Merry Christmas MooseCountry

Your Moose fan here,
Halifax played their last home game before the holidays last night against the 14th place Acadie-Bathurst Titan (a 4-3 win). They will next play two road games over the next week before taking a break for Christmas. They will play Moncton tonight and Saint John on Friday. They will then play one more road game after the break before coming back home for three straight games. December 29th is the Battle of Nova Scotia event where the Moose wear special NS themed jerseys and January 4th is finally our Teddy Bear Toss game. (I will post before and after both of these games.)

I wanted to wish all of you an early very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! I hope you have a wonderful holiday season and enjoy your time with your family and friends, I know I will be.



Merry Christmas

Moose break a record

Your Halifax Mooseheads were playing the Acadie-Bathurst Titan tonight and won 4-3 through 60 minutes of play. The Moose have now broken a franchise home wins record with 16 straight home games won this season. The red, green and gold had tied the record last night with a win against the PEI Rocket. The record was first set in the 1995-1996 QMJHL season, which was Halifax's second season in the league.

With this win the Mooseheads are now 16-1-0-0 at home this season and have an overall record of 27-3-1-1 for 56 points, good enough for first in the Maritimes division, first in the Q and a ranking of #1 in the country.

PEI figure out defense card

The PEI Rocket have finally figured out how to play defence this season against the league's leading goals scored team, the Halifax Mooseheads. Though the shots indicate differently (35-29 Moose), the team who will next year be called the Islanders, finally limited the red and green to 3 goals after 3 games played this season allowing 7.33 goals/game. In Halifax's record tying 15 straight home win of the season, the home team won 3-1 without their star players Nate, Jo and Marty.

Notes: Beauchemin was credited with 2 goals tonight... MacKinnon, Drouin, Frk and Abeltshauser were all not in the lineup and won't be in tomorrow's game either... Konrad missed his 6th straight game with a wrist injury...

50/50
Congratulations to Michelle of Hubbards who got $8,200 winning tonight's 50/50

Three stars:
3. Currie (PEI)
2. Fucale (HAL)
1. Beauchemin (HAL)

Beauchemin also received Dickies hardest working player of the game

Attendence: 7,032

Nathan and Jonathan also were named to Canada's world junior team and will miss games until the 2 road games in January.


Score
Rocket 1 at Mooseheads 3

UP NEXT: versus Acadie-Bathurst tomorrow night at the Metro Centre

Dec 13: PEI vs. Mooseheads game preview

Home game number 16 goes tonight at 7:00pm and will be played against the Prince Edward Island Rocket. The Rocket are hosts to two of the top three scoring leaders so far this season with the Moose being host to the other, Nathan MacKinnon, who will not be playing tonight. Both Nate and Jonathan Drouin are currently playing for the Canadian junior team against the University of Calgary as I write this. They will know by tonight if they will represent our nation later in the month starting on Boxing Day in Ufa, Russia. Halifax can tie a team record tonight for consective home wins if they are able to beat PEI for the fourth time this season. In three games versus the Rocket, Halifax has scored an average of 7.33 goals, winning 8-1 on Sept 23 and 7-5 on October 17 in PEI, and most recently 7-3 at the Metro Centre on October 28.
Brad Cuzner will play tonight as a replacement for the still injured Konrad Abeltshauser. Halifax is going into the game with a 8-1-1-0 record in their last 10 games overall while PEI are 5-4-1-0 in their last 10 and have a 6-7-1-0 record on the road so far this season.

Overall record:
PEI: 17-12-2-0 = 36 points (3rd in Maritimes Division, 8th overall)
HFX: 25-3-1-1 = 52 points (1st in Maritimes Division, 1st overall)

Top Scorers:
ROCKET: #19 Josh Currie (27G, 25A, 52 PTS), #16 Ben Duffy (20G, 31A, 51 PTS), #29 Tomas Pavelka (6G, 20A, 26 PTS)
HALIFAX: #22 Nathan MacKinnon (22G, 30A, 52 PTS), #27 Jonathan Drouin (19G, 29A, 48 PTS), #91 Martin Frk (12G, 25A, 37 PTS)

Moose stay on top

For the fifth straight week, the Halifax Mooseheads were ranked number one in the CHL Top 10 rankings. Halifax has won 3 straight games after a 3-0 shutout loss last Sunday against Moncton. Every Wednesday, the Canadian Hockey League announces their top 10 teams over the 3 leagues. Along with the Mooseheads, three other teams from the Q were named in the rankings.

