PRESEASON: Moose to Play 5 Games

After a couple of trades this summer and a signing, the Mooseheads have already secure their overage situation with Austyn Hardie, Jessie Lussier and Philippe Gadoury. Coach Dom Ducharme said that there are a few more open spots this season than the past few, with about half of the defenceman spots up for competition and another 3-4 spots open at forward. Zach Fucale is pretty much guaranteed the #1 goaltending job but there will be 5 boys fighting for the backup job. It should make for a very exciting training camp and interesting preseason games. 

The schedule for the Halifax Mooseheads preseason was announced a little while ago but with the Eagles playing in the Junior Club World Cup tournament changes were made to the original schedule.

Here's a refresher of when the games will be:
Saturday August 16 vs Saint John at 7pm  (Dartmouth Sportsplex)
Sunday August 17 at Cape Breton at 4pm (Centre 200)
Friday August 22 at Saint John at 7:30pm (Harbour Station)
Saturday August 23 vs Saint John at 7:00pm  (Rath Eastlink Community Centre - Truro)
Saturday September 6 at Cape Breton at 7pm (Centre 200)


Tickets for all the "home" game are now on sale.

Players arrive today for camp

It's registration day for your Halifax Mooseheads!!

With the Red/Green rosters for the intrasquad games being announced now, lets take a little deeper look at it.

• A total of 47 players have been invited to camp.
• More than half of the camp will be battling it out for the 3-4 spots that are available at the defense and forward position while it is highly believed that the other 5 goalies at camp are fighting for the backup position. Goaltender Jacob Dempsey and forward Maxime Fortier will look to impress even more this season for a more permanent spot on the team.
• Surprisingly all 11 2014 draft picks will be attending camp this week, including the two Americans that Halifax picked back in May. Watch out for Massachusetts defenceman John Marino, I hear he is pretty good.
• You probably noticed that Nikolaj Ehlers is not on the camp roster. That is because he has had a busy but exciting summer and is 'relaxing' in Switzerland. I put air qoutes around relaxing because he is practising with his old team, EHC Biel, with his father. He will join camp on August 20.

Here's the schedule for this week:
Tuesday August 12
3:00 - 5:00        Player arrival & registration
6:00                  Team & Billet Bar-B-Q

Wednesday August 13
9:00 - 9:50        Practice Red
10:00 - 10:50    Practice Green
4:00 - 6:00        Green vs Red intrasquad game

Wednesday August 13
9:00 - 9:50        Practice Red
10:00 - 10:50    Practice Green
4:00 - 6:00        Green vs Red intrasquad game

Wednesday August 13
9:00 - 9:50       Practice Red
10:00 - 10:50   Practice Green
4:00 - 6:00       Green vs Red intrasquad game

Saturday August 16
7:00       Saint John at Halifax (Dartmouth Sportsplex)

Sunday August 17
4:00      Halifax at Cape Breton (Centre 200)

I will have brief recaps of each intrasquad games as I am not able to attend them. I will let you know which players are cut through out the camp. Make sure to check back on Saturday and Sunday when I will be setting up the preseason games. Enjoy.

GOOD LUCK TO ALL THE PLAYERS.

PRESEASON: Training Camp Roster Announced

Training camp is just around the corner and your Moose have officially released their roster that will be hitting the ice on August 13 for the Red-Green intrasquad games. Cuts will be made throughout the next 3 weeks to make the 22 man roster that will represent your Halifax Mooseheads this season. A total of 49 players have been invited which includes all the Mooseheads 2014 draft picks except for the two Americans they picked.

Camp officially begins on Tuesday with player registration at 3:00pm and a billet and player BBQ. Team Red will begin the first week's practices at 9am at Cole Harbour Place followed by Team Green's practice at 10am. Intrasquad games will be played at CHP between 4pm and 6pm Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.

Team Red
G Christopher Langlais
G Jacob Dempsey
G Kevin Martin

D Austyn Hardie
D Nicolas Gibson  
D Adam Beveridge
D Brian MacDougal  
D Morgan Nauss
D Jean-Sebastien Taillefer
D Matt Murphy
D Josh Fitzgerald

F Brett Crossley
F Philippe Gadoury
F Vincent Watt
F Dominik Blain-Dupuis
F Ryan Falkenham
F Cedric Levesque
F Tyler Copeland
F Connor Moynihan
F Jonathan Courville
F Makail Parker
F Tristan Tardif
F Logan Saunders

