goals this year and help the team," Knotek said. "Hopefully it will be better than last year."

...Knotek said all summer long his plan was to come back to Halifax for the 2009-10 season. Unlike his 2008-09 teammate Jan Stransky, who jumped at the chance to sign with a pro team back in the Czech Republic, Knotek said that thought never crossed his mind.

"I always knew that I would be back this year," Knotek said. "I didn’t have any reason to stay home (for hockey). I feel really good here and I’m pretty happy in Halifax so I always wanted to come back."

Not surprisingly, Knotek has been the best forward at camp so far by a wide margin. He has been able to score virtually at will during the intrasquad games and has been regularly setting up his linemates for easy finishes. But Knotek shrugged off the early showings, saying it doesn’t mean a whole lot for a veteran to be tearing it up against a bunch of rookies.

"The first (few) days is just August hockey; it’s not really hockey," Knotek kidded. "There were 59 guys here (to start) and half of them I don’t even know. That’s just the way it is at the start of every camp."

__________________________________________________
*yes I am being a bitch today. I almost expect angry letters from mothers.
Grondin picture from http://www.albatroscollegenotredame.ca/

This is the face of our Enemy

Instead of obsessing over hockey today I went out and bought a great new pair of shoes (on sale) and then went to Canadian Tire to purchase some electrical wire so that I could finally hang that lamp in the bedroom (1 year and counting). When I returned home I put on the new shoes, clicked the heels – there’s no place like ‘win’ and checked the QMJHL website.

We were halfway through our game against the Eagles and much to my joy and surprise we were defeating them 2-1. Then the game came to a standstill, the little box on my screen - it did nothing. Oh sure shots on goal increased, penalties were handed out, but there was no change in score. There it stayed 2-1, five minutes later – still 2-1, and again five minutes after that 2-1. Oh hooray for us. With about three minutes left to go I dusted my hands of the Eagles – good game boys, and walked away to install my long-suffering-in-a-box modern pendant. The boys will live without me, I have more ‘growed-up’ things to do.

The lamp looks great. It took forever to determine the height and location but it does indeed look great. Yes, the world is awesome. We won our first pre-season game against the Eagles and I finally installed that damn pendant lamp. What do you mean we didn’t defeat the Eagles? They used their only two 20 year olds on today’s roster to pull out a goal in the final two minutes of the game, and then went on to defeat us in the shootout. Awwww muther son-of-a crap. There is Eagle egg all over our faces. Ewwwww. It looks like it was one of those typical Mooseheads games too, where we throw everything on net (45 shots) and still manage to lose.

Scoring started with Eagles overage defenceman Lamontagne slipping an unassisted goal (of unknown quality or variety) past Mathieu Corbeil. In the dying minutes of first period Randell (assisted by Grant and Piette) got the Moose on the board to tie up the game. About halfway through the second period one of my lower totem new boyfriends Linden Bahm put the Moose ahead on a goal assisted by Mr. Gabe. Cue my entrance, joy, testing new lipliners, more joy, lamp hanging and inevitable sorrow.

Some wee sprig named Maximilien Le Sieur drove a steak through my heart by putting a puck past Dumaresque’s lithe goalie body with only 1 minute and 20 seconds remaining in the game. Lamontagne and Murd (I just like saying Murd) gave him the puck with which to do the dirty deed.

Snow, O’Brien and Grant were unable to satisfy me in the shootout. Instead it was Cape Breton’s Jean-Christophe Gauthier who dropped by, did the wham, bam thank-you ma’am and ended the game. Alex Newman gets the win for Cape Breton after allowing no goals in 17 shots during the final half. Damn it.

Oh, and to top it off our third round draft pick Alex Lemieux just up and leaves because he does not want to share me with the other boys. That leaves us with only one 16 year old player (Desjardins) for the roster this year. Then the Moose told me that I cannot have defenceman Caldwell or forwards Fulton, Reiss and Jessome either. The Moose brass are stricter than the old nuns at a Catholic School.

Here, read this story about some of our young forwards by Willy Palov from the Chronicle Herald. Maybe it will make you feel better.

Today My Heart Swings

uhhhhhhhhggggg droool

Yeah there was an inter-squad scrimmage. I was there - laughing my ass off. It is like I am covered in a thick jelly-coat of glee. I am just that happy to have watched some live hockey again. It was all deep sighs and hard clapping for my Whitey (who did not get that goal in the shootout and looked kinda despondent in the 3rd).

So many penalty shots.

Bona (#2 for red) looked good and 'the other Bona' (#2 for green) also looked good, 'the other Bona' was kinda fast for a big guy. I don't know where my player guide is and I am feeling far too hobo to look it up online.

Check on Desjardins
Check on Forbes-Brisebois
Check on Dumaresque
Yes, they made me very happy.

...and speaking of check. My friends told me Linden Bahm (or as they called him 'green 9') was checking me out. Little dude don't worry about girls, just play your hockey! I figure that maybe he thought I was weird looking and got to staring. That must be it. In my mind I am still the awkward girl who couldn't get a kiss between the ages of 18 and 22. Now that I am older and in a steady relationship, boys aged 18-22 seem to be paying an inordinate amount of attention to me. What the hell dudes? Where were you when I was your age?

Anyway, I did not notice because I was actually watching the hockey. Still...Ahhh cute. Bahm is my new boyfriend. I like him already. Yep, I am easy to please. It is just too bad that he is too young for me.

A note to the boys: When the first period is up and you are standing around at the end of the ice watching the game with Swan (was that Swan?) and Marchand - maybe you can take the time to make Mathieu Corbeil feel like he belongs instead of ignoring him through all of periods 2 and 3. That is not very 'teammanship' like. That is all.