Wild Pre-season Line-up: Game 2

Ahh, more of my boys getting a shot tonight. Very exciting, though I feel pretty sure we're going to lose as the Chicago line-up is better offensively. But at least I get to listen tonight! Huzzah!

The lineup for tonight:

Nolan Irmen - Belanger - Veilleux
Gillies - Pouliot - Weller
Boogaard - Sheppard - Clutterbuck
Kalus - Koivu - Miettinen

Skoula - Zidlicky
Noreau - Johnsson
Bergeron - Reitz

Harding - Schaefer

A quote from Ryan Stanzle's blog regarding the travel plans for the game:

The team will depart from MSP at 2:30 p.m. for tonight's game, then return immediately afterward. Head Coach Jacques Lemaire said that the team is away from home so often during the season that, during the preseason, it's nice to give the guys a chance to stick around a little longer.

Cal Clutterbuck, though, is so fired up to be on this trip that he may just head to the airport right now.

Heh. I'm excited for him. Go Cal!

Very cool that Noreau is getting to play, too. It really is pretty amazing considering he was undrafted just a little over a year ago and now has a 3 year NHL contract and is playing his first NHL pre-season game tonight. Go Max!

Um, and just to be fair: Go Crack Squirrel!

Back after the game with any interesting stuff...

Update: Nolan is scratched so Irmen, who traveled as an emergency fill-in, is in. Very happy for him since the last game didn't go so well, with an ugly (and controversial) misconduct penalty that ended the game with only 3 minutes and change in TOI for him.

Post-Game Update: Nolan was purposely scratched to give Irmen another chance. Boy, that was nice of JL. And he did much better. JL expressed great pleasure with his performance tonight. He even got an assist on the first goal.

On the other hand, Reitzy... oh boy. He had a brutal game and got called out for it afterwards by Lemaire. He's in deep doodoo up there. I feel for the guy big time, but this is what I was afraid of for him. That he just wouldn't be able to think and act fast enough for the NHL game.

Kalus got himself a goal though it sounds like he got lucky. I'm sure they'll have highlights on Wild.com tomorrow, so we'll see.

Didn't hear anything good or bad about Clutterbuck, so I'm assuming he played a pretty conservative game. I did hear his name in the mix a few times. I dunno. Wish I could watch these games with my own eyes.