Goodbye Bourquie!

Image by Dinur via Flickr

How do you frustrate two teams fan bases? Waive a fan favorite at two levels and have him claimed by both levels biggest rivals. In case you haven't heard, the phuquing phlightless phouls, otherwise known as the Penguins, claimed Chris Bourque today. Caps fans are beside themselves. I've never seen this type of reaction from people on Japer's Rink. If you don't read the comments on that site you are missing out. They are usually very astute hockey people, but this issue has some of them acting like the Pens kicked their puppy, while clubbing baby seals, as they deforested millions of acres of rain forest. I can understand their frustration, but blaming the Penguins is directing their anger in the wrong direction. The Caps exposed Bourque because they couldn't get under the salary cap with his contract on the books. Be mad at the Caps. If you can't manage that, Michael Nylander has a cap hit of $4.875 mil and he's going to be a healthy scratch most nights, be mad at him. Actually be mad at the Caps for that too, they're the ones who signed him to that anchor of a contract.

So what does this mean to the Bears? Well, really not much. Bourque wasn't going to be in Hershey much this season anyway, so the only real result is that Boyd Kane will be up with the big club until Fehr or Flash come back.

Here is a nice little tribute video to Chris:



I was at practice again today, the boys had a much better effort today. More drills, but team drills rather than individual so more fun for the players. Hence, better practice to watch.

Alexandre Giroux and Keith Aucoin were both on the ice today, skating on a line with Darren Reid. Watching them it was a bit of a head shake. Wait, who's playing with G & Coiner? The more I saw of them and the more I thought about it, it makes a certain kind of sense. Reider can play the immovable object role in front of the crease very well. I'm just so used to thinking of him as a third/fourth liner that seeing him on the top line didn't compute.

Second line was Osala, Gordo and Perreault. Finley, Jouds and Pinner were the grind line matchups. Bouchard, Wilson and Kane skated together. Bouchard looked like he was hurting out there today. He also sweats more than any hockey player I've ever seen. His jersey was starting to dampen halfway through practice. After the conditioning skate, it was completely wet, dripping even.

Carlson was incredible during this session. On a skate & shoot drill, he lasered one past Cash and you could see he wasn't shooting as hard as he could. On the two on one drills, I never saw him get beat. He almost always took the man instead of the pass and he got the puck every freaking time. He still looks like he's stuck in second gear, but I don't know if that's because the game at this level is too easy for him or he just always looks relaxed and like he's not trying.

Met an interesting gentleman today, Pat Lauzon. His father Hank signed the first professional contract that the Bears, or B'ars as they were called then, ever offered. He's been part of the Hershey family since he was born and had some great stories about the old teams. I'm going to try and spend some more time with him and post some of the stories.

That's all for now.
GV

Trying out mobile blogging.

Here at Bears practice watching the conditionig skate and I decided to see if I could blog from my phone. It turns out I can. And here is the rest of it.

Tuesday Morning Musings.

One of the truisms of marketing is "Sex Sells," so I can understand what the Dallas Stars are trying to do in this webspot. (Warning: PG-13)



The big demographic for hockey is the pubescent to young adult male. They like pretty girls. I get it. However, if the NHL is ever going to be successful as a league, they need to find out how to reach that demographic without offending over half of the population. This spot reeks of 70s porn shlock, the cheesy music, the slow pans, playing with the strings on the bikinis, "Hey, where did my pants go?" Come on! This is the same freakin' team that suspended, then traded, Sean Avery for referring to an ex-girlfriend as "sloppy seconds." Talk about sending a mixed message to their fans and their players. My wife reminded me that Dallas is a strange market. The Cowboys started the cheerleader war in the NFL and still are pushing the limits of good taste, so this isn't a new phenomenom down south. However, I would have thought that the Stars would have been more sensitive to the irony of what they were doing. (Full Disclosure: As I was watching the spot last night, my wife asked me why I was watching porn on the computer. That's never a good thing.)

The Capitals had a bit of a kerfluffle with this earlier this summer. Semyon Varlamov made some ill advised comments about American women in a Russian magazine, and this still hasn't settled down for some fans. I'm thinking there may be some backlash from this for the Stars. I understand that hockey can be an "old boy's club," but, in this day and age, it's time to keep this stuff in the locker room not on the front pages.

And now back to your regularly scheduled Bears/DisGraceland news.

