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Division Rivalries Bring Heat

January 6, 2004 - Central Hockey League (CHL)
Austin Ice Bats News Release


Setting the Stage: The Austin Ice Bats of the Central Hockey League have begun defense of their Governors' Cup title, opening the 2003-04 CHL season with a 15-12-5 record. After a big home win over Rio Grande Valley last Saturday, the second-place Ice Bats now lead the Killer Bees by two points and Corpus Christi by eight points in the Southeast Division standings. The Ice Bats will face both those teams, as well as their other divisional rival, Laredo, this week.

Last season, the Ice Bats earned a franchise-best 46-14-4 record, clinching their second straight Southeast Division title and the Governors' Cup for the league's top overall regular season record.

Defeating New Mexico and Laredo in the 2003 President's Cup Playoffs, the Bats earned their second straight Southern Conference crown and a berth in the Cup Finals. There, however, for the second straight year, the Ice Bats fell one step short of the CHL's ultimate prize, falling to the Memphis RiverKings in five games.

A look back: The Ice Bats have won four of their five games played since the Christmas break. Last Tuesday, the Bats defeated Odessa, 4-1.

Odessa's Jami Yoder scored the only goal of the first period. With 5-1/2 minutes left in the second, a Shawn Legault deflection hit the post, but the Bats tied the game with two minutes left in the period on a Josh St. Louis score. The Bats then erupted for three goals in the third, scored by Brent Hughes, Tab Lardner and Legault.

Lardner and Daniel Tetrault led scoring with two points, while Austin goalie Jonathan Forest stopped 39 of 40 shots faced. Odessa failed to score on five power play chances.

On New Year's Eve, the Ice Bats won their third straight, 4-3 in a shootout at Lubbock. After a scoreless first, the Bats built a 2-0 lead on a Brent Hughes rebound goal and a Gerald Tallaire score. But a mere 70 seconds after Tallaire's goal, Lubbock's Dave MacIntyre stormed down the slot for a power play score. And less than two minutes after that, Chris Duggan tied the game with a rebound goal.

Cotton Kings defenseman Derek Holland threaded a power play shot through a screen from the left point, and Lubbock held its first lead with 7-1/2 minutes left. Trailing by a goal, Austin coach Jeff Greenlaw pulled goalie Jonathan Forest for an extra skater with 1:33 remaining. The Bats then dogged the Lubbock net in an extended forecheck, and tied the game with 36.3 seconds left, Tab Lardner swatting home a third rebound.

After a scoreless overtime, the Ice Bats scored on all four shootout attempts against Lubbock goalie Jeremy Symington. Credited with the game-winner in Round Two, Hughes finished with two goals and an assist.

Friday night, the Ice Bats had their three-game win streak snapped in Fort Worth, 4-1. On the best opportunity of a scoreless first period, Austin defenseman Clint Way glanced a shot off a skate and then off the left post. Former Ice Bat Joey Bastien then scored twice in the second to help the Brahmas build a 2-0 lead.

Austin's Josh St. Louis cut the lead in half midway through the third with a backhanded rebound. But with the Bats gambling up ice in the closing minutes, Fort Worth's Jeremy Vanin slammed the puck on net on an odd-man rush, and Jeff Scharf slid home the rebound. Scharf added an empty net goal with 16 seconds left. Brahmas goalie Erasmo Saltarelli stopped 21 of 22 shots for the win, the Brahmas' seventh in ten outings.

In the first of six straight divisional games, the Ice Bats picked up a big home win over Rio Grande Valley, 4-2 last Saturday. The Ice Bats opened with a 16-5 shot advantage, and a pair of first period goals 49 seconds apart. Brett Seguin scored from the wing and Kelly Smart on a rebound.

Rio Grande Valley goalie Jeff Levy kept Smart's line from scoring again early in the second, snuffing Shawn Legault's 2-on-1 rush bid off a Smart pass. But he couldn't stop Brent Hughes from deflecting in Brandon Carper's long shot for a 5-on-3 power play goal. And after Ryan Shmyr put the Killer Bees on the board late in the second, Austin's Tab Lardner all but wrapped it up with a score eight minutes into the third. The line of Smart, Lardner and Legault combined for two points each, as the Ice Bats retook sole possession of second place in the division.

