Inside The Nest

Training Camp Schedule and Roster - It's That Time of Year Again!

2007-08-15T16:55:00.000-07:00

Greetings Eagle fans far and wide, and I hope all of you had a great offseason although it may have been about the shortest offseason ever- at least it felt that way to me!

It's very hard to believe that a new camp and a new season will begin this weekend, and this year's tryouts shape up to be a fair bit more interesting than last year's. Last year we were returning almost an entire team of veterans and there were few open spots to be fought for. This time around, the Eagles lost a sizeable number of vets from last year's team - leaving several roster spots wide open to the new competition.

This blog is back after an offseason-long hiatus, and I'll get right into the information any hardcore Eagle fan wants to know: the training camp schedule and rosters.

TRAINING CAMP SCHEDULE (opening weekend)

Thursday, August 16

7-8 PM, Practice Group A
8-9 PM, Practice Group B

Friday, August 17

8:45-9:45 AM, Goalies on-ice
10-11:30 AM, Practice Group A (fitness testing)
12-1:30 PM, Practice Group B (fitness testing)

7:00 PM - Intrasquad Game

Saturday, August 18

8:45-9:45 AM, Goalies on-ice
10-11:30 AM, Practice Group B (fitness testing)
12-1:30 PM, Practice Group A (fitness testing)

7:00 PM- Intrasquad Game

Sunday, August 19

9:00-11:00 AM - Practice.

6:00 PM - Annual Black vs White Game
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FIRST CUT
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TRAINING CAMP ROSTERS

Group A

Jeff Amadio
Jackie-Ray Bernard
Mathieu Brodeur
Trevor Carmichael
Justin Collier (G)
Chris Culligan
David Davenport (G)
Marco Desveaux
Kyle Downer (G)
Brandon Edge
William Fradette
Samuel Finn
Dominic Fontaine
Bradley Gallant
Jean-Christophe Gauthier
Jeremy Gouchie
Jonathan Laberge
Alex Lamontagne
Francis Meilleur
Dean Ouellet
Olivier Patry
Vincent Rolland
Daniel Sauve
Neil Sherren
Robert Slaney
Evan Watts

Group B

Olivier Bellavance-Roy (G)
Marek Benda (G)
Etienne Breton
Daniel Brown
Stephen Ceccanese
Nicholas Chouinard
Spencer Corcoran
Olivier Dame-Malka
Lee Chuck Denny
Jeff Deruelle
Paul Dorsey (G)
Daniel Fazzalari
Philippe Fontaine
Maxime Gervais
Joey Haddad
Curtis MacDonald
Mickey MacDonald
Nick MacNeil
Kyle Mariani
Jan Piskacek
Beau Prokopetz
Michel Querry
Alexandre Quesnel
Cody Roland
James Sheppard

Notes:

- As you can see, there aren't separate "rookie camps" and "veteran camps" as has been the case in some past seasons. It seems as though new and old faces will hit the ice together from Day One.

- All eligible returnees from last season have been invited back, excluding guys who were obviously going pro (Luc Bourdon, Ondrej Pavelec, Oskars Bartulis). The list of returning invitees includes three players who spent the first half of the season with the Eagles last year in Stephen Ceccanese, Mickey MacDonald, and Daniel Fazzalari.

- All five returnees who are eligible to play on the team as overagers have been invited to camp. Among this group are Dean Ouellet, Beau Prokopetz, Jonathan Laberge, David Davenport, and Brad Gallant.

- Six goaltenders are in camp; they are denoted on the above lists with (G).

- Both 2007 European Draft selections, goaltender Marek Benda and defenceman Jan Piskacek, are to attend camp.

- Note on the training camp rosters the players picked up by the Eagles in offseason trades - winger Joey Haddad (from PEI) and defenceman Alex Lamontagne (from Baie-Comeau). Both are entering their 19-year-old seasons.

- The following were Eagle selections in the 2007 Q midget draft:

D Samuel Finn (rd 1)
G Olivier Bellavance-Roy (rd 3)
D Mathieu Brodeur (rd 4)
W Philippe Fontaine (rd 5)
D William Fradette (rd 6)
W Lee Chuck Denny (rd 7)
D Francis Meilleur (rd 9)
G Justin Collier (rd 10)
W Neil Sherren (rd 11)

* Rd 8 pick Ryan Taylor (D) and Rd 12 pick Pier-Olivier Cotnoir (C) do not appear on the training camp list. Until further notice, I'm assuming that means that they will not be in camp. Also noticeably absent from the training camp list is 2005 5th round pick Guillaume Vasseur, who attended each of the previous two Screaming Eagles preseason tryouts.

- Defenceman Daniel Sauve, a free agent invite, spent part of last season with the Gatineau Olympiques. He is entering his 18-year-old season.

- Guys returning from previous training camps who will get another shot at cracking the roster include D Evan Watts (2006 rd 5), W Jeremy Gouchie (2006 rd 4), D Maxime Gervais (2005 rd 3), F Nicholas Chouinard (2006 rd 5), G Kyle Downer (2006 rd 8), D Curtis MacDonald (2006 rd 10). As well, the team returns defenceman Kyle Mariani who tried out for the team as a free agent last year.

- Interesting battles to watch include the wide-open battle for the team's two goaltending positions and the overage situation (five guys in camp, must be reduced to three).

- It's hard to really know what all of the mostly unkown free agents coming to camp will bring, but most years at least one or two such players end up making the final roster. Who it will be this year is really anyone's guess at this point! Pretty much any player that has yet to be specially denoted in these "notes" is a free agent/invitee. Brandon Edge is an interesting invite because he's 19 years old and I've heard good things about Olivier Patry (for what that's worth!).

If anybody else has any further information to add pertaining to the training camp roster or schedule, feel free to share it, and if there is any erroneous information or glaring omissions in this piece, please bring it to my attention.

The two most exciting words in sports: Game Seven

2007-04-30T18:51:00.000-07:00

Or in the case of the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles and their fans, the two most unnerving words in sports right now.

Things were looking pretty good when Cape Breton scored a convincing Game 4 victory at home over the Val d'or Foreurs to take a 3-1 stranglehold on the best-of-seven QMJHL semifinal. Most, myself included, really thought that the Eagles were going to end the series at home in Game #5 on Friday night but it was not to be as Brad Marchand's overtime goal stood up as the winner, sending the series back to Val d'or.

In Game 6 tonight at the Air Creebec Centre, Cape Breton outshot their Val d'or counterparts 44-24 but came out on the wrong end of a 3-2 decision. As much as it was great that the Eagles outshot their opponent by such a wide margin, most of those chances were honestly from the perimeter. Both times that Cape Breton struck in tonight's game, they allowed the Foreurs to get it back within less than a minute - totally deflating any momentum they may have gained from their tallies.

Special teams were the really glaring difference in Monday night's contest, as Val d'or went 1/4 on the powerplay and Cape Breton was shut out with the man advantage for the second straight game, going 0/5. The Eagles have not even come close to scoring a powerplay goal in either of the past two hockey games, after having so much powerplay success throughout the 2007 playoffs. If the coaching staff and players cannot find a solution to this "power outage" tomorrow, it could be "lights out" on the season.

Right now, some of Cape Breton's best players simply are not performing like their best players. Veterans like Cam Fergus, Paul McIlveen, JC Sawyer, and Oskars Bartulis have been excellent all season but seem to be going cold at the wrong time of year. The Eagles will need these key guys to turn it around tomorrow night in the winner-take-all Game 7.

As well, the Eagles absolutely HAVE to find a way to slow down Brad Marchand. He is singlehandedly killing us out there, and seems able to blow through the entire team unchecked at times. With the veteran defence corps Cape Breton has, they should be able to do a better job on this guy. Plain and simply - the Eagles have to be much more physical with Marchand.

All of that said, nothing is a disaster until that fourth game is lost. We are still just one win away from winning this series and if Cape Breton finds a way to win tomorrow night, the Game 5 and 6 losses will be forgotten soon enough. In the playoffs, momentum can shift in the blink of an eye; just look at how it happened for Val d'or thanks to the result of Game 5.

And the Eagles do have some positives to build on entering the seventh game. They outshot the Foreurs 32-15 over the final two periods, and at times Val d'or really was hanging on for dear life. If Cape Breton can pick up in Game 7 where they left off tonight with that intense play and hemming up the Foreurs in their zone, they may end up being fine. As well, the Eagles probably haven't played their best hockey in five of the six games so far (Game 4 excluded) yet the series is still tied 3-3. What happens if they happen to come out with their best hockey tomorrow night? Finally, and this may not have anything to do with the outcome of tomorrow night's game................... but for what it's worth, the road team has won all three Game 7's to have occurred thus far in the 2007 playoffs.

The key thing for players, coaching staff, and fans alike right now is to not panic. Many a Stanley Cup champion or QMJHL winner has had its back against the wall in a Game 7 somewhere along the line in their ride to glory. Some have even blown 3-1 leads along the way and still found a way to lift the Cup at the end of the day. Look no further than last season's Carolina Hurricanes, who let a 3-1 series lead in the Stanley Cup Final slip through their fingers only to end up winning Game 7. Of course, they got to play Game 7 at home....... ours is on the road. But honestly, if we can only beat Val d'or once out of four tries in their building in a playoff series we do not deserve to advance to the next round.

This is the ultimate test of the resiliency and character of this Eagle hockey team, and few if any have doubted this team's mettle in those regards this season. We cannot give up on this hockey team until the final horn goes tonight. If we do, how stupid do we look if the Eagles end up winning Game 7 and going on to lift the President's Cup?

The 2007 playoffs have seen us FINALLY beat Bathurst........... FINALLY win at the KC Irving Centre............ and FINALLY break that five-year-long playoff overtime drought. All of that tells me that anything is possible.

Keep believing, guys. You may end up being glad you did.

CULLI! CULLI! CULLI! CULLI!

2007-04-24T21:12:00.000-07:00

The "unsung hero" local boy is unsung no more!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Chris Culligan made Eagle history in a plethora of ways tonight, by scoring the game winner in Game 3 of this league semifinal series vs Val d'or in overtime ON A PENALTY SHOT.

For those of you who aren't quite aware how rare an occurrence that is, I'd say it ranks up there as pretty much the Halley's Comet of hockey......... a playoff overtime winner on a penalty shot. ESPECIALLY as far into the postseason as the third round.

Utter delirium ensued in the C200 crowd, with many speculating that the crowd reaction for the goal was the most emotional ever seen since the Screaming Eagles came to town. This blogger remembers a couple of goals in the 2002 Halifax series that at least give it a run for its money, but no matter - it was definitely a moment that will live on for a long, long time......... especially if the Eagles go on to win the series.

The "made for Hollywood" overtime winner saved the Eagles from what could have been a crushing defeat, as they had blown leads of 3-0 and 4-3 earlier in the game.

In the two games in Val d'or, Culligan had just one assist while James Sheppard was held pointless. They needed to come up big tonight, and did they ever respond. James scored a goal and an assist, while Chris had two goals and two assists including the potentially-legendary overtime winner.

What's weird about this is that Cape Breton fans didn't see a single game go to overtime all season or playoffs at C200 leading up to tonight. As well, only one Eagle game all season went into a penalty shot shootout. It was in Moncton. Wanna guess who scored the penalty winner for Cape Breton in that game? ;) One Chris Culligan, of course!

With that, Cape Breton takes a 2-1 lead in this ultra-tight semifinal series with Val d'or, with Game 4 going tomorrow night from C200. That is also historically significant in that a 2nd win in the 3rd round of the playoffs means that this year's Eagles have now officially gone farther in the postseason than any Eagle team has ever gone before. The 2002 Eagles lost the third round 4-1 in games.

Not much time to savour this win, right back to the rink for another HUGE game tomorrow. We let these guys back into this series once when they won Game 2 in Val d'or.............. we don't want to let them back in it a second time.

There could be pages and pages written on tonight's game, as it was one of the most exciting and action-packed Eagles games ever, but for now I'll just leave it all at that. Not much time to savour this win, as it's right back to the rink tomorrow night for another HUGE game. We let these guys back into the series once when they won Game 2 in Val d'or........... we don't want to let them back in it a second time. Be ready to bring the intensity just as loud and proud tomorrow night as you did this past night, Eagles fans. C200 was HOPPIN for Game 3, and the Eagle fanbase should be proud of a job very well done!

Finally, in terms of the raw collection of talent assembled on the ice, it may have been the highest calibre of hockey we've ever seen in a Cape Breton Screaming Eagles hockey game. These are two serious QMJHL heavyweights, both dotted with future NHLers, going toe-to-toe. It's a huge treat to watch, and anyone who wasn't at Game 3 owes it to themselves to get down to C200 tomorrow and Friday nights to see this stuff.

Despite tonight's deliriously gratifying win, we all know that the Eagles are capable of a better 60-minute performance. Let's hope we see that tomorrow night as the team strives to put a stranglehold on this series and go ahead three games to one.

See you at the rink!

Game 3 tomorrow; get ready to ROCK the Nest!!!

2007-04-23T18:06:00.000-07:00

Going into the first two games in Val d'or, most fans felt that if the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles could attain a split of those two games, that they'd be in good position heading home for three straight games at a rocking and sold out C200.

Mission accomplished.

Now, the team and its fans have to take advantage of these home games. As the title of this blog says, get ready to rock the Nest, because these are the biggest games we've seen there in five years. Two exciting teams that are built for a run at a championship. Tons of interesting subplots. This series seems to have it all. An unforgettably raucous atmosphere at C200 would just put it over the top. The fans in Val d'or definitely brought it; now it's up to us to match that intensity. Our crowd has been great all year, so I think we can make for an atmosphere that hasn't been seen since the 2002 series against Halifax!

The Foreurs had the upper hand in both games in Val d'or, but now the series shifts to C200. Here, not only do the Eagles have the home crowd behind them, but they also have the all-important benefit of "last change"....... i.e. they get to wait until Val d'or throws a line out on the ice before deciding what line they want to counter with. This could be of great benefit to Cape Breton as they will probably get to use the Chris Culligan-James Sheppard-Scott Brannon line to try and neutralize Brad Marchand, who as predicted has been doing most of the damage for les Foreurs. Marchand was given too much room to move in the first two games, and if the Eagles are to have success in this series, they will have to slow him down and frustrate him.

All in all, Cape Breton has been an excellent home team all year, so there is much reason for optimism heading into Game 3 with the series tied 1-1.

Sheppard, Culligan, and Cam Fergus have been excellent and consistent producers for the Eagles all season, but only managed two "second assists" among them in the two games in Val d'or. Sheppard was actually held pointless. Therefore, look for these three guys to factor in on the scoresheet in the three upcoming home games in this series.......... they usually aren't held scoreless for too long. It is also hoped that Paul McIlveen can continue to be the hot hand that he was up north, that Dean Ouellet can continue to be the silent producer he's been all playoffs, that Jo Laberge can continue his timely postseason scoring, and that our defence corps can tighten up and hold the Foreurs at bay. The Eagles gave up 36 and 42 shots against in the first two games, which is a bit uncharacteristic of our team. Look for the shots against to come down in the next couple of games.

One final interesting twist going into tomorrow night's pivotal Game Three is that goaltender Jeremy Duchesne is said to have returned to the Foreurs and will most likely get the start in goal tomorrow night, relieving Raffael D'Orso who played the first two games. This development only further thickens the plot of a series whose plot is already quite deep. I expect that if he is in goal tomorrow night, Duchesne will be extremely hard to score on. Thankfully we counter with the league's best goaltender in Ondrej Pavelec; let's hope that he's at 100% after taking a few rough rides during Game Two that led some to question whether or not he was maybe hurting a little bit during that contest.

I can't really build this game up any more. It's the third round of the playoffs, against an extremely exciting and exotic team. There should be a loud and raucous sellout crowd. It's a chance for our Eagles to advance farther than they've ever advanced before. It's games like this that the entire season has been building towards.

I could go on and on............ but it would be pointless. It's as simple as this: if you're not ready to tear the roof off of C200 for this one, you may want to check your pulse.

SEE YOU AT THE RINK.

Great teams find ways to win games they shouldn't!!!!

2007-04-20T23:22:00.000-07:00

For two periods tonight, the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles were quite outclassed by the Val d'or Foreurs.

That didn't end up mattering though, as Cape Breton found a way to score twice in the third period to tie the game, regain the momentum and carry the play for the first extended period of time in the contest, and force OT.

That set the stage for, believe it or not, the first Eagle playoff overtime win since Andre Martineau scored to end Game 2 of the 2002 second round series vs Halifax. The Eagles had lost EIGHT playoff OT games in a row in the meantime.

Early in the extra frame, Paul McIlveen scored one of the biggest goals in franchise history, when his snapper from about the top of the circle found the top shelf on the glove side of Val d'or goaltender Raffael D'Orso. This set off pandemonium on the Eagles' bench, and in many homes throughout Cape Breton where fans were gathered together to watch this huge game.

Ondrej Pavelec was the game's first star, and for extremely good reason. The Eagles were dominated in the first two periods, and Pavelec was by far the biggest reason that Cape Breton was even still in the game. He made several game-saving stops throughout the night, showing the Abitibi region of Quebec why he is the #1 goaltender in this league. Without this guy tonight, we fall behind about 4-0 after two periods, in my books.

In the playoffs, sometimes you have to find a way to win a game you don't really have any business winning. The Eagles somehow managed to do that tonight. It's good to know that the team played their worst game of the playoffs to date, and still managed to win. That said, much better games are needed from the team throughout the rest of the series, as I honestly doubt Val d'or lets us off the hook like that again.

The Foreurs showed us for much of tonight's contest that they are a FAR cry from the teams we faced in the first two rounds. They are extremely skilled and speedy, and boast some borderline ridiculous high-end talent in Letang and Marchand. Cape Breton seemed overwhelmed by Val d'or's speed and skill in the first two periods tonight, and will have to find a way to play entire games the way they played the third and OT if they are to have success in this series.

Expect Val d'or to come out with fire in their eyes tomorrow night in Game 2 to redeem themselves from the one that got away, but you would also think that Cape Breton would come out with a better all-around game as well.

In any event, one of the most thrilling wins in years tonight, and the standard playoff goal of a split on the road is already complete.

Game 2 goes tomorrow night at 8:00 PM AST, also televised/webcasted Eastlink.

An outlook on Eagles-Val d'or

2007-04-19T11:50:00.000-07:00

Well here we are, finally on the eve of one of the biggest playoff series in team history. It's only the second time in the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles' ten-year existence that they've reached the third round of the playoffs, the first time coming in 2001-2002 when they faced the Bathurst Titan and lost in five games. That loss hurt that year, and fans have been eagerly waiting for a return to round three for some redemption, and they'll finally get their chance to see it this year against the Val d'or Foreurs. The only playoff series the Eagles have been involved in that I can think of as having been more anticipated than this one would have been the 2001-2002 second round series against the Halifax Mooseheads, which received extra hype for obvious rivalry-related reasons.

Not only is this series a glorious opportunity for Cape Breton to move on to the QMJHL final for the first time, but it could also be the source of some of the most exciting and highest-calibre hockey ever seen at C200 since the Screaming Eagles landed in 1997. Both teams involved in this series have lineups dotted with big names and impact players at all positions, both teams can play any style of hockey game you want (freewheeling, defensive, you name it) and most pundits around the league see the Eagles and the Foreurs as being extremely evenly-matched. At the Christmas trade period this season, no two teams made a bigger statement that they were going for it this year than Cape Breton and Val d'or, and here they are on a semifinal collision course. It's extremely exciting stuff.

With all of that said, let's look at how the teams match up:

OFFENSE

Both teams have an extremely deep and potent offense. Cape Breton has two full lines who can score with the best of them (Ouellet-Fergus-McIlveen and Culligan-Sheppard-Brannon), and can also get some decent scoring from third line members Slaney and Laberge. They also receive some offense from blueliners Sawyer, Bartulis, and Bourdon.

Val d'or has about seven forwards and two defencemen who score on at least a fairly consistent basis.

Those seven forwards are Brad Marchand, Mathieu Roy, Jerome Samson, Felix Schutz, Martin Thibeault, Marc-Andre Cote, and Julius Sinkovic. The two extremely offensively-gifted defencemen are Kristopher Letang and Sebastien Bisaillon.

So far in these playoffs, Marchand and Letang have been the rock stars. Marchand has 23 points in 9 playoff games, and Letang 19 points in 8. While Val d'or has a ton of threats, it's clear that THESE TWO GUYS are who the Eagles will have to really key in on and try to shut down. If these two guys are shut down, that may be enough to break down this Val d'or machine, because although the Foreurs have a lot of guys who can score, they rely quite a bit on these two. One only has to look at the game summaries of their playoff games to date. There aren't too many goals that Marchand and/or Letang aren't in on.

Roy is their finisher; he had 50 goals last year for Bathurst and 42 for Val d'or this season. However, I don't quite find he can make things happen out of nothing like Marchand and Letang can. Samson is an awesome two-way player who had 44 goals and 99 points to lead the Foreurs in regular season scoring this year. He won a President's Cup with Moncton last year, and has an incredible work ethic and character to go along with his talents. He's a real playoff guy who will be lethal. Schutz seems to be one of those "final piece of the puzzle" type trade deadline pickups........ he's been playing excellent hockey since being rescued from the doldrums of Harbour Station and the Saint John Sea Dogs. Finally, Bisaillon is Letang's partner in crime on the blueline, and teams up with Letang to form probably the deadliest due on the point on the powerplay in the league. He has a rocket of a shot and, while his numbers are a bit down this year, he had 35 goals last year.

How do the two teams' offenses stack up?

While once again both teams have excellent scoring, and while Val d'or may possess the league's best overall hockey player in Letang, I think that Cape Breton has a little bit deeper an offense that Val d'or has. With the Eagles, which line do you shut down? The one consisting of a 40 goal scorer/a 53 goal scorer/a 37 goal scorer, or the one with James Sheppard? Val d'or, while they also have a ton of scoring options, seems to rely a bit more on a couple of select players, namely Marchand and Letang. On the other hand, no CB players have been scoring at the crazy paces that those two have been thus far in the playoffs. If they can continue scoring at such torrid rates, the Eagles may be in trouble. You can expect the Culligan-Sheppard-Brannon line to see a lot of ice against the line with Marchand and Roy.

It's extremely close, but I think I'd give an ever-so-slight edge to Cape Breton on offense.

DEFENSE

Cape Breton has a very uniform "top four" that can be tossed over the boards all game long and shut down opponents. It consists of pairings of Sawyer/Bourdon and Bartulis/Prokopetz. In this, the Eagles essentially have two legitimate "top pairings". As #'s 5-6, Swit and Corcoran have been steady and reliable, although whether or not they receive quite as much ice in this series as they did in the last two remains to be seen. #7 (or 6-B) Etienne Breton is ready to return from his broken jaw, but I don't know how easy it would be to work him back into the lineup at this stage of the playoffs.

Val d'or relies a ton on their twin superstar two-way defencemen, Letang and Bisaillon. Letang has cleanly established himself as the best overall defender in the league, and possibly even the best overall player in the Q at any position this season. He's good enough to turn a series around by himself. After that, Vdo's #3-4 are serviceable defensive defencemen Louis-Etienne Leblanc and Samuel Richard. I honestly don't know too much about #'s 5-6-7-8 Jason Legault, Cedric Archambault, Patrice Daneau, and Shawn Morton-Boutin. Legault was the 3rd overall pick in the 2004 midget draft (same draft where James Sheppard went #1 overall), but has far from lived up to expectations at the major junior level.

Overall, while the Foreurs have the best defenceman on either team in Letang, Cape Breton's D corps looks a fair bit deeper than Val d'or's. After the top two, there seems to be a bit of a dropoff on the Foreur blueline to the rest of the pack, while Cape Breton can throw out two real #1 units.

Give Cape Breton the edge on overall defensive depth, but is Letang good enough to make up for that spread?

GOALTENDING

Ondrej Pavelec of the Eagles vs Jeremy Duchesne of the Foreurs............ that's a goaltending battle if there ever was one, and I see very little to choose between the two goalies. Both are among the top three in the league as far as I'm concerned. A battle between these two over a long series would probably be a stalemate for quite a long time, and it would basically be a situation of who ends up blinking first. Having said all of that, whichever team receives better goaltending in this round is likely to win the series. Pavelec needs to remain on top of his game and outduel the technically sound and playoff-proven Duchesne. Fans may remember Duchesne from his extended stay with the Halifax Mooseheads, where he became a very familiar foe to the Screaming Eagles.

Sadly, Duchesne will not be available to start the series as he has taken a leave of absence from the Foreurs due to the passing of his father, Gaetan Duchesne. Raffael D'Orso will be given the nod between the pipes for Val d'or for the time being, and will start Game 1 tomorrow night. He'll continue to start until if/when Jeremy is ready to return. D'Orso is 17 years old, but isn't just any rookie; he was good enough to make Canada's U-18 team this past summer, and is considered to be a solid NHL draft prospect. While he is raw and doesn't quite have the veteran experience Duchesne has, he'll be no pushover in the Val d'or net. He was first star in a 4-1 Val d'or win in his only start against the Eagles this year.

Whether it's Duchesne or D'Orso in the Val d'or net, Pavelec will have to be on top of his game like he's been since Christmas in order to give our team the goaltending edge it needs in this series.

SPECIAL TEAMS

Both teams have absolutely lethal powerplays. Cape Breton ranks 1st in the postseason at 38.0%, while Val d'or is 4th at 24.6%. The two powerplays are a lot closer than those numbers indicate. Cape Breton has finally seemed to find two really good PP units that can both realistically threaten to score, and powerplay success has been a huge part of their playoffs so far. This HAS to continue vs Val d'or. The Foreurs, if I'm not mistaken, use one powerplay unit a lot more than they use the other, as they really only have two defencemen on the team that can play the point on the PP. Their main PP unit is a fully loaded one; Roy-Marchand-Samson up front with Bisaillon-Letang on the points. Take dumb penalties, and you know that stacked unit makes you pay big time.

On the penalty kill, Cape Breton is 1st in the playoffs at 86.0%, while Val d'or is 3rd at 82.5%. The Eagles' three main forward units on the PK are Culligan-Sheppard, Ouellet-Fergus, and Slaney-Laberge. All have done a tremendous job, as have all six defencemen and goaltender Pavelec.

Cape Breton also leads the playoffs with six shorthanded goals.

OTHER INTANGIBLES/ODDS AND ENDS

- Cape Breton and Val d'or have never before met in a playoff series.

- The full circle that is the Luc Bourdon trade(s). Val d'or traded Bourdon to Moncton last season as part of their building for a run this year. They ended up getting superstars Marchand and Samson from the Wildcats in that deal. Now, Bourdon ends up on an Eagle team that they are facing in the league semifinal in their "go for it" year. Very ironic.

Who will win out? Bourdon, or the guys he was traded for?

What's also weird is:

Why do the Eagles have Bourdon? Because Val d'or let him go.

Why do the Eagles have to contend with Marchand/Samson in this round? Because Val d'or let Bourdon go.

I'm not quite sure I've seen a situation quite like this in the Q!

- Bourdon and Letang played together on two consecutive Canadian WJC gold medal winning teams, and actually paired up on defense at the latest championship. Marchand was also on this year's Canadian team.

- Sheppard and Marchand were linemates in midget for the Dartmouth Subways.

- Roy was a big part of the Bathurst Titan team that knocked the Eagles out of the playoffs last season.

- Justin Saulnier of the Foreurs was always a big rival of the Eagles when he played 3.5 seasons for the Halifax Mooseheads. He particularly seems to have a rivalry with Sheppard.

- Both coaches, Pascal Vincent of the Eagles and Eric Lavigne of the Foreurs, are looking for their first trip to the Q final.

- The two teams haven't met since October.

All in all, this one is about as closely matched up as they come, and could go either way depending on "the bounces". Unlike their first two series, where they were favoured against Bathurst and heavily favoured against St. John's, there is no real favourite going into this best-of-seven. Cape Breton goes into this series knowing that if they don't come up with one of their best stretches of hockey of the season, they will lose.

That said, this blogger is confident that the Eagles are a bit deeper offensively and especially defensively, and that they are on a mission and have what it takes to beat this extremely difficult opponent. Keys to success for Cape Breton will be to do whatever it can to shut down Marchand and slow down Letang, to receive the same excellent goaltending from Pavelec it has since Xmas, and for the powerplay to continue to play the excellent hockey it has thus far in the playoffs.

There's no looking back now.......... no overthinking anything............ no room for fear. It's full steam ahead from here on in; the easy part of this playoff journey is over. This whirlwind of a series starts tomorrow, may fans on both sides be treated to classic hockey, and may the best team win.

Great news; Games 1 and 2 in Val d'or to be televised on Eastlink TV

2007-04-18T19:26:00.000-07:00

Fans eager to see their Cape Breton Screaming Eagles kick off Round Three of the playoffs for just the second time in team history got some great news Wednesday.

Instead of having to settle for audio only of the start of this highly-anticipated semifinal playoff series, diehard Eagle supporters will be able to see the action unfold for themselves from the comfort of their homes. Eastlink Television announced today that it will be picking up the video feed from a Quebec TV station (my apologies, I don't know its name yet!) and will air Games 1 and 2 LIVE from the Centre Air Creebec in Val d'or.

Game 1 is scheduled for an 8:30 PM AST start this coming Friday, while Saturday's rematch will get underway at 8:00 PM AST. Please note the different starting times between the two nights.

Get together with some friends, order up some food, crack open a few cold ones (if you're of legal age of course!), and watch Eagles playoff history happen live and in colour!!!!!

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For those wondering about the extremely long distance between the two cities in this playoff round and what effect it may have on the Eagles, the team will not be bussing to Val d'or; they will be leaving the Sydney Airport at 3:00 PM Thursday on a charter flight, and will fly throughout the series. Obviously this eliminates a huge portion of the travel weariness that would have otherwise worn down our team in this playoff round between two of the most remote teams in the league.

Fans are invited and encouraged to drop by the airport and give the team a sendoff.

Round 3 opponent confirmed

2007-04-15T01:23:00.000-07:00

Hey guys,

Just briefly logging in to confirm that our Eagles will indeed face the Val d'or Foreurs in the third round of this year's QMJHL playoffs.

Val d'or salted away their series with the Baie-Comeau Drakkar with a 4-3 victory tonight, taking the set in five games.

Game One will most likely be Friday, April 20, from the Centre-Air Creebec in Val d'or, PQ.

What a challenge this will be for our Screaming Eagles.

Pre-series breakdown to follow.

Five years later.......... we're all the way back

2007-04-14T08:39:00.000-07:00

Five years ago, in April 2002, the Acadie-Bathurst Titan ended the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles' hopes of a league title by taking them down in five games in the third round of the QMJHL playoffs. It was a heartbreaking end to a playoff run that the Eagles and their fans truly believed would end in championship glory.

Five years later, in April 2007, Cape Breton has knocked off those same Titan (in the same five games), to reach the league semifinal for the first time since, and only the second time ever in the team's ten-year existence on the island.

The series win was clinched last night at C200, with a wholly convincing 6-0 win. After a tentative first five minutes or so, the Eagles absolutely dominated the rest of the game in every way imaginable. The real key point to take away from last night's clincher was the absolutely blitzing Eagle powerplay. Cape Breton managed to score on each of its first four powerplay opportunities of the game, and on most of those chances with the man advantage, it didn't take them long to find the back of the net. Each of the team's two powerplay units contributed two goals, and both powerplay units were consistent factors all series. It's GREAT to see the team finally find two powerplay units that are almost equally strong and that can threaten pretty much equally to score, after spending much of the season honestly relying in large part on just one stacked powerplay unit.

The powerplay units that had so much success in this series were:

UNIT A

JC Sawyer-Oskars Bartulis on the points
Dean Ouellet, Jonathan Laberge, and Cam Fergus up front

UNIT B

Paul McIlveen and Luc Bourdon on the points
Chris Culligan, James Sheppard, and Scott Brannon or Nick MacNeil up front

I've said it countless times before and I'll continue to say it; for us to achieve our full playoff potential, our powerplay has GOT to be rocking. It was the team's Achilles Heel for so many years prior to this one, and it's really appreciated by the fans to finally see a team that can really threaten on every powerplay chance they get. The Eagles have scored at least one powerplay goal in each playoff game they've played thus far, and are far and away in the lead in PP % so far in these playoffs, at 38.2%. The next-closest team still in the postseason is Lewiston, at 27.6%.

Speaking of special teams, the Eagles' PK has also been huge thus far in the playoffs. The team also leads the league in this playoff category, at an 86.0% killing efficiency. To top it off, Cape Breton has scored six shorthanded goals in these playoffs, also a league-leading statistic. Five of those six "shorties" came in the series against the Titan.

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A few keys to the five-game series win over le Titan d'Acadie-Bathurst were:

- An extremely strong forecheck. Our forwards were absolutely relentless in pressuring the young and mistake-prone Titan defence, and it resulted in many favourable turnovers. As well, it often prevented Bathurst from setting up out of their zone the way they would have liked to.

- Excellent team defense, forwards included. How else were we able to for the most part keep the #2 and #3 scorers in the league (Beauregard and Perreault) in check throughout the series?

- Our third and fourth lines stepped up and outplayed theirs. This was one concern that this blogger had entering the series, that maybe their "lower" lines were a bit more established than ours. But ours came together great, with guys like Jonathan Laberge and Brad Gallant (for example) stepping up and playing their best hockey to date this season. Laberge especially had his coming out party as an Eagle in the series against the Titan. After disappointing in the second half of the regular season after being acquired from the Saint John Sea Dogs, Laberge missed most of the first round against the St. John's Fog Devils with an injury. He returned against Bathurst with a vengeance, scoring four goals in the five-game series, including a couple of really big ones. He was also probably our best faceoff man in the series. If Jonathan can keep up this excellent play, we'll have finally found that bonafide third line center the team has been wanting all season.

- Our best players have continued to be our best players. It's a tired old cliche, I know, and some of you may want to throw rotten tomatoes at me for using it, but look at the scoring stats so far in the playoffs. Not a single guy on the team is lagging behind what he's capable of doing in terms of point production.

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As for our round 3 opponent................

it's looking most likely that it will be the Val d'or Foreurs.

As many of you already know, the third round of the QMJHL playoffs features a crossover between the league's two divisions. Each division will have two teams remaining entering round three. The highest-remaining seed from the East Division will play the lowest-remaining seed from the West, and the highest-remaining seed from the West will play the lowest-remaining seed from the East.

Lewiston and Cape Breton are the two teams to have emerged from the East, while the two West Division playoff series are still taking place.

Cape Breton WILL be the #2 seed from the East, as they finished behind Lewiston in the regular season. Therefore, they will play whoever is the highest-remaining seed from the West once the rd 2 playoff matchups in that division are finished.

That looks like it's probably going to be the Foreurs. They currently sport a 3-1 lead in their series against Baie-Comeau. If they finish that series off (Game 5 goes tonight from Baie-Comeau), they WILL be our opponent in the semifinal round, as they finished first in the West and would be the highest-remaining seed.

If Val d'or somehow blows their 3-1 lead and loses to the Drakkar in 7, then our third round opponent would be the winner between Drummondville and Rouyn-Noranda. The Voltigeurs currently lead that series 3-2.

Anything can happen, but expect us to face Val d'or in round three, barring a near-miracle from the Drakkar. The Foreurs are a stacked hockey club who completely loaded up for this season, and would be an extremely difficult challenge for our Eagles; St. John's and Bathurst would not even come close to the challenge les Foreurs would be. However, I'll wait until they're actually our next opponent before getting into too much detail about Val d'or.

Unfortunately, the Eagles will NOT have home ice advantage in the upcoming third round. Even though Cape Breton finished with more points in the overall standings than did any West Division team, the league simply awards home ice to the "highest seed" in these third round playoff series. It doesn't make much sense at all, especially when you consider that in the league final, the league simply reverts to awarding home ice to the team that had more points in the overall standings. However, we have to play the cards we're dealt, and who knows, considering the 2-3-2 format our series will have no matter who we play (i.e. two games on the road, three games at C200, then two games on the road), perhaps not having home ice advantage could turn out to be an advantage of sorts for the Eagles.

Unless any scheduling snafus come up out of nowhere, expect the Screaming Eagles to kick off Round Three next Friday night (April 20), on the road.

Their first home game of the third round would be Game Three of the series, which would probably take place on Tuesday, April 24.

Eagles head to Bathurst up 2-0; a few notes heading into Game 3

2007-04-09T14:59:00.000-07:00

Checking in after a busy Easter weekend prevented me from doing so earlier. This blogger/fan is heading to Northern New Brunswick to cheer on our Eagles tomorrow and Wednesday, so this may be the last time I check in for a little while. A few point form thoughts on Game 2, and heading into Game 3:

- With the exception of an early second period lapse in Game Two, the first two games at C200 couldn't honestly have gone much better for our Eagles. The 2-0 series lead against the Titan marks the first time Cape Breton has ever won two games in a playoff series against Bathurst, and is just the second 2-0 series lead in team history....... the other one obviously coming last round against the St. John's Fog Devils.

- The eight goals scored by the Eagles in Game Two are a team record for a playoff game, although it must be kept in mind that one of those was an empty netter, and the other was an extremely rare "automatic goal", awarded because James Sheppard was interfered with as he skated in alone on a vacant cage. It's the first time I can ever remember the Screaming Eagles being awarded a "gimme" goal like that.

- With a win in Game Three in Bathurst tomorrow night, the Eagles would have seven straight wins to open the playoffs. That would be longer than any win streak the team put together throughout the course of the entire 70-game regular season.

- With a win in either Game Three or Game Four in Bathurst this week, Cape Breton would exorcise one of the biggest demons haunting it over playoff seasons past. The Screaming Eagles are 0-10 all-time in the playoffs at the KC Irving Centre in Bathurst, NB. What a feeling it would be for long-time Eagle fans to finally break that goose egg, and to finally break away from the hold that that building has had on us come playoff time.

Back to the 8-3 win in Game 2 at C200................

- When you draft a player with the #1 overall draft pick, you expect an impact superstar that will wow fans for years and deliver in all clutch situations. You expect a guy who will be able to singlehandedly turn a hockey game around in his team's favour. You expect an ultimate difference-maker.

