Saturday, November 2, 2024

Notebook: First era night happens Saturday

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The Sea Dogs will hold their first championship era night of the season on Saturday when they host the Rouyn-Noranda Huskies at TD Station.

The team will honour the 2011 and 2012 Sea Dogs championship teams, which saw the club win back-to-back QMJHL titles and a Memorial Cup championship.

Former players Mike Thomas, Zack Phillips, Kevin Gagne, Ryan Tesink, Pierre Durepos, Jason Cameron, Aidan Kelly and Spencer MacDonald will all be in attendance. Former head coach Gerard Gallant will be in town as well.
An autograph session will be held during the first intermission. Fans can also take photos will the Gilles-Courteau Trophy.

The first 1,000 fans in attendance will receive a poster honouring the teams.

This is the first of three championship era nights this season. On Jan. 19 the 2017 President Cup team will be honoured while on Feb. 17 the 2022 Memorial Cup squad will be honoured.

HALLOWEEN FUN
Following their 3-2 overtime win over the Moncton Wildcats on Thursday, the Sea Dogs are now 5-2-0-0 all-time in Halloween games. They've won the last three they'e played.


Six of the seven games the Sea Dogs have played on Halloween have been at TD Station.

NO SO FUN
The Sea Dogs had a great showing on the ice on Thursday. Off the ice it wasn't so pretty.

The announced attendance for the game was 1,654, the smallest home crowd in team history for a game that didn't have COVID capacity restrictions. Some of the team's previous attendance lows came on Halloween night as well.

It's a bit puzzling as to why this game was scheduled for Halloween night. The Sea Dogs and Wildcats seemingly could have found another date given how close the two teams are.

The Sea Dogs are now averaging 2,370 fans per game this season, placing them 12th in the league and behind markets like Cape Breton, Shawinigan, Charlottetown and Victoriaville.

CARRUTHERS JOINS FLIN FLON
Former Sea Dogs forward Leighton Carruthers has signed with the Flin Flon Bombers of the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League.
The 20-year-old forward was picked third overall by the Sea Dogs in the 2020 QMJHL Entry Draft. He appeared in 30 games with the club during the 2020-21 COVID season before being traded to the Rouyn-Noranda Huskies.

Carruthers has spent the past three seasons with the Huskies and played two games with the club this year. He posted a total of 47 points in 220 career QMJHL games.

Carruthers made his Flin Flon debut on Wednesday, recording an assist in a 3-2 loss to the Melfort Mustangs.

TURK BOOK
Haven't seen much news around this, but PEI writer Fred MacDonald has released a book about Gerard Gallant – and it looks like it will include some details on his time with the Sea Dogs. 

Here's the description from the Indigo website:

Gerard "Turk" Gallant started playing hockey as a young boy in Summerside, Prince Edward Island. He moved up through minor hockey, playing above his age group and garnering the attention of major junior teams and the NHL. The Detroit Red Wings drafted him as an eighteen-year-old and he became a rising young star, being selected to an NHL All-Star team the same year he played for Team Canada in the World Championships. When a back injury ended his playing career, Turk applied his talents to coaching.

He began, in 1995, by shaping the Summerside Western Capitals into a winning junior A team. It won the Royal Bank Cup (now the Centennial Cup) in 1997, the first from the Maritimes to win in the tournament's twenty-six-year history. In the Quebec league, Turk did the same for the Saint John Sea Dogs, in 2011, as it became the region's first major junior team to win the coveted Memorial Cup. Stints coaching at the semi-professional level led to a stellar career in the NHL, where he took two teams, the Vegas Golden Knights, in their inaugural year, and the New York Rangers, an Original 6, to the Stanley Cup finals. In 2021, Team Canada won a gold medal, at the World Championship, under Turk Gallant.

Turk has won numerous awards, most noteworthy are his three nominations for the Jack Adams Award, which goes to the NHL's top coach. He won in 2018. He was also inducted into several sports halls of fame. Turk lives in Clinton, PEI, in with his wife Pam.

Gallant coached the Sea Dogs to three straight 50-wins seasons, two President Cup titles and a Memorial Cup championship from 2009 to 2012.

OTHER THINGS
  • Saint John's Nov. 14 game in Moncton will be the CHL Game of the Week, meaning fans can watch the game for free on CHL TV.
  • Former Sea Dogs forward Dennis Lominac now has three goals and six assists in just three games with the MHL's Summerside Western Capitals. Lominac had a goal and two assists against Grand Falls on Friday.
  • With the CHL wide Top Prospects Game dead, will the QMJHL create a similar event?
  • Speaking of Brantford, it looks like the city will be getting a new arena and keeping the Bulldogs. So what does that mean for the future of hockey in Hamilton?
  • Grand Bay-Westfield's Lyndnen Breen scored his first goal of the season in Maine's 5-0 home win over Merrimack on Friday. Breen, a fifth-round pick of Saint John in the 2017 QMJHL Entry Draft, is in his fifth year with the Black Bears. Maine is 5-0-1 on the year.
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