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Comets Militia: Down on the Farm – February 27th, 2015
alt
Josh W
By Josh W
Feb 27, 2015, 15:00 ESTUpdated:
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Courtesy UticaComets.com
We are back
with this week’s Comets Militia where we review all the latest in news,
statistics, rumours, gossip and made up narratives on the Vancouver Canucks
farm team: The Utica Comets.  It’s been a
reasonably good for the Comets as they won 2 of 3 games missing that third game
in a tired leg of a back-to-back.
Read past
the jump to see what went down.

The
Statistics

The numbers
for the Comets have not changed too drastically this week.  The Comets saw their league ranking fall as
other teams are catching up in games played. 
Their goal and shot differentials improved but their possession numbers
declined – no surprise given the amount of call ups the Canucks have been
making.  In terms of PDO their shooting
percentage moved closer to league average while their excellent goaltending saw
an uptick.  Special teams results did not
change noticeably.

Friday’s
5-2 Win vs Toronto

[ Comets Review ]
First game
of the week was followed the typical script. 
The Comets outplayed the Marlies and outscored them to win the
game.  Thanks to a PDO of over 110% the
Comets finished the game with a score of 5-2. 
Alex Friesen stood out for the first time in a while and goaltender
Jacob Markstrom put up another quality start to help the team.

Saturday’s
1-2 Loss vs Albany

[ Comets Review ] [ Highlights ]
With the
league coding in a schedule loss for the Comets on Saturday night, a victory was
much harder to come by.  The Comets
outplayed Albany and even scored the first goal but could not respond to the
two goals from Albany that followed. 
They were given 6 opportunities on the power play and still could not
score, allowing the Devils to win 2-1. 
Despite playing in a back-to-back game Jacob Markstrom earned a Quality
Start with 21 saves while no forward was able to step up to help tie the game.

Tuesday’s
5-2 Win vs Hamilton

[ Comets Review ] [ Highlights ]
With a few
days off the Comets faced the Hamilton Bulldogs a few days later.  While Joacim Eriksson stood on his head with
Markstrom having received the call up, the Comets outplayed the Bulldogs and
were able to put 5 goals past the goaltender Mike Condon with prospects Nicklas
Jensen and Hunter Shinkaruk leading the offence. 

The Players

NamePosGPGAPTS+/-PIMPPGSOGSoG/GSh%
21
Dustin Jeffrey
C
46
17
24
41
6
14.00
0.89
89
1.93
19.10%
16
Cal O’Reilly
C
53
5
33
38
-5
8.00
0.72
68
1.28
7.35%
24
Brandon DeFazio
RW
52
18
17
35
10
58.00
0.67
131
2.52
13.74%
6
Bobby Sanguinetti
D
42
13
15
28
22
6.00
0.67
92
2.19
14.13%
28
Alexandre Grenier
RW
44
11
15
26
4
53.00
0.59
107
2.43
10.28%
10
Brendan Gaunce
LW
52
8
14
22
3
19.00
0.42
111
2.13
7.21%
17
Nicklas Jensen
RW
39
11
10
21
-11
21.00
0.54
114
2.92
9.65%
41
Will Acton
C
35
10
8
18
5
13.00
0.51
57
1.63
17.54%
25
Darren Archibald
LW
48
7
10
17
12
78.00
0.35
84
1.75
8.33%
9
Hunter Shinkaruk
LW
52
6
11
17
-5
22.00
0.33
108
2.08
5.56%
8
Alex Friesen
C
37
6
10
16
10
47.00
0.43
59
1.59
10.17%
3
Alex Biega
D
42
3
12
15
-2
16.00
0.36
73
1.74
4.11%
37
Andrey Pedan
D
33
2
9
11
7
56.00
0.33
65
1.97
3.08%
36
Wacey Hamilton
C
31
4
9
13
4
25.00
0.42
42
1.35
9.52%
15
Ronalds Kenins
LW
36
5
7
12
6
23.00
0.33
61
1.69
8.20%
34
Carter Bancks
RW
42
6
4
10
7
35.00
0.24
55
1.31
10.91%
4
Kane Lafranchise
D
27
2
8
10
-1
4.00
0.37
36
1.33
5.56%
14
Mike Zalewski
LW
32
3
6
9
-2
10.00
0.28
37
1.16
8.11%
26
Frank Corrado
D
21
4
4
8
3
17.00
0.38
50
2.38
8.00%
2
Travis Ehrhardt
D
30
3
4
7
-2
22.00
0.23
32
1.07
9.38%
40
Peter Andersson
D
38
2
3
5
10
18.00
0.13
48
1.26
4.17%
29
Kent Huskins
D
29
1
4
5
7
4
0.17
15
0.52
6.67%
11
John Negrin
D
23
0
2
2
3
6
0.09
18
0.78
0.00%
5
Jeremie Blain
D
10
0
1
1
-3
2
0.10
14
1.40
0.00%
19
Kellan Lain
C
10
0
1
1
1
20
0.10
18
1.80
0.00%
18
Patrick Kennedy
RW
5
0
0
0
0
0
0.00
7
1.40
0.00%

The Goaltenders

NameGPMinGASOGAAWLOTSASVSSAV%
Jacob Markstrom
26
1538:37:00
50
4
1.95
17
7
2
732
682
0.932
Joe Cannata
1
59:00:00
2
0
2.03
0
1
0
24
22
0.917
Joacim Eriksson
28
1608:20:00
69
0
2.57
15
7
4
758
689
0.909
With Jacob
Markstrom receiving the call up to Vancouver, the Comets signed AHL journeyman
goaltender Pat Nagle to a PTO.  He has so
far backed up Joacim Eriksson in one game and on the season has a .948 save
percentage in 3 games.  Recently Joe
Cannata was called up but he is coming off the Injured Reserve list in the
ECHL.

The Transactions

  • Nicklas
    Jensen was recalled and returned to Utica
  • Pat Nagle
    was signed to a PTO
  • Jacob
    Markstrom was recalled to Vancouver and is now embracing life as a Canuck.
  • Joe Cannata
    was recalled to Utica
  • Bobby Sanguinetti was returned to Utica
Technically
Tom Sestito is still with the Comets though the team and the player have mutually agreed to separate with no reason why. 
My guess is that because the Comets can only dress 6 veterans a game
(AHL Rules) he was not providing enough value to be one of those 6 players and
was a healthy scratch for a lot of games (though it was not uncommon to hear
him with an “undisclosed upper body injury”). 
I hear the Canucks will try and find a new home for him but I do not see
who would take him.

The Schedule

Not an easy
week coming up with a back-to-back-to-back while traveling between all
games.  The Comets will be hard pressed
to earn all 8 points.  Most interesting
is that the Comets are undefeated against Adirondack this year so that is worth
watching to see if they can go 10 and 0.

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