Second straight day of practice for the Moose as they prepare for a pair of matinees this weekend in Winnipeg as they will do battle with the Rockford IceHogs for the first time this season.
Still in Yellow:
With Chaz Lucius dealing with a concussion he suffered in a game against the Iowa Wild a few weeks back he was skating with the club yesterday but in a yellow, non-contact uniform. It seemed unlikely he’d be ready to play even if he was in a regular uniform as the team would likely want to give him some time to get in some practices to help with game shape but that is a moot point as he remained in a yelllow, non-contact jersey today at skate. He is unlikely to play this weekend vs Rockford. More likely the 2021 1st rounder is back the following weekend against Laval.
One more trying out neck protection:
Yesterday we saw five Moose players (Chaz Lucius, Henri Nikkanen, Brad Lambert, Danny Zhilkin and Artemi Kniazev) wearing neck protection and today Kristian Reichel had joined them donning it as well. I asked him both about his thinking about wearing it and how it felt:
“It felt fine. I played with it whole life to basically 18 and then I took it off because obviously in pro you usually don’t play with it/it’s not mandatory but we all saw what happened and it’s a sad story. I think the neck protection, we are wearing protective socks, protective sleeves on our shirts and the neck protection, for me, it’s another thing how I can be protected.”
He went on to say he took advantage of the opportunity provided by the Moose equipment staff to try to get used to it now. To get a feel for it and to be safer.
Suspect we see even more players will be wearing it next week.
Hockey Fights Cancer:
November is Hockey Fights Cancer month in both the NHL and AHL. Jets prospect Tyrel Bauer spoke after the skate about what it means for him as a player to provide support for those in the battle.
“It’s a huge honour Dave. A huge privilege. It’s emotional cause there are people fighting everywhere, all day. We’re extremely lucky to be in the position we’re in and be a professional athlete, something we don’t take for granted. It’s heavy, heavy in that room on our night and everybody knows somebody whose been affected by it so we’re going to fight on our end and try to represent the greater cause as we have the privilege to be allowed to do.”
Here is a link to the Moose Hockey Fights Cancer page.
Player media:
Interview with Kristian Reichel runs until 3:00.
Interview with Tyrel Bauer runs until the end.
Up next:
The Moose will take on the IceHogs tomorrow afternoon at 2 PM CDT at Canada Life.
