GAMEDAY 10 - at Halifax

GAMEDAY

Halifax Mooseheads vs Saint John Sea Dogs

Today at 7pm

Radio: News 88.9 | Webcast: Telus | TV: None | Live: @station_nation

Halifax Metro Centre – Halifax, NS

PREVIEW

HALIFAX – The Saint John Sea Dogs are back in action tonight as they make their first visit to the Halifax Metro Centre this season.

The Sea Dogs sit fourth in the Telus Maritimes Division and 12^th overall in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League with a 5-3-0-1 record. The Sea Dogs and Rimouski Oceanic are the only teams in the league who have played less than 10 games heading into today’s action.

Saint John is 2-3-0-0 on the road but are coming off yet another come-from-behind victory. On Sunday in Bathurst, the Sea Dogs overcame an early 2-0 deficit to defeat the Titan 5-4 in a shootout. Although the Sea Dogs are hovering near the .500 mark, they have been very entertaining and have kept most of their games close this season. Hopefully that can continue tonight in the Big City.

The Sea Dogs have been getting scoring from a lot of different people so far. Defenseman Michael Abbott leads Saint John in scoring with four goals and six assists for 10 points. Stephen Anderson and Oliver Cooper each have eight points.

Goaltender Sebastien Auger should get the start today. He has the second best goals against average in the league (2.15) and the best save percentage (0.942).

Meanwhile, the defending Memorial Cup champions enter action today with a 6-6-0-0 record and sit third in the Maritimes Division and 11^th overall. They are just one point ahead of the Sea Dogs in the standings and have played three more games.

Andrew Ryan leads the Moose in scoring with six goals and five assists for 11 points in 12 games. Rookie Nikolaj Ehlers is second on the team in points with nine.

This is the first of a tough couple games for the Sea Dogs this weekend. Tomorrow afternoon they host the top team in the Maritimes, the Charlottetown Islanders, at 3pm.

Tough Weekend Ahead For Sea Dogs

A challenging couple of games are ahead for the Saint John Sea Dogs this weekend.

On Saturday, the Sea Dogs make their first trip of the year to Halifax to take on the defending Memorial Cup Champion Mooseheads at 7pm. The Mooseheads lineup has recently been improved with the returns of Jonathan Drouin and Darcy Ashley.

Halifax has a 6-5-0-0 record and host the top team in the league tonight – the 9-0 Blainville-Boisbriand Armada – at the Metro Centre. The Sea Dogs sit one point back of the Moose with a 5-3-0-1 record.

This will be the second meeting of the season between the Dogs and Moose. Saint John defeated Halifax 4-2 on October 1^st at Harbour Station.

On Sunday, the Sea Dogs return home to host the top team in the Maritimes Division – the 7-1-0-1 Charlottetown Islanders – at 3pm. The Sea Dogs are 0-1-0-1 against the Isles this season.

Saint John is off to a fairly solid start and almost all of their games have proven to be quite entertaining so far. If you haven’t seen this team in action, you should probably do that some time.

Some other notes:

• Sunday’s home game against the Islanders is the first of four straight home matches for Saint John. They also host the Moncton Wildcats (Oct. 16), Quebec Remparts (Oct. 19), and the Chicoutimi Sagueneens (Oct. 20).
• The Sea Dogs are a solid 3-0-0-1 on Harbour Station ice this season. They outscoring opponents 12-7 at home.
• Nathan Noel currently sits sixth overall in QMJHL rookie scoring with seven points (five goals and two assists) in nine games. His five goals tie him for third in rookie goal scoring with Charlottetown’s Daniel Sprong and Halifax’s Nikolaj Ehlers.
• Michael Abbott sits third in defenseman scoring with 10 points (four goals and six assists) in eight games. Abbott also leads all defenseman in power play goals with four and sits second in power play points with seven.
• The Sea Dogs have had only eight fights this season, the fourth lowest total in the QMJHL. Lukas Walter leads the team with two but has not had a fight since September 22^nd. All this according to HockeyFights.com.
• The Armada are off to the best start in the Canadian Hockey League. Former Sea Dogs forward Ryan Tesink is third on the team in scoring with two goals and seven assists for nine points in seven games.
• At the opposite end of the QMJHL standings sit the poor Shawinigan Cataractes who, entering tonight's contest against Victoriaville, are still winless with a 0-7-2-0 record.
• Former Sea Dogs defenseman Steven Duda has three assists, a +1 rating, and eight penalty minutes in nine games with the Ontario Hockey League’s North Bay Battalion. He had six assists in 52 games with Saint John last season. North Bay sits first in the OHL’s Central Division with a 5-4-0-0 record.
• Thanksgiving.