We've always known that James Sheppard, the Eagles' only first overall pick ever (2004), had most or all of these qualities one expects in a number one draft choice, but I'm not sure if he ever put it all on display like he did in Game Two on Saturday night. With two goals and three assists, including THE goal that turned the game around when the Eagles were losing 3-2 and reeling a little bit, James came up with one of the absolute biggest playoff performances in team history. His solo mission through virtually the entire Bathurst Titan roster to tie the game at 3-3 was something that few junior players in this country are capable of pulling off, and his shorthanded effort to set up Chris Culligan early in the third period for the 6-3 goal was almost equally amazing.

Many fans have said it; in these playoffs, we go as James Sheppard goes. If that's truly the case, I as a fan have all the confidence in the world as we head further down the playoff path.

- Also having a huge night was defenceman Oskars Bartulis. With two powerplay goals and two assists, Oskars really broke out with a huge game at a time when perhaps he needed one. He is most effective on the point when putting low slapshots on goal as opposed to wiring pucks up high, and that was proven when both of his goals were practically right along the ice. Here's hoping that performance goes a long way towards helping his confidence the rest of the way.

- Even though two of them were empty netters, three shorthanded goals in one period (third period, Game 2) has to be an Eagle team record......... regular season or playoffs. Anyone want to look that up for me? ;) As well, the powerplay came through yet again with three big goals........ it's been said for years; playoff success will be achieved when we finally get a powerplay that produces in the playoffs. It's been happening big time so far this year, and it's ever so much appreciated by the fans. Cape Breton has scored at least one powerplay goal in each of its six playoff games so far... let's hope that continues this week!

- A lot of people were disappointed with the play of "hired gun" Luc Bourdon down the regular season stretch, but most of you would have to agree that in these playoffs so far, he's really been showing us why we went out and acquired him. Luc was a gigantic physical and defensive force in those first two gams against the Titan. Kudos as well to JC Sawyer for his excellent work neutralizing the top Bathurst snipers, and to Beau Prokopetz for his top notch physical play and careful defensive awareness. Finally, Jason Swit and Spencer Corcoran have been rock solid as the unheralded third pairing; two of the team's most improved players over the second half of the season.

- How about that time out called by coach Pascal Vincent? Timeouts often evoke a positive change in the team that calls them, but that was one of the biggest improvements in a team from "before" to "after" that I've seen in a while after a coach called a timeout. Kudos to Vincent for recognizing the need and acting accordingly.

For Game 3, we really just need similar efforts to the two excellent ones put forth in the first two games. All four lines and all six defence truly contributed in big ways, and goaltender Ondrej Pavelec was there when needed. I honestly can't think of a single player that failed to pull his weight in the first two games of this series. If our boys can continue this strong and honest play, follow the game plan that's worked to date, and remain hungry despite the temptation to relax a bit due to being up 2-0, we should be fine and should continue to enjoy success. Discipline and powerplay production are also "musts".

There will be a decent number of Eagle fans cheering the team on in Bathurst, myself among them, all I have to say to end is GO EAGLES GO!!!!!

A virtually flawless performance; Eagles take Game One 3-0 before sold-out crowd

2007-04-06T23:36:00.000-07:00

You couldn't really ask for a more successful playoff game.

The Cape Breton Screaming Eagles came out in front of a packed house that had high expectations of the team and was expecting results, and boy did they deliver in Game One of their second round series against the Acadie-Bathurst Titan.

Cape Breton dominated the game almost start-to-finish, holding the high-flying Titan to only a handful of decent scoring chances, and hemming them up in their zone for much of the final two periods. The Eagles also showed excellent discipline, taking just two penalties over the entire course of the hockey game.

The boys got on the scoreboard with a powerplay goal that featured some phenomenal passing, with the play finished off with one of Cam Fergus's patented lasers to the top shelf, glove side. That gave them a 1-0 lead after one. In the second, Chris Culligan was behind the Titan net and caught goaltender Antoine Tardif looking the wrong way. He then feathered a pass out front in the opposite direction to where Scott Brannon was waiting to tap it in for a 2-0 lead. The game's final goal came as a result of some great work by the third line. Brad Gallant did an excellent job forcing a turnover, and then he and Jo Laberge tic-tac-toed it to Brendon MacDonald for his first career QMJHL playoff goal. Brannon's goal was also his first in the Q playoffs.

But the biggest "first" achieved on the night was the shutout. Ondrej Pavelec, and the excellent overall team defense, combined for the first playoff shutout in team history. As well, this is the first time Cape Breton has ever won the first game of a series against Bathurst............. and the first time they have ever led a playoff series against Bathurst, period.

All four lines were excellent and did their jobs fully. The Fergus line provided flash and dash and created tons of scoring chances, including a powerplay goal. The Sheppard line was possibly the best of the night, shutting down the Beauregard/Perreault line and contributing a tally of their own. The Laberge/MacDonald/Gallant line outplayed Bathurst's young third line, and scored a goal. Finally, the JC Gauthier/Quesnel/MacNeil line kept the Titan pinned inside their blueline on many a shift.

All six defencemen were rocks, including lots of big hits from Beau Prokopetz and Luc Bourdon, and goaltender Pavelec made the saves when called upon.

Almost as close as you can get to a perfect performance, and it all came in front of a very enthusiastic and appreciative sold-out crowd.

That's what playoff hockey is all about, and the boys will try to do it all again tomorrow night!

How sweet it would be to head to Bathurst up two games to none; GO EAGLES GO!

GAME DAY! Eagles vs Titan, GAME ONE

2007-04-06T06:12:00.000-07:00

After what seemed like an eternity of a wait, we are finally back to C200 tonight for playoff hockey! Game One of the second round of the playoffs against the Acadie-Bathurst Titan kicks off tonight and there should be a sellout or near-sellout crowd on hand to witness it. This is only the third time in team history that the Eagles have had home ice advantage in round 2 and hosted the first two games on their ice.

The key for tonight should be how the Eagles respond to having had nine days off since finishing the St. John's Fog Devils in Game Four last Wednesday in Newfoundland. Throughout this season, Cape Breton honestly didn't respond very well to extended periods without a game; some of the Screaming Eagles' worst performances of the season came on the heels of six or seven-day layoffs. It is CRUCIAL that the team not come out flat tonight despite having been idle for the past nine days. You know that le Titan will hit the ground running, as they're coming right off of the high of an overtime Game 7 win on Tuesday night against PEI.

One good thing about the long layoff was that it allowed Cape Breton to rest any nagging injuries players may have had. As a result, we should be entering tonight's game with pretty much a full lineup, with the exception of Etienne Breton, who is still a little ways away from coming back from that broken jaw. Here is a guess at line combinations and defence pairings for tonight:

Dean Ouellet-Cam Fergus-Paul McIlveen

Pure offensive line that delivered the goods big time against the Fog Devils, and will be asked to outproduce the Titan top line of Bartos-Perreault-Beauregard.

Chris Culligan-James Sheppard-Scott Brannon

The Eagles' superb two-way unit that can score goals, play physical, and most importantly, is extremely accountable defensively. These guys will be called upon to chip in offensively, to set the tone physically, and to play a big part in shutting down the Titan top scorers; especially Perreault and Beauregard.

Robert Slaney-Jonathan Laberge-Brendon MacDonald

A gritty checking line with decent offensive skills too, although it's a bit of an unproven entity as a unit. Laberge is just coming off of injury, but it's in this series where he's really going to have to start stepping up and showing us why we went out and traded for him. His performance is a big part of whether or not this line works. The challenge for this line will be to outplay the Titan third line of Joly-Faille-Grenache.......... and that's going to be a tough order.

Alex Quesnel or Nick MacNeil-JC Gauthier-Brad Gallant

A plucky energy line with very good offensive skills for a fourth line, and JC Gauthier is really counted on for his faceoff prowess. However, like line 3, this trio hasn't played much together as a unit, and will have to gel quickly to match the Titan fourth line of Jezegou-Morneau-Labelle.

DEFENCE

JC Sawyer-Luc Bourdon

Two of the top defencemen in the league pair together as a fearsome duo. JC is the offensive defenceman, Luc the mean and physical shutdown guy. These two guys seem to have pretty good on-ice chemistry together, and I'm sure they'll be given the assignment of making life miserable for the flashier Titan forwards........ and I think they can't wait to take on this assignment. Bourdon's play in this series, like Laberge's, could go a long way in determining his true value to this team after being picked up in a trade.

Oskars Bartulis-Beau Prokopetz

A skilled but safe duo that will be playing a simple defensive game and chipping pucks in and out. Beau can also punish you physically. Oskars is one of the league's top defencemen, but has been hot and cold since about Xmas now......... he needs to be on top of his game night-in, night-out from here on in.

Jason Swit-Spencer Corcoran

No frills here, these guys will be asked to outplay the 4-5-6 Titan defencemen like Desnoyers, Pomerleau, Tesink. Both guys were pretty much near the top of their game against St. John's and need to keep bringing it if we're to have true defensive depth 1-thru-6.

And of course, in goal, the Czech Wall- Ondrej Pavelec.

This guy has been absolutely on top of his game since January, and all I can say is keep it up kid. If Ondrej is on top of his game in this series, the Titan tandem of Tardif and Miller will eventually wear out trying to match him save for save.

Good Friday has been good to the Eagles, and it's been very bad. In 2002, Pierre-Luc Laprise scored the OT winner to give Cape Breton a thrilling 5-4 win over Baie-Comeau to finish off the Drakkar in five games before a jubilant sold-out C200 crowd. But in 2004, Good Friday saw the Chicoutimi Sagueneens finish off the gigantic five-game upset of the Eagles that remains the team's darkest moment to date. Extreme joy in 2002 and crushing sorrow in 2004........ what will Good Friday bring in 2007?

It's playoff hockey, breathe it in, feel the electricity, and prepare to get wild as part of a potentially sold out C200 crowd tonight! A long-time foe comes for yet another challenge, and it may very well indeed finally be time to slay the demon that's haunted pretty much our entire playoff existence- the Bathurst Titan.

A pre-series look at our 2nd round opponent: the Acadie-Bathurst Titan

2007-04-05T06:42:00.000-07:00

The Acadie-Bathurst Titan finished the regular season with a 35-28-2-5 record for 77 points and a .500 winning percentage. This record was good for a fifth place finish in the East Division standings. Of course, that is nothing more than background information. You know the cliche; once the playoffs start, regular season statistics go out the window. Bathurst faced the fourth place PEI Rocket in the first round of the playoffs, and snuck by them thanks to an overtime win in Game 7.

I'll now take a line-by-line, position-by-position look at our hated adversary, le Titan:

FORWARDS

LINE 1

LW Martin Bartos C Mathieu Perreault RW Thomas Beauregard

This trio of players needs very little introduction. Perreault last night was named League MVP at the QMJHL's Golden Puck Awards, and finished third in league scoring with 41 goals and 119 points. Perreault was also named to the QMJHL's First All-Star Team. He is one of the most shifty, smart, creative, and dynamic players in the league. Add to all of that that he's also a proven clutch playoff performer. In my opinion he is THE most dangerous force the Titan have.

Then there is Thomas Beauregard, sniper extraordinaire, who led the league with 71 goals and finished second in the points scoring race with 124. He too was named to the first all-star team, and it can be argued that there is no player in the league as dangerous around the net.

The line is topped off by Martin Bartos, who while not quite the superstar Perreault or Beauregard is, is no slouch himself with 24 goals and 81 points, including a lot of success against the Screaming Eagles.

This is one of the premier offensive units in the entire QMJHL, and the Eagles will have to defend strongly against it.

LINE 2

LW Dany Masse C Charles Bergeron RW Jordan Clendenning

A very solid two-way line that offers decent scoring punch and a lot of other intangibles. Masse is probably the best pure offensive threat on the line, with 26 goals and 56 points on the season. Clendenning had a bit of a sub-par season offensively (16 G 51 PTS), but this guy is a warrior and is a clutch playoff performer, and he's showing it so far in this postseason, as he leads Bathurst in playoff points so far with eight. Jordan does a little bit of everything, and like I said, he's built for the playoffs and will be one for the Eagles to keep an eye on.

Finally, we have Charles Bergeron. If he has his way, he could really change the landscape of the series, and could be the most talked-about name in the C200 stands, even ahead of the superstars on line 1. Bergeron is a hulking and physical power forward who is a pure pest and agitator. He'll do whatever it takes to get under the skin of Eagles players, and to change the momentum of games in his Titans' favour. The big challenge for Cape Breton here is to not buy into this clown's antics, and to not let him get into their heads. Keep an eye on him folks; I guarantee he'll stir up trouble.

LINE 3

LW Tomy Joly C Eric Faille RW Samuel Grenache

On the surface, this looks like a fairly harmless trio, consisting of two rookies and a sophomore, none of whom had very big regular season stats.

Look beneath the surface, and this line could be as important as any for the Bathurst Titan, and could really change the direction of the series if it outplays Cape Breton's third and fourth lines.

This is a bunch of guys who maybe spent most of the season going through typical rookie ups and downs, but really started to come into their own near the end of the season, and have started the playoffs with a big bang. In the first round against PEI, Grenache had 3G 5 PTS, Faille 1 G 5 PTS, and Joly 1 G 4 PTS. DO NOT overlook these guys, they could be a key catalyst for le Titan! I truly believe a big factor in this series will be whether or not one or both of our third and fourth lines will be able to step up and outplay these guys. If they can't, give the edge on forward depth to the Titan.

LINE 4

LW Spencer Jezegou C Samuel Morneau RW Lucas Labelle/Jean-Simon Legros

Kind of a grab bag of players, but they've been an effective unit so far in the playoffs. Jezegou, for starters, is not just a fourth line player....... he's there only because they don't want to disrupt the other three well-established trios. Jezegou scored the series winner in OT of Game 7 against PEI, and believe it or not, also scored the OT winner in Game 2 of that series. This is a hidden threat living on the fourth line in Bathurst.

Morneau is a solid 16 year old player who fits the same mold as the three guys on line 3. You may remember Lucas Labelle from his brief stint with the Screaming Eagles in fall 2005, and if so, you'll recall that he's a scrappy agitator who I'm sure would love to prove to the Eagles that it was a mistake to let him go. Legros is honestly a one-dimensional fighter who may not play too much in the series.

DEFENCE

The Titan have six regular defencemen that we'll see a ton of in this series. They are:

Mathieu Labrie
Zack Firlotte
Nicolas Sigouin
Marc-Antoine Desnoyers
Brad Tesink
Maxime Pomerleau

This is a pretty young overall defence crew, with Sigouin/Desnoyers/Tesink being just 17 years old. That said, all three were first round QMJHL Midget draft picks, so there is no doubt some talent there, it's just unrefined. However, all three stepped up into major roles in the PEI series, and if they can continue that strong play, Bathurst will bring a decently deep if unspectacular defence corps to Cape Breton.

There isn't really a JC Sawyer or Luc Bourdon calibre star defenceman on this roster. Their best overall D is probably Labrie, a 19-year-old veteran who's always been a bit of a thorn in the Eagles' side.

Defence could also honestly be a weakness for le Titan, if those young guys I mentioned become overwhelmed against a veteran offensive force like the Eagles. Labrie and Firlotte, you know what you're going to get, but it's those four other younger guys who will make or break this Bathurst D in this series.

GOALTENDING

All season, goaltending has been THE question mark for this otherwise pretty balanced hockey club. The Titan have been relying on a 19-year-old journeyman free agent named Brant Miller, and 16-year-old rookie Antoine Tardif, who while quite talented, is still pretty inexperienced and raw.

Miller played the first six games of the PEI series, before coach John Chabot rolled the dice and started Tardif in Game Seven. The young Tardif responded with a sparkling 45-save performance in a 4-3 OT win, and after that, you'd have to think he will get the start tomorrow in Game One against Cape Breton.

Goaltending may have been a weakness for Bathurst all season, but all they would need in this series would be for Tardif (or Miller, if he ends up playing) to have a few hot games. If the talented youngster can play like he did in Game 7 in PEI, an extremely high-pressure situation, Bathurst might not be in such bad shape in goal.

Coach John Chabot rolls all four lines and six defencemen. This enemy has four quality lines, including two of the top stars in the league, and a defence that can either be hit or miss. Their goaltending is a question mark, but Tardif wouldn't be the first goaltender to catch lightning in a bottle when unexpectedly thrust into the heat of playoff battle. Look no further than Cam Ward and what he did for the Carolina Hurricanes last year.

All in all, this is a solid opponent; much tougher than the St. John's Fog Devils. That said, Cape Breton could use a really good challenge. They will be sure to get it when Game One kicks off tomorrow in front of a potentially sold out crowd at C200.

Eagles to face long-time nemesis Bathurst Titan in second round

2007-04-04T04:34:00.000-07:00

Thanks to some ridiculous Game 7 OT drama last night at both the Charlottetown Civic Centre and the Moncton Coliseum, the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles' second round adversary will be none other than the team that sent them packing last year; the Acadie-Bathurst Titan.

The Titan squeaked out a 4-3 OT win over the PEI Rocket in Game 7 of that series in Charlottetown, and then no doubt gathered around a TV to watch as Halifax defeated Moncton 3-2 in 2 OT in a thriller of a Game 7 from Moncton.

I just wanted to quickly sign in to establish for those who may not yet have read the paper that it will indeed be Bathurst in the second round. Stay tuned soon for a detailed pre-series rundown, as well as lots of information on the playoff history between these two teams........ as you will see, Cape Breton has a lot to draw from in terms of motivation to beat these guys.

Games 1 and 2 go Friday and Saturday, both 7:00 starts, from C200. This series could well be a barnburner.

My, how the plot has thickened - second round opponent to be determined in "Games 7" Tuesday night

2007-04-02T09:10:00.000-07:00

In my previous blog, I noted that of the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles' three potential second round playoff opponents (Acadie-Bathurst Titan, Moncton Wildcats, and PEI Rocket), the Wildcats and Rocket were on the brink of elimination, and that therefore Cape Breton's most likely upcoming adversary would be the Bathurst Titan.

My how things have changed since then. This blogger will freely admit that he was maybe a little too quick to count out the Rocket and the Wildcats. At the time, PEI trailed Bathurst 3-1 in games, but they have since come back to tie the series at 3-3, forcing a Game 7 tomorrow (Tuesday) night at the Charlottetown Civic Centre. Moncton also looked like they were on their last legs. They trailed their series 3-2 against the Halifax Mooseheads, and had gotten crushed 5-0 at home in Game 5 of the series. However, Moncton has been surprising QMJHL fans all season, and proved that they had at least one more surprise left in their bag of tricks when they pulled out a 4-3 win at the Halifax Metro Centre in Game 6 to force a seventh game at the Moncton Coliseum tomorrow night.

What all of this means to the Screaming Eagles is that their second round playoff opponent is still very much yet to be determined, and that there is now pretty much an equal chance of it being any of those three possible opponents. Come Friday night, we could be facing Moncton, PEI, or Bathurst, and it will all be decided by the two Game 7's tomorrow night.

I'll try to put it as simply as possible:

- If Moncton defeats Halifax in the 7th game of that series, MONCTON WILL BE OUR OPPONENT. It will not matter what happens between Bathurst and PEI.

- If Halifax defeats Moncton in the 7th game of that series, then our opponent will be THE WINNER OF GAME 7 BETWEEN PEI AND BATHURST.

Fans may be interested to know that Game 7 between Moncton and Halifax is being carried LIVE on Eastlink Television tomorrow night at 7:30 PM from the Moncton Coliseum. Therefore, interested Eagle supporters can tune in and watch the team's second round fate become at least in part (if not fully) determined by the result of that game. The Eastlink broadcast will surely provide many updates on what's going on in Charlottetown, as well.

It's a tangled web we weave, but I for one wouldn't have it any other way. It's exciting when things go down to the wire like this, and furthermore, it's gotta be a good thing for our Eagles that whomever our second round challenger ends up being, they've already been through a gruelling seven-game series, and will hopefully have been worn down a bit.

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Speaking of second round playoff matchups, those in the Telus Division are now finalized.

In Round One............

(1) Val d'or swept (8) Chicoutimi 4-0
(7) Baie-Comeau knocked off (2) Victoriaville 4-2
(6) Rouyn-Noranda shocked (3) Gatineau 4-1
(4) Drummondville dispatched (5) Quebec 4-1

That gives us second round pairings of...................

(1) Val d'or vs (7) Baie-Comeau
(4) Drummondville vs (6) Rouyn-Noranda

Look for Val d'or vs Baie-Comeau to be a potentially high-scoring dandy between two teams with absolutely potent offences.

Also note Gatineau's very surprising early exit. This is proof that playoff failure can happen to absolutely anyone, as nobody has a richer playoff history than the fabled Olympiques.

I'll check in after tomorrow night's Game 7s are played out, by which time we'll know our second round opponent and can all start dissecting how the series may go down!

Break out the brooms- Eagles complete first-ever series sweep

2007-03-29T12:54:00.000-07:00

For the first time since moving to Sydney in 1997, the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles have swept a playoff opponent in four straight games.

Cape Breton put the finishing touches on the series win with a 6-2 win over the St. John's Fog Devils at Mile One Centre last night, becoming the first of Cape Breton's "main" hockey teams to sweep a best-of-seven series since the 1993 Cape Breton Oilers dispatched (note the irony coming up here) the St. John's Maple Leafs in four straight in the second round en route to winning the Calder Cup as AHL champions. The Eagles are hoping that there is something about sweeping St. John's in the playoffs that correlates with winning league titles!

It was the usual suspects hitting the scoresheet for Cape Breton last night, as the team's "best players continue to be their best players", as the old cliche goes. Cam Fergus led the way with a brace of goals (one on the powerplay, and a shorthanded laser beam to the top shelf), while Dean Ouellet, Paul McIlveen, Robert Slaney, and James Sheppard added singles. Ondrej Pavelec played the first two periods of the win before giving way to David Davenport for period three, apparently at his own request.

The Eagles outscored St. John's 18-6 over the course of the four-game series, and their powerplay clicked for 10 goals on 30 opportunities, or a 33.3% success ratio. Everyone stepped up and contributed to the victory in some way, and no serious injuries were sustained in the series. As long as the sweep doesn't make the boys overconfident, we can't possibly have asked for a much better outcome from this opening round series.

The team will now enjoy nine days to rest before Round 2 opens on Friday, April 6 against a yet-to-be-determined opponents. This will be great for any guys who may have nagging injuries. Nine days off can be dangerous, as it can allow a team to get stale and lose momentum, and it's up to the guys and the coaching staff to remain intense and ready in practice so as to hit the ground running in the next playoff series.

As for their rd 2 opponent, there are still three possibilities as to who it will be (Moncton, PEI, and Acadie-Bathurst), but it's really starting to look like it is going to be the Bathurst Titan. Moncton currently trails Halifax 3-2 in their series, and lost Game 5 by a score of 5-0. As for the Rocket, they currently trail the Bathurst Titan 3-1 in games in their series, leaving themselves with an uphill battle. Stranger things have happened, but I for one am preparing to see the Eagles face the Titan.

As many of you diehard fans know, there is a bit of a playoff history between the Eagles and the Titan. In fact, this series would be the fifth playoff meeting between the two teams in Cape Breton's ten-year existence, if it were to happen. But I'll get into all that history in my next blog........... maybe when it's 100% certain that Acadie-Bathurst will be our next opponent.

Until then, players and fans alike, soak up a first round that couldn't really have gone much better!

Eagles going for the sweep tonight!

2007-03-28T05:52:00.000-07:00

The Cape Breton Screaming Eagles couldn't have asked for a much better outcome from last night's Game 3 of their best-of-seven series against the St. John's Fog Devils, played from Mile One Centre in the Newfoundland capital.

Cape Breton was able to play a very sound and effective road game for pretty much the entire 60 minutes, en route to a 4-2 victory over the Fog Devils and a commanding 3-0 series lead. This is the first time in the team's ten-year history that they have led a playoff series by a count of three games to none. It's a pretty tight stranglehold on a series, and to be quite honest, it's extremely unlikely that the Fog Devils will get back into the series now.

Chris Culligan, Paul McIlveen, and Dean Ouellet all scored powerplay goals for the Eagles, while JC Sawyer scored at even strength and had two powerplay assists. The Eagles' three powerplay goals in Game Three gives them eight powerplay goals in the series thus far, which is just great news for a Cape Breton team that saw its efficiency with the man advantage become a little bit inconsistent at times during the second half of the regular season. It's been said for years and years, that for an Eagles team to have playoff success, it needs to have a proficient powerplay, and that's exactly what we've been getting in the first three games of this playoff series. If this powerplay success can continue, it only improves our chances at advancing deep into the postseason.

As well, the old worn-out cliche says that for a team to have success, "its best players have to be its best players." That has definitely been the case for the Screaming Eagles thus far in this series. After last night's game, each of the team's top six scorers from the regular season (Culligan, McIlveen, Ouellet, Sawyer, James Sheppard, and Cam Fergus) has at least one playoff goal already, and each has been on the scoresheet many times so far in this series. As well, kingpin acquisition Luc Bourdon has elevated his play from where it was at the end of the regular season, and we need him to keep that up. Our best players have indeed stepped up and been our best players so far in this young postseason run, and that's great news for a franchise that too often in the past has seen its best players struggle to hit the scoresheet come playoff time.

Another positive to take from last night's game is that it sounded pretty clean, a nice change from the flat-out dangerous final few minutes of Game Two. A key to this series will be getting out of it without any further injury, and although the series isn't over, last night's tamer affair is hopefully a postive sign.

Another note from last night is that St. John's tried to change the momentum a bit by making a goaltending change. Despite his 40+ save effort in Game Two, netminder Ilia Ejov was replaced by backup goaltender Pierre-Alexandre Marion to start last night's contest. Marion played admirably, stopping 36 of 40 shots, but it didn't end up making any real difference for the Fog Devils in terms of the end result.

Game Four goes tonight at Mile One, and is slated for a 6:30 PM start our time (CJCB AM 1270). Last night's game started a half hour late because of inclement weather in the St. John's area. Tonight's game is a chance for the Eagles to finish off the series, and buy themselves the maximum amount of possible rest time before the start of Round Two, to help heal any nagging injuries that a few players surely have. It would also be the first series sweep in Eagles' history, and pulling it off would surely give the team a little extra swagger heading into the second round.

Not much more to say, let's just hope for the team to keep doing what it's been doing and finish things off tonight.

Huge news for Eagles as no less than FOUR players named to league all-star teams!!!!!

2007-03-26T20:22:00.000-07:00

The QMJHL named its first and second league all-star teams today, along with its all-rookie team.

On each team, one goaltender, two defencemen, one left winger, one center, and one right winger are selected.

The QMJHL First All-Star Team is as follows:

Goal- ONDREJ PAVELEC, CAPE BRETON

Defence - Kristopher Letang, Val d'or
Defence- Andrew MacDonald, Moncton

Left Wing- Slava Trukhno, Gatineau
Center- Mathieu Perreault, Acadie-Bathurst
Right Wing- Thomas Beauregard, Acadie-Bathurst

The QMJHL Second All-Star Team is as follows:

Goal- Jonathan Bernier, Lewiston

Defence- JC SAWYER, CAPE BRETON
Defence- OSKARS BARTULIS, CAPE BRETON

Left Wing- Benoit Doucet, Victoriaville
Center- JAMES SHEPPARD, CAPE BRETON
Right Wing- Francois Bouchard, Baie-Comeau

The QMJHL All-Rookie Team is as follows:

Goal- Peter Delmas, Lewiston

Defence- Simon Lacroix, Shawinigan
Defence- MARK BARBERIO, MONCTON (FORMER EAGLE, of whom we're all still quite proud)

Left Wing- Michael Frolik, Rimouski
Center- Christopher DiDomenico, Saint John
Right Wing- Jakub Voracek, Halifax

This is HUGE for the Screaming Eagles. I remember the days when the idea of having just one player on a league all-star team seemed absolutely unfathomable. When it finally happened in 2001-2002 with Mathieu Dumas's selection to the second all-star team and David Cloutier's selection to the first team, I remember thinking it was a pretty big deal. So to have four guys so honoured this season really says a lot about what a year it was for our squad. We not only had a great finish in the standings, but we have impact players too............ all-star team selection calibre guys are usually guys who can singlehandedly turn a game around. And don't forget that aside from all of these league all-star selections, we still have a 53 goal scorer, a 40 goal scorer, a 37 goal scorer, and a 30 goal scorer besides!

I personally don't entirely agree with all of those all-star selections, and I feel that a few very deserving players around the league were curiously omitted, but it's still great to see four Screaming Eagles there. I also really don't see how Andrew MacDonald made the first all-star team ahead of JC Sawyer (or a guy like Maxime Noreau of Victoriaville, for that matter). MacDonald had an awesome season, and was a huge reason why Moncton was such a pleasant surprise. However, his 58 points and +5 don't seem to compare to JC's 77 points and +40. I'm not sure how a guy leads all defencemen in both points and plus-minus and doesn't get selected to the first all-star team. I know that stats aren't everything, and I know that it may seem petty to point this out when we have four guys selected to league all-star teams, but I still don't quite understand it.

That small quibble aside, this is pretty sweet news for Cape Breton, and will hopefully give those players that much more confidence heading into the upcoming playoff games. All of those all-star selections are well and good, and look pretty on a guy's resume, but I'm sure any of them would trade such personal honours in a heartbeat for the chance to lift that President's Cup.

Ryan Graham suspended two games for hit on Bartulis

2007-03-26T20:16:00.000-07:00

Read all about it here folks:

http://www.lhjmq.qc.ca/lang_en/index.php?page=232&id_nouvelle=1403

This is great news for us. Not only was justice served for an extremely dangerous play, but the Fog Devils will now be missing their leading goal scorer (Graham had 37 goals this season) for the next two games of the series.

If the Eagles were to finish the series off in the following two games, Graham's season could end thanks to that hit.

It is not yet known for sure who St. John's plans to place on that top line to replace Graham alongside Wes Welcher and Nicolas Bachand.

Game Three goes tomorrow, at 6:30 PM our time at Mile One Centre. Catch it all on CJCB AM 1270.

Eagles sweep at home to take first 2-0 series lead in team history; head to Rock hopefully healthy

2007-03-26T04:46:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the lateness of this blog guys n gals, it was a busy Sunday yesterday.

Well you guys have already run down a lot of the Eagles' second 4-1 win in as many nights to assume a 2-0 series lead over the St. John's Fog Devils, so I won't get into too much detail about it.

The game was still in doubt after two periods, with the score tied 1-1 despite the Eagles holding a 33-17 shots on goal advantage. Cam Fergus and TJ Brennan had exchanged powerplay goals, and Cape Breton was stymied on quite a few second period chances by Fog Devil goaltender Ilia Ejov. It felt like it might end up being the type of game where we might never end up getting any bounces around the opposing net, where the enemy goaltender could possibly be in our shooters' heads, and all it would take in the third period would be one St. John's goal to send us to a surprising defeat. We saw a few such games in the regular season.

Thankfully, that didn't happen in Game Two. Just past the midway point of the period, the game's turning point occurred. James Sheppard lost an offensive zone faceoff, but linemate Chris Culligan forechecked hard and stripped the puck from Fog Devil defender (and former Eagle) Luke Gallant. He then threw the puck back out front, right on Sheppard's tape, and the captain wasted no time putting it into the top shelf for the icebreaking goal. Many fans around the rink had been saying to me that if we wanted to beat Ejov we were going to have to shoot high, and that's exactly where Sheppard went. It ended up being his second game-winning goal in as many games to open the 2007 playoffs.

Minutes later, Cape Breton scored the backbreaker. After successfully killing a penalty to defenceman Beau Prokopetz, the puck came back to the point to the Fog Devils' Wes Welcher. Welcher was a bit nonchalant with the puck and took his time with it, not noticing Prokopetz coming out of the box and sneaking up behind him. Beau picked his pocket and sent our forwards up-ice, where a nice passing play immediately resulted in Robert Slaney putting one five-hole on Ejov to give Cape Breton some breathing room in the form of a 3-1 lead.

As soon as the Eagles took a 3-1 lead, St. John's spent the rest of the game trying to send some sort of message through goon tactics, the worst of which easily being Ryan Graham's dangerous hit from behind on Oskars Bartulis that earned him a 5:00 match penalty and an automatic suspension for Game Three of the series Tuesday night in St. John's. I won't talk too much more about the Fog Devils' antics in the final five minutes, as they have already been run down quite enough in the responses to the last blog. The final minutes of the game were nasty, to say the least! Amongst all the craziness, Dean Ouellet added a powerplay goal (his sixth point of the playoffs in just two games) to give us our final score of 4-1.

The win gives Cape Breton a 2-0 series lead, which as said in the title, is actually the first such series lead in the Eagles' entire playoff history. It was pretty important to win those two home games going into potentially three straight at Mile One starting tomorrow (Tuesday).

According to today's Cape Breton Post, Bartulis is OK despite the vicious hit from behind, and centre Jonathan Laberge should also play in Game Three after sitting out the second game thanks to a collision that happened in Game One. However, Scott Brannon took a high hit from the Fog Devils' Nicolas Bachand late in the game and didn't play another shift. Hopefully he is OK, as he has been a really effective physical force so far in the series.

As said, Game Three goes tomorrow night, at 6:30 PM our time. Kenny MacNeil will get his always-informative pre-game show up and running at 6:00.

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I'd also like to run down what has been happening in other playoff series to date!

EAST

(1) Lewiston vs (8) Shawinigan

Lewiston leads series 2-0

The MAINEiacs may lead this series 2-0 after back-to-back wins at the Androscoggin Bank Colisee in Lewiston, ME, but it certainly wasn't easy. In Game One, Lewiston trailed 2-1 late in the game, and needed two powerplay goals from David Perron to narrowly escape with the win. In the second game, Shawinigan led 3-2 after the first period, but Simon Courcelles scored the winner in period three to five the MAINEiacs a 4-3 win and a 2-0 series lead.

It was expected that Maine would win both games at home, but Shawinigan gave them everything they could handle. The series now shifts back to the Jacques Plante Arena in Shawinigan for a pair of games.

(3) Moncton vs (6) Halifax

Moncton leads series 2-1

In a series that has a rare format where the venue alternates with each game, Moncton took the opener at the Moncton Coliseum 6-4, while Halifax responded with a convincing 5-1 win at the Halifax Metro Centre in Game Two to even the series. Yesterday afternoon, back in Moncton, the Wildcats erupted for four goals early in the second period to take a 5-1 lead, and then barely hung on for dear life as the Mooseheads roared back to cut the lead to 5-4. That was the final score, and the Cats lead the series 2-1 with Game Four set to take place in Halifax tonight.

(4) PEI vs (5) Bathurst

Series tied 1-1.

This one was expected to be a tight series, and it certainly delivered on that promise in the first two games at the Charlottetown Civic Centre. Game One saw the Rocket erase a 2-0 first period deficit and 3-2 early third period deficit to score a thrilling 5-3 win.

In Game Two, Bathurst once again jumped out to a quick first period lead, this time taking a commanding 4-0 lead into the dressing room after the first frame. However, PEI would storm all the way back and tie the game at 4-4, forcing overtime. Brett Morrison led the comeback charge for the Rocket, notching two goals and two assists.

In overtime, however, the Titan made up for the blown lead when rookie Spencer Jezegou scored the sudden death winner for a 5-4 Bathurst victory to even the series. It was Jezegou's fourth point of the game.

The series shifts back to the KC Irving Regional Center in Bathurst, NB, and is expected to continue to be neck-and-neck.

WEST

(1) Val d'or vs (8) Chicoutimi

Val d'or leads series 2-0.

In a series viewed by some as having some serious upset potential, the Val d'or Foreurs did what they could to silence their critics by taking both games at the Centre Air Creebec. Game One was an 8-2 blowout win for the Foreurs, with Kristopher Letang leading the way with a spectacular two goal, three assist performance.

Game Two was a heartbreaker for les Sagueneens. They led the game 4-3 in its late stages, but Letang struck again, scoring the game-tying goal with just over five minutes to play, and then notching the OT winner on the powerplay to put Val d'or up two games as the series shifts back to the always-raucous Centre Georges Vezina in Chicoutimi for the next three games. Obviously, the Sags have to take the next one at home if they are to have any chance of crawling back into this series.

(2) Victoriaville vs (7) Baie-Comeau

Series tied 1-1.

In another series expected to be close, Baie-Comeau netminder Michael Dupont was the first star as the Drakkar stole the first game 3-1 on the road, while Tigres cage cop JC Blanchard was first star in the rematch, leading les Tigres to a 4-1 win in Game Two. The next two games take place at the Centre Henry-Leonard in Baie-Comeau.

(3) Gatineau vs (6) Rouyn-Noranda

Series tied 1-1.

The Huskies shocked the Olympiques by waltzing into Centre Robert Guertin on Saturday night and roaring out to a 6-0 lead, hanging on for a 6-3 Game One victory. Yannick Riendeau was sensational for Rouyn in this game, scoring four goals and an assist. In Game Two, Paul Byron led the way for Gatineau with a hat trick, and goaltender Ryan Mior made up for a shaky Game One by being named first star in the rematch, as the 'Piques won 5-2 to even the series. The two teams shift to the Dave Keon Arena in Rouyn-Noranda for Games Three and Four.

(4) Drummondville vs (5) Quebec

Series tied 1-1

In possibly the tightest series of them all so far, les Remparts drew first blood in Game One with a 4-3 overtime win, thanks to sudden death heroics from 16-year-old rookie Kelsey Tessier. Kevin Desfosses was huge in the Quebec net in this game, making 49 saves for the win. However, Game Two saw Drummondville win a wild seesaw affair in which the lead changed hands many times, as Steven Cacciotti scored with less than two minutes remaining to give les Voltigeurs a 6-5 win. Superstar Derick Brassard was huge in this game, coming up with a goal and two assists and being named first star. These two teams head to a no doubt sold out Colisee Pepsi in Quebec City for Game Three tonight, and I really think this series is going to go the 7-game distance.

That's a look at how the rest of the playoffs have been going down thus far around the Q!

