Patrick Holland of the Tri-City Americans fights through traffic in an attempt to get a shot off on Saskatoon Blades
goaltender Andrey Makarov on Wednesday night in Kennewick, Wash.
(Photo by John Allen / AridAcres.com)

THE MacBETH REPORT:
F Derek LeBlanc (Brandon, Calgary, 2003-07) requested and was granted his release by the Belfast Giants (Northern Ireland, UK Elite) for personal reasons. He had four goals and nine assists in 12 games for the Giants this season. . . .
G Dusan Salficky (Tri-City, 1990-91) has been loaned by Litomerice (Czech Republic, 1.Liga) to Karlovy Vary (Czech Republic, Extraliga) for at least one game. Salficky has yet to appear in a game this season. Last season, he had a 3.88 GAA and a .885 save percentage in 12 games with Plzen (Czech Republic, Extraliga), a 2.73 GAA and a .927 save percentage in nine games with Litomerice, and a 1.14 GAA and a .963 save percentage in six games with Slovan Ustecti Lvi (Czech Republic, 1.Liga).
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F Austin Connor, who was acquired by the Vancouver Giants from the Prince Albert Raiders on Monday, has chosen to retire. The Raiders, instead, have sent the Giants a fourth-round pick in the 2013 bantam draft. The Raiders got F Teal Burns and F Tyler Hart in the deal, with D Arvin Atwal going to Vancouver.
Connor, who is from Beechy, Sask., has decided he would rather farm than play hockey.
Steve Ewen of the Vancouver Province has that story right here.
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Rob Vanstone, in the Regina Leader-Post: “The WHL is transmitting mixed messages. While vowing to crack down on headshots, with the laudable goal of reducing concussions, the league refuses to provide specific injury information on its website. Instead, the site typically refers to upper- and lower-body injuries. In this case, the WHL’s collective big brains should give their heads a shake.”
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Vanstone, continued: “Let’s amend that: They should give their upper bodies a shake.”
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I am told that D Matt Benning of the AJHL’s Spruce Grove Saints has been offered a scholarship to Minnesota-Duluth, starting with the 2013-14 season. Benning is the son of Brian Benning, a defenceman with the Portland Winterhawks and Kamloops Blazers for parts of two seasons (1983-85). The younger Benning was a second-round bantam draft pick by the Kootenay Ice in 2009. His rights were dealt this summer to the Tri-City Americans, but he chose not to report as he wanted to keep his NCAA options open. It would seem that the NCAA option now has materialized.
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JUST NOTES: The Tri-City Americans have assigned F Justin Gutierrez to the NAHL’s Wichita Falls Wildcats. Gutierrez, who turns 16 on Dec. 22, was pointless in one game with the Americans. He is the younger brother of former WHLer Moises Gutierrez. . . . Rick Brodsky, who owns the Prince George Cougars, is a co-owner of the Wichita Falls franchise. . . . Head coach Don Hay of the Vancouver Giants will be the head coach of the WHL team that will meet a touring Russian side in the annual Subway Super Series. He will be assisted by Ryan Huska of the Kelowna Rockets and Lorne Molleken of the Saskatooon Blades. Of course, Hay also is head coach of Canada’s national junior team, and Huska is one of his assistants. . . . The WHL team will meet the Russians in Regina on Nov. 16 and in Moose Jaw on Nov. 17. . . . Greg Mayer of the Regina Pats, Curtis Amiot of the Moose Jaw Warriors and Jamie LeBlanc of the Swift Current Broncos will serve as the WHL team’s training staff.
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Some Wednesday highlights:
In Edmonton, D Griffin Reinhart scored his first two goals to lift the Oil Kings to a 2-1 victory over the Moose Jaw Warriors. . . . Reinhart forged a 1-1 tie at 13:20 of the second period, while on the PP, then got the winner at 18:28 of the third. . . . F Michael St. Croix assisted on both Edmonton goals. . . . Moose Jaw took 50 of 82 penalty minutes. . . . Edmonton held a 42-18 edge in shots. . . .