Huberdeau Nets 1st; Beaulieu Debuts

Jonathan Huberdeau’s first goal of the season was a very Jonathan Huberdeau goal.

Classic move.

Huberdeau has a goal and an assist in four games with the Florida Panthers so far this season. The Panthers lost 7-2 to the Tampa Bay Lightning last night, dropping them to 1-3-0. Fortunately for the Panthers the Buffalo Sabres exist so they are not the worst team in the NHL right now.

Also, Nathan Beaulieu made his NHL season debut last night, helping the Montreal Canadiens defeat the Edmonton Oilers 4-1. The Montreal Gazette has a big time article on Beaulieu.

Sea Dogs Notebook

MacAULAY

Former Sea Dogs forward Stephen MacAulay is waiting for a working visa so he can play with the Wheeling Nailers of the ECHL. He returned home to Halifax this week where he was interviewed by John Moore.

The Nailers are affiliated with the Montreal Canadiens and Pittsburgh Penguins.

MacAulay also picked up his newest Memorial Cup ring this week.

RENT

The CBC New Brunswick website has also posted Jacques Poitras interview on Information Morning where he is discussed the Sea Dogs’ and Titan’s arena contracts. Listen to that HERE.

HUBERDEAU

Jonathan Huberdeau is still considered a prospect by Hockey’s Future. In their latest top 50 rankings, Huberdeau is ranked second.

From Hockey’s Future:

A creative playmaker, he got his teammates involved thanks to his astounding passing skills and on-ice awareness. For his efforts, the 2011 third overall pick became the franchise’s first Calder Trophy recipient. Already a rising star in the NHL, it should be only a matter of time before he is among the elite players in hockey.

Huberdeau has a goal and an assist in four games with the Panthers this season. The Panthers are 1-3 and have been outscored 18-7.

Montreal’s Alex Galchenyuk is the top ranked prospect. Also of note, Nathan Beaulieu is ranked 36^th, Charlie Coyle 46^th, and Simon Despres 48^th.

COYLE

Speaking of Coyle, he is expected to miss three to four weeks with a sprained knee according to the Wild website. He suffered the injury in Minnesota’s 4-3 overtime loss to the Anaheim Ducks earlier this week.

“It’s not an ideal situation, but I’m fortunate it’s nothing worse than it is,” Coyle told the Star Tribune. “I’m going to keep a positive mindset, and I’m looking forward to recovering and doing everything I can to be healthy again.”

Coyle has been held pointless in the two games he has appeared in this season.

The Patriot Ledger also had an article on Coyle last weekend.

CBC News Feature On Arena Contracts

The financial dealings and details between the Saint John Sea Dogs and Harbour Station has been kept quite quiet over the years. But this morning on CBC Radio’s Information Morning, Jacques Poitras had an in depth feature on the Sea Dogs arena contract in Saint John in comparison to the Titan’s contract in Bathurst.

From CBC New Brunswick:

A CBC News examination of two arena contracts with two different Quebec Major Junior Hockey League teams in New Brunswick shows that Saint John’s Harbour Station is making money from its agreement with the Saint John Seadogs. 

Under the terms of the deal, the team has been handing over $500,000 to $700,000 per year to the Harbour Station Commission – meaning the facility’s overall deficit is far below the $1.2 million annual loss projected when it was built.

The whole article can be found here. Interesting read if you are into this kind of stuff, especially some of the Titan contract details.

The Irving owned Wildcats apparently persuaded the City of Moncton to not release details of their contract.

VIDEO: Nathan Noel's Shootout Beauty

Video of Nathan Noel’s beautiful shootout goal from Sunday’s 5-4 Saint John Sea Dogs road win in Bathurst has surfaced.

Via Champions Hockey:

Would probably look a whole lot more awesome if this was in high definition and slowed down a bit. Anyways… quite impressive for a 16-year old playing in his ninth career major junior game.

Noel, the third overall pick in the 2013 QMJHL Entry Draft, has looked solid so far in his rookie campaign. He has five goals and two assists in nine games with the Sea Dogs.