Eagles take 1-0 series lead

2007-03-24T06:38:00.000-07:00

The Cape Breton Screaming Eagles survived a few first period jitters and delivered very solid second and third period performances en route to a pretty nice 4-1 win over the St. John's Fog Devils in Game One of their opening round best-of-seven series, last night at C200.

The win occurred in front of a boisterous playoff crowd of just under 4000, many of them clad in their white playoff t-shirts. Fans deserve a lot of credit for really bringing it for the first playoff game and creating a pretty good atmosphere. The intensity in the rink was clearly stepped up a notch from the regular season.

Things got off to a bit of a rocky start when the Fog Devils scored a shorthanded goal very early on in the game to open the scoring. The goal came as a result of an unnecessary icing on an Eagle powerplay, a cleanly lost ensuing draw in the defensive zone, and very poor defensive zone coverage on the Fog Devil possession (not to mention a really juicy rebound given up). But in what may have been the most important play of the game, Cape Breton got the goal back IMMEDIATELY, on the same powerplay in fact (Oskars Bartulis low wrister from the point tipped in by Dean Ouellet). Making amends right away for that ugly shorthanded goal against really helped avoid any early-game panic setting in, for either the players or the fans.

Those two goals were the only ones of the first period, meaning the Eagles escaped with a 1-1 tie in a period where they showed typical "first period of the playoffs" jitters. In period two, Cape Breton started to really carry the play and take it to the Fog Devils with confidence; a number of consecutive powerplays didn't hurt either. At the very end of one powerplay, James Sheppard's off-wing blast found the top corner glove side on Fog Devil netminder Ilja Ejov for a 2-1 Eagle lead. Later in the period, on a five-on-three advantage, some patience and fine passing by the Eagles' #1 powerplay unit saw Paul McIlveen move in really deep from his point position and bury a Cam Fergus pass top shelf for a 3-1 Cape Breton lead after two stanzas.

It was a very relaxed and confident Eagle team in period three, as they wore down the clock with smart passing and solid defensive play. St. John's never really did threaten to get back in the game. McIlveen added his second of the game to round out the scoring, when he pumped home his own rebound after being robbed by Ejov on a one-time attempt in the slot. McIlveen's two goals are a great start to the playoffs for a guy who had a very good playoff showing for Cape Breton last year. Hopefully this guy can keep on delivering clutch playoff points!

The Eagles also scored three powerplay goals in the game, an encouraging stat for fans who were a bit worried about the powerplay heading into the postseason. Granted, one or two of the PP goals weren't exactly your typical powerplay goal (sustained pressure, lots of passing, etc), and there were several powerplays where the team didn't really get anything going, but at the end of the day, you have to be happy with 3/8 on the powerplay. Cape Breton was also excellent on the penalty kill, killing off all eight Fog Devil powerplays, including a 4:00 penalty to Brad Gallant and a two man disadvantage late in the second period. Many players deserve a lot of credit for their fine work on the PK, too many to really start listing.

Also key was the Eagles' physical play and grit. Going into the series, most agreed that Cape Breton had St. John's outmatched in most categories related to pure talent, and that the Devils would have to even the score by outdoing t Eagles in terms of physical play and grit. However, the Eagles may have surprised the Fog Devils last night, as it was actually the home team that dictated the play in terms of physicality and grit. At the very least, we matched them in this aspect of the game, and in my opinion we actually set the tone, instead of the other way around. This of course has to continue tonight, and throughout the series.

Goaltender Ondrej Pavelec wasn't tested overly often in the final two periods, but was solid when he had to be in getting his playoff off to a good start. And Luc Bourdon, who had a lot of people watching for a more intense performance from him than he had delivered in most regular season games, brought that intensity that we need to see from him. He was physical and involved, and ended up picking up second star honours. After an underwhelming second half of the regular season with the Eagles, it's time for Bourdon to really show us why we acquired him here in the playoffs, and he got off on the right foot last night by visibly stepping up the intensity.

The only glaring minus on the night is that Jonathan Laberge left the game in the second period following a mid-ice collision and never did return. He left the ice seeming to favour his left leg. I have yet to hear an injury report, but we obviously hope he won't be out for too long a time. He had been getting his playoffs off to a fine start as the third line center, almost scoring on a couple of great chances, and winning four or five pretty important faceoffs in his period and a half of action. Here's hoping this kid is OK; after all, he lost all that long hair in favour of the mohawk to play some playoff hockey!

Very positive start to the playoffs last night at C200, and as said a very fun playoff type atmosphere in the stands, but the team and its fans can't get too too high; they have to do it all over again tonight in Game Two at the Centre. I don't have much to say entering Game Two; as long as the Eagles keep up the intensity they showed in Game One, and keep doing the little things right, things should be OK in the long run.

I'm pumped for Game Two tonight, let's keep the momentum rolling, and see you all at the rink!!!!!

Eagles-Fog Devils series preview, and a few other notes

2007-03-22T09:09:00.000-07:00

With the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles kicking off their first round playoff series against the St. John's Fog Devils this weekend with Games 1 and 2 Friday and Saturday night from C200, it's high time for a little series preview here at Inside The Nest.

Most everyone around the league has the Eagles as heavy favourites in this series, and it's hard to argue with that general consensus when looking at the two teams on paper and what they've accomplished this season. Cape Breton seems to have the advantage in most of the "traditional" categories; on offense, on defence, in goal, and on special teams. To boot, Cape Breton finished 32 points ahead of the Fog Devils in the final standings. Yes, the Eagles are the heavy favourite in this series, a role the team actually hasn't handled overly well over the course of this season, but you have to play the cards you're dealt.

The Fog Devils have shown Cape Breton this season that they are not a team to take lightly. While they finished fourth-last in the Q this season, they seemed to save some of their best hockey for the Screaming Eagles, and seem to match up better against them than against many other foes around the league. St. John's was actually the only team in the division to manage to beat the Eagles twice on C200 ice this season. On both occasions, goaltender Ilja Ejov stole the show for the Devils, and their forwards were opportunistic enough to make the most of some third period opportunities.

The Foggies are just a second year club and are still in the process of building, but they aren't short on heart or grit, which could take them a long way in a series where they honestly have nothing to lose, another fact that could make them dangerous.

Still, the Eagles have it all over them in terms of depth and talent. Looking at the regular season results between the two teams, Cape Breton vastly outshot St. John's in most contests. Ejov and Co managed to steal a couple of those, but if the Eagles can manage to outshoot and outplay the Fog Devils like they did in the regular season, St. John's will not be able to keep up over the course of a best-of-seven series. They may put up a fight for much of the series, but eventually would succumb. Of course, this is all contingent on Cape Breton playing to their potential; if they don't, the series could be an entirely different story.

All in all, the synopsis of this opening round best-of-seven is that Cape Breton is the heavy favourite, but can't at all take St. John's lightly. Eagle fans need only to look back a few years in team history to find the ultimate example that no team can be taken lightly, no matter how big of an underdog they may be.

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Having gotten all of that out of the way, let's take a look at the opponent, the St. John's Fog Devils:

In goal, the Newfoundlanders will be relying on Ejov, who started seven of eight games against the Eagles in the regular season and played extremely well in the vast majority of them. Backup goaltender Pierre-Alexandre Marion is also an option, but I'm guessing that coach Real Paiement will give Ejov the nod. Ilja struggled at times this year, posting a 4.15 GAA and .876 save %, but as stated many times already, he's played some excellent hockey against the Eagles and showed that he's capable of stealing games when he's on.

On the blueline, St. John's is led by two very good offensive defencemen in TJ Brennan and former Eagle Luke Gallant. Both put up a solid 41 points from the blueline, and both are very capable powerplay quarterbacks with great shots from the point. Veteran defenceman Pat O'Keefe is a stay-at-home guy who works extremely hard, and young defender Maxime Dubuc has developed well with increased ice time over the second half. Overall, however, St. John's doesn't really have a true shutdown guy, and gave up 310 goals, second-most in the league.

Up front, St. John's has two pretty good lines.

One includes their top two scorers, Wesley Welcher (21 G 55 A 76 PTS) and Ryan Graham (37 G 37 A 74 PTS). Be sure that these two guys will have an impact on the upcoming series, especially Graham, one of the fiestier players in the league, who has a knack for scoring the big goal. The Eagles' success in this series will have a lot to do with how well they can contain these two guys. I am not entirely sure as to who will start the series as the third man on this unit.

Their second scoring line revolves around sophomore Jean-Simon Allard (12 G 38 A 50 PTS) and Swedish speedster Mario Kempe (23 G 19 A 42 PTS). If most of the attention is on checking Welcher and Graham, these guys can step up and do some damage. This line is completed by Nick Layton, a rookie who surprised with 21 goals this year, including a league-leading six against the Screaming Eagles. Every year, there are one or two surprise playoff producers, and Layton fits the bill as having the potential to be that type of guy.

The Devils' forward corps also has a lot of grit, with Graham and 20-year-old bruisers Nicolas Bachand and Tim Spencer leading the way. Captain Matt Fillier is also an intense and physical player who can also put the puck in the net the odd time. He's a heart and soul kind of guy that I can totally see taking his game to a new level in the playoffs. Even if the Eagles come out on top in this series, there is the potential that they could be a bit banged up, as the Fog Devils are physical and take few prisoners.

The catalyst for this Fog Devil hockey club is coach Real Paiement. Paiement is one of the real veteran coaches of the league, and has a long and successful history behind QMJHL benches. He's a crafty old tactician who knows virtually every trick in the book, and has a particular knack for getting the most out of teams that are a bit short on talent. Screaming Eagles' coach Pascal Vincent will have to be on his toes when up against this wily vet.

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The Eagles-Fog Devils series will follow the somewhat rare 2-3-2 playoff format, due to the large distance between the two cities.

This means that the first two games will be at C200 (Fri, Mar 23 and Sat, Mar 24), the next three will be played from Mile One Stadium in St. John's (Tues Mar 27, Wed Mar 28, and Fri Mar 30, the latter only if necessary), and the final two (again if necessary) would be played from C200, on Monday April 2 and Tues April 3.

This format puts a bit of a different twist on the "home ice advantage" aspect of the series, as many would argue that if the home team loses either or both of the first two games, that the lower-seeded team kind of has a bit of an advantage going home for three straight. However, who knows if home ice really means much of anything to either side in this series; the two teams met in the playoffs last year, and the road team won four of the five games. In the regular season this year (not that this has any real bearing on what happens in the playoffs), St. John's managed to win two out of four games at C200, while the Eagles garnered seven out of a possible eight points from Mile One. Does home ice advantage really mean anything? There isn't really any conclusive evidence either way.

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The Screaming Eagles are putting on a promotion of sorts for Game One of the series tomorrow night. The first 4000 fans to arrive will receive a free playoff t-shirt, in an attempt to create a bit of a playoff atmosphere at the rink.

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Finally, I'd like to throw a question out to you the readers and I'm looking for as much feedback (positive or negative) as possible.

The organization is thinking about the possibility of a fan bus trip happening sometime during these playoffs. For obvious geographical reasons, it couldn't happen during this St. John's series, but if the Eagles were to advance to round 2, they would probably be playing against an opponent that wouldn't be too far of a bus ride away.

Depending on what days of the week the team's away games fall on in such a series, the possibility is there of organizing a bus road trip of fans to cheer the team on in the playoffs in a visiting rink. It would obviously be much more likely to happen for weekend road games than for games during the week, as it would be hard to get too many fans who could make a trip on a weeknight.

I'm bringing this up to try and gauge fan interest in such a road trip, so respond away if you would be interested, and feel free to specify what conditions would best suit your interests (days of the week, going up the night before the game vs. the day of, things like that). Of course, if you want to respond but do not want your feedback publicly published on this blog, just say the word.

Once again, at this point this is still just an idea, but if there is enough SERIOUS interest, and if some road games fall on the right days of the week, it is something that could well become a reality.

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After a lengthy training camp, and a tiring 70-game regular season schedule, the real season starts tomorrow night. Our Cape Breton Screaming Eagles have been impressive for most of the year, but now begins the real test; the playoffs. Does this team have what it takes to have success in the postseason? We begin finding out tomorrow night at C200. See you at the rink this weekend!

Eagles close out season on a pretty good note

2007-03-18T18:24:00.000-07:00

The Cape Breton Screaming Eagles entered today's regular season finale against the Halifax Mooseheads having lost their previous three games. It would have made for a really sour note on which to enter the playoffs if they lost again today and made it four in a row to close out the season, but thankfully that didn't end up happening, as Cape Breton scored a convincing 5-1 win over the Mooseheads in front of a loud and enthusiastic sold out crowd at C200.

Today's win doesn't totally make up for the three losses that preceded it, but it at least sends Cape Breton and its fans into the playoffs on a positive note and in a generally good mood, and allows the team and its followers to enter the first round with at least a little bit of confidence. On the whole, the Eagles finish the season having gone 7-3 in their final ten games, which isn't too bad.

Dean Ouellet paced the Eagle attack today with a pair of goals, allowing him to finish the season with 40. Dean worked extremely hard all year and showed great patience and hand-eye coordination tipping pucks in in front of that net throughout the season, and a 40-goal year is a great reward for the man that many consider to be among the hardest-working players in the Q. Ouellet's 40 goals this season are a huge improvement from the 17 he scored last season. As well, this is the first Eagle team ever to possess two players with 40 or more goals on the season (Cam Fergus obviously being the other one, having finished the season with 53 tallies).

Also scoring for Cape Breton were Chris Culligan, Scott Brannon, and JC Sawyer. Culligan's goal was his 30th of the season, and it was just as nice to see "Culli" hit 30 as it was to see Dean Ouellet hit 40. Chris scored his 30 goals despite seeing virtually no time on the #1 powerplay unit all season. It should also be noted that he was the team's second-leading scorer at even strength this season. With Culligan hitting 30 goals, the team finishes the season with FIVE guys who scored 30 or more on the season, also a new Eagle high. Previous high was four 30-goal scorers, in 2000-2001.

In other milestones, Ondrej Pavelec played 25 minutes of shutout hockey today to ensure that he will win the Jacques Plante Trophy for the lowest GAA, and Paul McIlveen had two assists to establish a new team record for points in a season by a right winger. Pavelec was pulled after 25 minutes to protect his goals-against average......... whether or not you agree with such a tactic is totally up to the individual I guess! As well, I can't help but point out that McIlveen's second assist was kind of "fabricated" so as to give him the record.......... he was the third-last guy to touch that puck before Sawyer put it in. Not at all taking away from the excellent seasons that either McIlveen or Pavelec had, but I couldn't help but point out the small "asterisks" that maybe should go along with those records. It's my duty as an objective and impartial blog type guy!

One achievement that can't be disputed at all is the Eagles' finishing with the highest goals scored total in the QMJHL this season and thereby securing the Luc Robitaille Trophy. Cape Breton's five goals today put them at 308 for the season, while runner-up Baie-Comeau scored three to finish at 304. This is a great team accomplishment, especially in a league where offense is usually what wins championships. It's also a great offensive turnaround for a team that, despite boasting above-.500 records, had trouble scoring goals in each of its previous two seasons. It is nice that the Eagles were able to get this trophy honestly, unlike last year's Quebec Remparts, who required running up the score 16-3 (yes, you read that correctly!) on the Rimouski Oceanic in their final game of the regular season last year to secure the same award.

JC Sawyer scored three points in today's season finale to finish the year out with 77, the most of any QMJHL blueliner this year. It is the first time the Eagles have ever had a league-leading scorer at any position.

In the plus-minus category, the Screaming Eagles can be proud to finish the season boasting the top three plus-minus men in the entire league. Chris Culligan led the way with a +45 rating this year, while JC Sawyer was second at +40, and James Sheppard third at +39. This is a real testament to what great two-way players these three guys have become, and the fact that the Eagles had the top three +/- guys in the league says something about the way they dominated their opposition over the course of the season.

Cape Breton finishes with a 46-22-2 record, for 94 points, second overall in the league. Their 46 wins and 94 points are the second-highest for the team all-time in each category, behind only 2003-2004's 49 wins and 103 points. As well, this year's +108 goals for/against differential was just shy of 03-04's team record of +109. However, with a good playoff showing, this year's team would easily be considered to be far superior an Eagles team to the 03-04 edition! It was a fun season to watch, especially from home ice where the team boasted a 28-7 record and filled the net like no Eagles team has ever done before.

Anyhow, enough of season-ending stats and stuff. It was important to get one last win so as not to enter the playoffs on a four-game losing streak, and thankfully the Eagles were able to pull it out. The sold-out crowd was also nice to see, although it would be even nicer to see such a crowd show up for, oh you know, a playoff game that actually matters (today's game was meaningless in the standings)!

Stay tuned this week for an analysis of the upcoming Eagles-Fog Devils series, which gets underway Friday and Saturday night from C200. The first season is over, and has to be considered to have been pretty fun and successful, but the second season is now upon us, and it's the second season that is infinitely more important, especially for a franchise starved for playoff success like the Screaming Eagles are.

Is this the year that Cape Breton takes home their first QMJHL title? We start finding out on Friday.

Eagles flat in St. Patrick's Day uniforms; drop 2-1 decision to Titan

2007-03-17T09:22:00.000-07:00

Apparently the sharp new St. Patrick's Day uniforms weren't enough to fire up the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles last night, as they looked flat and rather emotionless for the most part in a disappointing 2-1 loss to the Bathurst Titan in front of a crowd well over 4000.

The Eagles mustered just 15 shots and very few real scoring chances over the first two periods, as they looked especially flat in period #2. In the third, Cape Breton outshot Bathurst 19-6 in a last ditch effort to tie the contest, and came close when Paul McIlveen was awarded a penalty shot with 1:55 to go, but it was not to be. They really didn't deserve to go to overtime any points last night anyway after the way they played the first two stanzas.

The powerplay was a big reason for the loss last night. It went 0-for-7, including just one shot on goal on the first four powerplay attempts. As well, a six-on-four advantage in the final minute of the game produced few decent scoring chances.

One bright spot in the game is that the Titan dynamic duo of Thomas Beauregard and Mathieu Perreault was held to a combined one assist. A lot of credit for this has to go to the line of Chris Culligan, James Sheppard, and Scott Brannon/Robert Slaney, as that line was matched up against those Titan snipers all game.

Speaking of Culligan, he had the lone Cape Breton goal, and it was a beauty snipe to the top corner glove side on Titan goaltender Brant Miller. Miller stopped everything else that came his way to earn first star honours.

Not much else to say about this one, it was a game to forget from C200. Perhaps the fact that the game was meaningless to the Eagles in the standings had a bit to do with their subpar effort, but you would think that after being thumped 9-5 by their biggest rivals on Tuesday, they would come out fired up in the next game.

Any way you slice it, three losses in a row this close to the playoffs makes fans a bit uneasy.

A better effort to finish off the season in style on Sunday is essential. With the otherwise excellent season the team has had, it would be pretty anticlimactic to finish it off with four straight losses.

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With the St. John's Fog Devils' win and the Shawinigan Cataractes' loss last night, it is now official:

The Eagles will be playing the St. John's Fog Devils in the first round of the 2007 QMJHL playoffs.

A preview of the series, and an in-depth look at the Fog Devils, should appear on here sometime this coming week.

The other East Division playoff series were also determined last night.

(1) Lewiston MAINEiacs vs (8) Shawinigan Cataractes

(3) Moncton Wildcats vs (6) Halifax Mooseheads

(4) PEI Rocket vs (5) Acadie-Bathurst Titan

The Telus Division, however, is still one big mumbo-jumbo heading into tomorrow, the final day of the regular season. Anybody could still pretty much play anybody!

Fun night at the rink expected this evening as Eagles take on Titan in St. Patrick's Day Game

2007-03-16T05:25:00.000-07:00

The Cape Breton Screaming Eagles take to the ice for their second-to-last home game of the season tonight, and they're hoping that a bit of the "luck o' the Irish" will be on their side as they take to the ice in special green St. Patrick's Day jerseys to face the Acadie-Bathurst Titan.

The sweaters, green with black and white trim and adorned with a ring of shamrocks near the bottom, are a very special set created for tonight's game and tonight's game only. The purpose of the jerseys is three-fold:

(1) A celebration of St. Patrick's Day and to create a bit of fun for the fans by playing on the Irish theme.

(2) A tribute to former majority owner Greg Lynch, who passed away in 2004. Mr. Lynch was very proud of the Screaming Eagles and of his Irish roots, so the jerseys (which also include the "PGL" commemmorative patch that the team wore the entire 2004-2005 season in his memory) will pay a nice tribute in this the team's 10th anniversary, to the man who for many years was the real driving force behind the betterment of Screaming Eagles' hockey.

(3) A fundraiser for a great cause.

As said, these uniforms are a one-night deal only, and they will be raffled off to fans following the game. Tickets will be sold (at $5 each I believe) during the game to be entered into a draw for a chance to win one of the 22 jerseys right off of one of the players' backs at game's end. These sweaters are extremely unique and rare, and I'm sure that if a guy like James Sheppard or Ondrej Pavelec ever goes on to a solid NHL career, that his St. Patrick's Day Screaming Eagles jersey would rank as quite the valuable collector's item! All proceeds from the ticket sales will go towards the Cape Breton Regional Hospital Fund.

If nothing else, it should be really different for fans to watch their favourites wearing green as opposed to the usual black and gold. The unique uniforms should make for a bit of an extra fun and lighthearted atmosphere at the rink, and the team could use a night like that with the playoffs right around the corner. To add to this, games against the Titan are always entertaining regardless; year in and year out, games against them rank up there among the most interesting of the season. So don't miss a fun night at the Nest tonight!

As for the importance of the game itself, it honestly has little to no significance to the Eagles in the final standings, but it is important because the team has lost its past two games, and really needs to get back on a winning note heading into the playoffs. Despite the two recent losses, two solid wins in front of good loud crowds in their final two home games should still send the Eagles into the playoffs with some momentum and some positive energy; it would also mean that the team would be entering the playoffs 8-2 in their final ten games, and there's never anything wrong with that.

The team really needs a successful weekend to finish off what has been an excellent season, and it starts with a great effort tonight against the rival Titan.

Be sure to come out and be part of all the St. Patrick's Day fun, and who knows, you could end up taking home a pretty sweet souvenir at game's end!

See you at the rink.

Ouch!!! Eagles blown away by rival Mooseheads

2007-03-14T06:17:00.000-07:00

It was expected that last night's game against the Halifax Mooseheads at the Halifax Metro Centre would be a tough one, but I don't think anybody saw that kind of a skunking coming.

The Screaming Eagles suffered a thoroughly embarassing 9-5 loss to the younger, less experienced Mooseheads last night, in what was said to be a really entertaining contest played before a packed house in Halifax.

The last time this blogger can recall the Eagles giving up nine goals in a hockey game was back in March 2001, in a 9-3 loss to the Rouyn-Noranda Huskies. Last night's game was therefore the first time in six years that the team gave up that many goals. I guess that statistic is a bit of a double-edged sword; on one hand, it's a testament to the strong team defence the Eagles have played year-in and year-out that they went six years without giving up nine goals in a hockey game. But on the other hand, the fact that the team gave up more goals than they had in any game for the previous six years shows what a truly atrocious defensive performance last night's game was!

One bright spot for the Eagles was the play of Cam Fergus, who scored two goals and an assist, upping him to 53 goals on the season. Dean Ouellet, Chris Culligan, and JC Gauthier also scored for Cape Breton.

For Halifax, Bryce Swan and Peter-James Corsi both scored twice. Swan, a Cape Breton native, always seems to kill the Screaming Eagles when he plays against them, which is obviously frustrating. Justin Pender, Daniel Smith, Ryan Seymour, Garrett Peters, and Ryan Hillier rounded out the balanced Halifax attack.

Incredibly, the Eagles lost the game 9-5 despite outshooting the Mooseheads 43-28 in the contest. How Cape Breton managed to give up 9 goals on 28 shots I truly do not know, but it's safe to say that we are used to seeing better defense and goaltending than that. Starting netminder Ondrej Pavelec was pulled after 4 goals on 14 shots, and obviously had a poor night, but can't be faulted too too much because it's really his first off game in a long time. David Davenport, however, had his second poor outing in a row, which has me wondering if maybe being left on the bench for so long was detrimental to "Double D's" development (please note the alliteration!).

Brendon MacDonald attempted to spark the team by engaging in a great fight with Halifax captain Ryan Seymour, and doing pretty well for himself, but Alex Quesnel's spark and spunk went a little bit too far, as he was ejected early in the game for a check from behind on Moose defender Guillaume Monast. Hopefully he will not end up facing suspension for the unintentional, but unfortunate and reckless, hit.

The Eagles' record on the season against Halifax now drops to 4-5, and their record at the Metro Centre finishes up at an inexplicable and quite frankly unacceptable 1-4. In the team's defense, Halifax is the only club to have a winning record against the Screaming Eagles this season, and is the only team to have defeated Cape Breton more than twice (thanks to Matthew Wuest of the Halifax Daily News for pointing that tidbit out).

It is also especially disappointing that the team would manage to come up with a dud of a game like that after dropping a game to the last place overall Saint John Sea Dogs. You would think that after losing to the Sea Dogs, a team would come out with a huge effort next game, not a shellacking at the hands of their provincial rivals.

Cape Breton now risks entering the playoffs on a sour losing streak, which makes the final two home games of the season this weekend all that much more important. History shows that it is not a very good idea for Eagles teams to enter the playoffs on a losing note. There should be two large, partisan crowds on hand this weekend, and two great efforts would go a long way towards erasing the last two ugly losses.

The nine goals against also really damaged the club's chances of finishing with the league's best defensive record. They entered the game with 188 goals against, three fewer than Lewiston's 191, but now sit at 197 goals against.

Not much else to say about this one; it was a game to forget.

Hopefully the Eagles will find their mojo again starting on Friday night, at home against Bathurst, in those beautiful St. Patrick's Day duds!

Eagles finish off road schedule tonight in Halifax against the Mooseheads

2007-03-13T06:30:00.000-07:00

The Cape Breton Screaming Eagles will play their 35th and final road game of the season tonight, when they pay a visit to the Halifax Metro Centre to take on the Mooseheads. The team heads into tonight's game with an 18-14-2 road record on the season, and will look to finish off the season with a 19th road victory. It is their fifth and final visit to the Metro Centre, where they sport a disappointing 1-3 record thus far on the year.

Tonight's game won't be easy, as the Mooseheads are red hot as of late - winners of five of their past six hockey games. You know as well that they're going to come out extra motivated tonight, as it is their final home game of the regular season, and they are expecting a sold-out crowd to be on hand. Momentum and other such intangibles should be in the Mooseheads' favour tonight, so Cape Breton will really have to dig deep to find a victory, even if they are the more veteran and more talented team.

One thing that is for sure in the Eagles' favour is that Halifax's top defenceman, Andrew Bodnarchuk, is out for 7-10 days with a bruised shoulder. Bodnarchuk has 11 points against the Screaming Eagles this season, more than any other player in the QMJHL. However, Cape Breton will still have to contend with red-hot players such as Jakub Voracek and Logan MacMillan, who stand a good chance at hitting the scoresheet tonight. Alder Point native Bryce Swan also has a history of performing very well against the Screaming Eagles.

From the Cape Breton side of the ice, the Eagles should enter the game icing pretty much a full lineup with the exception of defenceman Etienne Breton. Word has it that Etienne suffered a broken jaw in his Saturday night scrap with Saint John's Brett Gallant. Etienne is a great kid with a ton of guts and it's really too bad to hear that he may have suffered this injury; we wish him a speedy recovery and an eventual return to the lineup. A broken jaw is certainly not a fun injury, but Breton is a tough customer and I'm sure he'll be OK.

Starting goaltenders tonight will be Ondrej Pavelec for Cape Breton and Mark Yetman for the Mooseheads. Halifax's other goaltender, Roger Kennedy, is still out of the lineup after having to undergo and emergency appendectomy, although he has recently resumed practicing with the club. Yetman has been playing quite well as of late between the pipes for the Mooseheads.

Cape Breton will look for continued success from the newly-formed powerplay units of Laberge, Ouellet, and Fergus with Sawyer and Bourdon on the points, and Sheppard, Culligan, and Slaney with McIlveen and Bartulis quarterbacking. The powerplay has gone 4/13 in the two games played since these new combinations were installed.

These final three games of the regular season are now meaningless to the Eagles in terms of where they finish in the standings, so among the main focal points of these games are (1) to gear up for playoffs and give line combinations and powerplay units a workout (2) to try to avoid any devastating injuries that would cause players to miss any playoff time (3) to try and enter the playoffs on a good note and with some momentum, with a couple of late season wins, unlike a couple of other seasons where the team lost their final few regular season games and ended up disappointing in the playoffs. #2 is especially paramount!

Game time is 7:00 PM, and the game is available on internet video webcast for your viewing pleasure. Simply navigate to www.halifaxmooseheads.ca, and you will see a large link on the right side of the page to the video webcast. Kenny MacNeil gets the pre-game show kicked off on CJCB AM 1270 at 6:30 PM.

Eagles officially to enter playoffs as 2nd seed in East Division

2007-03-12T07:42:00.000-07:00

The chase for first place is finally over.

Hopes of catching the Lewiston MAINEiacs have realistically been slim for the past few weeks, but they officially came to an end on Sunday with the combination of the Eagles' 4-3 loss in Saint John and Lewiston's 4-3 home ice win over the PEI Rocket. Congratulations to Lewiston on very well-earned division and regular season titles. Both teams had excellent seasons, with Lewiston perhaps being just that little bit much more consistent. Late season stumbles against lower-echelon teams like Rimouski, Saint John, and St. John's really hurt Cape Breton's chances at finishing first, although that is not at all to say that a 45-20-2 record and second place in the overall standings is by any means anything to be ashamed of! Also, we all know that although the regular season title is something to be proud of, the real prize isn't handed out until sometime in May. That being said, Lewiston was just a little bit better over the course of the 70-game schedule than were the Eagles.......... now let's see how things shake down in the playoffs.

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Cape Breton now knows for sure that they will enter the playoffs as the 2nd seed in the East, and has three final regular season games to use as last-minute playoff preparation (fine-tuning of lines and powerplay units, etc). The games may now be meaningless in the standings, but if history is any indication, you really want to do well in your last few games of the season heading into the playoffs. Both the 03-04 and 05-06 Eagles lost their last three regular season games, and neither really lived up to playoff expectations.

The remaining week of the regular season will also determine who the Eagles' first round playoff opponent will be. As the 2nd seed, Cape Breton will face seed #7 for the East Division playoffs, which will either be the St. John's Fog Devils or the Shawinigan Cataractes. The Cape Breton Post ran an article today from a Saint John, NB newspaper that erroneously reported that the Eagles are guaranteed to face St. John's in the first round. This is not true, as this paper seems to have forgotten that Shawinigan (the 9th seed in the West that will cross over into the East playoffs) is just two points back of the Fog Devils, and could overtake them for the 7th seed in the East.

St. John's sits in 7th spot with 58 points, and has two home games remaining, both against the Saint John Sea Dogs.

Shawinigan currently holds the 8th playoff seed in the East with 56 points, and has three games remaining. They include road games against Drummondville and Rimouski, and a home date vs Gatineau.

As you can see, the odds are in favour of our facing the Fog Devils, although fans may perhaps want to see Shawinigan in the first round instead of St. John's simply for the sake of seeing something different. We have already played the Fog Devils eight times this season, and we faced them in the first round last year.

In any event, our first round playoff opponent will be either of those two teams, and the next week will determine which one it will be.

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A couple of team records were broken during Saturday night's 8-1 win at Harbour Station over the Sea Dogs.

Congratulations go out to JC Sawyer on setting a new team record for points in a season by a defenceman. His second assist of the night, on a Chris Culligan goal at 0:18 of the third period, gave him his 70th point of the season, surpassing Mathieu Dumas' old record of 69 points, set back in 2001-2002. In a very nice twist, Sawyer was able to accomplish this feat in his hometown in front of friends and family.

Sawyer finished the evening with three assists, and added another assist on Sunday, sitting now at 72 points on the season and adding to that new record. JC's 72 points put him in the league lead in points among defencemen, three ahead of Gatineau's Martin Frechette (69 pts) and four ahead of Victoriaville's Maxime Noreau (68).

The Eagles' first goal of the game on Saturday night, also scored by Chris Culligan, was historic as well. That goal was the club's 287th of the season, breaking the old team record of 286 goals in a season set by the 01-02 squad (not the 03-04 team, as reported in today's CB Post). Cape Breton now sits at 297 goals on the season, and will almost certainly hit the 300-goal plateau for the first time in team history.

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As reported in today's CB Post, the Eagles head into the final three games of the season with a chance to finish as both the top offensive and the top defensive team in the league.

Cape Breton currently leads the league in goals scored at 297, but right on their tails are the Baie-Comeau Drakkar (296) and the Gatineau Olympiques (293). All three teams have three games remaining. The team with the most goals for at the end of the regular season is awarded with the Luc Robitaille Trophy. Should the Eagles win this award, it would be their first time in team history.

As well, the Screaming Eagles currently have the fewest goals against in the QMJHL, at 188. The only team threatening Cape Breton in this category is Lewiston, who have 191 goals against. Again, both teams have three games remaining. Cape Breton has once before allowed the fewest goals against, back in the 2003-2004 season.

Finally, as long as he does not falter over these final three games, goaltender Ondrej Pavelec is in good position to pick up his second consecutive Jacques Plante Trophy for the lowest GAA among starting netminders in the league. He currently sports a 2.48 GAA, while nearest competitor Jonathan Bernier (2.59 GAA, which probably would have improved had he stayed healthy) has been able to do nothing but watch from the sidelines since a late January injury.

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A hat trick is when a player scores three goals in a game.

A natural hat trick is when a player scores three consecutive goals (uninterrupted by either team) in a game.

A perfect hat trick is when the requirements for a natural hat trick are met, except that the three goals are scored in the same period.

James Sheppard pulled off the rare feat of the "perfect hat trick" in Saturday night's win in Saint John, as he scored three consecutive goals in the third period.

What's more, each of his goals came in a different manpower situation. One was even strength, one was on the powerplay, and the third was shorthanded.

Rare stuff indeed, and yet another testament to what kind of a well-rounded player our captain really is!

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Tomorrow night's game against the Halifax Mooseheads, the Eagles' final road game of the regular season, could be a tough one. Even though Cape Breton sits much higher in the standings than does Halifax, the Mooseheads are red hot as of late, and are winners of five of their last six hockey games. As well, Halifax owns a 3-1 record against the Eagles from the Halifax Metro Centre this season. Finally, it is the Mooseheads' final home game of the regular season, so you know they're going to have a huge crowd and are going to come out flying. Most teams do not lose their final home game of the season (as Saint John showed us on Sunday), so the Eagles will have to be ready.

Couple of games in Saint John this weekend

2007-03-10T05:10:00.000-08:00

After an entire week without any games, the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles return to action tonight and tomorrow with back-to-back dates with the Saint John Sea Dogs from Harbour Station in Saint John, NB. The Eagles enter tonight's game (7:00 PM, CJCB AM 1270) sporting a record of 44-19-2 for 90 points, and riding a five-game winning streak, their fourth win streak of such length this season. If history is any indication, the Eagles will have to be on their guard tonight, because each of their three previous five-game win streaks was halted in game #6. Conversely, a win tonight in Saint John would give the Screaming Eagles their longest winning streak of the season.

As far the impact of tonight's game on the final standings is concerned, the Eagles would pretty much have to win in order to keep their very slim hopes of catching the Lewiston MAINEiacs alive. Lewiston won both games they played this week while Cape Breton was idle, meaning they now sit eight points ahead of the Screaming Eagles, with just four games left for Lewiston and five for Cape Breton. Do the math- chances are extremely slim of catching the MAINEiacs now, but if the Eagles are to have any chance at all, they would have to win tonight.

The Sea Dogs are in last place overall in the QMJHL, and are already guaranteed to miss the playoffs. However, that certainly doesn't mean that this weekend's games will be easy. For a reminder of this, look no further than last month, when Saint John visited C200 for a pair of games and gave the Screaming Eagles fits. The Sea Dogs upset the Eagles 2-1 in the first game and almost beat them again the second time around before finally running out of gas in the third period. They seemed to have down pat a really stifling, "dump it out" style of play that badly neutralized the talent on the Cape Breton roster. The Eagles will have to be prepared for a similar Saint John game plan tonight, although it's possible that the Sea Dogs would not play quite as stifling a style in front of their hometown fans. Cape Breton will also have to be ready with answers for goaltender Travis Fullerton, who stood on his head in those two games last month at C200, and who has a history of stealing games from the Screaming Eagles.

Jonathan Laberge should return to the lineup this weekend after sitting out the past few weeks with injury. One would also assume that Paul McIlveen would be in uniform once again after missing the two home games last weekend with the flu. Ondrej Pavelec is your likely starter in goal, as he's been given almost all of the starts down the home stretch to try and really keep him in a groove for the playoffs. However, the team could very well start David Davenport in the rematch tomorrow afternoon.

One final item of interest is that JC Sawyer has a chance this weekend to tie or even break the team record for points in a season by a defenceman (Mathieu Dumas, 69 pts, 01-02), in front of family and friends in his hometown of Saint John. He currently sits at 68 points, one shy of tying the record. It would surely be a special moment for him to be able to establish a new standard in his native city.

Record-setting weekend in Eagle land!!

2007-03-04T12:36:00.000-08:00

Talk about doing it in style!!!!!

As if breaking Ryan Walsh's long-standing team record of 47 goals in a season wasn't enough, Cam Fergus made for one of the most memorable nights in Eagles' history by notching a hat trick to become in the same night the first Eagle to ever notch 50 goals in a single season. To pull off both historic feats in the same game, in front of one of the biggest crowds of the season........ it was a script almost Hollywood-worthy!

Fergus entered last night's 5-3 win over the Quebec Remparts knotted with Walsh at 47 goals on the season, having tied the record the night before with a goal in a 4-1 win over Shawinigan. That Eagle standard had stood since March of 1998, back when the movie Titanic was tearing up the box office, the Nagano Winter Olympics had just concluded, and a lot of the younger Eagle fans you see at the rink every game this season weren't even born yet. It finally came crashing down last night.

