Friday, October 21, 2011

Bruins Begin Road Trip in La Ronge

For the first time this season the Bruins go on a road trip as they kick off a pair of matchups tonight with La Ronge and then once again tomorrow night the Bruins will meet the Ice Wolves before wrapping up the three game set with Melfort Mustangs.

I'm sure all of the players are excited about hitting the road and spending some time together away from Estevan. I know as a play by play guy, my favorite part of the job is traveling with the guys. I think the biggest reason I like traveling with the team so much is because I get to sleep in, usually I have to wake up at 4:00 when I'm working at the station but when I'm on the road it's much later than. With the Bruins it's always fun to be one the road because they're a bunch of great characters.  There's so many great stories I would to tell from previous road trips but you know the old saying, "Whatever happens on the road, should stay on the road." I'm so happy that these are the last 3 games where I don't travel with the team.

For tonight's game I would be surprised if Calder Neufeld and Eric Baldwin aren't back in the lineup. Keith Cassidy may elect to hold one or both out tonight, I talked with both guys on Tuesday and they each felt like they would be good to go for tonight against the Ice Wolves.

It will be interesting to see how Cassidy handles the goaltending duties this weekend. There's a possibility that all three goalies could play this weekend. Brandon Stone hasn't played in about 10 days, Steven Glass last game was on Sunday and Derek Tendler was in net on Tuesday in the Bruins win over Melville so all three guys should be more than rested for the weekend.

The Bruins have been lead by their 18 year old rookies over the past few games. Up front Matt Brykaliuk, Taylor Reich and Ben Johnstone and on the blueline Austin Yano and Tyler Kauk have been playing solid hockey and have taken a lot of positive steps over the past couple of weeks which is great news for the Bruins, these players are a big reason why the "reloading" phase for the Bruins is moving along much quicker than expected.

Opening faceoff tonight is 7:30, same time tomorrow night in La Ronge and then the Bruins wrap up the road trip on Sunday in Melfort.

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