DisGraceland Fantasy Hockey draft is tomorrow at 4pm. There is still room for four more teams. If you are interested, information can be found here on my Sep 25 post.

I was at Bears practice today, held in the Arena. Man, it's been a while since I've been in the old barn. I forgot how freaking cool it is. I spent a good 15 minutes just walking around looking at the details, the art deco overhead lights in the hall, the detailing on the seat sides at the end of the row, things like that.

Practice consisted of a series of drills. Passing, breakout, two on two, five on three, forechecking, etc. Not a lot to go on for the observers. Matthieu Perreault had a couple nice moves. John Carlson still looks like he's stuck in second gear. Francois Bouchard was getting beat on suicides by defensemen. Holtby and Bacashihua both looked good, but weren't really put to the test. Holtby was roaming around chasing pucks during the 5-3 drill, which scares me a little bit. Hopefully, that's just playground practice stuff and not something that he likes to do during games.

Coach French had to restart the drills a few times because of poor performance. At one point, he got on the forwards for not working hard enough on the breakouts.

Don't read too much into these observations. The boys'll be ready for opening night. They just didn't look sharp today. I'll be back at practice tomorrow, and give you another report.

After practice, John Walton was nice enough to help me get some interviews. Thanks John!

I talked to Coach French and Joe Finley. Transcription after the jump.

Interview with Head Coach Mark French:

GV: Now that you've been here for a couple of preseason games, what do you think your challenges are going to be going forward, given the success of this team?

Mark French: Well, I think anytime a team wins the championship, everybody always talks about the hangover that comes with it. I think that will be the challenge. We have a lot of guys returning. Some guys who's goal was to be playing in the NHL this year, and they might be back down. That's good for us, in terms of getting skilled players back, but, at the same time, I think the motivation will be interesting this year. The goal at this level is to win the Calder Cup. We played until June last year, so we want to minimize whatever that hangover might be, and get on our way. The quicker we can figure it out, the better off we're going to be.

GV: I saw you working a little bit on the breakout today. One thing I noticed in the Norfolk pre-season game, you guys kind of had the Mighty Ducks breakout going there for a little bit on your power play.

MF: Yeah I know, we brought five guys back. You watch a lot of NHL games now, you'll see a lot of teams are doing that. It's more of an adjustment to the PK forecheck and what they're doing. Everybody's just kind of backing off, four guys. So, you bring everybody back, and attack the zone with speed across the line.

GV: What are you working the most on in practice? What do you see as the biggest weakness, if you want to call it that, or the area that needs the most improvement?

MF: Well, I think what we're looking to do is to lay a foundation about our defensive team system. So that's what we'll generally work on this week. Trying to get down our forecheck and defensive zone coverage. Later in the week, we'll work more on special teams.

GV: You are carrying on the tradition of sitting up in Section 122 to watch the opposing team pre-game warmups. Where did that start? Was that a Bruce Boudreau thing or...

MF: interrupting Funny thing, Troy and I were talking about that the other day. I don't know, honestly, the history lesson on it. I don't know if Bruce and Bob did it, or if it was just something that Bob had done, and it stayed on when he was the head coach and both of us went up. We enjoy it. It's a good time for us to interact with the fans and to get up there and see some familiar faces. We look forward to going up there.

GV: What are you watching for when you're there?

MF: Generally, who's in the lineup for them. We have a pretty good feel of who's going to be in their lineup, but it just reiterates who's going to be out there for them and who's going to be starting in net. I'm also looking for their line combinations. That's the one thing in hockey, 100% of teams will do a drill where you can see what their line combinations and their D pairings are going to be. We go up to watch that, and we have a better understanding of what we're going to see from a pairing situation.

GV: Predictions for this year?

MF: I hope we get better every day.

GV: laughing Nice.

MF: laughing I dodged it didn't I?

GV: Yep.

Interview with Rookie Forward Joe Finley:

GV: So do you realize that you equaled your scoring total for all of last year in two pre-season games?

Joe Finley: Well, I don't think I had eight assists in the first two pre-seasons game, did I?

GV: OK, your goal scoring, what do you attribute that to?

JF: Just shooting the puck and driving hard to the top of the crease. As a forward, you get more opportunites for that. I just hope to be able to do more of the same and to have continued success.

GV: When did you find out that the switch from defense to forward was more than just filling in for someone who got hurt during development camp, and they might want to keep you there for the remainder of your career?