Week 12's CHL Top 10

1. Halifax Mooseheads (24-3-0-1) last week: 1
2. Portland Winterhawks (23-4-0-1) last week: 3
3. London Knights (23-5-0-2) last week: 4
4. Kamploops Blazers (22-7-1-2) last week: 2
5. Blainville-Boisbraind Armada (21-5-1-2) last week: 5
6. Owen Sound Attack (21-5-1-2) last week: 6
7. Quebec Ramparts (20-7-0-1) last week: 8
8. Barrie Colts (19-8-0-1) last week: 7
9. Calgary Hitmen (19-6-1-2) last week: 9
10. Edmonton Oil Kings (18-5-2-3) last week: -

    Honorable mentions:
    Prince Albert Raiders (20-9-0-2)
    Moncton Wildcats (19-10-0-0)
    Spokane Cheifs (20-7-1-0)

Team Canada selection camp roster announced

Thirty seven under 20 year old hockey players were announced to Team Canada's world junior hockey selection camp today. Only twenty three of these men will end up playing for their country at the 2013 World Junior Ice Hockey Championships in Ufa, Russia between December 26 and January 5.

4 goalies, 12 defensemen and 21 forwards were announced to the camp roster. Among the announced were Sea Dogs forward Jonathan Huberdeau, Oklahoma City Barons (AHL) Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Edmonton Oil Kings Griffin Reinhart, Belleville Bulls (OHL) goalie Malcolm Subban, Moose Jaw defenseman and Maple Leafs prospect Morgan Rielly, Oshawa Generals forward Boone Jenner. Two Mooseheads forwards were also named to the camp roster; Nathan MacKinnon and Jonathan Drouin. Halifax goalie Zach Fucale was not named to the selection camp. Other NHL drafted players include Mark Scheifele of Barrie and Mark Strome of Niagara

11 WHL players were named, 18 named from OHL and 7 from the Quebec league. The extra one is RNH who is playing in the American Hockey League.

From Willy Povlov on Twitter: @Mackinnon9 doesn't care what position he plays: "If I have to be the water boy, I'll be the water boy"
@jodrouin27: "They don't really invite a lot of 17-year-olds but I want to show age doesn't matter"


Full roster of invitees here: http://hockeycanada.ca/index.php/ci_id/75137/la_id/1/season_id/202929/profile_id/202931/team_id/82853/ss_id/190000/

Moose statistics on December 2

Team:
Record 23-3-0-1 47 points (1st overall)
Goals for/against 136/70
Power play percentage 30.6% (2nd overall)
Penalty kill percentage 80.2% (5th overall)

Top 10 skaters points
10. Randy Gazzola 27gp-5g-12a-17pts
9. Brent Andrews 27gp-5g-13a-18pts
8. Luca Ciampini 26gp-12g-13a-25pts
7. Darcy Ashley 27gp-5g-21a-26pts
6. Konrad Abeltshauser 23gp-1g-26a-27pts
5. Matthew Boudreau 27gp-17g-10a-27pts
4. Stefan Fournier 26gp-16g-15a-31pts
3. Martin Frk 25gp-12g-23a-35pts
2. Jonathan Drouin 21gp-15g-27a-42pts (11th overall)
1. Nathan MacKinnon 27gp-22g-25a-47pts (3rd overall)

Top 5 plus/minus
5. Luca Ciampini +18
4. MacKenzie Weegar +19
3. Darcy Ashley +19
2. Jonathan Drouin +19
1. Nathan MacKinnon +26

Nathan also leads the team in shots and short handed goals, and is second in points per game and power play goals. While Fournier leads the team in power play goals and is second in shots, Drouin leads the Quebec league in the points per game, while six players are tied for second on the team with one short handed goal.

Goalies:
Zach Fucale 19-3-0-1 23gp 1363.12 minutes GAA - 2.51 SAV% - 0.898
Chris Clarke 4-0-0-0 4gp 266.40 minutes GAA - 2.70 SAV% - 0.888

Fucale is first overall in wins, second overall in goals against average and eighth overall in save percentage