Early in the game against the Remparts, with the Eagles on a powerplay, Dean Ouellet was banging away at a loose puck at the side of the goal, and it popped back out to Fergus. The 20-year-old sniper was pretty much on the goal line, standing at a very acute angle to the net, but managed to snipe it in off of goaltender Kevin Desfosses' back for his 48th of the season, establishing a new team record. The C200 crowd responded with a huge standing ovation, and that moment guaranteed early on that this would be a memorable night.

But little did Fergus, or fans, know how memorable it would end up being! Later in the period, Cam took advantage of a brutal turnover in the offensive zone by Quebec defender Andrew Andricopolous. He stole the puck, and led the Eagles back up-ice on a three-on-one. Using his two linemates as a decoy, he held onto the puck, almost to the point where it looked like he had held onto it too long and had perhaps run out of room. Finally, #14 snapped one through the five hole; Desfosses got a big piece of it, but the puck rolled through as if it had a mind of its own. Second of the night, 49th of the season, and fans were now sensing that perhaps we would get to see the new standard of 50 set that very night!

In period two, it happened! Quebec's Roman Bashkirov was leading a rush into the Cape Breton zone, but was absolutely HAMMERED by the Eagles' Oskars Bartulis. Bartulis then led a two-on-one the other way, feathered a perfect pass over to a streaking Fergus, and Cam one-timed it home with authority for the hat trick and #50! Fergus received his second standing ovation of the night, and certainly showed that he has a flair for the dramatic, by not only eclipsing Ryan Walsh's record, but shattering it.

All in all, it was one of the more memorable individual performances in Eagles' history, definitely one of the most historically significant, and I'm thinking that fans won't forget last night for a long time.

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The much-celebrated Fergus was not the only record-setting Eagle this past weekend. Defenceman Jean-Claude Sawyer's two helpers in Friday night's win over Shawinigan set a new team standard for assists by a defenceman in a season. Mathieu Dumas had established the old record of 52 assists by a defender back in the 2001-2002 season, but JC Sawyer's 53rd assist came when his point shot took a perfect carom off of the end boards and bounced back in front, giving Jean-Christophe Gauthier a wide open net.

Sawyer is also now just one point shy of tying Dumas' record of 69 points in a season by a defenceman, also set in 01-02. It was actually thought at last night's game against the Remparts that he had tied it on Cam Fergus's 50th goal, as he was originally announced as having earned an assist on the play, but upon later review, that helper was awarded instead to James Sheppard.

As well, after last night's game the Screaming Eagles sit at 286 goals scored on the season. That ties the previous team record, set (surprise, surprise) back in the 01-02 campaign. The next Cape Breton goal will establish a new team benchmark for goals in a single season. The Eagles also have an excellent chance of hitting the 300-goal plateau for the first time in team history.

Finally, last night's victory earned the Eagles their 90th standings point of the season, making this the third season that the Eagles have reached 90 or more points. The team record is 103 points, set in the 2003-2004 season.

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What else is there to say about both weekend games? Both were excellent team efforts, in all three zones of the ice, and the final shot totals (48-20 against Shawinigan, 45-19 against Quebec) indicate the extents to which the Screaming Eagles dominated the two games. Aside from a bit of a third period let down against the Remparts on Saturday night, the Eagles played fantastic hockey. The team looks like they're back, after that frustrating home stand where they lost two of three games to the expansion teams and couldn't seem to buy a goal.

The Quebec game was a particularly nice success, as it was played before a big crowd of almost 4400, and not only did the Eagles win rather convincingly, but it was an extremely entertaining hockey game to boot. The crowd was really into the game, fans were very very loud, and it was just a fun night to be at the rink........... the kind of night that makes a new fan want to come back.

Two great wins, the team rolled on all cylinders for most of the weekend, and most importantly, the team really seems to be improving a lot over these last ten hockey games of the season, and using them to really get ready for the playoffs. It's starting to remind me of the final stretch of the 01-02 season, where the Eagles went unbeaten in their final 11 games, outshooting and vastly outplaying their opponents in most of them. And as you no doubt recall, that year saw by far the Eagles' most successful playoff run to date. Here's hoping that the team keeps up the great work over these final five games of the season.

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The Eagles did all they could in the battle for first place with the Lewiston MAINEiacs by winning their two weekend games. However, the MAINEiacs did not cooperate with us in the LEAST!

Lewiston had just an incredible three-game road trip, stopping in Gatineau/Rouyn-Noranda/Val do'r, and winning all three hockey games. This is widely considered to be the toughest road trip in the QMJHL, and even top teams often come out of it with just one win out of three. Lewiston deserves a gigantic hunk of credit for their gutsy performance in taking all six points, and they really made a statement that they're not likely to let anybody take first place away from them.

It's still possible, of course, for the Eagles to catch the MAINEiacs for first, but it's now pretty unlikely. They're four points back, and Lewiston holds a game in hand, and we're almost out of schedule with which to catch them. That said, as much as it's a nice goal to try and strive for down the stretch, it's far from the end of the world if Lewiston finishes first, as long as Cape Breton is truly properly prepared for the playoffs when they start up, likely on March the 23rd.

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I'd like to close by perhaps clarifying a little bit what this blog is supposed to be.

It's not supposed to be a robotic system that simply previews and recaps the games one-by-one. With all due respect, that's what a newspaper is for. This blog is supposed to offer something a little different than the standard goals/assists/shots on goal you can find by simply picking up the sports section in the AM. Sure, there are times when this blog simply recaps a game and leaves it at that, but usually those are cases where there really isn't much else to talk about.

This weekend, I figured that there wasn't really much to talk about from the Shawinigan game, and also realized that the Quebec game had tons of potential for discussion, especially with the possibility that records would fall that night. Therefore, I felt it would be best to wait until the end of the weekend and talk about it all in a bit of a broader context, instead of writing a stale recap of a Shawinigan game that didn't really leave too much to run down.

I'm writing this because a couple of people (or maybe just one person, writing multiple times) seemed a bit annoyed that there weren't game recaps immediately after the games this weekend, and were maybe under the impression that the purpose of this blog was just to recap each game one-by-one, instead of maybe stepping back and looking at the big picture sometimes......... which in my opinion makes for better writing.

So yes, sometimes there will be cases where there isn't a game report right away after a game, because it's felt that it would be better to wait until the material is a little bit meatier to cover. For example, there are two games in Saint John next weekend, and they'll probably just be briefly discussed as one, along with whatever other relevant topics are at hand, at the end of the weekend.

Thanks for reading, and I hope that clears things up a bit.

Sheppard Offensive Player of Month/full lineup expected for weekend games/all-time team voting underway

2007-03-01T04:47:00.000-08:00

First of all, a nice win on Monday night at C200 over the PEI Rocket. Good teams find a way to win in the face of adversity, and it was a job well done by the Eagles to find a way to win despite a very low overall team energy level due to that flu bug that was still lingering throughout the team.

The key to this win was the play of Ondrej Pavelec, especially in the second period, heading into which the Eagles were leading by a score of 2-1. The visitors dominated the frame, outshooting their hosts to a staggering tune of 19-2. This may have been Pavelec's single finest period, on home ice at least, of the entire season to date. Of their 19 shots, PEI probably had a good 10-12 real quality scoring chances, and I doubt that there are too many other goaltenders in junior hockey who could have gotten us out of that period alive. Pavelec was just sensational, not seeming to mind the onslaught at all, looking like he was quite enjoying himself more than anything. His best stop was likely on a Brett Morrison-to-Marin Latal one-timer, where Ondrej read the play perfectly, and dove across the crease just in time to get a left pad on Latal's blast.

After the Eagles weathered this second period storm, they came up with a much more controlled third period, and Cam Fergus's beautiful goal to make the score 3-1 was the backbreaker. His 46th of the season was a nifty effort where he made several moves in tight before tucking the puck back out in front and in from behind the goal line; a real goal scorer's goal. Fergus is now just one goal away from tying the team record for goals in a season, so the record could conceivably be matched or broken during this coming weekend's two home games.

The game was a good opportunity to see how the Eagles matched up against the hottest team in the league, and they passed the test, albeit by the skin of their teeth. PEI showed that they will be a formidable playoff foe, and that in the event of a second round series between the two teams, the Eagles had better be ready.

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This just in from the Q head office.

The QMJHL Offensive and Defensive Players of the Month for the month of February have been released, and it was a great month for Screaming Eagle players.

James Sheppard has been named QMJHL Offensive Player of the Month for February. He scored 23 points in the ten games he played during the month.

Ondrej Pavelec and JC Sawyer were both runners-up for the Defensive Player of the Month award for February. They were both slightly nudged out by Val d'or's superstar defenceman Kristopher Letang.

To have three players in the running for Player of the Month awards at this time of year, the stretch drive, speaks well for the impact players this year's edition of the Eagles possesses.

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This upcoming weekend is one for fans to look forward to, as two rare Quebec-based teams will visit C200, a nice break from the same old East Division foes. The Shawinigan Cataractes visit on Friday night, and Patrick Roy and his Quebec Remparts are in town on Saturday. Both teams are making their first visits to C200 since November 2005, a good sixteen months ago.

The Shawinigan game is interesting because there is an outside chance that the Cataractes could be the Eagles' first round playoff opponent. The Quebec game is a draw in and of itself, as the Remparts are one of the more entertaining teams in the league, and their coach Roy always draws a crowd thanks to his celebrity alone. There should be a very good crowd on hand at C200 for the Quebec game. It will be nice to see the more wide-open style that the Quebec-based teams generally tend to bring (well maybe not so much Shawinigan, but most likely the Remparts will); many fans agree that a large proportion of the most entertaining games at C200 to date this season have been against the Quebec teams.

As well, as mentioned earlier, team history could be made this weekend, as Cam Fergus is just one goal away from tying, and two away from breaking, Ryan Walsh's record for goals in a season.

The really good news for the Eagles' faithful this weekend, and yet another reason for fans to want to come out to the rink, is that the club expects that they could very well ice a full lineup for the first time in who knows how long. It's being speculated that Oskars Bartulis and Jonathan Laberge could be good to go for the weekend's games, after sitting out the last few each with injuries. It is also hoped that the few days of rest the team is enjoying will be enough to kill that flu bug that has crippled our squad over the past while. The Eagles have been playing for at least the last month with at least one or two key players out of the lineup, so it would be nice to see the team play at full strength for once. The team definitely needs to play a few games with the full squad before heading into the playoffs.

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Finally, do not forget to cut out the ballot in Wednesday's edition of the Cape Breton Post, and cast your votes for the 10th anniversary all-time Cape Breton Screaming Eagles team! Fans are asked to choose two goalies, four defencemen, six forwards, and two tough guys to help make up a first and second all-time Screaming Eagles team for the past ten seasons.

Ballots can be brought to C200 over the two upcoming weekend games, and dropped off in ballot boxes located inside the arena. Have fun voting, and don't forget to use your write-in option if you feel that a deserving player has been left off of the ballot!

Big challenge tonight for Eagles as red-hot Rocket pay a visit

2007-02-26T04:45:00.000-08:00

After returning home from a successful two-win trip to Newfoundland, the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles face a stiff challenge tonight against the hottest team in the QMJHL, the PEI Rocket, in the form of a rare Monday night home game.

PEI has been the most improved team in the league from the first half of the season to the second, and are absolutely scorching hot right now; they're 11-1-1-1 in their last fourteen hockey games. They're a deep and talented club at all positions, with especially impressive depth at forward. They will be missing top goal scorer David Laliberte (back on the Island recovering from a hip injury), but we will still have to contend with red hot players like Guillaume Doucet, Geoff Walker, Martin Latal, and Sydney's own Brett Morrison. All of these guys have really been piling up the points lately, and Walker and Morrison have had a lot of success against the Eagles already this season.

This is the eighth and final meeting between the two division rivals this season. The Eagles may hold a 5-2 lead in the season series, but do not be fooled at all by this deceiving stat; most of those games were played in the first half of the season, when the Rocket was just an ordinary hockey club. In the second half, PEI has been one of the very best teams in the league, and looks to enter the playoffs as a solid darkhorse contender.

Speaking of playoffs, there is a reasonably good chance that tonight's game could be a preview of an eventual playoff series. The Eagles currently sit in second place in the East Division standings, and the Rocket sit in third. If the two teams finish the season in those positions, and if they both advance past the playoffs' first round, there is a very good chance they could have a second round date with each other. Tonight will be a great chance to see how the two teams match up against each other.

The big question for the Eagles, winners of both games in Newfoundland last week despite a badly flu-stricken squad, is what their lineup will look like tonight. Have any of the guys who sat out with the flu in Newfoundland recovered enough to play tonight? Have any of the guys who played through the flu on Friday gotten worse? Has the virus spread further still throughout the team, afflicting even more players? Word on tonight's lineup should be available shortly after the conclusion of this morning's practice. It sure would be nice to be able to add James Sheppard back into the lineup, after he missed both games in St. John's. As well, one thing that is pretty much for sure is that Scott Brannon will finally be reinserted into the lineup after missing about a month with a concussion. Once again, any flu-related lineup news will be posted as soon as it is made available after practice.

On the other side of the ice, it was mentioned earlier that the Rocket will be missing top goal scorer Laliberte (44 goals on the season), and they'll also be missing two excellent 16-year-old players in centre Chris Doyle (16 goals) and defenceman Jordon Southorn. Both of those youngsters are away at the Canada Games, representing their respective provinces of PEI and Quebec.

Ondrej Pavelec and Antoine Lafleur should be your goaltenders of record tonight. Also, don't forget that it's a Season Ticket Redemption Night, so any unused season tickets from earlier in the season may be used towards tonight's game!

It's a really good challenge for the Eagles tonight, facing the league's hottest team, and as said before, it could also be a great chance to see how we measure up against a very possible playoff opponent.

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Speaking of the Canada Games, tune in to TSN today at 3:30 PM AST to watch Screaming Eagles prospect Evan Watts and Team Nova Scotia take on Team Quebec. Two former Eagle prospects are also going to be playing in this game; Mark Barberio of the Moncton Wildcats is on Team Quebec and Matthew Stoddard of the Saint John Sea Dogs is on Team Nova Scotia.

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Don't look now, but the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles currently have the best GAA in the league. All season, the Lewiston MAINEiacs have led in the goals against department by a healthy margin, but the Screaming Eagles have been tightening up defensively and narrowing the gap over the past couple of months. Now, the Eagles have 178 goals against on the season, just two more than Lewiston's 176. The Eagles have played one more game, giving them a goals-against-per-game average of 2.87. Lewiston's GAA is 2.89. If this trend continues, maybe we can see the Eagles pass Lewiston over these final few games of the season for the top goals against in the league.

The additions of Luc Bourdon and Beau Prokopetz to the Eagles' blueline have certainly helped towards this end, as has the much-improved play of goaltender Ondrej Pavelec since he returned from the World Juniors. The fact that Lewiston has been missing #1 goaltender Jonathan Bernier for the past month has also been a factor in Cape Breton narrowing the gap on the MAINEiacs in the race for the best goals against in the league.

Eagles show a ton of character in sweep on Rock in spite of rampant flu bug

2007-02-24T08:40:00.000-08:00

It was stated in a recent blog that after a disappointing home stand which saw the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles drop two of three games, what the team could really use was a stiff challenge to right the ship.

They certainly got that on their road trip to Newfoundland this week, in the form of a flu bug that nailed a large chunk of the team.

Captain James Sheppard didn't make the trip due to the flu, and rookies Etienne Breton and JC Gauthier were affected badly enough by their illness that they couldn't suit up for the second game on Friday. Chris Culligan, Brendon MacDonald, Paul McIlveen, and Ondrej Pavelec are among the players said to also be suffering from the effects, but suited up and played through it anyway. To top it off, assistant coaches Mario Durocher and Blair Joseph were also hit so hard by the bug that they stayed in their hotel rooms during Friday night's game.

Add this flu issue to the injuries already trimming down the Eagles' roster (Oskars Bartulis, Jonathan Laberge, and Scott Brannon all missed both games due to injury), and Cape Breton barely had enough healthy bodies to ice a team on Friday night. That, however, did not stop the determined Eagles from taking both games from their Newfoundland rivals, the St. John's Fog Devils. The Eagles held on for a 2-1 win on Thursday night, with rookies Nick MacNeil and Alex Quesnel providing the offence, and scored a 4-1 win on Friday night, with Paul McIlveen leading the way with two goals and an assist despite being under the weather. Cam Fergus also scored in this game, his first goal since returning from a back injury that had kept him out of seven hockey games.

Team defense was great, limiting the Fog Devils to very few scoring chances over the two games. As St. John's-based reporter Robin Short reported in the local newspaper, Ondrej Pavelec "hardly broke a sweat."

With the win, Cape Breton takes seven out of a possible eight points from Mile One Stadium on the season, a huge improvement from the mere one point they picked up in the Fog Devils' barn last year. The Eagles also win the season series 5-3 against the pesky Fog Devils. Their record improves to 41-19-2 overall, and they have won five in a row on the road, a real nice statement by a team whose play away from home had been questioned earlier in the season.

Some more good news last night was that Lewiston lost 8-3 to the Acadie-Bathurst Titan, so the Eagles' win brings them to within just two points of the MAINEiacs once again. Lewiston, however, holds two games in hand.

The Eagles are currently stuck in St. John's due to the massive snowfall that area has received of late, and aren't scheduled to get home until later tonight. They'll then have tonight and tomorrow to rest up for their next home game, Monday night against the PEI Rocket. Hopefully that will be enough time for at least some players' flu symptoms to improve, and most importantly, let's hope that the bug doesn't spread any further throughout the team.

Real gutsy win, and the team can for sure head home with their heads held high.

Depleted Eagle roster seeks redemption on the Rock

2007-02-22T08:36:00.000-08:00

After a humbling home stand against Saint John and St. John's last week, the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles flew to Newfoundland this week for a two-game set against the Fog Devils, tonight and tomorrow night at Mile One Stadium, where they seek to really redeem themselves for their recent surprising losses.

They'll have to do it without a SLEW of key players. Here is an injury/illness update:

- I'll start with the good news because there isn't much of it. Cam Fergus is expected to return to the lineup tonight after a fairly lengthy absence. He made it through practice yesterday, was a little bit stiff from not playing in a while, but is going to give it a go tonight. We welcome back our sniper and hope that the time off the ice allowed him to heal properly.

- Scott Brannon, who most thought would return to the lineup this week in Newfoundland, will not be back until Monday. There is a new league rule that any player suffering a concussion has to sit out a minimum of a precautionary month, and Scott hasn't quite reached a month yet.

- Jonathan Laberge continues to be out of the lineup with injury (shoulder if I'm not mistaken), and isn't expected for another two weeks or so.

- The real bad news for this pair of games in St. John's: captain James Sheppard is really battling the flu, and didn't even make the trip. We are a totally different team with and without Sheppard in the lineup, and we'll have to rework our offense and find a way to win without him. In the last couple of games where the team couldn't seem to get anything going, he was one of the very few players who seemed able to make anything at all work, and now we won't have him for these two games, so other guys are really going to need to step up.

- Oskars Bartulis is listed as "doubtful" for tonight's game, as apparently he has come up with a minor injury.

- Ondrej Pavelec is also apparently feeling a bit under the weather, and his status to start tonight is up in the air. Recall a game in mid-November against the Halifax Mooseheads where Pavelec was given the start despite being really stricken with the flu. He ended up allowing three goals on four or five shots and being pulled, so if he's really sick tonight, maybe he shouldn't play. Other than this possible flu issue, tonight would surely have been Pavelec's start.

As you can see, our forward corps is really depleted for tonight, even with the return of Fergus. I imagine they will reunite the Ouellet-Fergus-McIlveen combo that has really worked well for long stretches this year, and those are three guys that are really going to have to bring it in the absence of Sheppard. I can't really begin to speculate as to what other line combinations will look like, but it looks as though we'll only have one real proven "scoring line". If we're going to win tonight, it may have to be in ugly, dump-it-in/dump-it-out fashion.

Then again, the last few games we went into as extremely heavy favourite, and it did the team no good whatsoever. Perhaps a change in perspective, going into tonight's game with a fair bit of adversity hanging over our heads, will be good for the Eagles.

St. John's is also missing a few key guys, most notably defencemen Luke Gallant and Pat O'Keefe, two of their top minute-munchers. They'll also be without 16 yos Luke Adam and Taylor MacDougall, who are away participating in the Canada Games tournament, and 20 year olds Maxime Chamberland and Tim Spencer are "maybes" for tonight's game. I'm sure the Eagles will once again have to contend with Ilia Ejov in the Fog Devil goal, and will have to find a way to beat him after being repeatedly stoned by him on Sunday.

Game time is 6:30 PM AST, with the pre-game show starting on CJCB AM 1270 at 6:00.

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A couple of interesting results around the Q last night.

The PEI Rocket defeated the Moncton Wildcats 6-5 in OT from Charlottetown in a very important matchup standings-wise. With the result, PEI has tied Moncton for third place in the East Division standings, and actually now sits just six points back of the second-place Screaming Eagles. They are 10-1-1-1 in their last 13 games, making them the hottest team in the QMJHL. They're a team for us to watch out for, both in the standings now and in the playoffs later, for sure.

Also, the Shawinigan Cataractes broke a ten-game losing streak when they incredibly came back from a 5-1 second period deficit to beat Baie-Comeau 7-5 last night. Coupled with Rimouski's tough 5-2 loss in Quebec (they led 2-1 early in the third period but just couldn't hang on), the Caratactes have opened up an eight-point lead over Rimouski in the battle for the final playoff spot in the "Telus Division".

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With ten games left in the regular season, I figured it's time to look at a few potential team and individual milestones this year's Eagles could eclipse before the campaign is over:

- The team record for goals scored in a season is 286, set by the 2001-2002 edition of the Eagles. This year's team currently sits at 267 goals scored, so they need just 19 goals over their final ten games to break the record. It would also be nice to see the Eagles enjoy their first-ever 300-goal season; they'd need 33 goals over the final ten games for that to happen.

- The team's goals against currently sits at 176.......... by comparison, they gave up just 195 in 2004-2005 (league was lower-scoring back then, as it was prior to the "new rules") and 206 last season. It would be nice if the team could keep the goals against under 200 for the season. The Eagles have really been keeping the goals against down lately.

- The team record for goals scored by a single player in a season is 47 by Ryan Walsh in the Eagles' first season, 97-98. Cam Fergus currently sits at 44 goals, three back of the record.

- The team record for points in a season is held by Dominic Noel, with 105 in 2001-2002. James Sheppard sits at 85 points with ten games remaining, although he won't play in the first two, as stated earlier in the blog. Cam Fergus has 82 points. This record looks like it will be tougher to break by anybody this season.

- The team record for points by a defenceman in one season is 69, set by Mathieu Dumas in 2001-2002. JC Sawyer currently sits at 63 points.

- The best goals for/against differential for a season by an Eagles team is held by the 2003-2004 edition. They had 273 goals for and an impressive 164 goals against, for a differential of +106 on the season. This year's Eagles currently have 267 goals for and 176 against, for a differential of +91, with ten games remaining.

Of course, the "here and now" is a lot more important than the past, and doing well down the stretch/preparing for playoffs is paramount at the moment. I still thought it would be fun to look up those stats from previous years and see how this team could potentially stack up by year's end.

Expansion clubs get the better of veteran Eagles

2007-02-19T09:38:00.000-08:00

Ah, the unpredictability of junior hockey.

One weekend, the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles go three-for-three on the road, beating a couple of the league's top contenders along the way. The next, they shock their fans by losing two of three home games against the expansion cousin Saint John Sea Dogs and St. John's Fog Devils, continuing a disturbing recent trend of playing down to the level of weaker opposition.

Cape Breton dropped a 2-1 decision to the extremely young Sea Dogs on Thursday night and lost 2-1 to the second-year St. John's Fog Devils on Sunday afternoon. They also came dangerously close to losing to the Sea Dogs again on Friday night, before managing to come up with a big third period and turn an otherwise ugly performance into a 4-1 win.

The Screaming Eagles, near the top of the league in goals scored for most of the season, had an incredibly hard time scoring in these games. Goaltenders Travis Fullerton of the Sea Dogs and Ilja Ejov of the Fog Devils both came into C200 and absolutely stood on their heads, limiting Cape Breton to just six goals on 134 shots for the home stand. If you take away the three-goal third period outburst against an out-of-gas Sea Dog team on Friday night, the Eagles were held to three goals on 118 shots in the other eight periods.

It would be easy to simply write it off, using "The team just ran into hot goaltenders" as an excuse, but it's not quite that simple. The Eagles were not themselves; their chemistry seemed off, they were panicking around the net, and they were making poor shot selections that led to a lot of blocked shots, pucks going wide of the net, and wasted shots right into the goalie's chest. To almost oversimpify it, they simply couldn't score. Despite the large shots on goal advantages the Eagles held in each game (41-14, 44-31, 49-21), you couldn't really say they deserved to win.......... the opposition made their chances count, and Cape Breton didn't. As well, all three games (even the win) saw the opposition come into our rink and get the Eagles away from playing their own game, sucking them into playing theirs.

The powerplay, which struggled even on the three-win road trip of last weekend (1-for-19 on that trip), continued to sputter. The Eagles went just 1-for-21 with the man advantage on the three-game home stand, leaving them at a ghastly 2-for-40 in their last six hockey games. This is the same Eagles team that has thrived on the powerplay for much of the season! On the plus side, Cape Breton's penalty kill was successful 14 times out of 15 on the home stand, and has allowed just two powerplay goals against in 30 enemy powerplay attempts in the last six games.

A lot of the offensive struggles do have to do with the key forwards currently missing from the Eagles' lineup. Cam Fergus and Scott Brannon have been out with injuries for fairly extended periods of time now (Jonathan Laberge also missed the last game and a half of the home stand), and their absences have forced the Eagles to go with makeshift line combinations - impromptu, unproven combinations that have been hit and miss in terms of chemistry. One would hope that things will be a bit back to normal once these injured players return to the lineup, most of them ready to return relatively soon.

With the surprising results of this frustrating home stand, and with Lewiston having won their weekend games, the Eagles now fall all the way back to six points behind the MAINEiacs for first place in the division; they were just two points back as recently as Thursday. Lewiston also continues to hold a game in hand. Cape Breton's hopes of finishing first certainly took quite the hit on this home stand, with the chances of making up six points on the MAINEiacs over the final ten games being rather slim.

Not much else to say about a frustrating trio of hockey games. Stretches like this are not the end of the world, and could very easily be pretty much forgotten by the time the dust settles on the season.......... heck, maybe in a way it's best that the team gets these kinds of games out of the way now rather than have them happen come playoff time. But dropping unnecessary games here and there will likely be the difference between first and second place for the Screaming Eagles this season; 10 of the team's 19 regulation losses have come against teams with sub-.500 records. I know, the President's Cup isn't handed out to the team that finishes first overall in the regular season, but it is frustrating to see the team miss out mostly because of these unnecessary losses to bottom-dwelling teams.

The best medicine to break out of this little funk would likely be a big challenge against a top-of-the-standings team. However, thanks to this year's wonderful Q schedule, next up are two more games against the Fog Devils - Thursday and Friday night from Mile One Centre in St. John's- making it three in a row against the Devils and five in a row against the expansion teams. What a way for a team to gear up for the playoffs down the stretch drive! Excuse my sarcasm.

Although it could be so easy for staleness to set in playing against the same team three games in a row, maybe the Eagles can use their 1-6 all-time record in Newfoundland as a source of motivation for the upcoming two games. Hopefully the few days off between now and the Newfoundland games will be enough for some of our injured forwards to get back into the lineup. There are only ten games left in the regular season, and we need to get everyone back into the lineup to find the proper line combinations with which to start the playoffs.

Sea Dogs in town for a pair/upcoming stretch of games/a look at divisional battles across the league

2007-02-15T04:41:00.000-08:00

It's been a few days since the last blog; hey, we all needed a bit of time off after that gruelling three-in-three, no? :)

The first topic at hand is obviously the visit by the Saint John Sea Dogs for two games, tonight (Thursday) and Friday night. Hopefully our Eagles are rested up after returning on Monday morning from Lewiston, and getting in a couple of good practices.

The Sea Dogs come into this pair of games with the worst record in the QMJHL, at 15-37-1-2 for 33 points. They are also just 1-8-0-1 in their last ten games. To many observers across the league, including many that will make their way to C200 tonight and tomorrow night, these two games should be easy pickings for the Eagles. However, one would think that both the Eagles and their main core of fans have not yet forgotten a lesson taught to the team by the Rimouski Oceanic just a couple of weekends ago. That lesson, of course, was that if one team shows up wanting the two points more than the other, and goes out and outworks the other, it may very well not matter how far behind in the standings, or how short they are on talent.

The absolute key to these two games is that the Eagles do whatever they can to make sure they don't take the Sea Dogs for granted, that these are actually pretty dangerous games, as a loss tonight or tomorrow night could really deflate this team. The guys have to remember how hard they worked to earn those road victories last weekend, and have to dedicate themselves to applying the same effort against Saint John. These guys are coming into our rink with pretty much nothing to lose, and that in itself makes them a dangerous hockey club.

As well, Sea Dog goaltender Travis Fullerton has stymied the Eagles on a couple of occasions in his QMJHL (last year as a member of the Lewiston MAINEiacs), and sometimes all it takes to really change the outcome of a game is a red hot goaltender. Forward Chris DiDomenico and defenceman Alex Grant have been pretty hot lately for Saint John, and you know that former Eagle Francois Gauthier is going to come into these two games with something to prove. Gauthier has really turned his season around since joining the Sea Dogs; in 18 games with the second-year club, he has 10 goals and 7 assists for 17 points.

On the whole, this entire upcoming stretch of games could be dangerous for the Eagles if they aren't properly prepared for them. Starting with tonight's contest, the team has five straight games against the "expansion teams". After the two straight tonight and tomorrow night with the Sea Dogs, the Eagles host the St. John's Fog Devils on Sunday afternoon, and then travel to the Rock for two more against the Fog Devils next Thursday and Friday. While these games are a good opportunity for Cape Breton to pick up some very important points in the standings, they are also games where upset losses could be very hard on the team's psyche. As well, Eagle clubs have over the years had a nasty trend of playing down to a weaker opponent's level, and five straight games against teams that have been among the weaker five teams in the league most of this season could be a way for the Eagles to develop some bad habits, not exactly what you want with the playoffs right around the corner.

So for those who think this next stretch of games is a great opportunity for the Eagles to cruise to an easy 8-10 points, keep in mind that this is actually a potentially dangerous part of the schedule for Cape Breton, and let's just hope that the Eagles find the best way to handle it.

Game time tonight against the Sea Dogs is the usual 7:00 PM. You would think that they may split the two goaltenders between the two Sea Dog games, and your guess is as good as mine as to which will get the call tonight. As far as the Cape Breton lineup is concerned, it should be similar to the one that finished out the road trip in Lewiston, as long as Cam Fergus didn't reaggravate his injury in that game against the MAINEiacs. The only other guy who played last weekend who may be a bit of a question mark is Spencer Corcoran; he took a high stick to the face in one of the games and went for X-rays to determine any damage. As for Scott Brannon, he has been skating with the team this week, and if all goes well, he should return for the two games in Newfoundland next week.

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I'd also like to take an opportunity to have a quick look around the league at the races for playoff positioning that are taking place. There are a number of battles to keep an eye on as we head down the stretch drive.

- First and foremost to us, of course, is the battle for first place in the East Division (and in the league) between the Lewiston MAINEiacs and our Cape Breton Screaming Eagles. As I'm sure you guys know, Lewiston currently leads this race 80 points to 78, and holds a game in hand, but the Eagles have been gaining momentum for last while...... while Lewiston has been sagging. This one should be down to the wire.

Also factoring into this race are the Moncton Wildcats, who sit five points back of the Eagles with 73 points, although they too have been sliding as of late. And if we're making it a race for first overall, you have to include the Val d'or Foreurs (75 points) and Gatineau Olympiques (72 points) from the West.

- Next down the rung in our division is a very interesting battle for third place in the division between Moncton (73 points) and the PEI Rocket (69 points). Moncton has been pretty far ahead of PEI for most of the season, but the Rocket are currently the hottest team in the QMJHL (8-1-1 in last ten games), while as said, Moncton has been sliding a little bit. PEI also holds a game in hand. Don't be surprised if the Rocket pass the Wildcats before too long.

- The following group in our division consists of 5th place Bathurst (62 points), 6th place Halifax (56), and 7th place St. John's (54 points). Bathurst was ahead of PEI for most of this season but seems to have fallen far behind in the battle for home ice advantage in the first round. I personally don't see them rebounding and challenging the Rocket in the standings, and Moncton may be too far ahead for them to catch as well. I also find it pretty interesting how close St. John's has crept up on Halifax.

- The 9th place team from the West Division crosses over into our division as the eighth playoff team. They are then seeded within our division based on their overall point total. For example, if they were 9th in the West but still managed to have more points than the 7th place team in the East, they would be the #7 East seed for the playoffs, and the 7th place team in the East would be seed #8.

Having explained that, you can factor the Shawinigan Cataractes (48 points) into the above race with Halifax and St. John's, although when you're a club that's in a freefall like Shawinigan is, six points may be too much to make up.

You can also add the Rimouski Oceanic to this race, as they still have a chance at catching the Cataractes to be the last playoff team from the West. They have 39 points, nine back of Shawinigan, but also hold two games in hand. Recently, Rimouski really made it look like Shawinigan had something to be worried about, as they went on a six-game winning streak. However, they have lost their last three since, and their chances of making the playoffs are still pretty remote.

This battle for 6-7-8 in the East is one to watch for Eagles fans, as we will most likely end up playing one of these teams in the first round of the playoffs.

- In the West, we have a crazy logjam near the top. It would take far too long to go into all possibilities, so I will cut things short by simply giving my personal views of what the races are.

I consider Val d'or (75 points) and Gatineau (70) to be slugging it out for top spot.

I then see a four-team battle for seeds 3-6 between Quebec (69), Victoriaville (68), Baie-Comeau (66), and Rouyn-Noranda (63). Your guess is as good as mine as to how these six top teams from the West are going to finish.

There is then an intriguing battle for the 7th seed between Chicoutimi (59) and Drummondville (57). Drummondville has two games in hand on the Sags, has been hot lately, and is scheduled to return superstar forward Derick Brassard to the lineup very soon, possibly as soon as Friday night. Of course, if Rouyn-Noranda keeps sliding like they have been since acquiring Mathieu Carle at the trading period, they could very well be caught by Chicoutimi and/or Drummondville.

With so many races going on pretty much all over the league, involving pretty much every team in the league but the Saint John Sea Dogs, the playoff picture still remains pretty cloudy with a month remaining in the regular season.

Eagles make it a three-for-three road trip; make big statement to MAINEiacs with huge win!

2007-02-12T05:13:00.000-08:00

Make it a perfect road trip.

After winning the first two games in Shawinigan and Victoriaville, the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles made it three-for-three yesterday by beating the Lewiston MAINEiacs 4-1 in their own barn in what may have been the most important game of the season to date.

With the win, the Eagles now sit just TWO points back of Lewiston for first place overall......... the closest we have been to these guys since pretty much the start of the season. A loss in yesterday's game would have meant the gap between the two teams widening to six points. Not only was the win important from a standpoint of gaining two points on the MAINEiacs, but it was also a chance to make a big statement to Lewiston by beating them in three straight games down the stretch, and the Eagles took advantage - big time.

This three-for-three road trip is also a huge confidence-builder for the Eagles in terms of their play on the road. Going into this trip, the team's road record was slightly below .500, and was considered to be one of the few weaknesses on a generally strong team. As well, the Eagles' last road trip was one to forget; I'm sure most of you recall the trip the team made right after the trading period, which saw them win just one out of four games. The Eagles weren't about to have two awful road trips in a row, and made a big statement to themselves on this trip that they can indeed find a way to win under tough circumstances on the road, something that was legitimately in doubt throughout much of the season. Now, the team should have a lot more confidence about their play away from C200 heading down the rest of the stretch, and into the playoffs. You cannot have playoff success without solid play on the road!

In yesterday's game, the first two periods were tight-checking, defensive affairs. Beau Prokopetz came up huge with his first goal as an Eagle late in the first period to stake the Eagles to a 1-0 lead after one. In period two, Dean Ouellet scored on the powerplay to make it 2-0. Cape Breton went up 3-0 when James Sheppard came out of the box just in time to take advantage of a miscommunication between Lewiston goalie Peter Delmas and MAINEiac dman Sebastien Piche. He stole the puck and slid it across to JC Gauthier for a backbreaking goal.

In the third period, however, Lewiston came out flying, and Cape Breton suddenly found themselves on their heels and starting to run out of gas. It was soon apparent that the three games in less than 48 hours were finally starting to get to the Eagles, and they were basically hanging on for dear life to their lead. They were hanging on even harder after Lewiston's Kevin Marshall pinched in and tipped home a Michal Korenko pass to cut the lead to 3-1.

That's when Ondrej Pavelec came up with his finest work of the road trip. From then on, he took over for his tired teammates and shut the door on numerous Lewiston scoring opportunities as the MAINEiacs outshot Cape Breton 18-7 in the final period in a desperate attempt to get back into the game. None of his stops was huger than his penalty shot stop on Dave Taylor at 4:08 of the final frame. A goal there would have made it 3-2, and given Lewiston all the momentum with plenty of time left to tie the game. That penalty shot stop has to rank up there as one of Pavelec's most important saves of the season.

The Eagles managed to hold the fort, with Paul McIlveen icing things with an empty net goal from his own blueline; a bit of a dangerous play that thankfully didn't backfire on us with an icing call against. With the win, Cape Breton improves to 38-17-2 for 78 points, five points ahead of third-place Moncton, and of course two behind first-place Lewiston.

The Screaming Eagles have a much more favourable schedule the rest of the way than does Lewiston, so they are now in the driver's seat in the race for first place. However, a couple of blown games against weaker opponents (like the one against Rimouski) would put the MAINEiacs right back in the driver's seat where they have been all season. Cape Breton has to keep that in mind the rest of the way, and has to make sure to come out as sharp this weekend against the Sea Dogs and Fog Devils as they did on this past road trip! But first, the team will enjoy a well-deserved day or two of rest.

