Bulls set for first ever meeting with Southern Minnesota
November 2, 2005 - North American Hockey League (NAHL)
Billings Bulls News Release
The North American Hockey League is a league of growth and expansion. During this past off-season the NAHL broadened itself to a four-division league after adding 3 new teams to the NAHL contingent, the North Iowa Outlaws, the Traverse City Outlaws and the Southern Minnesota Express. The Billings Bulls have already had a taste, albeit a bitter one, against one of these teams when the Bulls fell 7-1 to the Traverse City North Stars back on October 20th as part of the NAHL Showcase. Now they will get their first look another of these new teams when Billings welcomes the Southern Minnesota Express to MetraPark Arena tomorrow evening.
The Express are based in Owatonna, Minnesota and are seated in the NAHL's Central Division amidst the Fargo-Moorhead Jets, Minnesota Blizzard, North Iowa Outlaws and the Bismarck Bobcats. Southern Minnesota comes into tomorrow's game one game under .500 with a record of 6-7-1, good for 13 points and 4th in the Central Division. The Express are coming off a 4 games in 4 days home stretch last weekend that saw them go 3-1 with a pair of wins over the Wasilla Spirit and a split with the Fairbanks Ice Dogs. Southern Minnesota has already played 5 games against Western Division foes and has an impressive 4-1 record against the West. The Express have struggled on the road though where they are a disappointing 1-4. Southern Minnesota is lead by forwards #17 Sean Murphy (8-11-19), #18 Alex Coles (12-2-14) and #21 Ryan Guentzel (6-8-14).
The Bulls on the other hand are coming off a disappointing weekend in which they won only 1 of their 3 games at home this past weekend. Billings started off their home stretch with a nice 3-2 win over the Helena Bighorns Wednesday but faltered 7-4 against Helena on Friday and were doubled up by the Fargo-Moorhead Jets 4-2 on Saturday. The Bulls currently stand at 6-8-1, good for 13 points and 4th in the Western Division. In order to curb the Bulls current 2-game losing streak they'll simply have to try and find a way to score more goals. The Bulls 39 goals for this season is worst in the Western Division and 3rd worst in all the NAHL. The Bulls will also need to stay out of the penalty box as they are averaging 23.3 penalty minutes/game (5th worst in the NAHL) and their penalty killing is clicking at just 78.6% which ranks them 19th out of the 20-team league.
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