Admirals Aftermath: Week of Oct.15th - Oct. 21st

The Norfolk Admirals swept the Connecticut Whale (New York Rangers affiliate) over the weekend, scoring 11 goals and letting in 7.

On the power play, Norfolk was 1-for-6 on Friday and 3-for-8 on Saturday. While on the penalty kill, the Whale were held to only 3 power play goals in 14 attempts. Coming into the game, Connecticut had 7 power play goals in two games prior to this series. Another special teams surprise were the short handed goals of Chris Wagner, his first professional goal, and the shorty scored by Troy Bodie, helped by Wagner after he drew a penalty.

The Admirals once again split the goalie duties, giving Igor Bobkov the start Friday. He kinda looked sloppy, again, but still stopped 26-of-30. Frederik Andersen started Saturday, he had another good game, stopping 32-of-35 shots. Gabe Guenztel got his first start of the year on Saturday after Matt Smaby suffered an injury on his left leg Friday. Leaving the ice, Smaby could not put any weight on his leg at all.

The scratches for the two games were John Kurtz, Garrett Klotz, and Luca Caputi, all have yet to play a game outside of preseason.

The four wins so far have been nice. Yet, after the first two weeks of the season, the Whale and Worecester Sharks are both in the bottom third of the conference. St. John's could prove to be a tougher opponent this coming weekend.

Line Combinations & Cumulative Season Stats

Kyle Palmieri - Peter Holland - Patrick Maroon: 14 points; 7 goals, 7 assists, plus-7 and 14 PIMs

Ryan Lasch - Corey Elkins - John Mitchell: 8 points; 6 goals, 2 assists, minus-2 and 7 PIMs

Emerson Etem - Brandon McMillan - Devante Smith-Pelly: 4 points; 0 goals, 4 assists, minus-4 and 10 PIMs

Troy Bodie - Chris Wagner - Jay Rosehill: 10 points; 4 goals, 6 assists, plus-11 and 28 PIMs

Hampus Lindholm - Nate Guenin: 4 points; 0 goals, 4 assists, plus-9 and 4 PIMs

Jordan Hendry - Sami Vatanen: 6 points; 1 goal, 5 assists, plus-4 and 6 PIMs

Matt Smaby - Mat Clark: 1 point; 0 goals, 1 assist, minus-1 and 0 PIMs

NOTE: Matt Smaby's replacement, Gabe Guentzel, was minus-2 with 2 PIMs in his first game of the season..

Power Play

First Unit: Smith-Pelly - Holland - Maroon & Palmieri - Vatanen

Second Unit: Etem - Elkins - Lasch & Guenin - Lindholm

The Admirals racked-up 4 PP goals from four different players: Vatanen (from Holland and Palmieri), Lasch (from Elkins and Lindholm), Maroon (Vatanen and Palmieri), and Holland (Palmieri and Vatanen). Palmieri and Vatanen quarterback the power play for the most part.

Penalty Kill

Mitchell - Elkins - Wagner - Holland

Guenin - Hendry - Smaby* - Clark

*Guentzel, Lindholm, Vatanen, would all rotate on the PK for Saturday's game.

Dulin's Players of the Week

1. Sami Vatanen
2. Kyle Palmieri
3. Troy Bodie

The Admirals look to conquer the IceCaps this weekend with games on Saturday and Sunday. The game times for the west coast will be earlier than usual with Newfoundland being in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, so Saturday's game will start at3:00p, and Sunday's game will start at 11:30am.

In slightly smaller news, I found out I can control the future...