Vast Number of Veterans: With Josh Green’s return from injury in Friday night’s 3-1 win over Philadelphia, the Moose now have a total of seven healthy veterans. Green along with Keane, Roy, Goren, Darby, Bouck, Butenschon and defencemen Jason Doig, out with a shoulder injury, give Manitoba a total of eight players with veteran status. The AHL allows teams to dress a total of five veteran skaters per night.
Sharing time: After Moose forward and now Canucks forward, Alexandre Burrows recording his first NHL goal in a 4-3 Canucks win over Toronto on Tuesday night, the Moose have now had six different players record points in both the AHL and NHL this season. Josh Green, Jozef Balej, Lee Goren, Rick Rypien, Kevin Bieksa and Alex Burrows all recorded at least a point in their time with the parent club. This season the Canucks have also called up Sven Butenschon, Nathan Smith, Rob McVicar and Maxime Ouellet for a total of 10 different Moose players.
Schultz and Darby Remain Moose Ironmen: After Maxime Fortunus did not dress in Friday and Saturday night’s games against Philadelphia, only Craig Darby and Jesse Schultz have skated in all 43 Moose games so far this season. Schultz leads the team in points with 34 and Darby has come on strong of late recording seven points in his last eight games, leaving him fourth on the team in scoring with 29 points. Last season the Moose had four players dress for all 80 games including Peter Sarno, Jeff Heerema, Kevin Bieksa and Tomas Mojzis.
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The Moose had some well deserved rest this week playing only two home games against Philadelphia on Friday and Saturday night. Josh Green made his return to the Moose lineup in Friday's game after sitting out 14 games with a broken hand. The Moose dominated the Phantoms in Friday's game holding the reigning Calder Cup champs to only 15 shots in a 3-1 victory. Playing his second game in as many nights, Wade Flaherty stopped all 42 shots to lead the Moose to a 2-0 shutout win on Saturday night.
The Moose will have another relatively slow week, again playing back-to-back home games on Friday and Saturday night against Hamilton. They will then head on the road for four-straight before returning home for the AHL All-Star Classic at the MTS Centre.
 The Moose continue their four-game homestand with back-to-back games against the Hamilton Bulldogs. Manitoba is 2-1 this season in three games with the Bulldogs with Hamilton edging out the Moose 3-2 in their last meeting on Jan 07/06. Hamilton have lost two straight and sit seventh in the North Division with a 17-25-0-2 record, gathering 36 points in 44 games. The Bulldogs are 14th on the powerplay with a 16.5% scoring rate and 26th on the penalty kill with a 79.4% kill rate. Corey Locke leads the way in scoring with 11 goals and 17 assists for 28 points in 44 games played. Yann Danis has been the go to goalkeeper of late for the Bulldogs, sporting a 10-9-1 record in 20 games played. Danis also sits with a 2.63 GAA and a 0.911 save percentage. |
 Wade Flaherty stopped 56 of 57 shots he faced during Manitoba's two games this week - both wins over the defending Calder Cup Champion Philadelphia Phantoms. On Friday, he faced only 15 shots and made 14 saves for his 14th win of the season and then on Saturday, he followed it up with a first star performance by stopping all 42 shots he faced for his league-leading and career season-high sixth shutout. Flaherty now has 10 shutouts in a season and a half with Manitoba -- the most by any Moose goaltender in the franchise history. He now has 28 shutouts in his 17-year career. He finished the week with 0.50 goals against average and a .982 save percentage. The Terrace, BC native is now third in the AHL with a 2.25 goals against average and is second in league with a .925 save percentage. He is also fifth in the league with 15 wins. |
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