Three-for-three road trip............ I don't think even the most optimistic of Eagle fans expected that. Hats off to the team on a fine accomplishment.

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One statistic that really illustrates how well this team has played throughout this season is this:

The top three +/- ratings in the entire league all belong to members of the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles.

Chris Culligan leads the league with a +38 rating.

JC Sawyer is second at +36.

James Sheppard is third at +31, and could be first if not for the fact that he's played 10 and 12 less games than Sawyer and Culligan, respectively.

Culligan and Sheppard are also a lethal penalty-killing duo, and while there are no stats to support it, I really don't know if there is a penalty-killing forward duo in the league that is scored on as seldom as those two guys are.

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To FURTHER illustrate what a great week it was for the Eagles, this just in from the QMJHL's official website:

James Sheppard has been named Offensive Player of the Week thanks to his 3G 8A 11PT output in four games this past week. Robert Slaney was also considered for the award thanks to his explosion for 4G 5A 9PTS over the week.

Ondrej Pavelec has been named Defensive Player of the Week. In three games, he earned three wins, and had a 2.00 GAA and .924 save %. He was third star in Victoriaville and first star in Lewiston. JC Sawyer was also considered for the award, thanks to a 1G 4A 5PT week where he also finished with a +5.

Eagles sweep the Offensive and Defensive POW honours, and two other Eagles are considered for the award - further evidence of what a week the Eagles enjoyed!

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Amongst all of these positive things, there is always room for improvement.

What jumps out at me right away is the fact that despite the three road wins, the powerplay went a combined 1-for-19 on the road trip.

The powerplay has been struggling for a while now, and has to improve come playoff time. Some fans still grimace thinking about the Eagles' powerplay in the playoffs last year......... which at one point in the postseason was an absolutely ghastly 3-for-50.

Whether it's just a matter of time before the current powerplay combinations start clicking, or whether a bit of a switch-up in the powerplay lineups is necessary, I don't know, and hopefully the coaching staff can figure it out.

Slaney, Sheppard, Culligan lead Eagles to huge win in Victoriaville, while Lewiston looms for tomorrow

2007-02-10T22:44:00.000-08:00

The Cape Breton Screaming Eagles came back from a 2-0 first period deficit today to earn a 5-2 win over the Victoriaville Tigres, who as mentioned earlier, entered the game 21-4-1 at home.

This is a huge win for the Eagles, as it puts them at two-for-two on this road trip thus far. Most importantly, it allowed them to keep pace with the Lewiston MAINEiacs heading into tomorrow's crucial matchup. Lewiston won their game tonight against Drummondville, so the Eagles still trail them by four points, with the opportunity to cut the deficit to a mere two with a win tomorrow.

For the second game in a row, the Eagles were paced by the new combination of Chris Culligan, James Sheppard, and Robert Slaney. Culligan had three points (1G 2A), Sheppard had four points (1G 3A, 1st star honours), and Slaney had the biggest game of his Q career to date with two goals and two assists for four points. Slaney now has nine points in his last three games, and has been generally on fire since being placed on that line with Culligan and Sheppard. He has been asked to play many different roles this season, including even a lengthy stint on defence, and has been a workhorse in every one of them, so it's great to see Robert enjoying such success on the scoresheet lately.

Paul McIlveen scored the other goal for the Eagles on a brilliant individual effort, and Ondrej Pavelec earned the win in goal by making 23 stops and being named third star of the game.

Big, big win against a very good team in a very tough place to steal the two points.

Tomorrow's game in Lewiston is absolutely huge and needs no further billing. Win and we're just two points back of them, lose and we fall down to six back. If ever the old cliches about "four point games" are going to apply, it is for games like this one.

We need Pavelec to continue his mastery of the Colisee in Lewiston (he has a huge track record for standing on his head in that building), and it would be great if that Sheppard line could continue its excellent play, along with getting some offensive help from the other forward lines and the powerplay, which has been the team's one glaring weakness on this road trip (0/12 in the last two games).

Peter Delmas should start in goal for the MAINEiacs, as Jonathan Bernier remains out of the lineup with that ankle injury suffered a few weeks back in Halifax. Marc-Andre Cliche, however, is back in Lewiston's lineup after missing the two hockey games played in Cape Breton between the two teams two weekends ago.

From the Cape Breton side of the ice, Cam Fergus may return for tomorrow's game after missing the last four games with a back injury. I'm sure he's hungry to get back at it after watching the last couple of games from the broadcast booth while doing colour on the radio with Ken MacNeil!

It's our team's third game in three days, but with two wins already on this trip, let's hope that the boys running on adrenaline more than they are suffering from fatigue. Tired or not, they know how big this Lewiston game is; they've likely been looking ahead to it all trip. They're going to be ready, Lewiston is going to be ready (and very much wanting revenge for the sweep in CB), and it should be a great hockey game.

It all gets underway with a 4:30 PM pre-game show and 5:00 PM puck drop on CJCB AM 1270. You don't wanna miss a minute of this one!

Eagles get the job done in opening game of road trip

2007-02-10T09:42:00.000-08:00

The Cape Breton Screaming Eagles got this weekend's road trip off to a good start with a 4-2 win over the Shawinigan Cataractes. The home team put up a spirited effort in their attempt to stop a five-game losing streak, and Cape Breton had to bear down and work for what some people probably assumed would be an easy two points.

Chris Culligan and Robert Slaney combined to create the eventual game-winning goal, which broke a 2-2 tie about midway through the third period. They skated in on a two-on-one, Culligan made a great late pass over to Slaney, who one-timed it in for his eighth of the season and third in his last four games since being put on a line with Culligan and James Sheppard.

Both Slaney and Culligan finished with a goal and an assist on the night, while Oskars Bartulis and Jonathan Laberge (into an empty net) scored the other Cape Breton goals. It's nice to see Bartulis hitting the scoresheet over the past couple of games after struggling (by his standards) for a little while.

On the minus side, the powerplay went 0/6 on the night, and the top powerplay unit continues to struggle to score since its addition of Luc Bourdon. Is it just a matter of time before that combination catches fire, or will it soon be time to try something different for a #1 PP unit?

With the win, the Eagles took full advantage of an opportunity to close to within four points of the idle Lewiston MAINEiacs. Cape Breton's record now sits at 36-17-2 for 74 points, and they have won their last three hockey games.

The road trip continues today just about an hour down the road in Victoriaville, where the hometown Tigres are a very impressive 21-4-1 from the Colisee Desjardins (formerly le Colisee des Bois Francs). Victoriaville will be without leading scorer Benoit Doucet, but still boasts a deep lineup that has enjoyed a ton of success over the past couple of months, as they've very quietly moved up the standings in the Telus Division. The key player around whom the Victo offence revolves is Danish star Morten Madsen, who has been scoring at a clip of almost two points per game this season.

They'll most likely start veteran Jean-Christophe Blanchard in goal. No goaltender has performed better on his home ice this season than Blanchard, the former Moncton Wildcat. His home ice record is 16-3, with a 2.20 GAA, three shutouts, and a .929 save %. Cape Breton will have to get to this guy today if they are to have any chance at victory. The Eagles will counter with Ondrej Pavelec, who has really been rounding into form as of late. Other than the substitution of Pavelec in goal for David Davenport (who got the job done in getting the win last night), the Cape Breton lineup should be pretty much the same as it was yesterday.

It should also be noted that former Eagle Vincent Zaore will be in the Victoriaville lineup. He's been having a great overage season as one of the Tigres' most reliable blueliners.

Game time is at 5:00 PM ADT, with Kenny MacNeil kicking off the pre-game show from CJCB AM 1270 at 4:30.

This blogger personally thinks this will be the toughest game of this three-game road trip, so the Eagles had better be sharp!

PS- Keeping an eye on the race for first place, the Lewiston MAINEiacs are at home to the Drummondville Voltigeurs tonight.

Eagles open important road trip in Shawinigan tonight

2007-02-09T05:13:00.000-08:00

Tonight, the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles start off an important three-game February road trip with a 9:00 PM ADT start from the Jacques Plante Arena, against the host Shawinigan Cataractes. It will be the first meeting of the season between the Eagles and the Cataractes; Shawinigan is the only team remaining that the Eagles have yet to play.

Shawinigan is a rebuilding club that sits in ninth place in the ten-team "Telus Division" with a 21-29-2-3 record for 47 points. They have been especially cold as of late, with five losses in a row and a 3-7-0 record in their last ten hockey games. They also have trouble scoring goals; their total of 180 goals is third-worst in the league. Despite all of this, the Cataractes cannot be taken for granted. Look no further than last Friday night's loss to Rimouski as evidence that nothing is ever a guarantee, even if the odds are stacked strongly in your favour. Their five losses in a row, and especially their four straight losses on home ice, could make the Cats really hungry for a win tonight. As well, playing a Cape Breton team that is perceived as a "top team" might give them a bit of a "nothing to lose" mentality, and teams that are playing with that mentality can be very dangerous. The Eagles are for sure the favourite tonight, but they will have to be on their toes, especially since the Arena Jacques Plante can be an intimidating building to play in.

No word yet on a starting goaltender for Cape Breton, but Kevin Malletto should be between the pipes for Shawinigan. Tonight's game is the Cataractes' third in three nights, and former Eagle Marc-Andre Perron got the start in each of the previous two.

INJURY REPORT for Cape Breton:

- Luc Bourdon (ankle) practiced yesterday in Riviere-Du-Loup and reportedly made it through the practice pretty well. He is listed as "probable" (but not definite) for tonight's game.

- Cam Fergus (back) also practiced yesterday, but didn't make it through the practice. He will definitely not be back in the lineup tonight, and will likely be given a little bit more time off than originally anticipated to ensure a full recovery. I'd guess that he may sit out this entire road trip.

- Dean Ouellet, after a premature return on Tuesday against Moncton, also felt pretty good in practice yesterday and while he's not quite back to 100% yet, he will play tonight in Shawinigan.

- Jonathan Laberge has returned to the Eagles after taking a few days off to return home and attend his grandfather's funeral. He'll be in the lineup tonight.

- Scott Brannon (concussion) is still a couple of weeks away from recovery, and did not even make the road trip.

So in summary, Laberge will definitely be added to the lineup that defeated Moncton on Tuesday night, and Bourdon has a pretty decent chance of being added back to it as well. Fergus and Brannon remain out of the lineup.

The Eagles continue the road trip Saturday night in Victoriaville, and finish it off Sunday with a very important meeting in Lewiston with the first place MAINEiacs.

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The voting for the 10th anniversary all-time Screaming Eagles team will start soon! Fans will be asked to choose the top goaltenders, defencemen, forwards, and of course enforcers, from ten years of Screaming Eagles hockey. More details on the exact starting date for voting, and on the voting process itself, will become available once they are known, but the balloting should begin sooner rather than later.

Eagles top Cats 7-3 to take over sole possession of second place

2007-02-07T04:51:00.000-08:00

With four key players out of the lineup for last night's home game against the Moncton Wildcats, it was up to the rest of the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles to step up and fill a few voids.

That they did- in spades.

The Eagles managed to come through with a complete effort and dominant performance en route to thrashing their division rivals 7-3, and outshooting them 41-22. Managing to come up with such a performance with four key guys out of the lineup is a testament to how prepared the team was for this game, and how hard the guys worked out there. The challenge now is to be able to translate such preparation and intensity, on a consistent basis, over to games where the team has their full lineup.

Cape Breton received particularly great performances from Robert Slaney (1 G, 2 A), James Sheppard (2 G, 2 A), and especially JC Sawyer, who followed up his record-setting six-point game on Sunday with a FIVE-point effort last night (1 G, 4 A). Sawyer now has 11 points in his last two hockey games, totals which are simply staggering, especially for a defenceman. JC now has 61 points on the season, and is really closing in on Mathieu Dumas' team record for points in a season by a defenceman (69, back in 2001-2002).

The Eagles jumped out to a quick 4-0 first period lead and never really looked back. Moncton scored two quick ones midway through the first period to cut the lead to 4-2, but a Chris Culligan goal (finishing off a great rush by Sheppard) in the period's final minute gave Cape Breton a 5-2 lead after the first frame and, more importantly, swung momentum back in their favour. That first period was where most of the game's excitement occurred; the final two periods were pretty pedestrian.

With that character win, the Eagles move one point ahead of the Wildcats for sole possession of second place in the East Division. They also sit second overall in the league, as they managed to pass the Val d'or Foreurs as well last night. The team now trails the league-leading Lewiston MAINEiacs by six points, with Lewiston holding a game in hand (they play it tonight, in Saint John against the Sea Dogs).

Cape Breton finishes the five-game home stand with four wins and a loss, and their high-scoring wins in the last two home games will hopefully inject the team with confidence as they embark today on an important three-game weekend road trip. They will play Friday night in Shawinigan against the Cataractes, who sit in ninth place in the ten-team Telus Division. On Saturday, they take on the Victoriaville Tigres, who are near the top of the Telus and possess one of the best home ice records in the league. Finally, Sunday sees the Eagles travelling across the US border to take on the Lewiston MAINEiacs in a crucial matchup that needs no further billing!

Hopefully, a few of the guys missing from last night's game will be able to return on this road trip, and hopefully the team will be able to translate the desperation with which they played last night over to such games where they have a full lineup. Last night's game was not only an important two points in the standings; it was a reminder of exactly what got this Eagles team to where it is in the first place.

Depleted Eagles to take on Moncton for second place tonight

2007-02-06T05:07:00.000-08:00

The Cape Breton Screaming Eagles have a golden opportunity tonight to move into sole possession of second place in the East Division, in the form of a meeting with the Moncton Wildcats, who they trail by just one point for that second spot.

However, they're going to have to try and get it done without a bevy of key players.

Sitting out tonight's game for sure are Scott Brannon (concussion), Luc Bourdon (ankle), and Dean Ouellet (lower body). The latter two, as you likely recall, left Sunday afternoon's game and did not return. Thankfully, their injuries are being reported as "day to day" in nature, as opposed to anything long-term.

As well, Cam Fergus (upper body) and Jonathan Laberge (personal) will likely be out of the Cape Breton lineup tonight.

Add it all up, and that's five key players missing, assuming that all of those guys do indeed sit out. Four of those players are forwards, leaving the Eagles with just nine healthy forwards, or enough for just three lines. Given that, the team will likely call up an affiliate forward or two for tonight's game. Line combinations are really anyone's guess, although it should be reasonably safe to assume that the Culligan-Sheppard-Slaney combination from the last hockey game will remain intact (and should be counted upon for a large chunk of tonight's work).

With so many key players out of the lineup, the guys that are playing tonight will go into the game knowing that they won't stand a chance against this Wildcat team if they give anything less than a full 60-minute effort. This is a challenge that, should the Eagles embrace it, could produce very rewarding results, and really remind our team of the virtues of hard work (which seemed to be forgotten at times on Friday night vs Rimouski). Tonight's game could be looked at as a real character-building opportunity, and for that reason I look forward to seeing how our depleted lineup fares.

Ondrej Pavelec will be back between the pipes tonight for Cape Breton, while Moncton could counter with either of two strong goaltenders; Jhase Sniderman or Nicola Riopel. Considering that he shut us out in the last meeting between the two teams, my guess is that we'll face Sniderman.

Also, tonight's game marks the return of Mark Barberio to C200 for the first time since being traded to the Wildcats in the Bourdon deal. It will mark his first of many appearances on our ice in a Wildcat uniform. Be sure to give this kid a warm reception, as he's a great player who never wanted to leave Cape Breton. It's going to be tough watching him develop into a franchise player in another team's uniform over the next few seasons.

Moncton has a gritty, in-your-face team that never stops skating, and we'll have to counter with equally hard work if we're to beat these guys tonight. It's a great opportunity to overtake these guys for second place, rather than fall three points behind them, so I think our guys should be pretty motivated. As well, the Eagles are really going to want to take advantage of this last home game before embarking on a very tough three-game road trip on the weekend.

Don't miss the battle for second place, tonight at C200.

Sawyer runs amok for six points as Eagles thump tired Voltigeurs, 8-2

2007-02-05T05:53:00.000-08:00

It was a career night for Screaming Eagles defenceman JC Sawyer, as he scored three goals and three assists to lead Cape Breton to an 8-2 thrashing of a Drummondville team that was simply out of gas in their third game in less than 48 hours.

Sawyer's six points set a new record for Eagle defencemen and came just one point short of tying Olivier Proulx's team record of seven points in a game. His three first period goals also set a record for goals by an Eagle defenceman in a single period.

Dean Ouellet also established a new team record for goals in a season by a left winger, with his second goal of the game and 32nd of the season breaking the previous mark of 31 held by Kevin Cloutier.

The opponent may have been weary, but Cape Breton still deserves credit for bouncing back as best they could from a disappointing game on Friday night against Rimouski. Unlike Friday night's game, where a slow start proved costly, the Eagles came out flying right off of the opening faceoff on Sunday, and it resulted in them taking a 4-0 first period lead and never looking back.

David Davenport earned the win in goal for the Eagles, and looked sharp in his first start in six hockey games.

The win almost came at a huge cost, however. Both Ouellet and Luc Bourdon left the game with injuries and did not return, causing quite a bit of worry in the stands. However, post-game reports indicate that neither injury is expected to be long-term, and that both players are "day to day". This is a huge relief to Eagle fans, as it always seems as though the worst injuries occur in harmless-looking blowout games like yesterday's.

Also on the injury front, the team played without leading scorer Cam Fergus yesterday, as he's nursing a minor upper body injury. Scott Brannon continues to sit out with his second concussion of the season.

With the win, Cape Breton improves to 34-17-2 for 70 points and moves to within a single point of the Moncton Wildcats for second place in the division. They have a great opportunity to overtake the Cats on Tuesday, when the teams meet head-to-head at C200. As well, it is the final home game for the Eagles on this home stand, before embarking on a very tough weekend road trip.

Dominating win for the Eagles, but the Volts didn't put up much of a fight. Hopefully the Eagles won't have too much trouble switching gears between playing a listless opponent like that, and playing an extremely gritty and in-your-face hockey club in Moncton on Tuesday ngiht.

Eagles outworked, outwilled by plucky young Oceanic

2007-02-03T09:23:00.000-08:00

After perhaps thinking they'd turned the corner with their two wins against Lewiston last weekend, the "new" Cape Breton Screaming Eagles received another reality check last night, in the form of a 5-3 loss to the Rimouski Oceanic at C200.

Rimouski simply wanted last night's game more than the Eagles did, and they played with an urgency and intensity that the Eagles weren't quite able to match, at least not in the first two periods. By period three, Cape Breton seemed to realize that they were going to need a full 100% effort to beat these guys, and they did dominate that third period, but it was "too little, too late."

It also didn't help matters that the Eagles ran into a hot goaltender. Tommy Legault was outstanding in the Oceanic net, making 34 saves (many of them from point blank range) and earning first star honours. Rimouski's bevy of young up-and-coming stars looked great last night, none more dominant that Czech forward Michael Frolik, who scored two goals and played great in all three zones of the rink.

For the Eagles, the line of Chris Culligan-James Sheppard-Robert Slaney had a decent game, with Sheppard and Slaney scoring highlight-reel goals, and goaltender Ondrej Pavelec was once again solid in the crease despite the loss, but too many players had "off" nights last night.

Friday's results were a significant blow to the Eagles in the standings. Along with Cape Breton's loss, the Lewiston MAINEiacs and Moncton Wildcats both recorded wins. The Eagles now sit three points back of Moncton for second place in the East Division, and a whopping eight back of Lewiston. After last weekend's sweep of the MAINEiacs, the Eagles were just four points back of the division leaders. It doesn't take long to lose the ground you worked so hard to make up, but with a couple of great efforts in coming games, it may not be long before we make up some serious ground either.

The loss also cost the Eagles a chance to establish a new team record for consecutive home ice wins. They entered the game on an 11-game home winning streak, which tied the mark set back in 2003-2004.

The challenge now is for Cape Breton to rebound with a great effort on Sunday afternoon against the Drummondville Voltigeurs, who have a similar potential to surprise a team that takes them lightly. Nothing but a full 60-minute effort will suffice. It's up to the Screaming Eagles to make that happen.

Edit: I edited out the content about the possibility of Derick Brassard returning to the Voltigeur lineup tomorrow, as I've since received word that he's not supposed to be back for a couple of weeks yet. Sorry for anyone that may have been misled.

Eagles home for another weekend; host Rimouski and Drummondville

2007-02-02T04:46:00.000-08:00

Cape Breton Screaming Eagles fans will enjoy a rare opportunity to see two West Division opponents for the only time each this weekend, as the Rimouski Oceanic and Drummondville Voltigeurs come to town for Friday and Sunday games respectively. Fans only get to see each Quebec-based team once per season as a result of the rather unpopular unbalanced schedule adopted by the QMJHL in conjunction with the NHL's new (and equally unpopular) unbalanced schedule.

On Friday night, the young and exciting Oceanic sail into town riding a season-high four-game winning streak. Their offence seems to have really woken up during this streak, led by the QMJHL Rookie of the Month for January, Czech forward Michael Frolik, who was also picked 10th overall by the Florida Panthers in this past June's NHL draft (just one spot behind the Eagles' James Sheppard). Other flashy young players on this team include Maxime Tanguay (brother of the Calgary Flames' Alex Tanguay), Max Gratchev, and Olivier Fortier - all considered pretty good prospects for this coming NHL draft.

Rimouski may sit in last place in the West Division, but their current four-game win streak indicates that perhaps their young core is adjusting to the league, and that they could be a better team in the second half. For sure, they can't be taken lightly by the Eagles tonight, or they will extend their win streak to five games.

Speaking of streaks, Cape Breton has a chance to set a new team record streak of their own. They enter tonight's game having won each of their past eleven home games, which ties the previous team record set back in the 2003-2004 season. A win tonight would establish a new Eagle record for consecutive home ice wins.

Scott Brannon and Robert Slaney are still questionable for tonight's game with injuries. Ondrej Pavelec will likely get the call in goal, as the Eagles shall almost certainly keep riding the hot hand that has enjoyed so much success as of late (more on that in a bit).

On Sunday, Cape Breton hosts the Drummondville Voltigeurs in a 4:00 matinee from C200. Voltigeur superstar forward Derick Brassard will not be back in the lineup in time for this game. He has missed the entire season thus far with a severe shoulder injury, but has apparently been skating for the past few weeks and could return some time this month.

Drummondville had a bad start but has been moving up the standings over the past couple of months. They are led offensively by Europeans Tomas Svoboda and Tomas Zohorna, as well as overager Jonathan Duchesneau and 19-year-old Etienne Bellavance-Martin. Defencemen Drew Paris and Frederic St-Denis are also players to watch, and they've received very good goaltending this season from Pier-Olivier Pelletier. I don't have much more to say about this team because they are extremely foreign to most Cape Breton fans (myself included).......... all I know is that they have been playing pretty well over the past couple of months (after a terrible start to the season) and should pose a pretty stiff challenge to the Eagles.

Aside from the points available in the standings, this weekend's games are important in that they're part of the stretch drive towards the playoffs......... a key time of year when teams that have tweaked their rosters at the Xmas trading deadline are supposed to start gelling and building towards a finished, playoff-ready product. In our case, newcomers Jo Laberge and Beau Prokopetz seem to have pretty much integrated themselves into our lineup, but the big acqusition, Luc Bourdon, seems to have yet to really find his niche in the Eagles' lineup. Last weekend, he was suffering from an injury; if he is healthy this weekend, it's a real chance for he and the coaching staff to make some real strides in getting this guy fully integrated into our lineup.

This weekend, we fans get a break from the same old East Division rivals, and that's reason enough to come down to C200 and see something different!

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I would like to take the time to congratulate Screaming Eagles goaltender Ondrej Pavelec on one heck of a return from the World Junior Championships. His play in six January games since coming back from that tournament was enough to earn him a Defensive Player of the Week award, a CHL Goaltender of the Week award, and most recently, QMJHL Defensive Player of the Month honours.

Ondrej had a bit of an up-and-down first half to the season, and it was expected that once he returned from the World Juniors, he would start to really get the lion's share of the starts in an attempt to really get him in a groove for the playoffs. We knew that he was going to be given the ball by the coaching staff upon his return, and so far, he's been just incredible. Congratulations Ondrej on all of your awards this month, and keep up the great work - we'll need you down this stretch drive and in the playoffs!

Lewiston weekend a huge success as Eagles sweep in front of sold out crowd!

2007-01-30T04:57:00.000-08:00

The most critical weekend of the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles' season to date couldn't have gone down much better.

This past weekend's pair of home dates against the division-leading Lewiston MAINEiacs had been circled on fans' calendars for a long time, and the Eagles made sure it was well worth the wait. Cape Breton won both of the crucial divisional matchups, the latter in front of a sold-out crowd, to not only gain four very important points in the standings on the rival MAINEiacs, but to rebound very nicely from a road trip full of struggles the weekend before, where they won only one of four games.

Friday night's contest was a tight-checking goaltender's duel that was hanging in the balances until the final buzzer. Netminders Ondrej Pavelec of the Eagles and Peter Delmas of the MAINEiacs stole the show, each standing on his head in front of a crowd decimated in size by a winter blizzard that rocked the Island. Chris Culligan opened the scoring by blasting a low slapshot past Delmas in the second period, and set Dean Ouellet up at the side of the net with a perfect pass for the eventual game-winner late in the third. Pavelec came up with a number of huge saves to ensure the victory, none bigger than his penalty shot stop on Lewiston forward Stefan Chaput in period three. Defenceman Beau Prokopetz made his home debut as an Eagle in this contest, but fellow newcomer Luc Bourdon sat out with an ankle injury.

On Saturday night, the weather couldn't stop a sold-out crowd from filling C200 pretty much to capacity as the Eagles came up with one of their best 60-minute efforts of the season in a convincing 4-0 victory over the American visitors. Pavelec was unbeatable in this contest, registering his first shutout of the season and cementing his status as the QMJHL's Defensive Player of the Week for the week. Cape Breton got two great goals from somewhat unlikely sources (Jean-Christophe Gauthier and Brad Gallant) early in the game and never looked back; the outcome of this game was never really in much doubt. This game also saw Cam Fergus finally break out of his five-game pointless streak with a pair of goals. Linemate Paul McIlveen also broke a five-game pointless streak with an assist on one of Fergus's markers. New defenceman Prokopetz made a great impression on the C200 crowd by earning third star honours in just his second home game with the team. As well, the packed house got to see Bourdon finally make his much-anticipated home debut with the Eagles, although he was still clearly hurting and could only play at limited capacity.

After losing three of their first four games with the new faces in the lineup, the "new look" Eagles team had something to prove, and prove it they did by taking all four points from the first-overall Lewiston squad this weekend. Although the team's goal scoring may need another game or two to get back into full gear, this weekend's wins were a huge step in the right direction, and in large part make up for the recent disappointing road trip. The most important thing in these two wins was the play of goaltender Pavelec. If the Eagles are going to go anywhere this year, they're going to need Ondrej at the top of his game, and in each of his last four starts, we have seen him at the top of his game. Here's to hoping that this trend can continue.

With the two wins, Cape Breton improves to 33-16-2 for 68 points, and now sit just four points back of Lewiston for first place, and one point back of Moncton for second place. Going into the weekend, the Eagles trailed Lewiston by eight points, and Moncton by three.

The Eagles are now enjoying a few days off before continuing their five-game home stand on Friday against the Rimouski Oceanic and Sunday against the Drummondville Voltigeurs, before finishing it off next Tuesday with a potentially pretty important date with the Moncton Wildcats.

The stretch drive is really heating up, as the Eagles still have about 1/3 of their home schedule remaining for the regular season. Get yourself down to C200 to watch this team gear up for the playoffs!

Additional breaking news on this weekend's games vs Lewiston

2007-01-26T07:35:00.000-08:00

The plot has thickened regarding the highly-anticipated weekend series between the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles and the Lewiston MAINEiacs.

In their 5-4 shootout loss to the Halifax Mooseheads last night at the Halifax Metro Centre, the MAINEiacs lost saw three of their players fall to injury, including both of their goaltenders.

Their star #1 netminder, Jonathan Bernier, had to be helped off the ice with 30 seconds remaining in the contest and did not return.

Their #1 centre, Marc-Andre Cliche of Team Canada WJC fame, was nailed open-ice by Halifax defenceman Jiri Suchy, and left the game with a possible concussion and possible jaw problems.

Finally, their backup goaltender, 16-year-old Peter Delmas, hurt himself during the overtime and stayed down on the ice for several moments. He did however manage to get up and finish off the game, but is still being listed as having a day-to-day injury.

The MAINEiacs have flown in emergency call-up goaltender Marc-Andre Sauve for this weekend's games. Sauve is 18 years old and was an 8th round pick of the MAINEiacs in 2005. He has yet to appear in a QMJHL game. Whether or not Lewiston will start Sauve tonight, or perhaps roll the dice with the "day to day" injured Delmas, I do not know. It seems as though Bernier has little chance of playing this weekend.

For more information, please follow this link to an article by the Lewiston Sun Journal's Justin Pelletier: http://www.sunjournal.com/story/196405-3/LocalSports/Loss_to_Halifax_proves_costly/

Without Bernier and Cliche, Lewiston is not as tough an opponent, and Cape Breton's chances of winning likely increase. However, at this time of year, what is most important it gauging how our team stacks up against the best in the league. For that reason, I was really looking forward to seeing how the Eagles would respond to the challenge of two games against the FULL Lewiston team. The Eagle players now also have the challenge of not letting themselves get too comfortable with the knowledge that Lewiston will likely be missing these players. They can still score without Cliche, and any goaltender they throw at us could stand on his head on any given night and send us tumbling to a demoralizing loss.

Cape Breton will have to focus now more than ever. One thing is for sure: as said in the opening line of this blog, the plot has certainly thickened.

Current issues: upcoming weekend, recent road trip, and support our troops

2007-01-25T06:10:00.000-08:00

It's been a few days since the last blog, but there are a number of current issues to talk about, and I decided to wait until they were all pretty much equal in relevance to talk about them.

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First and foremost is the upcoming weekend set at C200 vs Lewiston. This is easily the most highly-anticipated weekend of the regular season for the Eagles! Today's Cape Breton Post reported that Saturday's game is already just a few hundred tickets short of a sellout, and that over 3200 tickets have been sold for Friday night's game. There are a great many reasons why:

(1) The games are a battle between two of the best teams in the QMJHL, and pit the Eagles against a Lewiston MAINEiacs team that leads the East Division standings. It's a great opportunity to gauge how the Eagles, an aspiring contender, stack up against possibly the strongest foe in the league.

(2) The games mark the very much-anticipated home ice debut of Luc Bourdon in a Cape Breton uniform. Scores of fans who saw his play at the World Juniors will turn out to see him alone.

(3) Barring a playoff matchup between the two teams, there is a very good chance (unless he returns to the league as a 20 year old next year, but I doubt he will) that the games will be the last two in Cape Breton for Eskasoni native Chad Denny of the MAINEiacs. This should result in a great number of fans from the reservation to make the trek to C200 to see their hometown hero play here for one last time.

(4) Saturday night's game will be Timbit Night at C200, coinciding with the annual Timbit Jamboree the next day. Hundreds of young Timbit hockey players from all around the island will be in attendance.

(5) About sixty seats are spoken for by a couple of busloads of MAINEiac fans making the very long trip up from Lewiston to see their team play. Be sure to treat these folks with the Cape Breton hospitality we are known for; even though they are cheering the enemy, they are our guests!

As for the games themselves:

The Lewiston MAINEiacs play a stifling, defensive style of hockey, and the Screaming Eagles have been having trouble scoring as of late as it is. They will have to come out flying and find a way to penetrate the smothering Lewiston defence. They will need to be first to more pucks than their opponents, and grind them into the ice with hard work. Lewiston also possesses one of the top goalies in the league in Jonathan Bernier, and while they aren't what you'd call an "offensive juggernaut" and don't have any huge offensive superstars, they roll the most balanced four lines in the league; any of their lines can score at any time. They score by committee.

The Eagles will need to regain their scoring touch, both even strength and on the powerplay. They will need to find some real on-ice chemistry that was lacking during their recent four-game road trip. Some key members of the team have been slumping over the past four games, and will need to rebound this weekend in a big way if we are going to beat these guys. Lastly, and most importantly, the team needs Ondrej Pavelec (who I expect to start both games) to come up big in goal. He played fantastic in the two games in Moncton earlier this week, and if he can play anything like he did in those games, Lewiston could be in for some headaches.

How do the new-look Eagles stack up against a top contender? Find out this weekend by making the trip down to C200 and being part of two packed houses.

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I'd like to briefly comment on the recent road trip. Obviously, it was quite disappointing for the Eagles. They lost three out of four games. In three of the four games, they scored just one goal or less. The powerplay struggled mightily. The team looked lost and seemed to have little on-ice chemistry. An entire scoring line went completely dry. The new additions did not overly impress. It was a bad road trip, there is no denying it. The team looked awful.

As bad as things were this past road trip, it was still just four games, and it was still just one road trip. Over the course of a 70-game season, that isn't the end of the world. Most importantly, it is essential to keep in mind that there is almost always an awkward "adjusting period" for the first few games after a team brings a few key new bodies into the lineup. It takes a while for everybody to get used to one another, and for new additions to get used to the team's systems. It takes a while for the guys to know what each other will do out there on the ice. Timing and chemistry need to be re-established. Some players have to adjust to new roles. While three losses in four games is still a disappointing and poor result, such an awkward period of adjustment was to be expected. The hope is that four games should be about enough time for players to work some of the kinks out, and that the few days off between games that the team is enjoying right now should be enough time for coaching staff and players alike to sit back and think about what was done wrong on the road trip and what can be done to correct the problems. When you play four games in five nights, there isn't really much time for such reflection. Before anybody panics and suggests that the moves made were a mistake, let's wait and see how the team comes out at home against a real strong opponent this weekend.

The last thing I'll say about this topic is this: In 2001-2002, the Eagles had a strong team and made a few deadline deals to add players such as David Cloutier and JF Dufort. Just like this year, the new additions didn't just seamlessly fit into our lineup. There were struggles in the first few games after they arrived. In fact, the team went winless in their first five games after making those trades, including three losses in a row. People were questioning the trades and wondering if the team had actually gotten worse. But after those first five games, the team went on a tear. They finished the season out on an eleven-game unbeaten streak, and then embarked on the club's best playoff run to date.

The recent road trip sucked, no doubt about it, but give this team a little bit of time to gel.

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Finally, Friday night will be an important night at C200 for reasons other than just the hockey game. The Eagles organization has declared Friday night's game to be Support The Troops night, and asks fans to wear red to show support for our troops over in Afghanistan. This was done last Friday night in Prince Edward Island at the Rocket-Eagles game, and was a resounding success. Tons of people turned out, and the vast majority were decked out in red to show the brave young men and women overseas that we care. Let us follow Charlottetown's lead and turn the C200 seating area into a sea of red on Friday night.

Eagles rebound on the road with shootout win over Wildcats

2007-01-21T15:53:00.000-08:00

It may not have been pretty or convincing, but the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles managed to earn two badly-needed points today at a packed Moncton Coliseum against the very gritty and tough Wildcats courtesy of a 2-1 shootout win.

Regulation time seemed tentative and tight-checking, with the first powerplay unit coming through with Cape Breton's only goal; Dean Ouellet finishing off a pretty passing play to notch his 30th of the season, giving the Eagles their third 30 goal scorer on the year so far. Matt Marquardt scored for Moncton less than a minute later to tie things up. Both teams killed off late penalties, including the Eagles doing a great job of killing off a double minor to Scott Brannon. Goaltenders Nicola Riopel of the Wildcats and Ondrej Pavelec of the Screaming Eagles were solid in goal as the 1-1 stalemate stood throughout regulation time and the five minute overtime period.

On to the shootout, the Eagles' first of the season; hard to believe that it took 48 games for the team to participate in one. James Sheppard, Cam Fergus, and Paul McIlveen, in that order, were selected as the three shooters for Cape Breton. Marc-Andre Labelle, Phil Mangan, and Matt Marquardt were selected for Moncton. Fergus scored on a great deke, and Pavelec stopped Labelle and Mangan, leading to a scenario where Marquardt had to score to keep Moncton alive.

He did, blowing a hard shot by Pavelec, and we went into a sudden death extra session. JC Sawyer was chosen to shoot for the Eagles, and he made it look easy, moving a bit wide to the outside, cutting back in to the inside, and quickly snapping one low blocker side for a 2-1 Eagle lead. However, the Wildcats' Maxime Lincourt scored on his attempt to keep the game alive.

Up next for Cape Breton was Chris Culligan, and he made a great deke to score what would eventually be the game winner. He had gotten in awfully close to goaltender Riopel, and it didn't look like he had any room left to do anything, but he somehow managed to find a hole and roof it in, and it was then up to Matt Eagles to keep the Wildcats alive for a third straight time. This time, however, it was not to be, as Pavelec stayed with him the whole way and ended up forcing him to shoot wide.

With the shootout win, Cape Breton improves to 31-15-2 on the season, for a total of 64 points. They sit one point behind the Wildcats (who earned a point despite the shootout loss) for second place in the division, and seven back of Lewiston for first.

The Eagles still have obviously have a way to go in finding the proper combinations and that right chemistry with the new additions, as evidenced by the fact that they scored just one goal for the second game this weekend, but the way this road trip has gone, the team will just take the two points any way they can get them.

The Eagles are next in action on Tuesday night, when they face the Wildcats once again from the Moncton Coliseum. Game time is at 7:00. With a win, Cape Breton could salvage a split of their four-game road trip, which would look pretty good considering the way it started out.

Disappointing 7-5 loss in Bathurst

2007-01-21T10:26:00.000-08:00

The "new look" Cape Breton Screaming Eagles are now 0-2.

An adjustment period of sorts was expected as newcomers Luc Bourdon, Beau Prokopetz, and Jonathan Laberge got used to their new teammates, and vice-versa, and as the team worked out all the kinks of making changes to the lineup during the trading period. Still, that doesn't excuse a third period collapse like the one seen in last night's 7-5 loss to the Acadie-Bathurst Titan. Not counting the empty net goal, Cape Breton was outscored 4-2 in the final frame, and succeeded in squandering a 3-2 lead after two periods, as well as two separate two goal leads held earlier in the game.