All-Stars: Announced today, the reserves for the Southern Conference All-Star squad will include Ice Bats forward Gerald Tallaire and defenseman Daniel Tetrault. For the veteran Tallaire, the team's top scorer, it will be his first All-Star appearance. Tetrault will be making his third appearance as an Ice Bat, having appeared in the 2001 WPHL All-Star Game as a rookie, and then as a starter in the 2002 CHL All-Star Game. This year's CHL All-Star Game will be played January 22nd in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Major Milestone: With two assists New Year's Eve at Lubbock, Ice Bats center Brett Seguin has moved into the top 50 career point producers in the history of minor pro hockey. Now with 986 professional points, Seguin moved ahead of recently-retired Oklahoma City legend Joe Burton and Reggie Meserve, an Eastern League center of the 50's and 60's, in the rankings of all-time scorers.

Player Plaudits: Ice Bats goalie Jonathan Forest still ranks among the top ten league goalies, at 11-6-4, with a 2.35 goals-against average and .924 save percentage. Forwards Gerald Tallaire and Brett Seguin are tied for the team lead in scoring, with 31 points each. Brent Hughes leads all CHL rookies with a team-most 15 goals, to go along with 6 assists. Forward Shawn Legault ranks 3rd in the league with 171 penalty minutes.

Potential Bite Victims: With a 19-point Southeast Division lead, outstanding Laredo threatens to leave the rest of the league in its dust. The Bucks are 26-5-2, and lead the league in virtually every category-- on offense (3.97 goals per game) and defense (2.18 average goals allowed). They're tops on the power play (24.1%) and although 2nd on the penalty kill (90.1%), have scored a league-most 10 shorthanded goals. Laredo even leads the league in average penalty minutes (30.2 minutes per game). The Bucks boast the league's top two scorers, Brent Cullaton (21 goals, 39 assists) and Jeff Bes (17 goals, 40 assists).

Both have averaged over two points per game in the midst of eight-game point streaks. Joining them as All-Stars is veteran Chris Grenville (18 goals, 17 assists, 9 power play goals), but speedy Patrik Nilson (15 goals, 15 assists) did not make the squad. Rookie Mike Amodeo leads the league with 192 penalty minutes. And don't forget about the league's top two goalies, Marco Emond (14-2-2, 1.99 GAA) and David Guerrera (12-3, 2.12 GAA, 3 shutouts). 15-1-1 at home, the Bucks have won nine straight at the LEC. Yep, if titles were earned in the regular season, Laredo'd be skating the Cup.

Potential Bite Victims, continued: Corpus Christi is fighting to keep the season from slipping away. At 12-17-3, the Rayz are six points behind Rio Grande Valley, and have won just twice in their last ten games. Corpus is 7-11-1 under interim coach Pat Dunn, who was hamstrung immediately by the reassignment of top scorer Ed McGrane (14 goals, 7 assists in 19 games) to another league. Defenseman Mike Tilson currently leads the team with 9 goals and 16 assists (with 7 goals coming on the power play). Centers Jay Woodcroft and Dan Shermerhorn have 22 points each. The Rayz rank 2nd in average penalty minutes (just under 30 per game), and winger Brad Wingfield is 2nd in the league with 177 total minutes. 4th in minutes played, goalie Brent Belecki hasn't had the season he hoped for, at 10-13-3, with a 3.23 GAA. The Rayz are 9-5-2 at home, 3-12-1 on the road.

Just because they're now a couple points behind Austin, don't expect Rio Grande Valley to abandon their formula of grit and goaltending. The Killer Bees are 14-13-5, winless in their last three. The Bees rank last on offense (2.34 goals per game), but are still 5th defensively (2.69 average goals allowed). Most of the offensive load has come from one line, led by Bill Newson (17 goals, 8 assists) and Matic Kralj (11 goals, 9 assists). But it's been goalies Jeff Levy and Jacques Vezina that have led the team. Levy is 12-10-3, with a 2.46 GAA and league-most four shutouts. Vezina is 2-3-2, but ranks 3rd in the league with a 2.14 GAA. 7-6-1 as a road team, Rio Grande hosts the top teams from both Conferences before coming to Austin. They'll play Laredo for the 10th time this season on Friday, then host Bossier-Shreveport on Saturday.