JF: I wouldn't say it's a career move yet, but Coach Boudreau and George McPhee talked to me a little bit at the end of development camp and gave me the heads up that I'd be going into training camp as a forward. For me, being a young guy, I want to trust in the management and the coaches and do everything I'm asked to to make the hockey team and to make the hockey team better.

GV: Where do you see your role as a forward on this team?

JF: I'm a guy whose just going to get the puck, put it in deep, and go put pressure on the defenseman. Just keep it ultra simple, because every game is a learning experience for me. As long as I keep it simple and do what I'm asked to do, I'll be successful.

GV: What was the hardest part of the transition going from D to forward?

JF: Just little plays, maybe at your defensive blueline when the pass is coming up, making sure you're getting pucks out. I'm still working at that every day. Making sure I'm in good defensive position in the offensive zone. It's funny, you're playing forward, but you are always trying to be responsible defensively. Just take care of your own net.

GV: How would you compare the arenas, from the Ralph to the GC?

JF: Obviously, in Ralph Englestad they had a lot more bells and whistles there. It's a phenomenominal facility. I don't think it's matched by any NHL facility that I've ever played in. I've been fortunate to play in a few with Frozen Fours and things like that. I haven't played in front of a sell-out Giant Center crowd yet, so I don't know what that's like. But I know in Grand Forks, every night's a huge game; it's the talk of the town, as it is here. I'm just excited to get going and SEE WHAT KIND OF NOISE THOSE FANS CAN BRING. (emphasis mine)

GV: nervous OK. Please don't hit me when I ask you this.

JF: Ok

GV: How would you feel if after you score your first regular season goal, little toy lawnmowers come on the ice?

JF: laughs You know what? It's one of those things. If it gives anyone else a chuckle, I'm all for it. It's one of those things, the people that weren't there don't really know what goes on. Many people know, like they say, don't believe everything you read in the paper. For me, it's behind me.

GV: When did you realize that this had hit the internet and just blew up?

JF: i don't pay much attention. No disrespect to you or anyone else, but I don't pay much attention to the internet or things like that. It's never going to dictate anything that I do on the ice or away from the ice. It's just an unfortunate situation. It was front page news in Grand Forks in the middle of the summer. It's unfortunate to say, but they didn't have anything else to put on the front page.

GV: Well, it is Grand Forks.

JF: laughing You said that, I didn't.

GV: Matt Frattin had another run in a little bit after that. Have you talked to him lately? What's he going to be doing this year and in the future?

JF: I'm not going to comment on Frattin's situation, but I do know the kid's the type of guy you'd go to war for any night. He's a phenomenal teammate, that guy will do anything for you. He's well respected in the dressing room, not only by the players but by the coaches. He put himself in an unfortunate situation; he's going to pay the price for it. It's also unfortunate because he would have been one of their top players this year. I think he would have led the squad. He's back in Edmonton now, getting in shape, taking care of himself. I know he has an opportunity to rejoin the team around Christmas. I expect he'll do that, work hard the remainder of the season, and be ready to go next year.

GV: DisGraceland isn't only about hockey. The members are very interested in charitable works as well. Do you support any charities other than the Bears local charities?

JF: Yeah, I have a really good family friend, Laurie Weidbush, who passed away this summer of breast cancer. Her daughter, Chelsea, and two sons, Trent and Trey, are like brothers and sisters of mine. We support Laurie and her foundation for breast cancer. I've done breast cancer walks and things like that. Not only has it affected family friends, but it affects so many other people as well. I definitely support the Breast Cancer Foundation. Also, my sister is diagnosed as handicapped. She can't speak or raise her hands, so I was always with her special education class at Edina High School helping out. She graduated this past year and is in a Crossroads program, so I try to spend as much time as possible with her, helping out, doing anything I can. I remember being that little kid that always looked up to the older guys helping out people in need, so now I want to be that guy that kids can look up to.

(end of transcript)

These were my first interviews in twenty years and, listening to my recorded self, I realize that I sounded like an idiot. I'd like to thank Coach French and Joe Finley for putting up with my idiotic, rambling questions.

The transcriptions have been slightly altered for clarity, mostly on the GV questions rather than the answers.

I realized, when listening to the Finley interview, that I'd broken one of the cardinal rules of journalism. I didn't verify the correct spelling of Laurie or her kids' names. I'll do what I can to rectify this tomorrow.