In Red Deer, the Rebels scored the game’s last three goals, the final one into an empty net, and beat the Kamloops Blazers, 4-2. . . . All three goals were unassisted efforts, with F Tyson Ness and F Chad Robinson erasing a 2-1 deficit with goals 24 seconds apart early in the third period. . . . F Turner Elson got the empty-netter at 19:41. . . . Red Deer’s Patrik Bartosak, the CHL’s goaltender of the week, stopped 30 shots. . . .
In Everett, the Brandon Wheat Kings got two goals and an assist from each of F Darian Dziurzynski and F Paul Ciarelli and beat the Silvertips, 8-2. . . . There have been reports that Dziurzynski scored three goals, but the online scoresheet shows him with two. . . . F Brenden Walker and F Michael Ferland each had a goal and two helpers. . . . Brandon G Brandon Anderson stopped 30 shots. He’s 2-0 since being acquired Sunday from the Lethbridge Hurricanes. . . . Dziurynski has three (or four) goals in two games since being acquired from the Saskatoon Blades, also on Sunday. . . . Brandon F Mark Stone had a goal as he ran his season-opening point streak to 11 games. . . . The Wheat Kings were without F Bruno Mraz, who left Tuesday’s game against the Seattle Thunderbirds after hitting his head on the boards. . . . The Silvertips had three players leave with injuries — D Ryan Murray, F Josh Birkholz and F Ryan Harrison. . . . Murray, one of the WHL’s top defencemen, left in the first period after taking a hit from Stone. Murray was on crutches after the game. . . . The Wheat Kings next play Friday in Medicine Hat against the Tigers. That game will mark the second time the Clouston brothers have clashed as head coaches. Cory is in his first season as Brandon’s head coach; Shaun is the Tigers’ second-year head coach. . . . Rob Henderson of the Brandon Sun notes that the two met on Jan. 3, 2003, when the Kootenay Ice, with Cory running things, beat the Tri-City Americans, with Shaun as head coach, 4-1, in Kennewick, Wash. . . . It’s believed that the only other brothers to have opposed each other in the WHL was the Sauters, Doug with the Calgary Wranglers and Mike with the Lethbridge Broncos, in 1979-80. . . .
In Kennewick, Wash., F Justin Feser scored twice and set up another as the Tri-City Americans got past the Saskatoon Blades, 5-2. . . . Feser’s second goal, at 18:00 of the third, gave the Americans a 4-2 lead and F Brendan Shinnimin iced it with an empty-netter 38 seconds later. . . . Tri-City G Ty Rimmer stopped 33 shots, three fewer than Saskatoon’s Andrey Makarov. . . . The Blades have lost three in a row in the U.S. Division after opening the swing with a victory in Everett. . . . The Americans will spend the weekend in Prince George. Tri-City won last season’s series 2-1-0-1, but the Americans hold a 20-3-0-1 edge since 2005-06.
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Mike Heika of the Dallas Morning News has been following the impending sale of the NHL’s Dallas Stars. Tom Gaglardi, the majority owner of the Kamloops Blazers, is hoping to purchase the Stars out of bankruptcy and there is an important deadline arriving on Saturday.
Heika’s latest piece is right here.
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A report in the Estevan Mercury indicates that the four western Canadian junior A leagues are seriously considering abandoning the RBC Cup and starting up their own championship.
Why?
“According to the document,” the newspaper reports, “a major reason for the change is to get away from Hockey Canada’s overbearing rules for hosting tournaments, which restrict profit for the host community by forcing them to change most or all of their advertising to Hockey Canada sponsors.
“The document cites ‘Hockey Canada exclusivities’ and ‘administrative fees for event management’ among the reasons for taking this initiative.”
The Mercury’s complete story is right here.

gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca
     
gdrinnan.blogspot.com
     
Taking Note on Twitter

A note about fighting majors from a follower of this blog . . .
“Kerry Toporowski had 58 fighting majors in 90-91 in Spokane. He had 506 PIMs going into the last game in Portland. Brantt Myhres was 16 and wanted to fight him and he declined. At the time he didn’t want the record of 511 by Brent Gogol. Years later, he told me he wished he had.
“Remember . . . Gogol’s numbers included misconducts which Topper’s didn’t include. If you did, he would have had that year 871 PIMs. My source . . . you! You wrote it several years ago! LOL!!!”
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JUST NOTES: The 2013 Ford World men’s curling championship will be decided in the Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre in Victoria. The event runs from March 30 through April 7, 2013, so the WHL’s Victoria Royals will be out of their home arena for a couple of weeks should they qualify for the playoffs next season. . . . The Everett Silvertips have promoted Zoran Rajcic, their longtime director of business operations, to assistant general manager. Rajcic is in his ninth season with Everett. Yes, he has been with the Silvertips since Day 1. . . . The Silvertips now have company in Comcast Arena in Everett. The Everett Raptors, an Indoor Football League team, will play out of the facility in the 2012 season. The league schedule should be released in the near future. . . . Rich Preston, the GM/head coach of the Lethbridge Hurricanes, has been nicked by the WHL office for a grand for “comments to officials” after a 2-1 loss to the host Kootenay Ice on Friday. The referees were Chris Crich and Pat Smith. . . .
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D Austin Connor, who was acquired by the Vancouver Giants from the Prince Albert Raiders on Monday, has a shoulder injury. He was injured Oct. 7 as the Raiders beat the host Seattle Thunderbirds 5-0. Elliott Pap of the Vancouver Sun reports that Connor will be examined Friday by the Giants’ medical staff and that, if he is hurt badly enough, the deal may have to be redone. Pap’s story is right here.
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D Dane Phaneuf, who was released by the Prince George Cougars prior to this season starting, is skating with the QMJHL’s P.E.I. Rocket. Marcel Vander Wier of the Charlottetown Guardian has the story right here.
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SOME TUESDAY HIGHLIGHTS:
In Swift Current, F Victor Rask scored three times to lead the Calgary Hitmen to a 7-1 victory over the Broncos. . . . Tickets were $2. Hamburgers were $2. Soft drinks were $2. And beer $2.25. . . . There were 2,521 people in the 2,879-seat iPlex. . . . The Broncos gave up the game’s first goal for the seventh straight game. . . . Swift Current t6ook 86 of the game’s 142 penalty minutes. . . .
In Medicine Hat, F Emerson Etem scored his WHL-leading 14th goal and G Tyler Bunz stopped 31 shots as the Tigers edged the Kootenay Ice, 2-1. . . . Etem gave the Ice a 2-0 lead at 12:16 of the first period. . . .
In Portland, the Winterhawks scored three times in the shootout and beat the Saskatoon Blades, 7-6. . . . The Blades, who got four goals and two assists out of F Josh Nicholls, held a 6-4 lead with 10 minutes left in the third period. . . . Portland D Troy Rutkowski scored on the PP at 10:33 and D Joe Morrow tied it at 14:31. . . . F Brad Ross had two goals and two assists for Portland. . . . Nicholls, who also had the Blades’ lone shootout goal, had never had four goals or six points in a game; in fact, he had never scored more than two goals in a game. He had five points in one game last season. . . . The Winterhawks leave today on a nine-game road trip. They’ll play six games in the Central Division, then stop in Kamloops for one and Kelowna for a doubleheader. Portland won’t play at home again until Nov. 11. . . .
In Kent, Wash., G Brandon Anderson stopped 31 shots and F Darian Dziurzynski had a goal as the Brandon Wheat Kings beat the Seattle Thunderbirds 4-1. . . . Both players were acquired in trades on Sunday and were making their first appearances with their new team. . . . Brandon F Mark Stone had an assist to run his season-opening point streak to 10 games. . . . Seattle G Daniel Cotton stopped 45 shots in his first WHL start. . . . Seattle had won three in a row. . . . Brandon lost F Bruno Mraz to a suspected head injury in the second period.
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So . . . you’re wondering how things are doing in Chilliwack, the former home of the WHL’s Bruins and now the home of the BCHL’s Chiefs.
Steve Ewen of the Vancouver Province has that story right here.

gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca
     
gdrinnan.blogspot.com
     
Taking Note on Twitter

THE MacBETH REPORT:
D Kevin Seibel (Prince George, Swift Current, Vancouver, 1998-2004) requested and was granted his release by Rødovre (Denmark, AL-Bank Ligaen). He had one goal and four assists in nine games this season.
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There were more player moves on Monday . . .
The Everett Silvertips acquired D Lucas Grayson, 17, from the Red Deer Rebels for a fourth-round pick in the 2013 bantam draft. Grayson, from Port Hardy, B.C., was a sixth-round selection by Red Deer in the 2009 draft. He had two points and 71 penalty minutes, 45 of those from fighting majors, in 40 games last season in Red Deer. This season, he had gotten into only one game. . . .
The Silvertips also assigned F Tyler Giebel, 18, to the SJHL’s Yorkton Terriers. Giebel was a second-round selection by Everett in the 2008 bantam draft; Everett actually gave the Prince Albert Raiders a third-round pick in order to move up in the second round and take Giebel. He had six points in 49 games last season and is pointless in eight games this season. . . .
F Campell Elynuik, 19, is on the move for the second time this season. Elynuik, the son of former WHLer/NHLer Pat Elynuik, has been traded by the Regina Pats to the Prince George Cougars for a conditional sixth-round pick in the 2012 bantam draft. He had three points, including a goal, and 24 penalty minutes in eight games with the Pats. They had acquired him from the Everett Silvertips for a sixth-round pick in the 2012 draft. . . .
The Vancouver Giants have acquired F Austin Connor, who turns 19 on Nov. 16, and D Arvin Atwal, 16, from the Prince Albert Raiders for F Teal Burns, 19, and D Tyler Hart, who turns 19 on Saturday. . . . Connor, a 6-foot-4, 228-pounder, is pointless with seven penalty minutes in five games. Last season, he had 13 points and 104 Pms in 59 games. . . . Atwal is with the major midget Greater Vancouver Canadians, for whom he has one assist and 22 PMs in eight games. He was an eighth-round pick by the Raiders in the 2010 bantam draft. . . . Connor will give the Giants some much-needed size up front. . . . Burns, who had 20 points as he split last season between the Portland Winterhawks and the Giants, has four assists this season. Portland selected him in the eighth round of the 2007 bantam draft. . . . Hart has two assists in nine games with the Giants. Last season, he had eight points and 80 PMs in 44 games. . . . Steve Ewen of the Vancouver Province has a good look at the Vancouver-Prince Albert deal right here.
Prince Albert also released Latvian D Kristaps Bazevics, 17, and filled that import slot with Slovakian F Michal Hlinka, 18, whom they had acquired last season from the Moose Jaw Warriors. . . . Bazevics had two penalty minutes in two games this season. . . . Hlinka had 10 points in 45 games last season. He played 23 of those games with the Raiders, picking up four points, including one goal. . . . According to a Raiders’ news released, Hlinka “will arrive immediately after receiving his visa to enter Canada, which is expected to take approximately 7-10 days.”
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JUST NOTES: F Sven Bartschi of the Portland Winterhawks is the WHL’s player of the week. He had seven points, three of them goals, in two games last week. . . . Patrik Bartosak of the Red Deer Rebels is the WHL’s goaltender of the week. He was 2-0-0, 1.00, .966 last week. . . . The Brandon Wheat Kings have recalled F Jack Palmer, 16, from the junior B Saanich, B.C., Braves and he will play tonight against the Seattle Thunderbirds in Kent, Wash. Palmer, an eighth-round pick in the 2010 bantam draft, has seven points in seven games with the Braves this season. . . . The Vancouver Giants have assigned F Greg Lamoureux, 19, to the AJHL’s Okotoks Oilers. In 109 regular-season games with the Giants, he had 28 points, including six goals. . . . The Kamloops Blazers have assigned G Taran Kozun to the SJHL’s Nipawin Hawks. Kozun, 17, is from Nipawin. He got into two games with the Blazers, going 1-1-0, 3.53, .857. . . . Congratulations to Earl Morris, a former Brandon Wheat Kings defenceman, who has been inducted into the Duncan, B.C., Sports Wall of Fame. Morris played for the BCJHL’s Kelowna Buckaroos before spending two seasons (1969-71) with the Wheat Kings. He was Brandon’s captain in 1970-71.
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SOME MONDAY NOTES:
In Lethbridge, the Kootenay Ice got a goal and two assists from F Max Reinhart in beating the Hurricanes, 4-2. . . . The defending-champion Ice improved to 7-2-2, while the Hurricanes have lost nine in a row. . . . G Liam Liston and D Spencer Galbraith, both of them acquired from the Brandon Wheat Kings on Sunday, were in the Lethbridge lineup. Liston made 30 saves. . . . F Nick Buonassisi, who was acquired by Lethbridge from the Prince George Cougars, is expected to make his Lethbridge debut on Friday against the visiting Kamloops Blazers. . . . Lethbridge also had D Joel Topping and F Reid Duke in its lineup. Duke was a first-round pick in the 2011 bantam draft; Topping was a second-round selection in 2010. Duke picked up an assist in what was his second game this season; Topping, who played one game last season, was in the lineup for the first time this season.
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F Darren Kramer of the Spokane Chiefs 46 fights during the WHL’s 2010-11 regular season. That may well be the WHL record. In fact, it may be a major junior record. And if it is it may be in jeopardy as F Ty Bilcke, a 17-year-old freshman with the OHL’s Windsor Spitfires, has had nine fights in 12 games. Go ahead. Do the math.
Jim Parker of the Windsor Star has that story right here.

gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca
     
gdrinnan.blogspot.com
     
Taking Note on Twitter