Team Green
G Kevin Resop
G Jean-Phillipe Brais
G Zach Fucale

D William Gonthier
D Taylor Ford
D John Morino
D Brandon Worthen
D Jacob Jacques
D Jesse Lussier
D Dominico Argento

F Gabriel Morin
F Eddie Banville
F Brandon Vuic
F Samuel Leblanc
F Maxime Fortier
F Jordan King
F Barrett Dachyshyn
F Andrew Shewfelt
F Daniel Moynihan
F Gabriel Vanier
F Timo Meier
F Mark Vokey
F Jake Gaudet
F Matthew Belley

Lovell Traded To Chicoutimi

The Halifax Mooseheads have announced today that they have traded defenseman Brian Lovell to the Chicoutimi Sagueneens for a sixth round pick in 2015.

Brian Lovell, 19, will be in his third junior year during the 2014-15 season if he makes the Sags. In two seasons with the Moose Lovell had 2 goals and 11 points. He played 81 regular season games. In the playoffs, he had 2 helpers in 17 games.

Moose Country would like to wish Brian good luck in Chicoutimi. Watch the Sagueneens training camp starting August 11 to see if Lovell makes the team.

Events

The QMJHL released the regular season schedule a few months ago and this year is a little bit different if you noticed. There are two home and home series between the Nova Scotia teams but neither are in December after Christmas which means no Battle of Nova Scotia events. Talking about December, there will be a New Year's Eve game for the first time in years.

Here are the annual events that are happening for the 2014-15 season:

HOME OPENER - September 19 vs. Moncton Wildcats

Pink in the Rink 7 - October 10 vs. Charlottetown Islanders

DND Appreciation Night - November 7 vs. Saint John Sea Dogs

Teddy Bear Toss - January 9 vs. Gatineau Olympiques
Fan Appreciation Night/Season finale - March 21 vs. Saint John Sea Dogs

Hockey Challenge Raises Over Thousand Dollars

The Jordan Boyd Celebrity Hockey Challenge, that was played today, raised over a thousand dollars. The $103,000 that was raised will be split between the Heart & Stroke Foundation and the Jordan Boyd Leadership Award.

Many local hockey celebrities participated in nine games that were contested between six teams. The "pros" were randomly selected to play with the different teams before they game together with top 24 fundraisers for an All-Star game.

Former Halifax Mooseheads players that played were Nathan MacKinnon (Colorado Avalanche), Brad Marchand (Boston Bruins), Andrew Bodnarchuk (Los Angles Kings), Brendan Duke, MacKenzie Weegar and Stephen MacAulay. Other celebrities that participated included James Sheppard (San Jose Sharks), Zach Sill (Pittsburgh Penguins), Shawn O'Donnell (New York Rangers), Mason McDonald (Charlottetown Islanders) and Jacob Brennan (Acadie-Bathurst Titan).

Jordan Boyd passed away last year during the Titan training camp because of an undiagnosed heart condition. The Bathurst team had selected him in the fourth round of the 2013 QMJHL Draft.

Start of something new

It's August once again which means that we are close to the beginning of yet another season of Mooseheads hockey. After three straight years of going to the semi finals in the President's Cup playoffs with a championship in the middle, are we in store for a sub par season before the start of a rebuild. We will have to wait and see until March but the roster that they have set up for the preseason is a mix of strong offensive veterans and some talented draftees that had to wait their turn.

The top players that led Halifax to the Memorial Cup championship in the 2012-13 season have all almost moved on past their junior careers and a couple more could move on after the start of the season. Despite Nathan MacKinnon, Jonathan Drouin, Konrad Abeltshauser, Stephen MacAulay, Trey Lewis and MacKenzie Weegar going on to better things, the Herd still have a good group but don't expect them to blow teams away like they have the last 2 seasons.

With the begining of the preseason just around the corner, it also begins another year of MooseCountry blogging and tweeting from me. This will be my second full season of posting articles.

This year on Moose Country:

• Top Herd
• Around the CHL
• Live tweet schedule (post of games I will be at and tweeting)
• Gameday previews and recaps
• Preseason game previews and recaps
• Training camp news
• News on recent former Moose players in the pros

New this season:
*VOTE for Star of the Month - at the end of each month you the fans will get to vote who should be the star of the month from the Top Herd choices
*STAT SUNDAY - will be done once a month, breaking down the Mooseheads stats in the past month
*Pages on Halifax Mooseheads history including players and event backgrounds
*CONTESTS - I will be doing a few contests this season. Make sure you are following my Twitter and Facebook pages for all the details and when they will happen