2007-2008 Season Ends - Goodbyes Begin

The 2007-2008 CCHL season mercifully ended last night with a 4-3 loss to the Havana Moon at Eissporthalle Linz. The game was close all night, and tied 3-3 with only 8 seconds to go in the third period when unlikely goal scoring Shane Hnidy scored (his first goal of the season no less) on the power play after Todd Fedoruk took a stupid penalty with less than a minute to go. In the game, Michael Ryder managed to hit the 30 goal mark, and Derrick Walser scored his 9th and Jiri Hudler scored his 2nd.

While some teams get set for the second season, the Black Wings began saying their goodbyes. Tops on the list was Eddie Belfour, who announced his retirement at the end of the season. Other Black Wings that have likely played their last game with the Linz team include enforcers Donald Brashear and Todd Fedoruk and non-scoring centreman Shawn Bates.

The season's best Black Wing was of course Jason Spezza, who with linemates Marty St. Louis and Kyle Wellwood, formed a fearsome scoring line. Spezza managed 38 goals and beat the 100 point mark, a first ever for a Linz Black Wing player (in 2002-2003, Marty St. Louis led the team with 51 points). Kyle Wellwood's 79 points were a happy surprise and leading the team in +/- was a shock considering his well documented defensive liabilities.

Looking to the future, the Black Wings in 2008-2009 will likely see some players providing a much bigger presence while others may fade into the woodwork. Patrick O'Sullivan, Jiri Hudler, Eric Perrin and Scottie Upshall all look to provide more punch next season. They will have to help replace Michael Ryder and Kyle Wellwood who perhaps played beyond expectations this season but will both reutn next year. Pascal Leclaire is the goalie of the future and with Belfour's retirement, Leclaire will look to be the #1 man next year between the pipes. Martin Hanzal also looks to be ready to join the big club full time next season as well.

The Wings would like to thank all their fans for coming out this year, and putting up with a lot of frustration. The team prosmises to be better in the future while maintaining a core of talent that's been with the team for years.

Losing Skid Continues

The Black Wings seem to be heading into the end of the season looking like a train wreck. The Black Wings, perhaps having enjoyed a few too many mojitos, looking like they were playing the wrong sport as the Moon manhandling them 6-0. Outside of the final score, the Moon dominated every aspect of the game, 40-18 in shots on goal, faceoffs, passing. Linz only was able to get one power play in the entire game, and by the time is happened, the score was already 3-0 late in the 3rd. It also marked the second bad outing for Pascal Leclaire after a string of decent if not entirely productive outing of late.

With only four games left in the season, the Black Wings have nothing left to play for than pride, and it doesn't come easy these days.

Leclaire Finally Nets First Win of the Season

Pascal Leclaire (pictured) shone tonight as he picked up his first win of the season, beating the Havana Moon, 3-1. The first line of Jason Spezza, Kyle Wellwood, and Marty St. Louis continued thier hot streak (2 points each) and Michael Ryder added a goal just as Havana looked like they might get back into the game. Jason Spezza was a shocking 22-3 in the face-off circle on the night as well, ripping mainly into Eric Staal and brought his season point total to 95.

Linz took the lead early in the 1st period on Kyle Wellwood's 19th goal of the season on a stellar pass from Spezza. Early in the 2nd period, Spezza added one of his own, this time on a rebound off of a Martin St. Louis shot and Linz headed into the 3rd on unknown ground, holding a 2-0 lead, perhaps the worst lead in all of hockey. Only 32 seconds in the 3rd period, Alex Ovechkin scored his 32nd and brought the Moon within one and many of the fans in the Eishalle thought this was the beginning of another Black Wings 3rd period meltdown. However, midway through the third, Michael Ryder intercepted a Ric Jackman pass and was left all alone to spring down the ice and deposit the puck behind Marty Biron to make it 3-1 and seal the deal.

Overall the game was a small bright spot after a loss against Southwest the night before (despite the heroics of Spezza-Wellwood-St. Louis) and the night before travelling to Karlstad for their third game in three nights. Making tomorrow nights game even more difficult will be the fact that Jordan Leopold, Linz' #1 (when healthy) defenseman left the game again. He'll not suit up in Sweden and may indeed be lost for the rest of the season after managing only 52 games this year. Andy Greene will take his place in the line-up as the Black Wings play out the rest of the season.

