Well the farm is looking to bust up a 2 game losing skid with a home game against the Tampa Bay Lightning’s farm team the Syracuse Crunch. The Crunch are coming off back to back impressive wins over the Washington Capitals farm team the Hershey Bears and against the New Jersey Devils farm team the Binghamton Devils, winning those games 7-2 and 5-2 respectively. The Comets will need to see an improvement in their 5v5 scoring and some more reliable goaltending to make this game competitive!

 

Starting Lineup

 

LW	C	RW
Carcone	Kero	Boucher
MacMaster	Cameranesi	MacEwen
Dahlen	Jasek	Bancks
Gadjovich	Woods	Kile

LD	RD
Juolevi	Sifers
Sautner	Chatfield
Briesbois	McEneny

G
Ivan Kulbakov

 

Scratches	—
Blujus	Palmu

 

Injury Report	—	—	—	—	—
Arseneau	Darcy	Demko	Hamilton	Lind	Gardiner
Hand	undisclosed	concussion	concussion	week-to-week	undisclosed

 

Streamable Clarity Improvement Notice

 

Tonight I’m going to stick with what I did last game and stick with this kind of format – player (#jersey number of player) location at start of streamable if not plainly obvious by play description. To kind of speed up the process, I’ll probably spell the full players name with jersey number when they first show up in a play/highlight of the game, but will be shortened to just their last name in sequential plays…Opposing teams names will only be listed on goals against, or notorious penalties/majors etc. If anyone has suggestions to improve on the clarity of the highlights/plays, I’d love suggestions for improvement! Until then lets get into the game!

 

1st period

 

• Johnathan Dahlen(#54) with a nifty move off the draw, tries to set up Carter Bancks(#34) in front but he’s just a step ahead, fortunately a nice bounce lands at Guillaume Brisebois(#55) stick who shoots one on net
• Dahlen(#54) left of the circle, blocks a dump attempt by the Syracuse defender, gets it to center and backhands it on net
• Brisebois(#55) takes it up the middle and has a nice drop pass for Evan McEneny(#2) who quickly snaps it at the Syracuse tendy. Little bit of brew-ha-ha’ing in front of the net with Lukas Jasek(#9) who lets the crunch know he aint about gonna take no shit this game
• McEneny(#2) center of streamable – with a nice pinch that’s lets Zack MacEwen(#15) steal the puck and pass it to Tanner MacMaster(#19) who gives it away trying to pass to the left wing
• Jonah Gadjovich(#22) helping out along the boards doesn’t give up after getting muscled down, as he follows through with the play and gets off a great pass to Bancks(#34) for the one-timer
• MacEwen(#15) gets a gift of a giveaway from the Syracuse defender and gets a nice shot off on net but doesn’t light the lamp
• PTO Tony Cameranesi(#27) gets a pass from the Syracuse defender behind the net and sets up Olli Juolevi(#48) who plays far up to get a great shot on net
• Jalen Chatfield(#5) watching his man as his teammates just let Alex Barre-Boulet(#12) attempt a wrap-around. Ivan Kulbakov fortunately gets his leg stretched out in time to make the save
• Brisebois(#55) loses sight of the puck in the Syracuse forwards feet but Ivan Kulbakov is there for the save
• GOAL – SYRACUSE: Former Comet, Cory Conacher rips it after the Crunch win the draw and Kulbakov looks like he has no idea where it even went
• MRW Kulbakov lets in another wrister off the draw
• A less than stellar shift from Juolevi(#48)…not sure what he was watching but, the puck just slowly goes by him and he ends up beaten to it by the Syracuse forward, and the resulting aggression from Syracuse leads to the Comets taking a delay of game penalty
• GOAL – SYRACUSE: Alex Barre-Boulet(#12) with a quick turning snapper that gets past Kulbakov
• ahem…
• Some decent powerplay work from Juolevi(#48) and MacMaster(#19)

 

Score at end of 1st period:2-0 Syracuse

 

2nd Period

 