Joe, if you're reading this, you can post the correct spellings in the comments section, and I'll change the article.

Say it ain't so!

I usually subscribe to the Oreo cookie method of breaking bad news to people. Tell them something good, tell them the bad news, close it up with something good. In that vein, you look fabulous today! Michal Neuvirth is hurt. Those are really great shoes. Seriously, great. Where did you get them?

You're not distracted? Dang it! Okay, I don't know any more than what I linked to. I'm going to practice on Tuesday, and I'll try and talk to Coach French and find out what this means for Neuvy. I doubt if I'll get anything more than you could find on an injury report, but keep your fingers crossed. If this is a longer term injury, we will probably be seeing Bacashihua as the number one goalie until Michal gets back.

The Caps ended their pre-season today, and now there are some tough choices for the front office to make. With injuries to Eric Fehr (double rotator cuff surgery), Tomas Fleischmann (blood clot in leg), and Michael Nylander possibly being on his way out, four Bears are fighting for two, maybe three, forward spots. Quentin Laing is the most experienced with the big club, and Keith Aucoin is on a one-way contract, so the smart money is for these two to stick. However, Chris Bourque was impressive in the final pre-season game, and there have been some rumors that if he doesn't make the Caps, they will trade him.

The Caps may choose to use one of the open forward spots to keep an eighth defense-man. If that happens the choice would be between Karl Alzner and Tyler Sloan. Sloan would be exposed to waivers if he were sent down; I'm not sure how much that will affect the decision. BB and GM GM both seem to be "play your way in" type guys. Sloan seems to do very well with the big club, but Alzner is a first round pick and needs seasoning at the NHL level. This one is too close to call.

In other news, the Bears also had a game tonight, and my impressions are after the jump.

Bottom Line Up Front: The Bears won the game 4-3 in overtime.

I know it's the pre-season, but tonight's game brought back bad memories of the slump last year. The Chocolate 'n' White came out guns a-blazin'. People were flying around the ice, hitting people, getting into passing lanes, going to the open areas of the ice, paying the price down low. We scored one, then two, and then the foot came off of the accelerator.

From the mid-point of the second period on, Norfolk carried the play. Slowly, our 2-0 lead dwindled, 2-1 on a play that should never have happened. Turnover at center, three-on-three getting back, but my boy, Jay Beagle, didn't hustle to get on the goal side of his man. Pass to the slot, Beagle's man buries it. 2-2 on a really bad goal, Cash got caught out of position and had to fall to his right rather than butterfly down to get the puck, and the puck slid under him. 2-3 on a goal that you just felt was coming. Norfolk was pressing, Bears were sitting back. Guess what? They scored.

This doesn't mean that the Bears didn't have chances. Jaroslav Janus, the Admirals second "half" goalie, was committing grand theft puck on a regular basis. Twice I stood up celebrating as a sure goal was stolen from the Bears, but these were exceptions, rather than the rule.

The boys got a scrappy goal back at the death of the game, tying it up at 3-3, and sending us into overtime.

The OT turned the way of the Bears. They were dogged in the offensive zone, strong on the puck, and getting some good looks. Boyd Kane got the game winner, and we all went home happy.

Three fights tonight: Gavin Morgan had a great clean hit on an Admiral, and Ty Wishart took exception to it and made what probably was one of the biggest mistakes of his life. After Morgan hit him for the fifth time, Wishart was looking for the linesman to stop the fight.

Big Joe Finley dropped the mitts with Trevor Hendriks. Joe kept trying to drop the overhand bomb but was tied up pretty well. He needs to learn how to use his size to get an advantage, or his days as a scrapper will be over pretty quickly. Where is Daddy Youngblood when you need him?

Reider went with Scott Jackson and gave him the business in the early going but got tied up in his equipment and allowed Jackson to fight him to a draw.

Scott Langdon impressed me tonight. Lots of effort and really put the hurt on people when he got a chance.

The save of the night goes to the left goal post in the Bears zone. Seriously, it was a thing of beauty.

See you on Saturday! Who is tailgating??

Grizzled Vet.

Reversal of fortunes. Bears beat Pens 5-2

Although they were saddled with the classic referee stylings of one Nygel Peltier, the Bears overcame his heavy handed game management and pulled off a road win in the battle of I-81. We'll only see the flightless "foul" another 27 times this year, so it was nice to put their fans in their place. They were getting a little cocky after Friday night's victory.