Wisborg blows away Black Wings

Scott Gomez and Martin Straka of the Wisborg Donuts dismantled the Black Wings tonight 5-2 in Linz. Heavily outshot 58-22, the Black Wings spent most of the game playing in their own end of the rink and even more time shorthanded as some rather unbalanced refereeing led to 9 power play opportunies (and two goals) to Linz's one chance with the man advantage. The lone bright spot for the Wings was two goals by Jordan Leopold (pictured), his 7th and 8th of the season (with Spezza assisting on both goals). Stephane Robidas took 4 minor penalties himself and Donald Brashear added three of his own.

Linz will continue to play out the season on Sunday against River Cities. Pascal Leclaire and Kyle Wellwood should both be back for that match. The playoffs continue to slide out of view as well, as Portland won tonight.

Linz and Predators play dirty in Stinktown

Linz fell behind three goals early against the Hamilton Predators in Steeltown in a rough and tumble affair for a Tuesday night. Hamilton owned a 2-0 lead 1:11 into the 1st period on a goal by Sheldon Souray and it seems that at that point the Black Wings had already decided the game was unwinnable and began taking it to the Predators physically.

Just over a minute after the 2nd goal, Todd Fedoruk (pictured), perhaps in an attempt to spark his team, laid a beating on Jordin Tootoo and the game only got uglier from there. Midway through the 2nd period, Mark Streit lacde Boyd Devereaux into the boards. This led to an long delay at Jordin Tootoo took revenge for his Fedoruk beating out on Donald Brashear. Neither Devereaux nor Streit returned to the game after the incident. Donald Brashear also got a 10 minute misconduct for instigating and saw no more ice this evening after the incident. Kyle Wellwood also left the game in the second period in an apparently unrelated incident.

The rough play continued in the 3rd period as Todd Fedoruk and Sheldon Souray got into it again, however, only roughing minors were called but in the ensuring chatter, Sheldon Souray was given a 10-minute misconduct was hit the showers early. Somewhere in this mess, Garnett Exelby scored his first goal of the season.

Pascal Leclaire started again tonight and is still hunting for his first win of the season. He faced 35 shots on a night when the Black Wings defensive woes were glaring, 44 completed passes to 16 intercepted, but if you take out Greg Zanon's 13-0 record it's 31-16.

Kyle Wellwood, who has played a surprisingly successful role on the left wing of Jason Spezza and Martin St. Louis will miss a game or two. Boyd Devereaux, not so lucky, will likely be gone for the remainder of the season. Scottie Upshall is rumoured to be replacing Wellwood on the first line tomorrow night. Rookie Patrick O'Sullivan will replace Devereaux on the 2nd line against the Sandblasters of Hawaii on Wednesday to show of parts of what will likely be an integral part of the Black Wings 2008-2009 team.

Lahr power play drops Linz

Linz got into penalty trouble early and paid the price, eight minor penalties in a row to start the game. Lahr scored 2 first period power play goals and added another one in the third to put the Black Wings away 4-2. A shallow defense continues to doom Linz and sloppy play at both ends of the ice (almost 30% of thier passes are intecepted) make games difficult to watch.



Jason Spezza scored his 31st of the season and Greg Zanon added his 4th in the losing effort.

The rotating defense corps saw Derrick Walser benched as Andy Greene returned to the line-up.

Linz is off until Tuesday when they skid into the Hammer.

Linz Drops Two more

Denver and Long Island turns turns dropping the Black Wings, both with final scores of 6-2.



In the Long Island game, youngsters Sidney Crosby and Zach Parise each tallied four points in their win. Long Island dominated the game throughout but Boyd Devereaux scored his 11th of the season and Marty St. Louis scored his 26 in their losing effort. Additionally, Greg Zanon left the game early in the first period and did not return. He was also scratched from Wednesday night's game against Denver.

In the game against the Spurs Vicent Lecavalier scored a hat trick, with Marion Hossa assisting on all three goals. Ryan Smyth also grabbed three points and newly acquired Teemu Selanne got two assists. The Spurs shelled Eddie Belfour with 52 shots on goal as Linz diced with disaster as they played their second game in a row with now back-up goalie as Pascal Leclaire couldn't suit up once again and Wade Dubielewicz was trade to North Dakota at the trade deadline.

On the horizon, Pascal Leclaire and Greg Zanon should both be back for Saturday night's game in Lahr, Germany.