• Syracuse player(#25 – left of center) a little delayed with his check, wrecks himself
• Chatfield(#5) holds off Syracuse’ Cory Conacher and wins the footrace after a Syracuse dump and chase attempt
• GOAL – SYRACUSE: Brady Brassart(#19) off some nifty long ice passes gets it past Kulbakov’s glove side
• Ivan Kulbakov gets yanked for the 2nd time in 3 games, as he lets in 3 goals on 13 shots
• Bancks(#34) gets it to Juolevi(#48) who quickly passes it to MacMaster(#19) who takes too long to shoot. An easy save for Crunch goalie Connor Ingram
• Gadjovich(#22) finds a bouncing puck at center and draws a slashing penalty to put Utica up on their 2nd powerplay
• Back at even strength, MacMaster(#19) gets himself on a breakaway but gets hooked and is rewarded with a penalty shot
• Connor Ingram deflects the MacMaster(#19) penalty shot. Still a 3-0 game for Syracuse
• Comets on the powerplay, Dahlen(#54) tips a pass to Jamie Sifers(#26) who’s shot gets caught up in traffic; Dahlen finds it and rips a shot on the Syracuse netminder
• Chatfield(#5) from the blueline plays it to Tanner Kero(#10) behind the net who swiftly bounces the puck off the boards to an alone in front Reid Boucher(#24) who’s shot is deflected out of play by the Crunch goaltender
• Jasek(#9) with a great steal behind the net, centers it to MacMaster(#19) who tips it to Bancks(#34) for the tap in but Bancks just isn’t ready for the shot
• Comets on the penalty kill for a Brisebois delay of game minor: Chatfield(#5) with a great blocked shot leads to a shorthanded 2 on 1 for Utica
• Chatfield(#5) off the draw gets it to Dahlen(#54) who goes rinkwide to MacMaster(#19) who sets up Cameranesi(#27) for the one-timer, and wouldn’t you know it the man that started it all, Jalen Chatfield is there driving the net to try and hammer in the rebound
• Michael Carcone(#58) weaves around the Syracuse team and drives to the net but Connor Ingram continues to be a brick wall
• GOAL – UTICA: Bancks(#34) puts it past Ingram off a Brisebois(#55) shot from the point to FINALLY get Utica on the board!
• uh…nevermind….GOAL WAIVED OFF – GOALIE INTERFERENCE
• Dahlen(#54) passes through his legs to Chatfield(#5) who gets it to Ashton Sautner(#6) who rings one off the post
• Olli Juolevi on the defensive flicks the puck right in front of relief goalie Connor LaCouvee that almost puts Syracuse up 4-0

 

Shots in favor of Utica this period were 14 to 7… a pulled goalie, a missed penalty shot, a denied goal, oh boy that’s a heartbreaker of a period for the boys…would be shocked to see them pull off the comeback in the third after that one.

 

The Score at the end of the 2nd period: 3-0 Syracuse

 

3rd Period

 

• No audio to start the third so bear with me on a couple of the highlights
• Juolevi(#48) beaten to the boards on a dump by the Syracuse defenders, and gets away with a blatant holding, and fortunately for him McEneny(#2) is there in time to help him out
• Yowza, Syracuse’s Ben Thomas takes a slapper from Ashton Sautner(#6) right in the face
• Cameranesi(#27) with some great work on the Utica penalty kill
• Syracuses Andre Andreoff blows past Juolevi(#48) and then afterwards the Comets take turns standing still staring at the puck until they ice it
• GOAL – SYRACUSE: Utica playing with goalie pulled give up the empty netter off a blocked MacMaster(#19) shot
• The little things got me through this one

 

Pretty brutal third period, not a lot of scoring chances for either side, Comets passes not clean, Syracuse looking to just coast out the game, was quite the chore to get through… Utica led the period with 7 shots to Syracuse’s 5..

 

Our Final Score: 4-0 Syracuse

 

Takeaways

• Gadjovich had a much better game, was good along the boards, even if the team didn’t score I think he did good with every shift
• Juolevi did NOT have a good game, was consistently beaten in footraces for the puck, and wasn’t really noticeable on the point
• Tanner Kero looked to be completely phoning it in this game…kind of a crazy flip from last game where he Dahlen and Juolevi were working wonders together
• Dahlen, I almost want to say has to dial back his flash, because the guys he’s playing with seem completely unprepared to deal with the kinds of passes he’s generating for them in the front of the net
• I think Alex Kile had 1 shift in the third period, still not sure why the ECHL call-up is getting ice time over one of the Canucks signed players. Even if Palmu is in Cull’s doghouse, just slot him in and bench him for the majority of the game…he basically did with Kile so whats the difference?
• Jalen Chatfield had the best game out of the entire Comets bunch, strong checking, good footraces, hopped up into the offensive zone a few times, really solid game from an otherwise lackluster team performance
• Ivan Kulbakov, holy moly, this team needs to spend like 4 days straight drilling spinning wrist shots from the left and right circles because this guy cannot stop a shot like that whatsoever. Hard to generate any momentum for the team if every defensive zone faceoff draw has like an 85% chance of being a goal for the opposing team.

 

Whats Next?

Well this one was pretty brutal to sit through so hopefully the next one will be a bit more feisty; Utica is up again tomorrow visiting the Hartford Wolf Pack to round out their 6th double header of 19 double headers in the season. AHL schedules are nutty man, that doesn’t even include the 5 back-to-back-to-backs that the team plays across the season too! So let’s hope the farm can get it together and generate some offense again, because lord knows they aren’t getting the goaltending they need so they need to be scoring. BADLY.

 

Hope you guys enjoyed this edition of the Farmies, any feedback, improvement suggestions, content or highlights you’d like me to focus/pick out during games, let me know and I’ll do my best to provide during the next Farmies! Relating to the next Farmies! I’ll be visiting the states for the weekend so Saturdays Farmies will likely not be out until Monday night or Tuesday night depending on how the Canucks fare. I.E. Don’t want the Farmies lost in the myriad of posts should the big boys light up the Habs AND the Jets on Saturday and Monday respectively.

 

EDIT: Looks like Trent Cull wasn’t a fan of tonights effort from the farm either. some pretty strong words

“I didn’t like our copmete. It is not everybody. We have to compete harder on pucks. We have to battle harder. Different guys kind of bring the same compete, and other guys…I shouldn’t have to BEG guys to compete at the pro hockey level.”

source: https://twitter.com/OD_Birnell/status/1063634116132970498