Baby Gus got the scoring started late in the second. There was some confusion on the scoring as JW initially thought it was Pinner, but Gustafsson got the credit. Goals came from all over in the third: Miskovic got a shorty, Finley became the preseason's leading scorer, Francois Bouchard gets off the schnide, and Pinner caps off the scoresheet. I was listening on sportsjuice.com, so I won't give too many opinions about who was playing well or not, but I have to talk about a couple players.

Joe Finley has equaled his entire goal output for his 2008-09 season with the University of North Dakota in two pre-season games. I wasn't sure what to think of the "Finley to forward" experiment when it was tried during development camp, but, in retrospect, this may prove the genius that is the Caps front office/coaching staff.

Steve Pinizzotto is quickly becoming my favorite player. Even in the pre-season, he's flying around the ice making a nuisance of himself. I like scorers, I like defensively responsible players, I absolutely love the guys that do the little things well. Jay Beagle has been one of my favorites for the past two years. He is strong on the puck, he is tenacious on the forecheck, and he more than held his own in the faceoff circle, even against NHL opposition. Pinner is made from the same mold, with the bonus of being able to put the puck in the net. I'm predicting a breakout year for that one.

We here at DisGraceland love hockey, but we realize how fortunate that we are. Not everyone in the world is as lucky as us, that's why I've posted some charitable things on here in the past. I'd like to do so again, if you are interested, follow the jump; if not, hockey talk stops here.


Tara Wheeler is a former Goalie for the PSU women's ice hockey team. She's also a former Miss Virginia. As a beauty queen, she has, as you would expect, extraordinary pageant hair. As a hockey player, as you would expect, she isn't very obsessed with it.

During her reign as Miss Virginia, she became involved with pediatric cancer. She made a promise that if she raised a certain amount of money, she would shave her head. The Miss America organization made her set that amount at half a mil. She thought that was too much money, and indeed it was. She raised around $30K, so she made the kids a promise. When she passed on her crown, she would shave her head. This was before she got a gig as the sideline reporter for the Washington Redskins.

If it was me, I might try t weasel out of the whole cutting my hair off thing. Being a bald female could seriously jeopardize that job. Good thing Tara isn't me, she went through with it. In public, at a huge event. Congratulations Tara on a job well done!

Read more about it here

Tara's new look:

(Amy Argetsinger/The Washington Post)

And we're off. Bears Lose 2-4 to Baby Penguins

Image by Drew Olanoff via Flickr

I'm not a hockey apologist. If the Bears lose, I'm not going explain the loss away. They stunk like Limburger cheese last night. If you asked them, I'm going to bet that they'd agree. Before the Penn Live trolls start on the "Get Rid of French" train, let's take a look at what happened.

This was the third pre-season game for WBS. They had their first game almost a week ago, so they are much further along in understanding the system their coach is implementing. The Bears, on the other hand, have had about 20 minutes of PP/PK practice so far this season. Most of the WBS players last night will make the team, very few of the Bears on the ice last night will start the season in Hershey.

So please don't read too much into the score; it is the pre-season.

On to the game breakdown. I'm not going to give a play-by-play recap of the game. I'm just going to give my general impressions.

Early in the game the Bears looked really tentative. Nobody was hitting, just skating around trying to to get into space, rather than getting into the Pens' faces. It's my belief that most of our success last year was due to our aggression and physicality, particularly in the first period of games. When we laid off teams is when we would lose games, and that's what happened last night.

Anton Gustafsson has some work ahead of him if he wants to play in North America any time soon. He is a defense-minded center that doesn't seem to play defense very well. He really needs to impress the coaches in the the next week, or he's headed back to Sweden.

Joe Finley scored half of his goal total from the entire 2008-09 season last night. A beautiful shot high stick side beat Jordan Parise for the first Bears goal of the game. Parise & Finley were seen talking during the pre-game skate, so maybe Jordan was hooking up an old teammate, or maybe Joe just knew where to shoot on Parise. I was annoyed that I didn't have my little, toy lawnmower to throw onto the ice to celebrate Big Joe's first goal as a Bear, but my wife assured me that I wouldn't have been able to get it through the Giant Center's security anyway.

Michael Dubuc scored the Bears' second goal with a canny play in front of the net. With several players fighting for a short rebound, Dubuc poked it past a falling Parise. This isn't the way that Dubuc usually scores. He's more of a sniper, so it was nice to see him stick his nose into a scrum and get rewarded for it. He was playing a little soft last night. He got knocked off the puck in the offensive zone a few times, and I was mentally writing him off until he scored.