One of the few positives to be taken from last night's contest was the play of the Chris Culligan-James Sheppard-Scott Brannon line. That line combined for three of the team's five goals, and was a combined +8 on the night. Conversely, the unit of Dean Ouellet-Cam Fergus-Paul McIlveen was held scoreless for the second game in a row, and was a ghastly -8 for the hockey game.

The new-look powerplay, with Luc Bourdon replacing McIlveen on the point on the first unit and McIlveen dropping back to PP unit #2, was 1/4 for the second night in a row.

David Davenport appeared to have a tough night in the Cape Breton crease, allowing six goals on 23 shots. Antoine Tardif picked up the win in goal for Bathurst.

The Eagles jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the first period. Culligan set up Sheppard for his 22nd goal of the season for the first goal, and Luc Bourdon made a brilliant end-to-end rush on the powerplay for his first goal as a Screaming Eagle to double the Cape Breton lead. Thomas Beaurgard of the Titan would notch his league-leading 58th of the season to cut the lead to 2-1 heading into the intermission.

Cape Breton started the second off with a bang, taking a 3-1 lead as a result of a great passing play between Scott Brannon, Sheppard, and Culligan, finished off by the latter for his first of two on the night. Dany Masse would score for the Titan to put them within striking distance at 3-2 heading into the final period.

That's when the bottom fell out for the Screaming Eagles. A pair of Martin Bartos markers gave Bathurst a 4-3 lead, and Mathieu Perreault's 31st of the season made it 5-3 Titan. Cape Breton then got goals from Robert Slaney and Culligan to tie things up at five, only to lose the game with 2:56 left on Beauregard's second of the game and 59th of the season. Charles Bergeron was hauled down on a breakaway on an empty net, and the referee awarded the Titan overager with a rare automatic goal for a 7-5 final.

With the loss, the Eagles fall to 30-15-2 on the season, nine points behind the Lewiston MAINEiacs for first in the division as a result of their win against Saint John last night, and two points behind the Moncton Wildcats for second in the East Division.

Cape Breton takes its slumping act to Moncton today for a 4:00 meeting with the Wildcats, the first of two straight games in the Hub City. These games are obviously very important to the battle in the standings between the Eagles and the Wildcats. These games are also interesting as the newly-acquired Eagle Bourdon makes his return to Moncton, and the Eagles will face former teammate Mark Barberio of the Wildcats.

One to forget as Eagles drop 3-1 decision to PEI Rocket

2007-01-20T06:37:00.000-08:00

It was definitely a night to forget for the new-look Cape Breton Screaming Eagles last night in Charlottetown, as they couldn't seem to get anything going for any real sustained period of time, and ended up dropping a surprise 3-1 decision to the PEI Rocket. The loss spoiled the debuts of new additions Luc Bourdon and Beau Prokopetz on the blueline.

The game was scoreless until about midway through the second period, when Rocket forward Brett Morrison made a great pass to point man Benoit Gervais. Gervais fired a shot through a maze of traffic that goaltender Ondrej Pavelec never did end up seeing. The shot deflected off of the skate of Rocket forward Matthew Lachaine for a 1-0 Rocket lead.

Cape Breton tied things up in the late going of the second frame, on the powerplay, as Jonathan Laberge's attempt at a cross-crease pass ended up deflecting off of the stick of Rocket defender Luciano Lommano and in. The goal was Laberge's first as a Screaming Eagle.

The game winner occurred while the Eagles were enjoying a powerplay in the third period. After some sustained pressure in the PEI end, the Rocket broke out on a two-on-two shorthanded rush, and suddenly PEI defenceman Marc-Andre Gragnani found himself with all the room and all the time in the world to place his shot right inside the post, glove side on Pavelec for a 2-1 Rocket lead that they would not relinquish. Morrison would add an empty netter with seconds remaining to ice the game, a largely dull affair played on poor ice conditions.

Cape Breton seemed flat, and perhaps it had a lot to do with the lineup changes made to accomoate the new additions. In particular, there were changes made to the powerplay units. Paul McIlveen was replaced on the point on the 1st PP unit by Luc Bourdon, and was dropped back to the point on the 2nd PP unit with Oskars Bartulis. It is too early to make any real judgements on whether or not the new powerplay units are better or worse than the old ones, but last night obviously wasn't a great start.

Goaltender Pavelec seemed to be fighting the puck a bit; giving up fat rebounds on relatively routine shots, and letting a few pucks squeeze through him (although they didn't go in). If the Eagles are going to go anywhere in this year's playoffs, they really need Pavelec to regain the consistency that he showed last year, and they really need him playing with 100% confidence.

All in all, a flat game for Cape Breton, and one to forget. If any solace can be taken in last night's results, it is in the fact that the Lewiston MAINEiacs lost in overtime at home to Shawinigan. The club now sits seven points behind Lewiston in the battle for first place. On the minus side, the Moncton Wildcats defeated the St. John's Fog Devils, vaulting them two points ahead of the Eagles in the battle for third in the East Division.

It may take a little while for the team to really get used to the new faces in the lineup (and vice versa), but hopefully the result tonight in Bathurst is much better. If it isn't, however, there is no need to panic just yet. Teams often go through little slumps after "trading up", as it usualy takes a few games to find the right chemistry. Conversely, another weird trend in this league is that teams who "trade down" (trading veteran stars for younger players) often get hot for a few games after doing so; they go through a bit of a "honeymoon" period just because a few changes were made to a lineup that was struggling. For an example, witness the Saint John Sea Dogs right now. Anyhow, my point was that the first few games after trades are made often don't really make much sense. It may take a few games for our new additions to get used to their new teammates and the team's systems, and it may take a while for the coaching staff to find the correct combinations and chemistry with this new lineup. If things don't look any better a month from now, THEN feel free to worry that the trades the team made were not good trades.

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The Eagles travel to Bathurst today to try and rebound against the reeling Titan. I mention the fact that they are reeling (3-8 in their last 11 hockey games) because it is exactly what makes them a dangerous opponent tonight. They are coming off of a very embarassing 6-2 loss to the last-place Saint John Sea Dogs last night, and will likely come out very fired up to turn things around against a Cape Breton squad that handed them two defeats last weekend. Bathurst could be playing desperate hockey tonight, and the Eagles will have to match that desperation and intensity. The Titan played last night without Thomas Beauregard and Mathieu Perreault, the latter being out of the lineup for undisclosed disciplinary reasons, but they will both be back on board for Bathurst tonight.

My best guess at a starting goaltender for Bathurst is 16-year-old Antoine Tardif, as he mopped up in relief of Brant Miller last night in Saint John. For Cape Breton, maybe tonight would be a good night to go back to David Davenport.

Game time is 7:00 PM, and as always, you can listen in on AM 1270 CJCB, where Ken MacNeil will have all the play-by-play.

Bourdon makes Screaming Eagle debut as Cape Breton visits the PEI Rocket

2007-01-18T18:02:00.000-08:00

It's been over ten days since the blockbuster news of the trade for Luc Bourdon has been announced, and it has created quite a buzz around the hockey community. Fans have been eagerly awaiting big Luc's debut in the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles' black, white, and gold colours, but had to be patient while the defenceman rested up at home after helping Canada win gold at the World Junior Championship in Sweden.

Tomorrow night, for those fans who will be watching the Eastlink TV broadcast of the CB-PEI game, THE WAIT IS OVER. Bourdon will be in the lineup for the first time ever as a Screaming Eagle as the Eagles take on the Rocket at the Charlottetown Civic Centre for their first game of a four-game road trip that also takes the team to Bathurst for a Saturday night tilt, and to Moncton for Sunday afternoon and Tuesday night dates.

For the first time, fans will get to see that "big three" on the blueline of Bourdon, JC Sawyer, and Oskars Bartulis. Fans should also anticipate seeing new powerplay units, as Bourdon will certainly fit into the powerplay mix somewhere.

Bourdon may not be the only player making his Eagle debut tomorrow night. I can't honestly say I am 100% sure, but I've heard that it's a possibility that Beau Prokopetz may be ready to go for tomorrow night's game. The last I had heard, he was only day-to-day with his "upper body injury", and there have been rumblings that he may be ready by tomorrow. If not, I am sure that we will see him sometime pretty soon.

As exciting as it is to see these guys finally suiting up for the Screaming Eagles, fans must remember that it has been a while since either has played in a game, and that it may take a period or two at least for these guys to get their timing back and to get comfortable. Also, there will most likely be that inevitable period of adjustment to new systems and new teammates. Maybe it will take a couple of games for our new additions to become fully integrated into the Eagle lineup, so do not expect miracles from either of them tomorrow night! But it's still quite exciting just to see the new additions, especially Bourdon, wearing the jersey.

Cape Breton enters tomorrow night's contest on a three-game winning streak, and boasting a record of 30-13-2, good for second overall in the Quebec League, six points back of Lewiston for first in the division and in the league. PEI enters the game coming off of a pretty strong four-game road trip, where they had a 2-2 split against four tough teams. The Eagles are 5-1 against the Rocket so far this season, and have won the last five matchups. Could PEI be "due" to surprise us tomorrow night? We will have to be ready.

Ondrej Pavelec should get the start in goal for Cape Breton after his clutch play in helping the Eagles defeat Bathurst this past Saturday night. Antoine Lafleur will certainly get the start for the Rocket.

Rumours are abound that star PEI defenceman Marc-Andre Gragnani has been sent home to get his head together after an alleged incident on their most recent road trip, and that he may not be in the lineup tomorrow night as a result. However, at this point this is nothing more than a rumour; it has not been backed up by any real reliable sources yet. I still figured it was worth mentioning; we'll find out for real when it's time to drop the puck. Not that the presence or absence of this player affects the way the Eagles approach this game.

Once again, this game IS being broadcast live on Eastlink TV, so be sure to tune in to get your first look at Luc Bourdon (and perhaps Beau Prokopetz as well) in a Screaming Eagles' uniform. Was this guy worth giving up Mark Barberio? We begin the process of finding out tomorrow night.

Eagles come from behind to nudge Titan 5-4 in Saturday night thriller

2007-01-15T04:58:00.000-08:00

In what could safely be considered the most exciting game of the season to date from C200, the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles used a wild comeback to erase a 4-2 third period deficit and score a 5-4 win over the Acadie-Bathurst Titan to sweep the weekend series in front of approximately 3600 loud and boisterous fans.

In the most dramatic finish yet this season, hats rained from the stands when Cam Fergus's hat trick goal tied the game with exactly 3:00 remaining on the clock, and with just 45 seconds left in regulation, captain James Sheppard came through with an awesome individual effort for the winner to send C200 fans into a state of pandemonium.

Things weren't looking good for Cape Breton in the early going. The Eagles trailed 2-0 after the first period, were being outshot 14-7 by the visitors, and in general didn't quite look like themselves. Credit has to go to the Titan, who were able to put Friday night's whipping behind them and come out very strong in Saturday night's contest despite having only 15 skaters (three Bathurst players were suspended as a result of Friday night's incidents). Bathurst also got a couple of lucky breaks in period one, as their first goal stood despite appearing to have been kicked in, and a Cape Breton goal was waved off due to a quick whistle by referee Thane Arseneault. However, perhaps it was for the better that the Eagles got those two bad breaks in period one. Without them, maybe the game is tied 1-1 after the first period, and maybe the urgency that came with the 2-0 deficit would not have been there to make the changes necessary in their game that saw them play so much better in periods two and three.

Cape Breton came out with much more jump in period two, but still trailed 3-2 at period's end, the third goal against coming as a result of the team getting into some penalty trouble. Fergus had both Eagle goals in the middle frame, his second being a bit of a milestone - his 40th goal of the season. Fergus became just the fourth Eagle to score 40 goals in a season, joining Ryan Walsh, Dominic Noel, and Kevin Asselin. Despite the fact that the Eagles were still trailing, you could feel the tide turning, and many fans were optimistic during the second intermission that the team was going to get it done in period three.

The final stanza got off to a rough start, however, as a James Sheppard hooking penalty saw Titan sniper Thomas Beauregard pot a powerplay goal to restore Bathurst's two goal advantage. The Eagles responded right away, however, as Dean Ouellet's 29th goal of the season kind of came out of nowhere to pull Cape Breton right back to within one, with plenty of time (16:17) left to notch the equalizer.

In the next ten minutes, the Eagles had two powerplays as golden opportunities to tie things up. They had many glorious chances on these powerplays, but just couldn't bury one. On the second powerplay, TWICE the puck squirted out of the zone and gave Beauregard, the league's leading scorer, shorthanded breakaways. Both times, Cape Breton goaltender Ondrej Pavelec (making his first start since returning from the WJC) came up absolutely huge, robbing the 57-goal man. Those saves would turn out to be the difference in the hockey game, as without them, it would almost certainly have been lights out for the Screaming Eagles.

Those clutch stops set the stage for Fergus's game-tying goal, and for Sheppard's dramatic winner, and as I said, C200 was absolutely rocking. It was probably the most jubilant atmosphere seen at the Nest yet this season. A real gutsy, character victory, the kind the Eagles needed to show that they were capable of pulling off after scoring so many relatively easy wins at home this year.

The top line of Ouellet-Fergus-McIlveen had a huge night, as the three members of that trio finished with four points each.

With the win, Cape Breton swept the weekend series against a very good Bathurst Titan hockey club, and improved their overall record to 30-13-2 for 62 points. They now sit six points back of the Lewiston MAINEiacs, with neither team holding any games in hand. The Eagles went into the weekend nine points back of Lewiston, so leaving the weekend six points behind is pretty good.

After the news of the big deadline trades, I am sure that quite a few curious fans checked out an Eagles game for the first time this season, and it's great that the team gave a big reason to come back with this thrilling win. Next up for Cape Breton is a four-game road trip through the Maritimes, which will feature the Eagle debut of the much-hyped Luc Bourdon. The first game of this trip (and the first game for Bourdon) will be on Friday night at PEI, and the game will be televised live on Eastlink; be sure to tune in to catch this guy's first game as a Screaming Eagle!

Eagles use potent PP to whip Titan 7-2 in wild affair from C200!

2007-01-13T09:07:00.000-08:00

One of the main complaints from fans this season has been a real lack of rough stuff in games at C200 so far this season. People have been generally very happy with the team's performance, but some felt that there was something missing from most of the games this season.......... the general complaint was that too many games resembled a tea party more than they resembled a hockey game.

Maybe all that had to be done to correct this problem was to bring in the Eagles' long-time blood rivals, the Acadie-Bathurst Titan.

Fans were treated to a wild and wooly affair last night, featuring four fights, and seeing three different Titan players given major penalties and game ejections for things OTHER than fighting. Defenceman Brad Tesink received an aggressor major and game misconduct for jumping Cape Breton's Alex Quesnel in the second period. Defenceman Nicolas Sigouin received a match penalty for attempt to injure after the very bizarre move of kneeing Eagle blueliner Spencer Corcoran during a third period fight. And Titan captain Jordan Clendenning received an aggressor major and game ejection of his own for a brutal sucker punch on young Quesnel, who had a rough go of things last night it seemed!

The game also featured two heavyweight bouts between Cape Breton's Brad Gallant and the Titan's Charles Bergeron.

Add it all up, and the Eagles ended up with 15 powerplays on the night, while Bathurst enjoyed just two. That considered, it should not be surprising that Cape Breton walked away with an easy 7-2 victory over what is usually a very tough team to take the two points from. The Eagles scored five of those seven goals on the powerplay.

Dean Ouellet had two powerplay goals for Cape Breton, while Chris Culligan and Cam Fergus had a pair each as well, including one each on the powerplay. Paul McIlveen scored the other Eagle PP goal. James Sheppard was first star of the night, finishing with four assists to continue to be red hot. Newcomer Jonathan Laberge had a successful debut with the Eagles, recording an assist and going an incredible 16-4 on faceoffs!

Speaking of Sheppard, there was a scary moment early in the third, as Sheppard was nailed seemingly shoulder-first into an open bench door, and looked to be in a lot of pain as he crawled on all fours into the bench. Props to Brad Gallant for coming out and fighting the culprit right away, although I didn't think it was an intentionally dirty hit.

Speaking of players sticking up for teammates, huge credit also has to go to Robert Slaney, who showed exemplary leadership (to quote someone else I was talking to) in immediately dropping the gloves with Clendenning for his sucker punch on Quesnel. In fact, the Eagles as a team did a great job of sticking up for each other last night, proving that there's more to them than just fancy goals and a great powerplay. In a night where the team put on another great offensive show, the most rewarding part may have been to see the boys stand up for each other and show some real heart and gumption.

All in all, a very entertaining night at the rink. The fans were loud, proud, and raucous, and C200 had an atmosphere like it hasn't had all year. With all of the recent excitement and buzz about the team in light of the recent trades, it was a great time for a really entertaining game to occur.

With the win, the Eagles improve to 29-13-2 on the season, including an impressive 18-3 record on home ice. Lewiston lost in overtime to the St. John's Fog Devils last night, so Cape Breton gained a point on them, moving to within eight points of the division leaders while still holding a game in hand.

The two rivals go at it again tonight......... same time, same place. We're entering the stretch drive, people, the time of year where contending teams really start to hit their stride and fine-tune their game for the playoffs, so come one come all out to the rink and catch this very entertaining and high-tempo Eagle hockey club as they surge towards the playoffs!

Newcomer Laberge joins the fold as Eagles host Titan for first of two on Friday night

2007-01-11T17:34:00.000-08:00

It should be the first of two dandies tonight at C200, as the Acadie-Bathurst Titan make their first visit of the year to C200 for a two-game weekend mini-series against the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles.

This will be a really good challenge for the Eagles, who have been playing a lot of games against weaker and mid-pack teams over the past month or so. The Titan aren't far behind Cape Breton in the standings, and always seem to match up well against us and give us tough games. The two teams met for two very intense games in Bathurst back in October, with the Titan taking the first game 5-4 in OT and Cape Breton winning the rematch 8-2. Ever since those two games, I have been looking forward to a chance to see this team at C200. Over the years, the rivalry between these two has been great.

Tonight's game is the first chance for fans to see newcomer Jonathan Laberge, acquired from the Saint John Sea Dogs in exchange for prospect Matthew Stoddard. Laberge is a versatile, two-way center who is good on faceoffs and can score a bit, and should start tonight centering the third line, as long as everyone else is healthy. As for the other two newcomers, Beau Prokopetz won't be in the lineup tonight due to a minor "upper body injury", and fans will have to wait to see the much-hyped Luc Bourdon make his Eagles debut, as he is still home in Shippigan, NB, resting after helping Canada win a gold medal at the World Juniors. He joins the team on Monday.

Tonight's game also marks the return of goaltender Ondrej Pavelec, whose last game with the team was back on December 1st. Pavelec was also away at the World Junior Hockey Championship. He has been back practicing with the team since Tuesday, so I would guess that he will get the start tonight.

The Bathurst Titan boast a couple of very exciting stars that will be a real treat for fans to watch this weekend, in the unbelievable duo of Thomas Beauregard and Mathieu Perreault. Beauregard leads the league in scoring with 94 points, including an absolutely amazing 55 goals. I'm not sure I can ever remember a player in this league over the past ten years or so having 55 goals at this point of the season. This is a guy who, if he keeps it up at his current pace, could become the first QMJHLer since the 1980s to hit 80 goals in a season. Perreault is no slouch either; he is possibly the smartest player in the league, and is one of the very best playmakers. He sits third in league scoring, and was the leader before going away to the Canadian WJC tryout camp, where he missed a few games and fell back a little bit. These guys are possibly the best one-two punch in the league, and they can defeat teams all by themselves. The Eagles will not be able to completely hold them off of the scoresheet this weekend, but if they can keep them reasonably in check, their chances are pretty good, as the rest of the Titan team is just average.

As well, although he is not a superstar like Perreault or Beauregard, it should also be noted that the Titan recently picked up former Eagle Lucas Labelle, and he should be in the lineup for them tonight.

Cape Breton enters this game with a record of 28-13-2 for 58 points, tied for second overall in the league. They sit nine points back of the league and division-leading Lewiston MAINEiacs, but now hold a game in hand on their American rivals. Lewiston plays tonight in St. John's, NL. The Titan are 25-16-1-2 for 53 points, fourth in the East Division.

One concern for the Eagles could be a shortage in bodies on the blueline. With Mark Barberio gone and with Bourdon and Prokopetz not ready to play yet, the Eagles go into this weekend's games with only five natural defencemen. Whether or not they'll just go with the five defencemen they have or maybe drop Robert Slaney back on the blueline as they've done earlier in the year, I don't know. Hopefully this doesn't pose too huge a problem against the very high-flying Titan.

All in all, with the traditional rivalry and intensity between the Eagles and Bathurst, the debut of Jonathan Laberge, the return of Ondrej Pavelec, and the opportunity to see two of the league's most exciting players in Thomas Beauregard and Mathieu Perreault, there are plenty of reasons for fans to be excited about tonight's game.

A reminder to fans that tickets to both games this weekend are being offered as a special reduced rate package if they are bought together. Save some money and see a great weekend series between two long-time rivals!

Let's not forget where this team came from

2007-01-09T18:24:00.000-08:00

Amongst all the hype and craziness, I'm hoping that fans don't forget where this team came from.

This team's roots were grown in the ashes of the 2004 disaster. Remember the 2004-2005 team that so many predicted to finish dead last in the league? Thanks to excellent team chemistry and extremely hard work, that scrappy bunch led by the likes of Adam Pardy, Guillaume Demers, and Neil Smith overcame a 1-7-3 start to give us a great season, finishing 32-27-8-3; a solid above-.500 record despite being in the first year of rebuilding.

There was a very nice bond formed between the team and the regular fans that year, and never have I seen an Eagles team whose hard work was so appreciated by the fans as that year's team. I still remember the team doing a lap of the rink after the final regular season game, raising their sticks to the fans; that doesn't happen every year.

We had a few great rookies that we wisely gave a ton of ice time and used in all situations (PP, PK, final minute while down a goal or up a goal, etc) even though they were only 16 and 17, allowing their development to really accelerate, and allowing these guys to really become "clutch" type hockey players. We know these guys now as impact veterans named James Sheppard, Dean Ouellet, and Chris Culligan. It was clear that the next contending Eagles team would be built around these gems found in the 04 draft.

We now have a very deep and talented veteran roster, a big-name hired gun superstar in Bourdon, and there's a lot of excitement and buzz about the team. It kind of feels like 2004 all over again. There are going to be a lot of casual observers who are going to treat it like 2004 all over again. It shouldn't be, but that's how some people are going to treat it.

I just wanted to talk about the 2004-2005 team to remind everyone where this team really came from. Hard work on the ice, humble beginnings in the wake of a disastrous attempt at a run, team chemistry, and a great core that still remains with the team. Not big stars or bright lights or crazy expectations, which you're going to hear a lot of over the next couple of months.

It might be easy to forget what got the team in the position to make such a run this year in the first place, now that we have such a pile of riches on paper, that's all.

Just wanted to keep things in perspective for when you hear the wild predictions and expectations that are bound to be heard all over the CBRM over the next couple little while.

Blockbuster day for Eagles and their fans; a look at what exactly was done

2007-01-08T17:37:00.000-08:00

Today was certainly the most exciting day for the Eagles and their fans in quite some time. Players, fans, family, billets, and staff went into today's trading deadline expecting to see moves made to improve this year's edition of the Screaming Eagles, and boy did they get what they bargained for. Without any further preamble, let's look a little more in-depth at each of the three trades made by GM Pascal Vincent this morning.

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Trade #1

To Moncton: Mark Barberio (D, 16 years old), Cape Breton's 1st round pick in 2007.

To Cape Breton: Luc Bourdon (D, 19 years old).

This was obviously the "main event", the big blockbuster that was anticipated for weeks and weeks. It sent shockwaves throughout the local hockey community when it was announced, and it was the talk of many an office in Sydney today.

Luc Bourdon needs little introduction to most of you who are reading this blog, but I'll give one anyway. Luc was the #3 overall pick in the 2003 Q Midget Draft by the Val d'or Foreurs, and was the #10 overall pick by the Vancouver Canucks in the 2005 NHL Entry Draft. He spent two and a half seasons with the Foreurs before going away to the 2005-2006 World Junior Hockey Championship, where he not only helped Team Canada win a gold medal, but also was named to the tournament all-star team. During his time away with Team Canada, he was traded to the Memorial Cup host Moncton Wildcats in a blockbuster deal that sent Brad Marchand (among others) the other way. He was a member of the Wildcats' 2006 President's Cup champion and played for the Cats at the Memorial Cup, although his effectiveness was limited by the fact that he was just coming back from a broken fibula or ankle (I can't quite remember which).

Luc started off this season in the NHL with the Canucks, but after a handful of games was sent back to junior for one final season. He absolutely dominated during his short time in Moncton this year. To illustrate, his +17 was tops on the Wildcats by 10, and was achieved in only 13 games! To me, that is a staggering indication of just how much this guy can dominate at this level. After his brief return to Moncton, Luc was off to the WJC again, and once again helped Canada win a gold medal at the event.

Bourdon is a physical, mean, hard-hitting defenceman who is a very good skater, very mobile, moves the puck well, has a very good shot, and can play both ends of the ice (including powerplay and penalty kill). In short, there isn't much that this guy can't do when he's healthy. He has championship experience (two WJC gold medals and a President's Cup ring), Memorial Cup experience, World Junior experience, and NHL experience. He will be counted upon to use this experience to be a calming leadership force on the Eagle blueline and in the Eagle dressing room. He will be counted upon to be that dominant defenseman that we needed to take the pressure off of JC Sawyer and Oskars Bartulis. In short, Luc Bourdon was possibly THE most coveted player available in the Christmas trading period........... certainly the most coveted defenceman.............. and the Eagles went out and got him. He is almost certainly the most high-profile acquisition the Eagles have ever made.

HOWEVER

The Eagles paid a very high price.

Perhaps not as high a price as some of the rumours were suggesting might be required to land Bourdon, but losing Barberio, our first round pick in the 2006 Q midget draft, definitely stings. We have all seen Mark Barberio and we all know how good he is now and that the sky is the limit in terms of how good he may be. He is a real blue-chipper and has the potential to be one of the very best defencemen in the league someday, if not THE best. If the Eagles fail to reach their playoff potential this year, or if Bourdon is a disappointment in any way, it will be very painful for fans to have to watch Barberio develop into likely a superstar in a division rival's colours. However, that is the price that you have to pay if you want to acquire someone of Bourdon's calibre. Obviously, the Eagles decided that such a risky move was worth it. We will know come playoff time whether or not they were right.

Bourdon could be the final piece of the puzzle for Cape Breton this season, or this huge blockbuster deal could end up being something the Eagles regret in the long term. However, right now, there is no denying that the acquisition of Bourdon is just cause for great excitement among Eagles fans and the Cape Breton hockey community in general, and it should create quite a buzz around the team for the remainder of the season. On paper, we now have a defence that may be second to none in the league. Whether or not that translates into having the best defence in the league on the ice remains to be seen.

All we can do is sit back now and watch how everything unfolds. At the very least, the Bourdon acquisition signals that the Eagles are undoubtedly GOING FOR IT this season, and that in itself is very exciting.

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Trade #2

To the Saint John Sea Dogs: Matthew Stoddard (winger, 16 years old).

To the Eagles: Jonathan Laberge (center, 19 years old).

In this trade, the Eagles get a versatile centreman who has been playing his trade with the Saint John Sea Dogs for the past year and a half. Laberge has 16 goals and 33 points in 39 games to date for the Sea Dogs this season. He is a hard-working, intense, two-way player who can play both the powerplay and the penalty kill. He is gritty and is tough to play against. He is also good on faceoffs (52.50% to date this season, on 1021 draws, the most on the Sea Dogs).

Laberge will likely start out as an upgrade at the third line centre position, although he is good enough to play on the second line as well in the event of any tinkering with line combinations. With his grit, attention to defense, intensity, and decent scoring ability, he really fits the type of player we were looking for. Most importantly, our team was very much in need of another strong faceoff man. With all of the hype about Bourdon, do not forget about this pretty solid acquisition.

We are giving up Matthew Stoddard, who was our 2nd round pick (35th overall) in the 2006 Q midget draft. As you may recall, we had actually traded up (traded a 3rd and a 4th rounder) to acquire the pick used to select Stoddard, but he had a disappointing training camp and surprisingly did not make this year's team. Matthew is still a very solid Q league prospect, scoring at a clip of almost two points per game with Cole Harbour Major Midget, but it was felt that he was a price we were willing to pay to acquire Laberge. The Eagles have now given up both of their top two picks from the 06 draft (Barberio and Stoddard).

In all, the Eagles add some depth at forward at the sacrifice of a prospect.

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Trade #3

To the Drummondville Voltigeurs: Cape Breton's 3rd round pick in the 2007 midget draft.

To the Eagles: Beau Prokopetz (D, 19 years old).

In this trade, the Eagles (1) add further depth to their defensive corps (2) address a need for physicality on the blueline.

Beau Prokopetz is a stay-at-home defenseman who is reliable in his own end and is VERY physical. The league keeps track of hits on their statistics page, and Beau ranks #11 overall in the league with 103 "good hits" (whatever their definition of a "good hit" is!) in 33 games played.

He is not flashy, is not so much a "star player", and will not be counted upon to produce offense or play the powerplay, but he is steady, reliable, can play the PK, and adds a dimension to our defence that perhaps we were a little bit lacking in before; a real punisher along the boards, in open ice (apparently his specialty), and in front of the net. The Eagles lost three very physical defencemen from last season (Vincent Zaore, Charlie Fontaine, David Victor), and while this year's team possesses very good defencemen of all different kinds, they were kind of lacking that one real bruiser. With this trade, Vincent believes that they now have him.

A third round pick is a quality draft pick, but in this blogger's opinion, it will be worth it if Prokopetz delivers as advertised, especially considering that the Eagles do have another third round pick to fall back on (acquired for Vincent Zaore back in June from the Victoriaville Tigres).

It should also be noted that Beau played last season for the Bathurst Titan club that eliminated the Eagles from the playoffs in round two. It will be nice to have him on our side this time around.

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All in all, Cape Breton used the final day of the trade period to address depth at forward, and to BIG TIME address depth on defence. No longer do fans have to worry about Sawyer and Bartulis wearing down due to being overworked come playoff time. The team now has many more options for point men on the powerplay (Sawyer, Bourdon, Bartulis, McIlveen, Swit). The team now has four pretty good faceoff men (Fergus, Sheppard, Laberge, JC Gauthier). The team is now extremely deep and talented........... on paper.

The key will be for all of this "awesomeness" on paper to actually translate into a great team on the ice. Fans remember full well in 2004, how a great team on paper totally flopped on the ice come playoff time. The team had no chemistry, and that's the biggest challenge laid out before the players and especially the coaching staff for the rest of this season; to make sure that this new-look edition of the Eagles finds and maintains the right chemistry, and to make sure that nobody gets overconfident, which is easy to do with such a talented lineup.

Whether or not Pascal Vincent, his staff, and his team are up to this challenge over the next number of months, once again, only time will tell.

But for now, even if fans are (rightfully) wary about losing a player of Barberio's calibre, it is pretty much impossible for fans not to be excited about the rest of this season.

The floor is open, as always, to thoughts and opinions.

IN OTHER BREAKING NEWS

2007-01-08T10:00:00.000-08:00

Two more official trades to announce:

The Eagles acquire 19 year old forward JONATHAN LABERGE from the Saint John Sea Dogs in exchange for 16-year-old prospect MATTHEW STODDARD.

The Eagles acquire 19 year old defenceman BEAU PROKOPETZ from Drummondville in exchange for their 3rd round pick in the 2007 draft.

ANALYSIS OF ALL TRADES TO COME LATER ON THIS EVENING. This blogger is presently at work!

BREAKING NEWS: LUC BOURDON AN EAGLE

2007-01-08T09:44:00.000-08:00

According to RDS.ca:

http://www.rds.ca/lhjmq/chroniques/220603.html

The Cape Breton Screaming Eagles have acquired 19-year-old defenceman Luc Bourdon from the Moncton Wildcats in exchange for 16-year-old defenceman Mark Barberio and their 2007 1st round pick.

COMMENT AND DEBATE AWAY.

DEADLINE DAY

2007-01-08T05:36:00.000-08:00

As someone said to me earlier, today might be the most anticipated day in Eagles' hockey in a long time. Fans, players, and management alike are all quite eager to find out what exactly the final edition of our hockey club is going to look like, and I'm sure most have now grown tired of rumours and speculation and are interested only in learning the facts. We have to wait just a few more hours. Will that big trade with Moncton go down, in any form? Will we make a trade nobody saw coming? Will there be no trades at all? STAY TUNED.

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In their last game before the trade period, Saturday night at the Moncton Coliseum, the Screaming Eagles rebounded from their loss in Halifax with a gutsy 6-5 overtime win over the Moncton Wildcats. This was a back-and-forth game in which the lead changed hands a number of times, and things weren't looking good for Cape Breton when they trailed 5-4 late in the third period, but former Wildcat Oskars Bartluis managed to burn his former team with both the tying goal and the game winner in overtime to give the Eagles a much-needed victory after their upsetting loss the night before. Bartulis's overtime winner was a bit of a lucky one. His shot looked to be going over the net, but Moncton defenceman Nick Emanuele stuck a hand out to try and glove it down and ended up gloving it into his own net.

James Sheppard continued to be absolutely scorching hot for the Eagles, as he notched a hat trick in this game, his third hat trick of the season. He now has an absolutely unbelievable 11 goals in his last five hockey games. As well, a lot of credit has to go to Scott Brannon and Chris Culligan. Despite most likely playing with trade rumours on their minds (both have been frequent subjects of rumours), Brannon ended up notching three assists, and Culligan scored a goal and helped out on another. Dave Davenport earned the win in goal, improving his record to 8-2 in his role as #1 in the absence of Ondrej Pavelec.

The Eagles go into the trade period with a record of 28-13-2 for 58 points, tied for 2nd overall in the division and in the league, but seven points behind the league-leading Lewiston MAINEiacs. The Eagles sit at 1st overall in goals scored, and 2nd overall in Goals Against Average. Their powerplay ranks 2nd in the league, while their penalty kill is tied for 4th. All of these figures suggest a team that is contending for a league title, and today we will find out just how much (or how little) the Eagles improve their chances, and just how much the team gives up (or doesn't) to get a deal done.

As already said, today is one of the biggest days in years for the Eagles and their fans. In the event of any Eagle trades today, they will be announced on here immediately after they become official.

Eagles blow 3-0 lead in discouraging 6-4 loss to Mooseheads

2007-01-06T10:21:00.000-08:00

Last night at the Halifax Metro Centre was one to forget for our Cape Breton Screaming Eagles.

The team built up a commanding 3-0 lead after 6:47 of play on goals by Paul McIlveen, James Sheppard (on a ridiculous individual effort), and Nick MacNeil (as he continues his march towards a 20 goal rookie year).

After that, however, the Eagles seemed to let up and fall asleep a bit, and matters weren't helped by some serious penalty troubles the team got itself into. By the end of the second period, Halifax had clawed its way back into the game and tied it 3-3, and they had Cape Breton on their heels.

Sheppard scored his second of the game on the powerplay early in the third period (giving him nine goals in his last five games, making him easily the hottest Eagle right now) to regain the lead for Cape Breton, but the wheels completely fell off in the final ten minutes. Goals by Andrew Bodnarchuk and Ryan Hillier on harmless-looking point shots that either went through crowds or were deflected put the Mooseheads ahead for the first time, and for good. An empty netter in the final seconds sealed the deal, and the comeback was complete in front of a raucous crowd of over 9400 Halifax Metro Centre fans.

The turning point in this game seemed to be a series of fights, mostly instigated by Cape Breton, shortly after the Eagles had built up their 3-0 lead. These fights were damaging to the Eagles for two reasons. #1, the fights sparked the Mooseheads and gave them some energy, after they had looked VERY lifeless in falling behind 3-0 in the first seven minutes of the game. #2, and perhaps more importantly, the Eagles lost two forwards (Scott Brannon and Brendon MacDonald) to game misconducts as a result of these fights. The consequence of this was that the team's forward lines were quite messed up for the rest of the game, as head coach Pascal Vincent never did seem to find the proper combinations to make up for the losses of those two players. The rest of the game, the forward lines the Eagles were throwing out there clearly lacked chemistry, and that lack of chemistry more than made up for the difference in raw talent between the Eagles and the Mooseheads.

In essence, those fights (perhaps unnecessary when the team was up 3-0) seemed to turn the game around for the Mooseheads last night.

Why were the Eagle players so eager to engage in these fights? The team has hardly fought all season. Perhaps it was a reaction to the previous game, when coach Vincent publicly punished defenceman Jason Swit for failing to fight Halifax's PJ Corsi after he had hit Brendon MacDonald from behind. It is quite possible that the players that fought for the Eagles last night overreacted to the message being sent, and fought when it was probably not a good idea to fight.

Fighting-related theories aside, the fact remains that the Mooseheads were simply the better team in the second and third periods, and that alone made the Screaming Eagles deserving of the loss last night. Late first period penalty problems (again resulting in part from a fight) did not help Cape Breton's cause either, as going on the penalty kill for so long killed the momentum the team had built up in mounting a 3-0 lead.

All in all, it is quite discouraging to once again manage to lose to a Halifax team much lower than us in the standings after defeating them so easily in the previous matchup of the home-and-home set. Sadly, this has been a trend all year in two-game sets between the two teams. Cape Breton wins one game easily, and then somehow manages to lose the other. It happened again this time around.

The most important thing now is how the team reacts to last night's loss, possibly the most frustrating and demoralizing to date this season. Cape Breton has to remember everything it has done right lately in going 10-1-1 in the twelve games prior to last night's result. Hard as it may be to forget a game like last night's, they simply have to put it behind themselves and move forward, as an important matchup with the Moncton Wildcats looms tonight. This matchup is made so important by the fact that the Wildcats actually passed Cape Breton in the East Division standings last night, by virtue of their 4-3 win over the St. John's Fog Devils.