The Series: The Ice Bats are 8-6-1 in the two year series against Laredo, 1-3-1 this season. The Bucks won the season's first three meetings by a combined 14-3 score. But in the last two meetings in Austin, the Bats have earned a 3-1 win and 3-2 shootout loss.

The Bats are 41-17-4 lifetime against Corpus Christi, but just 1-1-2 this year. The Ice Bats won the only meeting played in Austin, but dropped a 4-3 shootout loss in the last meeting, December 12th in Corpus.

Austin is 2-3 in its first season of play against Rio Grande Valley. The Bats have earned 4-3 and 4-2 wins in Austin, but have lost all three games in Hidalgo by 2-1, 2-0 and 3-0 scores.

Comments from the Coach:

On last week: "We didn't play great games against Odessa and Lubbock, but we managed to win those games. And then when you combine a new and improved Fort Worth team with what might have been our worst game all year... you saw what happened. But I thought we rebounded with one of our better games against Rio Grande Valley. That was the win we wanted, coming in the division, and so I was happy to get it."

On this week: "All these games are extremely important. We have to do some damage in our division. We got the first out of the way last Saturday, and now it's on to Laredo and Corpus Christi, two tough places to play. We're definitely not intimidated-- we dominated Laredo last year in that building with a lot of our same team back. So we won't go in scared. But we know they're a great team and we'll have to play well to steal any game out of there. Everybody has to show up for it. If even one guy's not on, it's tough to beat them."

"I'm happy for both Tallaire and Tetrault to be able to go to the All-Star Game. Tally's been a standout from game one. He's worked hard all year, and has been one of our most consistent players. And even though Tetsy got off to a slow start, he's been good too over the last ten to 15 games. Both are deserving."

Cave, Sweet Cave: Friday night, one lucky fan will compete to win a new Ram pickup in the Dodge "Score-O" contest.

Sunday is Time Warner Cable Family Day. Fans may purchase a package of four tickets, four Pepsis, four hotdogs and a game program, all for just $49.99. Sunday is also Big Brothers/Big Sisters Day. For every Big Brother or Big Sister that purchases a ticket to the game, their Little Brother or Sister gets in free. Fans or media may contact Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central Texas for more details on this special offer and their "Sports Buddies" program, at 472-KIDS.

Tickets to all Ice Bats home games are now available at all Texas Box Office locations, including the Ice Bats ticket office and all Austin-area HEB stores. On-line ordering is available through www.TexasBoxOffice.com. To charge by phone, fans may call Texas Box Office at (512) 477-6060, or the Ice Bats ticket office at (512) 927-PUCK.

Individual game tickets range in price from $10 to $30, depending on section, with discounted rates for groups of 15 or more. In addition to group tickets, season tickets remain on sale at the Ice Bats office, in full-, half-season, or 10-game plans. Free Belfry Club membership is still included for all new full season packages, as well as free parking for all full-season and half-season plans.

For more information, fans may call the Ice Bats ticket office at (512) 927-PUCK, or log onto the team's website at www.icebats.com.

In the Air: For the second straight season, all Ice Bats away games will be broadcast on News Talk 1260, KWNX-AM. The station will broadcast all road games during the 2003-04 regular season and CHL Playoffs. All road games will also be available live on-line, through www.SportsJuice.com. The Texas Dodge Dealers Warm-up Show begins 20 minutes prior to game time. Ice Bats Director of Broadcasting, Media/PR Glen Norman will handle play-by-play duties for a sixth straight season.

Bats in Cyberspace: Bats fans can learn the latest about their team by logging on to www.icebats.com. The official website of the Bats was newly re-designed by BeyondBeyond Design and constructed by webmaster Nathan Jones.

Home or away, Bats fans can also follow the action with real-time scoring on the website, courtesy of Pointstreak.com. Fans will be able to access a game box score in real-time, as well as those of all other CHL games being played.



Central Hockey League Stories from January 6, 2004


The opinions expressed in this release are those of the organization issuing it, and do not necessarily reflect the thoughts or opinions of OurSports Central or its staff.

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