Two mildly entertaining fights happened in the first period. Trevor Bruess and Chris Cloud squared off @ 19:57. Bruess took it to Cloud at the beginning of the scrap but faded fast and ended up taking the worst of it. Scoring was Cloud in a unanimous decision. As soon as the puck was dropped to restart, Patrick Wellar and Baby Boogaard went at it. There were a couple nice punches, but it was mostly a hugging match with neither fighter being able to get an arm free for some clean shots. They skated over to the far board and basically decided that the fight was over before the linesman separated them. Scored as a draw, but kudos to Wellar for taking on Boogaard.

Neither Bacashihua nor Ford impressed me very much. Cash was better than Ford but showed why he never made it to the show. He was giving up fat rebounds all night and had a hard time with his positioning. The Pens first goal came as Cash was laying down on the side of the net after leaving the puck in the crease. After a glove save, Ford tried to throw the puck to his D and almost dropped it into his own goal. Granted, there was some defensive confusion in front of the masks, but they needed to be better, and they weren't.

John Carlson got an assist on both goals, but I wasn't impressed with his effort. He got beat getting back on a possible Pens icing that led to a goal by the black chickens. He tried to step up in the O-zone but missed the puck and got beat again getting back which lead to another Pens goal. He never seemed winded coming to the bench, probably because he wasn't trying very hard. Not a good showing for the young man. Hopefully, he'll get it together soon.

I liked Zach Miskovic's effort out there. He was usually in good position and had a lot of hustle. Finley was a bit of dogs' breakfast. On one shift, he'd make a mistake or be out of position; the next, he was setting up a scoring chance, scoring a goal, or de-skating someone. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt. He's still learning where he needs to be on the wing, and he's only going to get better.

What did you guys see, good or bad? Agree with my assessment or disagree? Let me know in the comments.

Grizzled Vet

The most wonderful time of the year.

Hershey Bears hockey starts tonight, with a preseason tilt against the Flightless Fowl. Join DisGraceland in welcoming the new season.

I'm back in Central PA and will start blogging again on a regular basis now that the season is upon us.

I watched practice yesterday and today. Yesterday was a full team practice under Coach French, nice little scrimmage followed by some special teams work. The penalty kill is a lot further along than the power play, but that's to be expected at this point of camp. Coach Mann seems to be doing something different with the PK, mainly on the defensive zone faceoffs. The boys had to be re-positioned several times in the circle to execute his concept. We'll see tonight how effective it is.

The John Carlson love fest is in full swing. He looked way too comfortable in the scrimmage, almost like he was playing at half speed while everyone else was going full bore. He scored one of the goals during his teams PP time. This kid is for real, get his autograph now, because he's not going to be here too long. Ammo impressed as well, all over the D zone, telling people where to go, blocking shots and generally being the player we know and love.

Today's practice was lean & mean. Coach Mann ran the nine skaters not playing tonight plus Holtby through a pretty thorough skate. He had some interesting drills: Four point shooting drill w/ players tipping the puck in front of the net; Three shift One on Ones and an extended shinny game. Like I posted on Facebook, the only person I recognized on the ice was Helmer. One player that impressed me was Scott Langdon from the Royals. He was a physical force out there during the drills and was paired up with a forward during sprints and usually beat him. I like this kid, he is officially DisGraceland approved. Reading fans, you've got a keeper here.

Full writeup on the game coming tomorrow. For now, let's play hockey!

Very cool coolness.

Sorry for the lack of updates, I'm currently away from home until late September. I'm currently in New Jersey and am hoping that I'll be able to take a break from work to scoot down and catch the rookie game on the 11th.

Rookie camp has opened and the Finley to forward experiment continues. No word yet on on when the Hershey Bears Lawnmower Toss is going to be.

Cool coolness abounds: Google has introduced sports schedules to their calendar app. Did you forget when the game starts on Oct 3rd? According to Google opening face off is at 7pm.

To add the Bears to your calendar go to "Other Calendars", "Add", "Browse Interesting Calendars", click the Sports tab, "Hockey", "AHL", "Hershey Bears" and voila. You'll never have to download the crappy PDF from the Bears site again.

More frequent updates beginning in the pre-season.

DisGracefully Yours,
The Grizzled Vet