Moncton is a team with average talent that is very scrappy, has great team chemistry, and is extremely well-coached. Cape Breton has defeated the Wildcats in both matchups so far this season, but neither of them was in the confines of the Moncton Coliseum, where the Cats have been so difficult to beat for the past three or four years.

Almost every team has a few demoralizing losses during the season. But the best teams find a way to bounce back. Let's see what our Eagles' team is made of tonight. Let's see how the players and coaching staff bounce back in the face of a stiff challenge from the Wildcats. It's about turning a negative into a positive. Last night's game was a negative, but embracing the challenge of showing a lot of character and rebounding could be a very rewarding positive.

That's all I'll say going into tonight's game.

Eagles @ Moose on Eastlink TV tonight

2007-01-05T06:48:00.000-08:00

The Cape Breton Screaming Eagles, 10-1-1 in their last 12 hockey games, take to the ice in Halifax tonight in their first of two weekend road games (the Eagles play in Moncton tomorrow night against the Wildcats). The game also serves as the back end of a post-holiday home-and-home stand with the Mooseheads, with the Eagles having won the first matchup 7-2 at C200 on Wednesday night. Cape Breton enters this game with a record of 27-12-2 for 56 points, good for second place overall and second in the East Division. The club continues to trail the league-leading Lewiston MAINEiacs by five points. Lewiston is at home to the Rimouski Oceanic tonight.

Tonight should be a closer game than the last meeting between the two teams, as the Mooseheads will certainly want to come out strong in front of their home fans after being dominated so thoroughly on C200 ice on Wednesday night. Having said that, this is still a team that the Eagles should beat. Each of the three two-game sets between the two teams this season has resulted in a split, and given where the two teams are in the standings and in the building cycle, it's high time that the Eagles take both games of a two-game set from the Mooseheads.

Lineups should be pretty much the same as they were on Wednesday night, including starting goaltenders David Davenport and Roger Kennedy. The only major lineup difference on either team is that Halifax will see the debut of newly-acquired overager Jean-Sebastien Cote, picked up yesterday in a trade with the Chicoutimi Sagueneends. Cote is an energetic two-way player and effective third liner, and should add some spark to the Mooseheads' lineup. He centered the third line on the 2005 President's Cup champion and Memorial Cup finalist Rimouski Oceanic.

The most important thing to note about tonight's game is that it is being broadcast live on Eastlink Television. This is a rare opportunity for fans to watch the Eagles play on the road from the comfort of their homes. Eastlink does an excellent job of broadcasting QMJHL hockey games, so be sure to tune in, you will enjoy it!

Once again, the main thing for the Eagles tonight is to avoid getting too overconfident after the easy win on Wednesday night, and to be ready to match the intensity that Halifax is likely to come out with after getting embarassed so badly.

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It has been announced by the team that defenceman Charlie Pens will be out four to six weeks at the very least with that concussion sustained on Dec. 28 against the Saint John Sea Dogs. It is very much up in the air as to whether or not Pens will return to hockey at all this season. We wish him the best of luck in his recovery.

As well, it should be noted that rookies Stephen Ceccanese and Mickey MacDonald have sat out three consecutive hockey games apiece as healthy scratches, an interesting fact considering that the trading and roster deadlines are fast approaching.

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Three more times this season, the Eagles will play back-to-back home games against the same team (Jan 12/13 against the Bathurst Titan, Jan 26/27 against the Lewiston MAINEiacs, Feb 15/16 against the Saint John Sea Dogs). For each of these two-game sets, the Eagles plan to offer fans a special discount ticket package. You will be able to buy both games as a package, receiving a discount of $2.25 on each ticket, or $4.50 in total. This will especially come in handy when Bathurst and Lewiston come to town, as these games will be key divisional matchups for the Screaming Eagles.

That's all for now. Of course, the trade rumour mill is swirling faster and faster with each day, and we will know in just a few short days what exactly the final edition of the 2006-2007 Eagles will look like. Stay tuned!

Electrifying first period sends Eagles to another victory

2007-01-04T04:47:00.000-08:00

It was all about the first period last night at C200, as the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles took a 5-0 lead after the opening frame en route to an easy 7-2 win over their divisional counterparts, the Halifax Mooseheads. The opening stanza featured some of the most dominant play fans have seen from the Eagles all season, which is saying something given the team's 17-3 record on home ice. Included among these first period thrills were two of the prettiest goals of the season at C200 thus far; we'll get to those in a bit.

Etienne Breton opened the scoring when he took advantage of a key faceoff win by JC Gauthier and stepped into one from the point. His laserbeam shot picked the top left-hand corner for the Eagles' first goal of 2007. It's kind of interesting that, on a team with snipers like Cam Fergus and Paul McIlveen, the team's first goal of the season was scored by Charlie Pens and their first goal of 2007 was scored by Etienne Breton; two of the most unlikely of sources possible!

Cape Breton went ahead 2-0 a very short time later when, on a delayed penalty, the puck came back to JC Sawyer at the point, and his wrister from the point found its way through a screen, through Mooseheads goaltender Roger Kennedy, and in.

Soon afterwards, the Screaming Eagles found themselves on the penalty kill, and after goaltender David Davenport came up with a couple of big saves, we got to see one of the best individual efforts of the season from captain James Sheppard. Sheppard stole the puck around the Halifax blueline and walked in shorthanded against two or three Mooseheads. Two defenders were draped all over him, but he still couldn't be stopped. He took a slash and a high stick, and still didn't break stride. With a pair of Mooseheads almost quite literally hanging off of his back, Sheppard drove to the net and deked Kennedy silly for a shorthanded goal and a 3-0 lead. We have seen a lot of highlights at C200 so far this season, but in my humble opinion, this was the best individual effort we have seen all year. It's only too bad that TSN wasn't in attendance to put this one on its highlight reels!

With fans still in awe of Sheppard's incredible goal, Paul McIlveen scored one almost as pretty to make it 4-0 Cape Breton. After taking a long drop pass from Cam Fergus, McIlveen dipped and dove through the offensive zone, in and around defenders like a waterbug, before firing a laser right along the ice, off the post blocker side, and in. If Sheppard's goal was the best we've seen all year, this one was at least top ten in its own right!

After this goal, Halifax shook things up by replacing Kennedy with rookie Mark Yetman, who was making his first appearance in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League. The Eagles tested him early and often, and finally were able to make it 5-0, as some sustained pressure by the third line resulted in Robert Slaney scoring in a scramble. Cape Breton could have even led by more after the first period, as Dean Ouellet had a couple of near-misses on a late powerplay when parked in front of the net deflecting pucks.

The first period also featured a fight between the Eagles' Spencer Corcoran and Halifax's Bryce Swan. Corcoran went after Swan for a questionable hit on Eagle rookie Nick MacNeil.

Period two was rather uneventful, which is often the case after one team takes a 5-0 lead after the first, although it did see the teams trade goals. Cam Fergus snapped one home from the slot, like he's been doing all year, to make it 6-0, before Halifax newcomer Peter-James Corsi slid one home in a scramble to get the Mooseheads on the board. 6-1 Cape Breton after two.

In period three, Halifax made it 6-2 when Bryce Swan scored off of a Ryan Hillier pass on a two-on-one that was created when JC Sawyer was thought to have been interfered with at the offensive blueline, much to the ire of Screaming Eagles' coach Pascal Vincent. Cape Breton had one more thrill for the fans up their sleeves before they headed for the exits, as Brad Gallant would be awarded a penalty shot after being hauled down on a partial breakaway. With an opportunity to show how soft his hands are when they aren't a fist, Gallant did just that, scoring on a sensational deke to give the fans one last thing to cheer about before heading home with the two points. The crowd (and bench!) reaction for this goal was great, with much of the building hitting their feet in celebration, a somewhat rare occurrence at C200. Everyone appreciated the chance to see Brad Gallant look like Cam Fergus or Paul McIlveen if only for a moment! Who knows, maybe we have a secret weapon on our hands for the shootout. :P

Although the game was kind of over in the first period, it was still a fun night at the rink and a pretty good-sized crowd went home happy with a convincing victory over their historic rivals. For the third straight game, the Eagles put forth a complete, dominating effort. It was also nice to see the third and fourth lines get a lot of ice time and powerplay after the team went up 5-0, and young guys like JC Gauthier and Alex Quesnel looked great with this opportunity to play.

With the win, the Eagles improve to 27-12-2, including a mark of 10-1-1 in their last 12 hockey games. Their 56 points remain second overall in the league and in the East Division, five points behind the first place Lewiston MAINEiacs.

The Eagles next take to the ice in Halifax to complete this home-and-home stand on Friday night at 7:00 PM from the Halifax Metro Centre. This game will be televised live on Eastlink Television, so be sure to take advantage of a rare opportunity to see the Eagles play on the road.

Eagles host Mooseheads tonight in first game of 2007

2007-01-03T04:49:00.000-08:00

After a brief and well-deserved New Year's break, the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles are back in action tonight at C200 against their historical rival, the Halifax Mooseheads. Cape Breton enters the game with a record of 9-1-1 in their last eleven games, as well a 26-12-2 record overall, and looks to remain hot tonight in their first game of the year 2007.

The Eagles should enter tonight's game with pretty much the same lineup that earned them a 5-2 win over the PEI Rocket in their final game of 2006, with the only real question mark being whether or not third line right winger Brad Gallant will be back after sitting out the last game with some damage to his hand. Defenceman Charlie Pens remains out indefinitely with what looks to have been a concussion after being nailed by Brad's brother Brett Gallant of the Saint John Sea Dogs back on December 28. David Davenport should once again start in goal.

From the other side of the ice, the Halifax Mooseheads are a different squad than the one the Eagles faced six times in the first half, splitting the games 3-3. Halifax has made a number of trades over the past couple of weeks. To summarize...........

Out: Forwards Justin Saulnier and Kirk Forrest, defencemen Luciano Lommano and Philippe Poirier, and goaltender Jeremy Duchesne.

In: Forward Peter-James Corsi, defencemen Stephen Lund and Guillaume Monast, goaltender Mark Yetman.

The most significant of those roster moves is the departure of star goaltender Duchesne to the Val d'or Foreurs. This leaves career backup Roger Kennedy as the new #1 in Moose Country, and I expect him to start tonight. Lund and Monast add depth to the Moosehead defensive corps, which was that team's glaring weakness in the first half of the season. Corsi is a talented player who wasn't fitting in in Val d'or and so far seems to have been rejeuvenated a bit in Halifax.

Cape Breton will counter with the same effective units they have been using of late. A powerful scoring line of Ouellet-Fergus-McIlveen, a versatile two-way line of Culligan-Sheppard-Brannon, a gritty shutdown line of B MacDonald-Slaney-Gallant (or Quesnel if Gallant is unable to play), and a young energy unit composed of JC Gauthier, Nick MacNeil, and either Quesnel or a player like Mickey MacDonald/Stephen Ceccanese as a fourth line. Defensive pairings last game were JC Sawyer-Mark Barberio, Oskars Bartulis-Jason Swit, and Spencer Corcoran-Etienne Breton, with Daniel Fazzalari as the seventh D; they should be fairly similar tonight.

This lineup has been fairly constant all year, but with this being the last home game before the end of the Christmas trading period, tonight could be the last night that C200 fans see this lineup as is; the next time that the Eagles take to home ice, there could be a new face or two in the lineup, and there could be a player or two gone elsewhere.

As mentioned in an earlier blog, it is somewhat disappointing that the Eagles have only managed a split of the six games against the relatively weak Mooseheads so far this season. Therefore, a top performance is expected tonight from the Eagles. With the opposition tonight being a historic rival, and with some people still not having yet finished their holiday break, we could anticipate a decent crowd at the rink tonight, although certainly nothing like the packed house that watched last week's win over the Sea Dogs. To be quite blunt, most games between these two teams this year have been disappointingly dull affairs, with very little hatred or animosity of any kind. One staggering statistic is that there has been just one fight in the six meetings thus far. I for one really challenge the two teams to change all of this in tonight's game.

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In other news, goaltender Ondrej Pavelec and his Czech teammates were eliminated in the quarterfinals yesterday at the World Junior Championships, due to a 4-1 loss at the hands of Team Sweden. The loss ends what was somewhat of a disappointing tournament for Pavelec, and as Eagle fans, we have to hope that this does not damage too badly the confidence of our #1 goaltender. We all remember 2004, when goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury never really recovered from a World Junior disappointment, and come playoff time, was a shell of his true self. Let us hope that history does not repeat itself with Ondrej Pavelec. He needs to have a great second half here in Cape Breton and really get into a long-term groove for the first time this season. I am not totally sure at the moment when he will be back with the hockey club but it will certainly be posted in this blog the second that information is known.

A minor news item

2007-01-02T07:47:00.000-08:00

A small news item relating to the Eagles today:

Free agent defenceman Collin Carwardine, who was brought in from Ontario on a practice tryout basis, has decided to return home after not having yet been offered a spot on the Screaming Eagles. This puts an end to speculation that this player was going to fill the void on the Eagle blueline that could occur should Charlie Pens be out for an extended period of time.

In other news, the Eagles host the Halifax Mooseheads tomorrow night in the seventh matchup of the season between the two teams. The season series is tied at 3-3, which is a mildly disappointing result for Cape Breton so far considering where these two teams are in the standings. For that reason, nothing short of a win should be expected for tomorrow night.

There are only six days remaining in the midseason trade period, and the Eagles have yet to make any moves of major significance. Speculation should be very high over these last six days, as fans expect to see one or two new impact additions, guys who are not only good players but also good fits, into Screaming Eagle uniforms.

Up next will be a preview of tomorrow night's game against the Mooseheads.

Complete 60-minute effort; Eagles get solid 5-2 road win over Rocket

2006-12-31T12:27:00.000-08:00

In Charlottetown last night, a total team effort gave the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles a very well-deserved 5-2 win over the host PEI Rocket, who had won four straight going into last night's hockey game.

The Eagles got on the board early, as Paul McIlveen was found in the slot and snapped one in blocker side on PEI goaltender Antoine Lafleur. PEI would tie things up minutes later, however, as overager Guillaume Doucet put in his own rebound in a scramble.

Cape Breton would take the lead again thanks in large part to a miscue by PEI defencemen Pierre-Luc Lessard and Benoit Gervais. At the Eagles' blueline, Lessard tried to fire a D-to-D pass over to Gervais, but Gervais was not in position, and Cape Breton ended up breaking out on a four-on-two the other way. JC Sawyer fed James Sheppard, who one-timed a low drive home for his fifth goal in three periods, and a 2-1 Eagle lead after one period.

Period two did not get off to a good start for Cape Breton, as Tyler Hawes found Guillaume Doucet parked literally in the blue paint of David Davenport's crease, and the diminutive centre one-timed the pass through the five hole of the Eagle netminder to tie things at 2-2.

Shortly afterward, the Eagles regained the league, as JC Gauthier made an excellent backhand pass to find McIlveen parked at the side of the net; nobody else on the ice had picked up our overage sniper, and he had a wide open net to tuck home his second of the hockey game. Once again, what a pass by young JC Gauthier.

Midway through the period, the Eagles faced a stiff challenge, as they were nailed for two penalties at the same time, giving the Rocket a full 2:00-long two man advantage. The same three penalty killers - Chris Culligan, JC Sawyer, and Oskars Bartulis- killed the entire penalty, and deserve a ton of credit for their fine work. Culligan in particular was huge on this penalty kill; on at least three occasions, he was able to read the play and intercept Rocket passes that would have resulted in prime scoring chances. And of course, the old cliche is that your best penalty killer has to be your goaltender, and our David Davenport made several very good saves on this kill; his rebound control was key.

That penalty kill was made that much more important when the Eagles' Dean Ouellet was able to score just moments afterwards to give the team a much more comfortable 4-2 lead. Had we not killed that disadvantage off, it would have been 3-3 instead, and there is a big difference between 3-3 and 4-2, so that kill was definitely the most important part of the game for Cape Breton, the "turning point" if you will.

Alexandre Quesnel put the cherry on top of the sundae in the third with a great breakaway goal; he scored with a nifty backhand deke. The third period also featured a fight between the Eagles' Daniel Fazzalari (welcome back to the lineup by the way) and PEI's Greg Paynter. I can't lie about this one; Paynter won the fight extremely decisively, although Fazzalari was no worse for the wear.

On the topic of fighters, Brad Gallant sat this game out with badly bruised-up knuckles after his Thursday night fight with Saint John's David Stich.

All in all, this was an excellent road effort in which the Eagles seemed to be in their highest gear for pretty much the entire game. Their forechecking and aggressiveness were just too much for a Rocket team that looked tired and seemed able to only muster an average-or-so effort. As an Eagles' fan, one couldn't be much happier with the team's performance last night.

Cape Breton finishes off 2006 with an impressive 26-12-2 record, good for 54 points and second place overall in the league. The team still trails the Lewiston MAINEiacs by five points for first in the division and first overall; it seems like we have been trailing these guys by five points forever, and it's going to be quite hard to catch them.

The Eagles' next game is at home on Jan 3, 2007 against their provincial rival, the Halifax Mooseheads. Halifax has made several roster changes since the two teams last met up. Here is hoping that this upcoming matchup with the Mooseheads is substantially more entertaining than the two meetings between the two teams in Halifax before the Christmas break.

Happy New Year to all!

Sheppard runs amok for four goals as Eagles pound Sea Dogs before biggest crowd of the year

2006-12-29T05:27:00.000-08:00

In front of a near-capacity holiday season crowd of just under 4300 fans, many of whom were seeing the Screaming Eagles for their first time this season, the team left a pretty good impression with a convincing 7-1 victory over the second-year Saint John Sea Dogs.

James Sheppard was obviously the story of the night, scoring four goals to tie a team record. Other Eagles to have scored four goals in a game include Ryan Walsh, Philippe Tremblay, Pierre-Luc Emond, Francois-Pierre Guenette, and Cam Fergus. He had a couple of great chances to set a new team record with a fifth goal, as teammates were trying very hard to set him up for it, but he was robbed on a couple of occasions by Sea Dog goaltender Travis Fullerton, who played a respectable game despite the final score.

Other Eagle goal scorers were Cam Fergus, who with his goal managed to hit the 35-goal plateau before the New Year, Nick MacNeil, who continues to move closer to becoming the first Eagle rookie to ever score 20 goals in a season, and Dean Ouellet, who hit the 25-goal plateau with his powerplay marker.

Also having a big night for Cape Breton were Scott Brannon, Chris Culligan, and Paul McIlveen, all of whom finished the night with three assists.

Defencemen Oskars Bartulis and Etienne Breton were very welcome additions back to the lineup, and played well in their first games back after fairly long layoffs.

A rather large damper was put on the night, however, when defenceman Charlie Pens took a hit to the head from the Sea Dogs' Brett Gallant and struggled mightily to skate off the ice under his own power. Pens has a history of concussion problems, and it looked as though he may have sustained yet another one on this play; his future with the team, and in hockey, is in jeopardy, and it was very unfortunate to see happen. Here's hoping for all the best for Charlie, but things did not look good last night.

A fun night in front of the biggest crowd of the season was capped off with two dandy scraps, sending the fans home extra happy. Brad Gallant squared off with Saint John's David Stich, and after a spirited bout, left Stich bloodied. On the ensuing faceoff, Brad's brother Brett Gallant of Saint John made a beeline for Breton of the Eagles, and Breton did pretty well for himself considering that Gallant had a bit of a head start in the fight (and picked up the instigator penalty for his efforts).

A 7-1 victory, a four-goal night by one of the team's stars, and two spirited scraps in front of almost 4300 fans means a successful night for the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles last night, and more importantly, the victory enabled the team to improve to 25-12-2 for 52 points and move to within three points of the division and league-leading Lewiston MAINEiacs.

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To confirm rumours that have been circulating around, Francois Gauthier has indeed been traded to the Sea Dogs in exchange for a 5th round pick in the 2007 midget draft. Hopefully Francois can get more ice time in Saint John and can find the niche there that, for whatever reasons, he never really found here.

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A few trades were made around the league yesterday, the most notable two being:

1) Halifax traded overage goaltender Jeremy Duchesne to the Val d'or Foreurs in exchange for 18-year-old dman Guillaume Monast and a 3rd round pick in the 2008 midget draft. It is possible that that draft pick could end up going back to Val d'or for a player at the draft.

2) Shawinigan traded 19-year-old defenceman Jean-Philippe Paquet and a 5th round pick in the 2007 midget draft to the Baie-Comeau Drakkar in exchange for 17-year-old defenceman Adam Leblanc-Bourque and 17-year-old forward Francis Filion.

Both of these trades are relevant to the Eagles. The first one means that one of our main competitors for a league title, the Foreurs, just got a lot stronger in goal. The second one means that the Screaming Eagles now have one less potential impact defenceman available to them through the trade route; some thought that the Eagles were going to pick up Paquet for the stretch drive and playoff run, but now Cape Breton will have to look elsewhere for the veteran help on the blueline that so many fans believe that the club needs.

With these two moves having been made, more pressure is on coach and GM Pascal Vincent to start making the moves necessary to solidify this team for the stretch drive and playoffs before all of the impact players on the trade market are spoken for.

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Cape Breton's next game is Saturday night, December 30, in Charlottetown against the newly-tweaked PEI Rocket. The Rocket will be tough opposition, as they are rejeuvenated by the impact addition of Brett Morrison to their lineup. Cape Breton has also won the last four games against the Rocket, so PEI might be due for a few bounces against the Eagles. The team will have to be on their toes for this game for sure.

The boys are back in town

2006-12-27T14:51:00.000-08:00

After a relaxing holiday break, the Screaming Eagles and their fans are back to C200 tomorrow night as the team kicks off the second half of the season with a game against the Saint John Sea Dogs.

Tomorrow night's game should see one of the bigger crowds of the season on hand, as many people are home for the holidays. This should create for a real fun atmosphere inside the rink; the game is always a more exciting experience when it's played in front of a packed house!

The Screaming Eagles had a very good first half, entering tomorrow night's game with a record of 24-12-2 for 50 points in the league standings. They'll try to start the second half on a positive note when they face a recently-renovated Sea Dog team. Saint John has made several trades since the opening of the Christmas trading period. The following is a brief look at who's come and gone for the Sea Dogs:

In: Keven Guerette-Charland and Kyle Kelly (from Victoriaville), Bruno Desjardins and Alexandre Leduc (Val d'or), as well as goaltender Travis Fullerton (Lewiston).

Out: Charles Bergeron (to Acadie-Bathurst), Felix Schutz (Val d'or), Alexandre Labonte and Alexandre Monahan (Victoriaville), Maxime Dubuc (St. John's), Dave Bouchard (kicked off team after controversial "flag incident").

Saint John sits in last place in the East Division and second-last place overall in the league, but of course no opponent can be taken for granted. Cape Breton found that out just before the break in Halifax, when they were maybe a bit overconfident going into that second game against the Mooseheads.

The Sea Dogs also feature in their lineup Sydney native Ryan Sparling, who is among their leading scorers. One more kid to watch is defenceman Yann Sauve, the top pick in the latest Q midget draft.

Cape Breton enters this game with a big boost on defence with the return of Oskars Bartulis, who was playing in the Pool B World Juniors with Latvia. Though the defence held up quite well while he was gone, he was missed (especially on the powerplay) and it will be great to have him back in the lineup tomorrow night for the first time in almost a month. Also scheduled to return soon from injury are defencemen Etienne Breton and Daniel Fazzalari, although I honestly don't know if either would be back for tomorrow night's game.

We should see David Davenport getting the call in goal for Cape Breton, and after his stellar third star performance tonight in Halifax, we could very well see new Sea Dog Travis Fullerton between the pipes for Saint John. Hopefully the holiday layoff gave Davenport a bit of time to regroup, refocus, and find his game again, as he struggled in five of his last six starts just prior to the break. You may remember Fullerton from a couple of games against Lewiston last season; on two occasions he robbed the Eagles of victories with 40-plus save performances. He has had our number, so the Eagles have to be sharp!

Once again, should be a great crowd on hand tomorrow night, and even though it would be nice if we were playing a bit bigger a rival for the occasion, it's still great to come out and catch a game during the holiday season. See you at the rink!

Note: The Screaming Eagles have also added a player from Ontario to the practice roster. 18-year-old defenceman Collin Carwardine skated with the team today. He is currently here on permission to practice with the team; whether or not he ever ends up playing any games for the Eagles remains to be seen.

Trading period well underway!!!!

2006-12-20T07:49:00.000-08:00

It's Day 3 of the QMJHL's annual midseason trading period, and ladies and gents, we have our first blockbuster of the season!!!

Yesterday morning, it was confirmed by Charlottetown newspaper The Guardian that the PEI Rocket have sent 20-year-old defenceman Pierre-Marc Guilbault along with long-time goaltender Ryan Mior (19 years old) to the Gatineau Olympiques in exchange for 18-year-old defenceman Benoit Gervais and Sydney-born sniper Brett Morrison (19).

In Mior, Gatineau gets that real #1 goaltender they've been in need of all season, and also picks up a very solid offensive defenceman in Guilbault, giving them another option on the powerplay (along with guys like Martin Frechette and Maxim Mallette), as well as additional depth on the defensive end. On the outs is overage goaltender Olivier Laliberte, which freed up the overage spot to be used by Guilbault.

The Olympiques lose their top centerman and one of their top scorers in Morrison, but rumour has it that star European David Kveton will be joining the team after Christmas; he would help offset the offense lost with Morrison's departure.

PEI is getting a bonafide 40-50 goal scorer in Morrison, and he'll most likely be back with them as a 20-year-old next season, the year they're looking at to make some noise. They also get a respectable defensive defenceman in Gervais (+10 so far with the Olympiques).

This looks to be a trade that will be good for both teams, and it's once again the first real blockbuster (first of many I'm betting) that we've seen this trading period.

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One other wrinkle to this deal is its effect on our provincial rival, the Halifax Mooseheads. Strong rumours had the Mooseheads dealing star goaltender Jeremy Duchesne to Gatineau in exchange for a package that would include Morrison, but obviously that's not going to happen now. Will Halifax now find a taker for Duchesne? Some think that the contending Val d'or Foreurs could use a goaltending upgrade. Time will tell!

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Speaking of those Foreurs, they have made a ton of noise very early on in this trade period. In the first two days alone, they picked up three forwards that they hope will play key roles in their quest for a title this year: Jerome Samson (from the Moncton Wildcats), Felix Schutz (from the Saint John Sea Dogs), and Justin Saulnier (from the Halifax Mooseheads).

It was known since last year that Samson was going to Val d'or as part of the conditional Luc Bourdon trade from last season. Samson would go to Val d'or if Bourdon returned to the Q this year, which he obviously did. He adds lots of skill, two-way play, grit, and character to the Foreurs' lineup.

Schutz, a native of Germany, is expected to add scoring depth and gives the Foreurs a second European player to go along with Slovakian Julius Sinkovic. Saulnier is slated for a third line energy role as a pesky crasher and banger who can chip in offensively a bit more than your average third line player. His attitude is the big question mark and was his downfall in Halifax, but this change of scenery may be exactly what he needs.

Val d'or can make all the moves they want, and it may turn out great for them, but this collection of talented individuals must become a TEAM if they are to win the President's Cup this year.

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The Saint John Sea Dogs are the other extremely active team this trading period, as they're pretty much overhauling their team after a painful first half. GM/coach Jacques Beaulieu promised to be active during the trade period, and he wasn't kidding.

Out are Schutz, disgruntled overager Charles Bergeron (to Bathurst), Alexandre Monahan and Alexandre Labonte (to Victoriaville), and of course the much-maligned Dave Bouchard, who was kicked off of the team in a story that's been all over the news.

In are Keven Charland and Kyle Kelly (from Victo), goaltender Travis Fullerton (played with Lewiston last year but was kicked off the team this year after an off-ice incident), Bruno Desjardins and Alexandre Leduc (Val d'or), and Bathurst's 4th round pick.

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The Screaming Eagles have yet to make any moves; they traditionally seem to wait until a bit later in the trading period before Pascal Vincent pulls any aces out of his sleeve. Rumours, however, are swirling around as to who may end up in a Cape Breton jersey for the second half of the season. Among the names rumoured are Matt Marquardt (Mon), Wesley Welcher (St. John's), Tyler Hawes (PEI), Beau Prokopetz (Dru), JP Paquet (Sha), and of course any contender in the league is "rumoured" to be going after Moncton's Luc Bourdon, although it would probably take a ridiculous price to fetch him.

The Eagles must add a player or two; they definitely have the high-end talent to make this year their year to take a run at the title, but they need more depth than they currently have. As of now, a couple of injuries to key players at playoff time could be lethal. However, I do not believe that Cape Breton has to go crazy and empty the cupboards, making multiple blockbuster deals and bringing in a huge slew of new players. We must not totally sacrifice the future, and adding too many players (or the wrong players) can disrupt dressing room chemistry, one of the Eagles' best assets over the past three seasons.

In this writer's opinion, two or three (at the very most) new bodies is all that the Screaming Eagles need to tweak for the second half and playoffs, as long as the guys picked up are the right fit.

Other trades around the league can be seen here: http://www.lhjmq.qc.ca/lang_en/index.php?page=1867346&id_equipe=all&start_year=2006&end_year=2007

Happy Holidays all!

Eagles finish off first half with split against Mooseheads

2006-12-18T07:28:00.000-08:00

The first half of the 2006-2007 QMJHL season is in the books, and following a weekend split in Halifax against the Mooseheads, the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles go into the holiday break in second place overall in the entire league with a 24-12-2 record, good for 50 points.

On Saturday night, Cape Breton played a virtually flawless game en route to an unbelievably easy 4-0 win. Their Halifax opponent looked totally disinterested in playing the game, and put up absolutely no fight whatsoever. Had it not been for the brilliant play of Moosehead goaltender Jeremy Duchesne, the score would have been somewhere around 8-0 for the Eagles. David Davenport picked up the shutout in goal, making some nice saves along the way, which was nice to see after he had struggled for four starts in a row.

Sunday afternoon, Cape Breton played a pretty good first period, but seemed to totally fall asleep once they fell behind in period two, and were handed a very unnecessary loss as a result. Perhaps the guys got a bit overconfident after the extremely easy win the night before; it would have been hard not to. Whatever the reason, the Cape Breton players mostly looked like they were more interested in going home for the holidays than they were in coming back and winning the hockey game. The end result was an uninspiring 4-1 loss to a Mooseheads team rejeuvenated mostly by an emergency team meeting held after their putrid Saturday night performance.

Neither game deserves any further discussion than the brief paragraphs written above, so no further discussion will occur. Cape Breton and Halifax are now tied at 3-3 in the season series. The Mooseheads are a far inferior team to the Eagles this season and in my opinion there is no way that we should only have a split of the season series with them so far. As well, there has been a grand total of one fight in the six meetings between the two "rivals".

Although the team is entering a Christmas vacation, we at Inside The Nest will continue to update you the fan on what's happening around the league throughout the holidays. Today is the opening of the annual midseason trading period, so even though there won't be any hockey games until after Boxing Day, there should be lots of league news to discuss.

LIVE TONIGHT from the Halifax Metro Centre in downtown Halifax, Nova Scotia

2006-12-16T09:52:00.000-08:00

It's the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles against the Halifax Mooseheads in the first of a two-game set between the two teams to finish off the first half of the season for both clubs.

It's always a rivalry between these two hockey teams, and no matter where they are in the standings, it seems to be a close battle almost every time the two teams meet.

Cape Breton will have pretty much the same lineup as they had for the two games in St. John's, but will need goaltender David Davenport to really regain his form after four consecutive shaky starts in the Eagle cage.

The Eagles come into tonight's game with a record of 23-11-2, good for second place in the East Division; five points back of the division-leading Lewiston MAINEiacs. However, when these two teams meet, standings are almost an afterthought; the rivalry is such that Halifax-CB bragging rights for the night is what is really paramount in the minds of the fans.

The Halifax Mooseheads are in one of the worst tailspins of their 12+ year existence, but once again, such trends totally go out the window when these two teams meet. The Mooseheads are 2-6-2 in their last ten hockey games, and have been in a state of turmoil with players (Justin Saulnier, Kirk Forrest) quitting the club and general rumours of an unhappy dressing room. But they might pull their act together through a desire to score a win against their hated rivals.

That's about it for today, there should be at least a few contingents of Cape Bretoners in the stands tonight to cheer on their Eagles. I will be among them. Go Eagles go!

Eagles rebound on the Rock

2006-12-14T07:40:00.000-08:00

After a sloppy performance in a 7-6 overtime loss in their first game of a two-game set in St. John's, NL against the Fog Devils, the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles rebounded in a big way last night, defeating the Fog Devils 6-3 and outshooting them by a margin of 49-19.

A lot of credit has to be given to the defensive core. This is the fourth time in the last five games that they have held their opponents to a very low shot total, even though the blueline is currently filled with rookies, call-ups, and forwards masquerading as defencemen. At one point the shots were 40-8 for the Screaming Eagles, so full credit to the entire team for a dominating performance on the road.

Nick MacNeil scored twice for Cape Breton, bringing his rookie season goal total to 11 already. He was also named the game's first star. The team record for goals in a season by a rookie is 19, shared by Martin Kasik and Vladimir Kubus. MacNeil has a pretty decent chance at breaking that record this season. Also scoring for the Eagles were Dean Ouellet and Paul McIlveen (24th goal of the season for both), along with Scott Brannon and Alex Quesnel. Quesnel had a very good overall game and was given third star honours.

David Davenport picked up the win in goal for Cape Breton, but was very shaky for the fourth straight game since Ondrej Pavelec has gone away to the World Juniors. The team is really going to need him to find his game again this weekend as they go to Halifax for a two-game set against their biggest rival, the Halifax Mooseheads.

The game was a pretty chippy affair, featuring a handful of scraps and a miniature line brawl. Fights of record included:

Paul McIlveen vs Pat O'Keefe
Robert Slaney vs Nicolas Bachand
Stephen Ceccanese vs former Eagle Luke Gallant
Scott Brannon vs TJ Brennan

The latter two were part of the mini line brawl that started as a result of Brannon making contact with Fog Devil goaltender Ilja Ejov and sending him for a tumble. Defenceman Charlie Pens was also challenged to a fight by Fog Devils forward Ryan Graham (who also had two goals in the game and was named second star), but smartly declined, as (1) he is still recovering from a concussion (2) his hand was taped due to a minor injury, and fighting with a taped hand results in an automatic ejection from the game. A lot of credit has to go to Slaney for doing well for himself in his fight against the bigger and much more experienced fighter Bachand. In McIlveen's fight, O'Keefe unfortunately fell awkwardly to the ice and suffered a ten-stitch cut to his face along with a broken nose. He returned to the game wearing a full shield, a testament to his character.

With the win, the Eagles improved their record to 23-11-2, managing to earn three out of a possible four points in Newfoundland this week, a big improvement from their one point out of a possible eight last season. More importantly, Cape Breton was able to pass the Moncton Wildcats for second place in the East Division standings, and now sit only three points behind the Lewiston MAINEiacs for first place in the division (and first overall in the league). Lewiston does however hold two games in hand on the Eagles. Cape Breton was also able to pass the Val d'or Foreurs in the overall standings for sole possession of second place in the entire 18-team league.

Not much else to say about this one except to reiterate that the result was a very encouraging turnaround from the team's sloppy seven goal/44 shot-against effort in the previous game. The Eagles have one more mission before going home for a well-deserved Christmas break: a two-game weekend set in enemy territory against their biggest rivals of all, the Halifax Mooseheads. Wouldn't it be sweet to invade the Metro Centre and take all four points? It will not be an easy task, but what a way to cap off an excellent first half it would be.

Five-game winning streak over; Eagles fall 7-6 in overtime to Fog Devils

2006-12-13T05:00:00.000-08:00

It was a wild and wooly affair from Mile One Centre last night, and despite some heroics from the Eagles' two Newfoundland boys playing in front of family and friends, the team dropped a 7-6 decision in OT to a plucky St. John's Fog Devils hockey club.

St. John's native Kyle Downer made his first appearance in the QMJHL, taking over from starter David Davenport early in the first period after Davenport gave up three goals on six shots in 6:07 of action. Despite the pressures of coming in cold in his first game in front of family and friends, Downer played pretty well and gave the team a chance to win. Who knows, maybe he will get the start in tonight's rematch (6:30 ADT, CJCB AM 1270).

The other Newfoundlander to come up big on the night was Upper Island Cove native Robert Slaney, who fired the game-tying goal at 14:53 to send the game to overtime. Robert only has three goals so far this season, but two of them have been clutch game-tying goals at very key times.

The first period was a crazy whirlwind unlike any the Eagles have been in so far this season to my knowledge. The game wasn't quite eleven minutes old before the score was 4-3 Cape Breton! The Eagles fell behind 3-1 early, which spelled the end of Davenport's night, but two powerplay goals by Cam Fergus and Mickey MacDonald's first goal in the QMJHL gave the Eagles the 4-3 lead heading into the dressing room after one. The three-goal Eagle rally was sparked in part by a timely fight by scrapper Brad Gallant, who challenged the Fog Devils' Tim Spencer to a fight immediately off the faceoff following the third St. John's goal. Over the years, Gallant has proven that he is very good at picking the right time to try and find a scrap to spark his teammates, and more often than not, it works.

In the second period, the see-saw battle continued, with the score 5-5 after two frames. St. John's overager Nicolas Bachand scored early in the third to give the Fog Devils their third lead of the hockey game, but Slaney's heroics sent the game to overtime.

To start the four-on-four overtime, the coaching staff rolled the dice by starting three forwards (Fergus, Paul McIlveen, and Dean Ouellet) and one defenceman (Jean-Claude Sawyer). The move didn't work, as it took just 26 seconds for St. John's sparkplug Ryan Graham to use his speed to motor to the front of the net and tip home a pass from partner in crime Wes Welcher to end things.

It sounds as though it was a very entertaining game from Mile One, but the Eagles have to be disappointed with giving up seven goals to one of the lowest-scoring clubs in the league. On the radio post-game show, assistant coach Mario Durocher claimed that the Eagles played one of their worst games of the season, and stated that there was no way that the Fog Devils should have outskated us like they did. He suggested that maybe the guys took this Fog Devil hockey team a bit for granted. Considering our now 0-5 all-time record at Mile One Centre, we have no business doing that.

