MORNING SKATE: Ducks at Isles

With the fresh faces up from Bridgeport, there will some changes tonight. Here are some notes from the morning skate…


- According to Ted Nolan, Bryan Berard and Marc-Andre Bergeron are out tonight and Aaron Johnson is in. Only six defensemen will dress.

- With that, don’t be surprised if you see Radek Martinek, Miroslav Satan and Brendan Witt getting power play time at the points. Said Nolan: “We need to put guys there that will get the puck through traffic and on net.”

- Richard Park (flu) is a game time decision. If he doesn’t go, Jeff Tambellini will skate on the left side of Josef Vasicek and Bill Guerin.

- With the chance of Teemu Selane making his season debut for Anaheim tonight, the Finnish media was in full force this morning. While in town, they also took the opportunity to talk to Sean Bergenheim.

- Mike Sillinger spoke to the media this morning about his hip injury. Greg Logan will have a more substantial report, but Silli said: a) He has battled through the injury since the beginning of December and b) He loves playing and wants to contribute, but at this point he can’t perform that he knows he can and that’s it better for some young guys to get an opportunity.

- If the match-up in goal is anything other than Rick DiPietro versus Jean-Sabastien Giguere, we’ll be surprised.

MORNING SKATE: Flyers at Isles

The Islanders are back home for an Atlantic Division tilt versus the Philadelphia Flyers. It’s the first time the Flyers have visited the Coliseum this season. Here are some notes from the morning skate.


- Defensemen Chris Campoli, Radek Martinek and Brendan Witt are indeed all out for tonight’s game. Both Martinek and Witt took the full skate and looked pretty good to the naked eye, but Islanders head coach Ted Nolan told the media that Marti is about a week away and that Witt could possibly play on Monday.

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- With that news, Aaron Johnson returns to the lineup and at his natural defenseman position. In his five games earlier this season, Johnson mostly skated as a fourth-line forward. Johny said the coaches told him he’ll be eased back into the lineup, but is excited to finally get back into an NHL game.

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- In the uber-tight Atlantic Division where the top and bottom teams are only separated by six points, the Islanders enter tonight’s contest only two points behind the third-place Flyers. The Islanders are only four points out of the Atlantic Division lead.

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- The probably match-up in goal tonight is Rick DiPietro versus Martin Biron.

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- The Islanders third-best penalty kill will get a good test tonight if the need arises against the Flyers who own the NHL’s top power play unit. They click at a 24.4 percent rate.

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- Before the game, Islanders forward Sean Bergenheim and Flyers goaltender Antero Niittymaki will partake in the photo-op with the youth Finnish hockey team from Ilves, Finland, who is participating in the International Division of the Lighthouse Tournament.

MORNING SKATE: Leafs at Isles

Along with the much anticipated return of Jason Blake to the Nassau Coliseum was the return of the Toronto Media. You gotta love those guys… And there’s not a good media relations person in the NHL who wouldn’t like to have the headache that comes along with working with that many reporters if it meant that much more coverage for their team. But I digress…

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Even the New York media came out for the morning skate for a chance to catch up with Blakey. I believe Mark Herrmann is writing a separate column on his return for tomorrow’s Newsday. Jason was in good spirits this morning when we caught up. The last time I saw him smile like that was after the trade deadline has passed last February. Let’s just hope he keeps the first period hat trick in the bag tonight.

After coaching him for a season, how does Ted Nolan plan on to defending the speedster from Minnesota? “We’ll play him tight because you know he’ll be flying around the ice tonight.”

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Rick DiPietro will be the Islanders’ goaltender tonight and according to the (radio) Voice of the Islanders (Steve Mears), Andrew Raycroft will be in net for the Leafs. Razor’s last game was back on November 24 at Phoenix. He was also in net for the 8-1 Leafs victory over the Islanders back in October.

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The Coliseum really needs to look into getting better glass behind the nets. An unknown Leaf punched a nice sized hole out of a pane of glass which was in the same place as the one that Marc-Andre Bergeron broke last week.

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If fans see a much younger Sean Bergenheim look-a-like tonight in the stands, it’s his brother. Now we know was Sean looked like about 10 or so years ago.

NEWS: Bergy Out, Walter In

As Ted Nolan told the media earlier today after the morning skate at the Nassau Coliseum, Sean Bergenheim is out with a shoulder injury and is day-to-day. Replacing him on the roster is Ben Walter, who was acquired just prior to training camp from Boston.

Walter is in a four-way tie for the team lead in scoring in Bridgeport (AHL) with seven points (four goals, three assists). He leads the Sound Tigers with four goals.

NYI: Bergy is a Hit

For over a year now, everybody has said “Sean Bergenheim is a ‘Ted Nolan type player.’” What everybody meant by that is this: Bergy plays hard, hits everything in sight, is “gritty” and just wants to help his team win.

Two periods are complete here in Bridgeport and we definitely have seen that so far tonight.

There was one shift in the second where he and Devils defenseman Vitaly Vishnevski battled hard for 45 seconds. Bergy must have finished at least three or four hard checks to Vishnevski. He took some hits too on that shift, but kept pedaling and kept playing with the same demeanor.

The former first rounder also has some scoring ability with his grit, not to mention an ability and willingness to play defense. Only time will tell if he will round to be the complete player we all hope he will turn out to be, but it certainly will be fun watching.

I’m Corey Witt and I’m a Sean Bergenheim fan.

NEWS: Berard to Wear #4

The Bryan Berard comeback story makes him #1 in our hearts and #4 on our line-up cards.

Wade Dubielewicz will keep his #34 and Berard will wear #4 in training camp. In case you forgot or didn't look at the old picture below, Berard wore #34 in his first stint with the Islanders.

In case you're wondering, Andy Sutton will wear #25, Josef Vasicek will wear #63 and Sean Bergenheim will wear #20.

#21 is still available as of today, so Mariusz Czerkawski... If you're around... Just kidding, folks.

NOTE: RFA's are A-OK

Not much has been said in regards to the Islanders restricted free agents this summer. The team didn't have too many and the ones we did have, well, have all been signed. And the last piece of that sentence is what matters the most.

Last year, Sean Bergenheim and Denis Grebeshkov were two holdouts for the Islanders. They didn't sign a contract before camp and were not allowed to come back once the team started training. In 2005-06, Mark Parrish almost sat out the season because of his contract. But this season there won't be any talks of holdouts because there isn't anyone to hold out. All of the Islanders RFA's for that matter have been signed and will be in camp this season.

On September 13th when the team flies up to Moncton, you wont hear of talk of which side will blink first or what will happen if the player isn't signed. There will be no RFA distractions. And that's great news for everyone.

Oh... And it helps when no one makes ridiculous offer sheets to your RFA's, too!