The Comets Opening Roster and How an AHL Roster Works

The NHL season is underway, and while that provides plenty of excitement for hockey fans, those who are a little more obsessed are still waiting for the American Hockey League season to kick off this weekend. Saturday night marks the season opener for the Utica Comets, the Vancouver Canucks AHL affiliate.

The Comets are coming off a season in which they led the Western Conference in points, and went all the way to the Calder Cup Finals, where they were unceremoniously brushed aside in 5 games by the Manchester Monarchs.

Let’s check out the latest updates to the Comets’ 2015-16 roster, and examine the intricacies of how an AHL team is put together.

Like any AHL team, the Comets are built from two sources: NHL prospects, looking to develop into capable NHL players; and AHL veterans, a collection of players who aren’t quite capable of sticking in the NHL, but have plenty to offer as both leaders and mentors at the minor league level.

The Comets, along with divisional rivals Syracuse Crunch (a former Canuck affiliate) decided to send their players to Lyon, France for training camp this season. They left on Monday, September 28th, just one week after the Canucks began their preseason. With only four NHL preseason games played before the plane took flight, there were a number of players cut before they might have been if the situation was different.

The following players attending Comets training camp in Lyon, France:

The Comets played a total of three games while they were overseas, two against the Crunch and one against a local team (yes, the French have hockey teams).

Utica: 1 – Syracuse: 0

The Comets began their exhibition series against the Crunch with a 1-0 victory. Nicklas Jensen scored the only goal for the Comets – hopefully the first of many if he hopes to resurrect a swiftly sinking career. Joe LaBate and Alex Friesen recorded assists on Jensen’s tally.

Joe Cannata started in net for the Comets and earned the shutout.

Utica: 1 – Syracuse: 2 (OT)

The Comets couldn’t pull off a second win against the Crunch. Again they scored just a single goal, this one coming from new signee Blair Jones. Mike Zalewski and Cole Cassels received the assists.

Clay Witt, an off season signing that just finished up five seasons at Northeastern University, took the net in Game 2, stopping 32 of 34, but was unable to secure a victory for the good guys.

Utica: 3 – Dragons de Rouen: 5

In their preseason game, the Comets finally increased their goal output, but they still lost. To a French team. At this point, it’s probably time to jump ship. If you can’t beat the French, then what hope do you have? All signs point to a 0-76 season for the Comets this year.

Okay, maybe not. It’s just preseason. Occasionally the lesser team wins. Hey, even the Buffalo Sabres won 23 games last season. They may not be French, but they certainly were terrible.

Anyways, the goals came from Nicklas Jensen, Blair Jones (their second goal of the preseason each) and Dane Fox. Jordan Subban and Andrey Pedan each had a couple of helpers, while Mike Zalewski and Anton Cederholm also recorded assists.

Since the Comets left for France, the following players were either reassigned to the Comets from the Canucks, or signed to an AHL contract (in the case of Curtis Valk).

Upon their return from France, the Comets sent Ludwig Blomstrand and Tyler Shattock to Kalamazoo. Sending Blomstrand down this early indicates how far out of their plans he is. The former 4th round pick seems to be little more than an afterthought at this point. Frankly, I was surprised he even returned to North America rather than going off to play in Sweden. I’d be equally as surprised if he didn’t head back to Sweden before season’s end.

As Vancouver fans already know, Jacob Markstrom is out week to week, necessitating a call up of Richard Bachman, an off season acquisition. This means that Utica will start the season with Joe Cannata and Clay Witt between the pipes. It I were a betting man, I’d peg Joe Cannata to get the start on Saturday – he’s spent parts of the last two seasons with Utica and has performed well.

These moves bring the roster to a total of 28 players. Even though the Comets season gets underway on Saturday, there really is no hurry to make cuts. Unlike the NHL, the AHL does not have a roster limit. The Comets are free to carry 28 players if they wish. In fact, last year they began the season with 29 players on the roster.

John Kurtz and Travis Ehrhardt are also still with the team, though they are not signed so I left them off the depth chart for now.

Of course, sooner or later they are going to want to reduce that number simply because you don’t want to have nine or ten players sitting in the press box every night. This year, Travis Green has mentioned that he intends on carrying about 24 players.

That means that we should expect some more cuts in the near future – though Saturday is not actually a hard deadline. In fact, the Comets have already stated that they will be starting the season with these 28 players on the roster.

The Comets lost a number of veterans that played major roles last season including captain Cal O’Reilly and other team leaders Bobby Sanguinetti and Brandon DeFazio. Who will wear the C this season has yet to be decided.

When it comes to naming AHL captains, it’s a decent bet that the team will pick a veteran. Alex Biega, who wore an A last season, likely has a good shot at the captaincy.

Comets play-by-play commentator Brendan Burke penned an article for the Comets website back in June that outlined how AHL rosters are constructed. It’s a good year for an in depth view on the subject – I’ll touch on it briefly here.

As you may have already noticed, there are some differences in how NHL rosters and AHL rosters can be built. Beyond the size limit already discussed, there are also rules that govern composition of the roster – something that doesn’t exist at the NHL level.

The AHL being a development league, there is a limit to the number of veterans that a team can dress for any given game. Veterans are determined by the number of professional games they have played, and are further split into two categories: veterans, and veteran exempts.

Veteran Exempts are players that have played in 261-320 professional games. NHL, AHL and European Elite league games count towards this number (note that ECHL games do not). Carter Bancks and newly reassigned Linden Vey fit into this category.

Veterans are players that have played 321 or more professional games. Blair Jones and Alex Biega are included in this group.

Only regular season games count towards this number. The number is assessed at the beginning of the season and veteran status is assigned at that point. Even if a player is sitting at 259 games prior to the start of the season, their status will not change when they cross the threshold. Here’s how the Comets’ statuses look for the upcoming season.

Additionally, goaltenders are not included in the veteran count. So another way to look at the veteran limit is this: team must dress at least 12 skaters that have played 260 or less professional games (again, the number is calculated prior to the season starting).

While there is no limit to the amount of veterans a team can have on its roster, only six veterans can dress for any given game. Furthermore at least one of these veterans must be a veteran exempt. In order words, no more than six players in an AHL lineup may have played more than 260 professional games, and no more than five players in said lineup may have played more than 320 professional games.

As it stands, the Comets are only carrying five players that are over the veteran exempt threshold and only two players that are over the veteran threshold. That means that the veteran count is highly unlikely to be a worry this season. Even if Adam Cracknell returns (498 professional games) and John Kurtz is signed, they’ll still only be at six, leaving plenty of room to develop young players.

Utica opens their 2015-16 campaign on Saturday in Rochester, where they will see a familiar face in Cal O’Reilly. The former Utica captain was recently named the captain of the Rochester Americans. Bobby Sanguinetti, Utica’s best defenceman last year, is also on the Rochester roster, but has suffered an upper body injury and will not play Saturday.