The Eagles gave up a goal early in each of the four periods played last night. They have also given up a goal on the first shot of the hockey game in each of their past three outings. They have given up the first goal in each of their last five games, although they won four of those.

For tonight, here's hoping for a better and more consistent effort, especially defensively, and for a better game from whatever goaltender ends up starting. We would all very much like to end this regular season Mile One winless streak, we need the two points in the standings (now one point behind Moncton and five behind Lewiston), we need to start finding a way to win on the road (the Eagles sport a mediocre 7-8-2-0 road record), and you really want to finish what's been a great first half on a positive note.

You're in for a scare....... you're in for a shock........

2006-12-12T04:48:00.001-08:00

how does it feeeeeeeeeel........... to be hit by the rock?

OK so we haven't heard that song in a good ten years, but tonight and tomorrow night, the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles visit "The Rock" for a pair of games against the St. John's Fog Devils, and if they can't get up for these games or take the Fog Devils lightly, that's what's going to happen to them!

Look no further than the Eagles' record last season (regular season) at Mile One Stadium in St. John's against the expansion Devils: four games, four losses, and just one point out of a possible eight (one loss came in overtime).

Granted, that was last year, this is now. St. John's hasn't been doing as well this season as last, especially on home ice. Last season, the expansion Fog Devils finished an amazing 25-8-1-1 on home ice. So far this season, the Devils are a less-imposing 8-7-0-1 at Mile One. As well, the Eagles may have lost all four regular season games in St. John's last season, but as I'm sure most of us recall, they broke the Mile One curse come playoff time, winning all three playoff games played there during their first round series win agains the Fog Devils.

Still, the Eagles should know that St. John's is not to be taken lightly on their home ice, even if they sit second-to-last in the East Division with a record of 12-19-1-1, good for just 26 points.

The Fog Devils have been having a difficult sophomore season in the QMJHL. They haven't had as much success as they had last year............ they have had countless injuries............ they have received inconsistent goaltending........... and they have had a number of off-ice problems with certain players. These problems all snowballed to send St. John's spiralling on a real bad streak lately (seven losses in eight games recently), although they have recently found a bit of light at the end of the tunnel, winning their last two games against the Halifax Mooseheads, and welcoming troubled overager Nicolas Bachand back into the lineup after he was temporarily sent home. As a result, the Fog Devils might be feeling better right now than they have for much of the season, so the Eagles will have to be on their toes.

Cape Breton comes into tonight's game with a record of 22-11-1, good for 45 points, and now sit just four points back of the league and division-leading Lewiston MAINEiacs. Just a few days ago, the Eagles were a whopping eight points behind Lewiston. The MAINEiacs play at home tonight, against the Saint John Sea Dogs.

One would assume that David Davenport would get the call again tonight for Cape Breton. Despite his somewhat shaky play against PEI this past weekend, he was still good enough to get the two wins, and I think that it would take circumstances a bit more extenuating than a couple of shaky games for the team to throw rookie Kyle Downer into the fray, seeing as how he hasn't played a minute of QMJHL action to date. However, if Davenport falters tonight, perhaps we could see Downer make his first appearance in the Eagle crease; he'll have friends and family on hand in his hometown of St. John's. Of course, the hope is that this doesn't have to happen, as we're looking for a strong game from "DD" tonight. St. John's will almost certainly start veteran Ilja Ejov, against whom the Eagles have had some troubles over the past two seasons.

The puck drops tonight at 6:30 ADT; be sure to tune in on CJCB AM 1270, where Ken MacNeil will be providing his usual excellent play-by-play. Do not be confused by the listed start time of 7:00; remember that Newfoundland time is a half hour ahead of our time here in Cape Breton!

Here's hoping that the Eagles can get their sixth straight win tonight, although it certainly won't be easy in a rink where the team has yet to win a regular season game. It's time for the Eagles to step up, try not to get too caught up in thinking about the upcoming holiday festivities, and finish that lingering regular season curse the team has had in this building.

Weekend roundup

2006-12-11T04:44:00.000-08:00

Although one could have asked for two slightly more inspiring hockey games, one couldn't ask for a better result for the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles, as they took both games of their two-game weekend mini-series against division rival PEI. On Friday night, Cape Breton outscored their opponent 7-4 in a powerplay-filled game dominated by the referees, and on Saturday night, Cape Breton snuck away with a 4-3 victory in a game that perhaps shouldn't have been as close as it was considering the 43-19 shots advantage and overall territorial advantage held by the Eagles. The most important fact is that Cape Breton started the weekend eight points behind the first-place Lewiston MAINEiacs, but finished the weekend just four points behind the division leaders.

FRIDAY NIGHT

The big storyline to take away from Friday night's game was the play of captain James Sheppard. In his first game since the disappointment of being left off of Team Canada's WJC selection camp roster, Sheppard came out like a man possessed. He scored three goals and an assist, hit everything that moved, skated through the Rocket like a hot knife going through butter at times, and overall played by far his best game of the season. After his surprising omission from the Canadian roster, James could have sulked and let it affect his play, or he could have taken it as a challenge to step up his game and prove a few people wrong. While this weekend was only two games, it seems so far like he has adopted the latter attitude. In any event, it certainly was nice to see James get a few breaks around the net after having so much trouble scoring goals so far this season.

In a game with a ridiculous amount of powerplays (so many that there was little to no flow in the game), Cape Breton made theirs count, finishing the night 5/13 with the man advantage. In conjunction with this, the Eagle penalty killers also had a great night, limiting PEI to just two goals on ten powerplay opportunities, and you can almost throw out one of those goals as it came on a six-second-long PEI powerplay; not exactly a "true" powerplay with sustained pressure and the like, in fact the Rocket player who was in the penalty box wasn't even back in the play.

To use a badly overdone cliche, Cape Breton's best players were their best players in Friday night's game. In addition to Sheppard's big night, Cam Fergus had two goals and two assists (his second goal being his 30th of the season), JC Sawyer had three helpers, and Paul McIlveen assisted on three goals. However, the win wasn't just about the team's stars. Credit call-up defencemen Spencer Corcoran and Maxime Gervais for filling in capably on the blueline, as well as Robert Slaney for dropping back to defence for hopefully one last time this season and doing a fine job. Credit Scott Brannon for a rambunctous effort that saw him land many big hits. Credit Chris Culligan for yet another excellent game on the PK; he has quietly developed into one of our best penalty killers. Credit Nick MacNeil for a very strong return from a long absence due to a bout with mono; he scored a great goal in the game's late stages. It was unfortunate that the game was so dominated by special teams, as it robbed many young third and fourth-line players on both teams of a chance to play very much.

All in all, Friday night's game was good in that the team won and in that the fans got to see yet another dominating offensive onslaught from the Eagles (7 goals, 50 shots), but the fact that the game was so lacking in intensity and flow was sometimes hard to ignore, from an entertainment standpoint. As mentioned before, the two referees had a lot to do with this problem.

SATURDAY NIGHT

The Eagles received some good news heading into this one, as defenceman Charlie Pens would finally return to the lineup after missing a good month and a half or so with a concussion. Pens ended up playing quite capably in his first game back. He was solid defensively and picked up an assist. Whether or not he'll be able to truly return to the bone-crunching physical game that he loves to play remains to be seen, but he certainly played capably in his return on Saturday night and it was nice to see him back.

Cape Breton dominated this game for the most part (final shots 43-19) but surprisingly only snuck away with a slim 4-3 victory. PEI hardly looked like they were interested in playing at times, but they somehow continued to hang around in a game they had little business being in. Perhaps the Eagles were a little bit guilty of letting the Rocket back into the game on a couple of occasions. For example, the second goal against was a result of Cape Breton's top line getting too fancy in the offensive zone and an ill-advised drop pass (and two guys' failures to pick it up) resulting in a breakaway the other way. The boys got the two points, and dominated the game for the most part, but it was surprising that the outcome was still in doubt during a pretty tense final minute.

The outcome was mostly decided early in the third period. With the game tied 2-2, Cam Fergus came up with yet another excellent snipe at a key time, shelfing one glove side on PEI goaltender Ryan Mior, who played excellent and kept his team in the game almost singlehandedly. Shortly afterwards, Francois Gauthier came up with a great shot of his own, letting go of a rocket of a slapshot that seemed to go right through Mior. Brad Gallant and Dean Ouellet also scored for the Eagles. Gallant's goal was a rebound off of a good solid point shot by Jason Swit, and Ouellet's goal was a one-timer (a bit of a knuckleball) into the top corner off of a nice feed by James Sheppard.

It should also be noted that Cape Breton perhaps caught a break early in the second period, as PEI had a goal waved off.

The Eagles could soon be without the versatile Robert Slaney for a short while, as he may be facing a suspension for his hit from behind on PEI's Chad Locke in the third period of this game. The illegal hit saw Slaney receive a five minute major and game misconduct, and set off a bit of a melee that involved several players on the ice; it was the first real fireworks seen at C200 in a long, long time.

Once again, a lot of credit has to be given to the defensive corps and the team's defensive game as a whole. For the third consecutive game, the Eagles limited their opponents to very few shots despite having so many injuries on the blueline. All in all, great to see the Eagles pick up all four points on the weekend, although it was disappointing to see so few fans in the stands both nights, and neither hockey game was the most entertaining one we've seen at C200 this year.

BACK-TO-BACK GAMES

I would just like to throw this out there for fans to respond to with their viewpoints. What do you think of the trend of back-to-back games against the same opponent that the Eagles have seen so many times (both at home and on the road) this season?

When the schedule came out and I noticed how many back-to-back games we had against the same opponents this season, I figured that either (1) It would be great, it would feel like a mini playoff series, and would really help foster intense rivalries (2) It wouldn't be that great, would be bland for the fans to see the same team two nights in a row, and the teams would have more trouble getting up for the second game against the same team than they would if they were playing against somebody different. Another concern would be that it could have an adverse effect on attendance, as many fans would see two games against the same opponent and would choose to go to just one, figuring (perhaps correctly) that the two games would be pretty much the same thing.

Respond away with your own opinions, but I think I have made it fairly clear what I think of these back-to-back games.

ROUNDING OUT THE FIRST HALF

This weekend's games were the last Eagle home games prior to the Christmas break. The Eagles posted an extremely impressive 15-3 home record during the first half of the season, and scored goals at a rate never before seen over such a sustained period of time by an Eagles team on C200 ice. Thanks for the entertainment boys, have a great Christmas and we'll see you on the 28th!

Before going home for the holidays, Cape Breton finishes out their first half schedule with four road games; back-to-back this Tuesday and Wednesday at St. John's against the Fog Devils and back-to-back on Saturday and Sunday at Halifax against the Mooseheads. Tuesday night's game starts at 6:30 AST and can be heard on CJCB AM 1270.

Regular season game #33- PEI Rocket @ Cape Breton Screaming Eagles

2006-12-08T06:21:00.000-08:00

Tonight's game opens a two-game weekend doubleheader between the fifth-place PEI Rocket and the third-place Cape Breton Screaming Eagles. We have seen quite a few such doubleheaders this season, as the QMJHL seems to be favouring a schedule that cuts down on travel costs. The Eagles and the Rocket met in a doubleheader back in October in Charlottetown, and it ended up in a split; PEI won the first game 5-4, Cape Breton took the second contest 3-0. Pascal Vincent and his troops will be looking for a better result this time around at C200. Cape Breton leads the season series between the two teams by a count of two games to one; in addition to the two games just mentioned, the Eagles scored a 5-2 victory over the Rocket on October 30 at C200. Cape Breton trails the Moncton Wildcats by two points for second place in the East Division, although they hold two games in hand. They also trail the Lewiston MAINEiacs by eight points for first place in the division; Lewiston finally had their 13-game win streak snapped in a 3-2 shootout loss to the Wildcats on Wednesday night.

The Eagles enter tonight's matchup having won their last three hockey games. They will be without defenceman Oskars Bartulis and goaltender Ondrej Pavelec, as those two have already left to join their respective World Junior teams. Called up to help fill these voids are goaltender Kyle Downer from St. John's Midget AAA, and defencemen Spencer Corcoran (Charlottetown Jr A) and Maxime Gervais (College Antoine-Girouard Midget AAA). The Eagles will also still be missing defencemen Etienne Breton (shoulder), Charlie Pens (concussion), and Daniel Fazzalari (knee), although the latter two are said to be returning soon. David Davenport will no doubt get the start in goal tonight for Cape Breton, while most of the line combinations should be fairly similar to what they were last game. The Eagles are still counting offensively on the lines of Dean Ouellet-Cam Fergus-Paul McIlveen and Chris Culligan-James Sheppard-Scott Brannon; both lines have been playing very well since they were put together two weeks ago prior to a game against the Halifax Mooseheads.

It will be interesting to see how McIlveen performs after being named QMJHL Offensive Player of the Week last week (five goals and an assist in two games), and it could be even more interesting to see how Sheppard responds to his disappointing omission from the Canadian World Junior selection camp roster. A lot of guys seem to feel the "Player of the Week" pressure and tail off in the game or two immediately following their selection, so we'll see if McIlveen can avoid that trend, and as for Sheppard, his attitude has been that his being left off of the Canadian roster will only serve as further motivation to play his best and prove them wrong.

From the PEI side of the ice, starting in goal for head coach Yannick Jean and his gang could be 18-year-old Antoine Lafleur. He has started the last four hockey games for the Rocket (playing extremely well), and there are plenty of rumours swirling around that long-time #1 goaltender Ryan Mior is on his way out of town. Helping to back up these rumours is the fact that the Rocket have recently called up goaltender Evan Mosher from the midget ranks.

On defence, the Rocket are led by the big three of Marc-Andre Gragnani, Pierre-Marc Guilbault, and Pierre-Luc Lessard. These guys are all very mobile, slick-skating, puck-moving two-way defencemen. All excel on the point on the powerplay, and all are key parts of PEI's transition game. The Screaming Eagles will have to keep a close eye on these three guys. Also playing well on defence for the Rocket is 16-year-old rookie Jordan Southorn, who they took in the first round, 17th overall, in this past June's draft. PEI also boasts a couple of other former first round QMJHL picks on the blueline in Stephen Lund and Pascal Boutin, although both have been disappointments thus far in their Q careers.

Up front, the Rocket have a pretty balanced attack, although they don't really have any "superstar" calibre scorers. Their most dangerous man offensively is overager David Laliberte, who leads the Rocket in scoring with 46 points in 31 games. Sniper Geoff Walker (40 points in 31 games) has a great shot and is dangerous from almost anywhere inside the bluline. The diminutive Guillaume Doucet has 29 pts in 31 games and often plays on a line with Laliberte; the two complement each other pretty well. Other decent forwards for the Rocket include Sydney native Joey Haddad (17 pts in 30 games), Europeans Martin Latal and Peter Cmorej, crasher and banger Tyler Hawes, and sophomores Chad Locke and Matthew Lachaine. The latter two, however, have had disappointing offensive production thus far this season. Latal is questionable for tonight's game after having left the Rocket's previous game with an undetermined injury.

For fight fans, don't get too excited about tonight; PEI has virtually no fighters to speak of (unless you consider Devan Praught to be a fighter), and the Eagles haven't seen a fight occur in a home game in about a month.

Special teams:

Cape Breton powerplay = 3rd iu the league at 24.9%
Cape Breton penalty kill = 4th in the league at 81.8%

PEI powerplay = Tied for 6th in the league at 21.6%
PEI penalty kill = 3rd in the league at 82.7%

PEI is a bit of a Jekyll and Hyde team; some nights they look as good as the league's contenders, other nights they seem to implode and beat themselves. Who knows which version will show up at C200 this weekend? Maybe we'll see both. Most weekend doubleheaders the Eagles have been involved in so far this season have ended up being splits, but it would be nice if Cape Breton can set the bar a little higher this weekend and go for three or even four points from the Rocket.

A couple of other little matters of interest:

- The Eagles have played 32 games so far and have yet to participate in a shootout. They have also only been to overtime once (5-4 OT loss in Bathurst in late October).

- If there is one disturbing stat about this year's Eagles, it is that they are 1-6 this season in games decided by one goal. This is a trend that has got to turn around; truly good teams find a way to win the close ones.

Not much else to say about tonight's game; Go Eagles!

QMJHL Trading Period preview

2006-12-07T05:20:00.000-08:00

Another day, another topic here at Inside The Nest. I would like to thank all of the fans who have participated and left comments thus far; the more fan participation we have, the better a place this blog becomes to talk about Screaming Eagles hockey and the QMJHL. Keep the comments coming!

Today's topic is a preview of the QMJHL midseason trading period, which opens on Dec. 18 and closes in early January. This is the time of year that teams, who have had the first half of the season to gauge where their team stands, make (or don't make) the moves necessary to build towards the goals they have in mind. Some teams have decided, based on a talented veteran lineup and a successful first half, that it would be best to trade for more help this season to take a run at the league title. Other teams realize that they have little to no chance of making much playoff noise this season, and will attempt to trade veteran assets in exchange for young prospects, effectively building for the future. Still other teams will stand pat with what they have, figuring that either they are a strong enough contender as they are, or that their time is next year, and they want to keep all of their main pieces together for a run at the title then.

In today's blog, I'll briefly run down what the league's eighteen teams may possibly do at the upcoming trading period. This is just the opinion of one reporter, they are educated guessed if you will, so take these prognostications with a grain of salt please!

I will run down the teams in terms of their current division standing, and will briefly comment on where their trading period priorities, and their intentions for this season, may lie.

EAST DIVISION

1. Lewiston (23-5-0-3, 49 points): Going for a run at the league title for SURE. This team has been building towards this season for the past few years, and their first half success has done nothing but reinforce their notion that this is the year for Lewiston to finally make some real playoff noise. The #1 item on their shopping list seems to be another top offensive defenceman to help out Chad Denny.

2. Moncton (21-12-0-1, 43 points): Do not let their record fool you; this team is not a league contender. They deserve all the credit in the world for getting the absolute most out of what they have so far this season; they've had a phenomenal first half. But the fact remains that after last year's championship run, the Wildcats are in rebuilding mode. If they were to keep their team intact this year, sure they would finish high in the standings and might win a round or two in the playoffs, but they just don't have the depth to truly contend for the league title this year, and holding on to their top veterans and losing them for nothing at the end of the season would set the Wildcats back for at least a couple of years. Furthermore, they're already losing top scorer Jerome Samson to Val d'or during the trading period as the final compensation for last year's Luc Bourdon deal. Expect this team to SELL, trading away some key veterans such as Bourdon, Andrew MacDonald, Matt Marquardt, and Nathan Welton (not all, but two or three for sure).

3. Cape Breton (20-11-1-0, 41 points): With it being the last year in junior hockey for Cam Fergus, Paul McIlveen, JC Sawyer, Oskars Bartulis, Ondrej Pavelec, and possibly James Sheppard, and with the Eagles' proving in the first half that they can run with the big dogs, this seems to be a year in which we should go for it. Topping the Eagles' shopping list, if they can be had at the right price, should be a top-four defenceman and a top-six forward.

4. Acadie-Bathurst (19-12-1-0, 39 points): Early in the season, the Titan were 3-7, had seemingly no goaltending, and seemed to be getting all of their production from just a handful of veteran guys. It was looking like it would be a rebuilding year in Titan land. However, the team has turned it around significantly since and has moved up the standings enough to be considered a possible contender. Mathieu Perreault has emerged as a very special superstar, and may be the best player in the QMJHL today. Sniper Thomas Beauregard leads the league with 38 goals and will not be back next season. The Titan still have question marks in goal, but their situation has improved with the acquisition of the adequate-at-the-very-least Brant Miller. Bathurst now looks like a team that could make some playoff noise.

The Titan could still conceivably rebuild, as they still have quite a few holes to fill if they want to truly contend, but history has shown that in most years where Bathurst looks like they have a halfway-decent chance, owner Leo-Guy Morrissette will give the green light to make moves to go for it. In conclusion, I could see the Titan taking various directions at the trading period, but my gut is leaning towards predicting that they're going to do a little bit of tweaking towards making some noise THIS year.

5. PEI (15-11-1-4, 35 points): The PEI Rocket have a pretty good team this year; they should finish above .500 and could win a round or two in the playoffs. That being said, I think that Rocket management is looking more towards next year as their big year. I think that PEI will for the most part stand pat (still leaving them with a pretty decent team this season), and may actually trade a veteran or two (rumours have goaltender Ryan Mior and dman Marc-Andre Gragnani on the trading block).

6. Halifax (15-14-2-1, 33 points): The Mooseheads have had a pretty disappointing first half, and even though team philosophy is usually to hold on to veterans and try to make as much noise as possible every year, I'm thinking that the Mooseheads' play so far this season has made it apparent that the team isn't going anywhere this year, and that it would be best to trade away a veteran or two and build for the future (which could very well be as soon as next season). Their biggest asset is star goaltender Jeremy Duchesne, who has been mentioned in a ton of trade talks, most of which have him going to the Gatineau Olympiques, possibly for a package that would include high-scoring Brett Morrison going to Halifax at the draft in June. Anyhow, Halifax should be SELLING.

7/8. Saint John (10-18-1-1), St. John's (10-19-1-1), 22 points each: These expansion cousins are both a good two years away from contending for any league titles. They will play out the rest of this season, giving ice time to young guys who will be key parts of their future, and will try to trade away the few veteran assets they have. The biggest name on the block from these two teams is Fog Devils' leading scorer Wesley Welcher, who has generated some interest from a few potential contenders around the league.

WEST DIVISION

1. Val d'or (20-10-2-1, 43 points): Going for broke, all eggs in one basket for this year. It's been about six years since the Foreurs have had a real contender, and their fans are starving for a deep playoff run. Starting with moves made at the end of last season to get veterans such as Brad Marchand and Mathieu Roy, Val d'or made it crystal clear that they're going full speed after the Cup this season. They will immediately acquire Jerome Samson from Moncton as soon as the trade period opens, and might even make further adjustments to fine-tune for the playoffs. Goaltending is one area where many think they need improvement. To summarize, this team will do everything it can to be in the championship mix.

2. Gatineau (20-10-1-2, 43 points): Not putting all their hopes on this year like Val d'or is, but still most likely making a run at the title. They have the depth at forward to do it, and they're looking to make the moves to upgrade in goal and on defence; if they're successful, they will be a very, very serious contender for the league title. However, the 'Piques will tweak in a way that won't leave them with nothing next season...... they want to be competitive every season. A team like Val d'or, on the other hand, will likely go "all in" (to use poker terminology) this season, with little regard for the coming season or two. As mentioned earlier, Gatineau is highly rumoured to be going after Halifax goalie Jeremy Duchesne. They are also apparently looking for another top-four dman (some rumours swirling about Bathurst's Mathieu Carle, although they would need the Titan to decide to rebuild if they were to get him). Even if they made no moves, Gatineau would still be a threat in the playoffs. This team will contend, and it may only take a single move or two.

3. Rouyn-Noranda (18-11-2-3, 41 points): The Huskies are a highly respectable team this season, but they have been planning for a long time for their big run to be next year. Despite their good record, they know that their key players are a year too young to start making big trades to add big pieces this year. I expect Rouyn to pretty much stand pat and wait for next season, although this will still see them finish in the top half of the standings and do halfway-decent in the playoffs. The only rumour swirling here is that the Huskies may be tempted to deal veteran goalie JP Levasseur, because so many contending teams could use a goaltending upgrade. Other than that possibility, expect these guys to pretty much stand pat.

4. Baie-Comeau (17-10-1-4, 39 points): A powerful team capable of making some noise, they possess the best offensive numbers in the league to date. However, they still may have a few too many holes in other areas (defence, goaltending) to really compete with teams in their division like Val d'or and Gatineau once those teams have made their upgrades. I think that the Drakkar will mostly stand pat and look more towards next season, when stars like Francois Bouchard, Alex Picard-Hooper, and Benjamin Breault should all still be with the team.

5. Quebec (18-14-0-1, 37 points): Patrick Roy likes to win, and I would be surprised if he didn't at least make a couple of minor tweaks to make his Remparts a little bit more of a contender this season. I'm not sure if they have the contender potential that the Foreurs and Olympiques possess, but Roy could decide to make a couple of moves to try and move his Remparts up the standings with those teams. I could also see him deciding that his team is a little bit young for a run this year and looking more towards next season. If they are going to try and make noise this season, Quebec needs a goaltending upgrade and a real high-calibre defensive anchor to at least in part offset the loss to the NHL of the man they were counting on to lead their defence, Marc-Edouard Vlasic. This could be a possible destination for the Wildcats' Bourdon, or PEI's Gragnani. In summary, I'm guessing Quebec will make a couple of moves to try and join in on the fun.

6. Victoriaville (18-13-0-0, 36 points): A decent team but I can't really see them contending this year. They'll likely mostly stand pat and keep their main pieces intact for next season, while possibly listening to offers for goalie JC Blanchard, dman Maxime Noreau, and maybe forward Benoit Doucet. I don't know if these guys will be too active during the trading period.

7. Shawinigan (15-14-1-3, 34 points): Have been falling fast since a hot, overachieving start. Only have a handful of impact players and are definitely in rebuilding mode, despite their decent record. I would look at them as sellers, with veteran guys like Francis Pare, Danick Bouchard, and JP Paquet sure to generate lots of interest on the trade market. They should trade at least one or two of these guys to try and speed up the rebuilding process.

8. Drummondville (14-16-0-3, 31 points): The poor Volts. They entered this season expecting to make this their big year, expecting to totally contend. However, almost everything that could possibly go wrong, has gone wrong for this hard-luck team. They lost one superstar, Guillaume Latendresse, to the Montreal Canadiens of the NHL, and their other superstar, Derick Brassard, has yet to play a game this season; he's out until at least February with a terrible shoulder injury. To add to this, they lost overage dman Olivier Magnan to the pro ranks, and potential star forward Francis Charette has quit the QMJHL altogether. Add it all up and it's been a disastrous first half for Drummondville, and they are left with just too many holes to plug to possibly take the run at the title that they had hoped that they could. Even with Brassard coming back late in the season, they would still have too many other holes; furthermore, Brassard has gone on record in newspapers stating that he would prefer to be traded to a contender when he returns to action. Therefore, it will be very interesting to see what the Volts do with Brassard at the upcoming trading period; some rumours have him going to the Gatineau Olympiques to play in his hometown. What kind of price can they fetch for a superstar who is no guarantee to ever fully recover from his terrible injury? Anyhow, expect these guys to sell as much as they can, a big disappointment for their long-suffering fans who were hoping for a real contender this season.

9. Chicoutimi (11-17-4-1, 27 points): In full rebuilding mode after a failed run at the title last season, the Sags are just letting their young kids play this year in hopes of icing a strong team in 2008-2009, when they hope to host the Memorial Cup. They do have a couple of veterans left over that should be of interest to contending teams, the best of whom is easily overage center David Desharnais, who should be one of the very most sought-after names on the trading market this Xmas.

10. Rimouski (6-21-4-1, 17 points): In Year Two of a massive rebuilding project that's been taking place ever since their glorious Sidney Crosby years came to an end in the 2005 Memorial Cup final. The Oceanic are talented, but extremely young, and are waiting to contend again in two seasons, 2008-2009. They don't really have veteran assets to speak of that I could see contending teams being interested in. I'd say this team will be relatively inactive at the trading period, just content to play out this season and let their kids gain experience; playoffs are very unlikely for these guys, but that's the way they like to build.

So in summary:

For sure contenders = Lewiston, Val d'or, Gatineau, Cape Breton

Teams that could well contend with a couple of moves = Quebec, Acadie-Bathurst

Teams likely not really going for it this year that will still be good teams and could upset a contender = Baie-Comeau, Rouyn-Noranda, PEI, Victoriaville

Sellers/rebuilders = Moncton, Halifax, Drummondville, Shawinigan, Chicoutimi, St. John's, Saint John, Rimouski.

Thoughts and comments would be appreciated!

Good news and bad news for Screaming Eagle players today

2006-12-04T09:21:00.000-08:00

Good news for today: Paul McIlveen was named QMJHL Offensive Player of the Week thanks to his five goals and one assist in the two games played this week. He was absolutely electric in those two games, with most of his goals being highlight reel calibre. Hopefully this serves as a real confidence-builder for a guy who had been struggling a bit in the four or five games prior to this week.

Bad news for today: Captain James Sheppard was surprisingly left out of the invitations for Team Canada's World Junior selection camp. James hasn't set the world on fire with his offensive totals so far this season, but he has still been a well-rounded two-way force for Cape Breton; playing in all situations and dominating at times physically, creating space for himself and teammates and causing turnovers in the Eagles' favour.

Many still expected him to at least be extended an invite, seeing as how he was selected 9th overall in the NHL draft and has been representing our nation for the past few years, playing very well on U-17 and U-18 teams within the program. This is not to say that players should be able to ride the coattails of their past performances into an invite to the WJC camp, but it certainly seemed like he was very much on Team Canada's radar and that only a disastrous start to the season would see him fall off of it. While Sheppard's offensive totals could be a little bit higher, he certainly hasn't had a disastrous start to the season.

From the Eagles' point of view, this means that he won't be lost to the team this month as was expected, but you always want the best for your players and I'm sure everyone is disappointed for him and wishes he had gotten the invite.

Thoughts on either issue?

Eagles salvage game in third period; defeat Moncton 4-2 to move into second place tie

2006-12-04T08:38:00.000-08:00

Things weren't looking very good for the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles for a while on Friday night against the Moncton Wildcats, but for the second straight game, three early third period goals saved the day.

The first period was very boring and saw the Eagles come out pretty flat; passing was off and the team couldn't seem to get anything going. A great pass by Andrew MacDonald found Phil Mangan in the slot, and the free agent pickup roofed one blocker side on Cape Breton starter Ondrej Pavelec to give the Wildcats a 1-0 lead after one period.

The Eagles had a bit more jump in the second period but still had some trouble getting anything going due to a stifling defensive style being played by the visiting Wildcats, who seemed content to try and sit on their 1-0 lead. After a couple of good scoring chances, the home side thought they had finally scored one late in the second period, but the goal was waved off as Cam Fergus was ruled to have interfered with Moncton goaltender Jhase Sniderman on the play. Fergus was also assessed a goaltender interference penalty. This was the second game in a row that saw the Eagles denied of a goal due to a goaltender interference penalty to Fergus, and like the previous time, a lot of fans thought that he had been pushed into the goaltender and that therefore the goal should have counted.

Seeing as how it was "Teddy Bear Toss Night", a lot of fans who thought the Eagles had scored a goal threw their stuffed animals onto the ice, to be collected by charities and dispersed to needy children on Christmas. In a move that drew the ire of most of the C200 crowd, Moncton defenceman Luc Bourdon allegedly threw a few of the toys back into the stands. He was booed loudly every time he touched the puck for the rest of the game.

The Eagles finally broke out in the third period, salvaging a game that looked like it was in danger of going down as a frustrating loss. Oskars Bartulis, playing his last game before going away to the World Juniors to represent Latvia, made one of the very best passes we have seen at C200 so far this year to send Paul McIlveen off on a breakaway. Bartulis, in his own end, spotted McIlveen "hanging out" at the opposing blueline, and banked a pass off the boards right onto his tape, sending him in all alone. McIlveen did the rest, beating Sniderman with a terrific forehand-to-backhand-to-forehand deke to tie the game and finally give the fans something to cheer about.

The Eagles then went on a powerplay and took the lead for good, as the top powerplay unit came through with a goal. Dean Ouellet showed great vision in finding Fergus at the lip of teh crease on the right side of the net, and the 20-year-old vet easily tipped it home for a 2-1 Cape Breton lead. Cape Breton then added to their lead with their third goal in just 2:41 (after being unable to get much of anything going at all in the first two periods), as JC Gauthier continued his hot play of late by banging home the rebound of a Brendon MacDonald shot from a bad angle. MacDonald's assist gives him a point in each of four consecutive games now, a rare accomplishment for a player whose duties are primarily of the checking and penalty killing variety. 3-1 Cape Breton and all the momentum our way.

Moncton made things interesting late in the game, as Bourdon went on a spectacular end-to-end rush (being booed the whole way), and then fed sophomore forward Matt Eagles (son of former NHLer Mike Eagles) in the slot. Eagles beat Pavelec low blocker side and suddenly things were a little more tense. However, McIlveen would ice the game with a brilliant empty net goal with just over a minute remaining, and Cape Breton would manage to win 4-2 despite trailing 1-0 heading into the third and final period. Two seasons ago, in 2004-2005, the Eagles failed to win a single game that they trailed after two periods.

It was not the best or most exciting hockey game of the year at C200, and the attendance of just over 2700 for a Friday night game in December was very disappointing, but the Eagles managed to pull it out in the late stages and improve to 20-11-1, tying the Wildcats for second place in the division and placing the Eagles third overall in the QMJHL standings. The Eagles still trail Lewiston by seven points for first in the East Division, as they're totally on fire, having won 13 straight hockey games.

Cape Breton next sees action this coming Friday and Saturday, when the PEI Rocket come to town for a doubleheader. The two games are the final two home games for the Screaming Eagles before the holidays, so come on out and catch a game; it will be a while before you can do so again!

Regular season game #32; Eagles vs Moncton Wildcats

2006-12-01T04:48:00.000-08:00

Tonight's game at C200 is a showdown of sorts for second place, as the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles host the defending President's Cup champion Moncton Wildcats for the second time this season. Cape Breton won the previous matchup by a score of 5-2 back on November 5. The Wildcats are two points ahead of the Screaming Eagles in the East Division standings, so tonight's game is an ample opportunity for Cape Breton to pull into a tie for second place.

Cape Breton enters the game with a 19-11-1 record, good for 39 points, which has the Eagles standing at fourth overall in the 18-team Quebec Major Junior Hockey League. The home team also enters tonight's game having won their last two; a 7-3 win over Halifax last Saturday and a 6-4 win over Gatineau this past Wednesday.

Moncton (20-10-0-1) enters tonight's game on quite the tear; they've won four in a row and have won eight of their last ten. This red-hot streak has a lot to do with the return from the NHL of star defenceman Luc Bourdon, who has been an absolute force most nights for the Wildcats since being sent back to junior by the Vancouver Canucks. With Bourdon, Andrew MacDonald, and Nathan Welton, the Wildcats have quite possibly the best "top three" on defence in the league. However, the Cats are still expected to be "sellers" during the upcoming Christmas trading period. They will almost certainly deal Bourdon to help build for the future, and will likely deal at least one of MacDonald and Welton. For tonight, however, the Eagles will have to deal with the Wildcats' "big three" on D.

Up front, Moncton is very young and is not overly deep in veteran/proven scoring, but they've evidently been finding ways to score enough goals to win hockey games. Their most noteworthy weapons up front are veterans Jerome Samson and Matt Marquardt. Samson, for sure the Wildcats' best offensive player, is a slick two-way forward who is putting up great numbers now that he's playing in a first line scoring role; last year with the powerhouse champion Wildcats, his role was on the third line. Moncton will not enjoy the services of their top scorer for much longer, however, as he will be going to the Val d'or Foreurs at the Christmas trade period to complete the trade made last January that netted the Wildcats the aforementioned Bourdon. Marquardt is a very big and physical power forward who has really come into his own as a goal scorer so far this season; his 22 goals leads the Wildcats. Other very good forwards for Moncton include Christian Gaudet, the two-way captain of last year's league champion, Phil Mangan, a recent pickup from the Ontario Jr A ranks who has had instant success in the Q, and Randy Cameron, a 17-year-old rookie who has been contributing from the get-go. As said, Moncton is not a hugely high-scoring team, and their only real consistently dangerous line is the Samson/Marquardt line, but they've been finding ways to win hockey games.

In goal, Moncton has a pretty solid tandem of veteran Jhase Sniderman and rookie Nicolas Riopel, the top goaltender selected in the 2005 QMJHL Midget Draft. The Cats have been using both regularly this season, with Sniderman getting slightly more playing time. Unsure as to a starter for them, but Riopel played in their last hockey game (5-1 win at Halifax on Wednesday), so perhaps it is Sniderman's turn to start.

From the Cape Breton side of the ice, expect a lineup pretty much similar to the one that defeated the Gatineau Olympiques on Wednesday night. The Screaming Eagles only have four for sure healthy defencemen (JC Sawyer, Jason Swit, Oskars Bartulis, Mark Barberio), but still managed to win on Wednesday night. Call-up dman Spencer Corcoran is a question mark at this point for tonight's game, as he left after the first period on Wednesday night after having reaggravated a minor injury. Tonight will be the last game for a while with the Eagles for Bartulis, as he leaves tomorrow for the Pool B World Junior Championships, where he'll represent his home country of Latvia.

Forward lines should be:

Dean Ouellet-Cam Fergus-Paul McIlveen
Chris Culligan-James Sheppard-Scott Brannon
Brendon MacDonald-Robert Slaney-Brad Gallant

Fourth line should be centered by JC Gauthier, with any mix of Stephen Ceccanese, Alex Quesnel, Francois Gauthier, and Mickey MacDonald on the wings. Ceccanese in my opinion should play for sure tonight, as he played an excellent hockey game on Wednesday night.

In goal, they might very well go back with Ondrej Pavelec after his solid performance on Wednesday night, but it's also a very real and totally fine possibility to go with David Davenport, who has also been playing very well as of late.

Powerplay: Cape Breton enters the game third in the league at 24.9%, while Moncton's powerplay is just 14th at 18.0%.

Penalty Killing: The Eagles enter tonight's contest with the 5th-best PK, at 81.5%. Moncton is also 14th in this category, with a PK % of 77.4%.

All in all, tonight's game is a battle for second place, a challenge for the Eagles' forwards to overcome the "big three" on Moncton's defence, and finally an opportunity for the Eagles' brass and fans to have a look at Marquardt and Bourdon, two names among the many that fans are considering as possibilities to be traded for during the upcoming Christmas trading period, to help the Eagles potentially make a run for the top in the second half of the season and the playoffs. I know that I will have a close eye on both of those guys.

Bon match!