Hiatus.

In case the massive lag between posts wasn't evident, this here is where I tell you that this blog is on a hiatus.

Have a fuzzy Guy Boucher .gif.

Sorry.

#AskBoucher

Look! Former Volts' coach Guy Boucher chatted with fans this morning!

Of course he's multitasking by drawing up plays at the same time. Were you really surprised by that? Honestly.


Entire transcript is here. Some highlights:

1. #AskBoucher how was it to be probably one of the only people to slap shot the 1st pitch at a baseball game? #BoltsAtTheBallpark
   — Michelle Spring (@MichelleSpring6) 3 hours ago 

   @MichelleSpring6 Major relief when it was done, but it was a lot of fun. It was actually a dare from Joe Maddon ^GB #AskBoucher — Tampa Bay Lightning (@TBLightning) 2 hours ago  

   #AskBoucher if you could pick any nhl player on your team why and who?  — justin leger (@justinleger4) 3 hours ago  

   @justinleger4 The ones I got right now ^GB #AskBoucher — Tampa Bay Lightning (@TBLightning) 2 hours ago 

   @tblightning We need a sub on my beer league team, can you send someone over? I'm sure someone has some time to kill. #askboucher  — Ol' Man Jesse (@jdreade) 2 hours ago 

   @jdreade I can send assistant coach Marty Raymond and Dan Lacroix and Nigel. They're on their way ^GB #AskBoucher — Tampa Bay Lightning (@TBLightning) 2 hours ago

Also flustered little ol' me:

1. @TBLightning a few players you've coached are now playing for your alma mater. have you been to any games at mcconnell lately? #askboucher
   — Kathy K (@czechtacular) 2 hours ago 

   @czechtacular I keep up with what's going on but I haven't been to any games lately. Last one I watched was Nat'l Champ game ^GB #AskBoucher — Tampa Bay Lightning (@TBLightning) 2 hours ago

And the infamous how-you-got-the-scar question:

I'll give you two guesses: either my tough wife or a shark fight. You pick! One of them put me in my place! ^GB #AskBoucher

If I had problems with the 140 character limit (in addition to not keysmashing all over Twitter), I'd assume that he...probably never wants to do this again. Remember that time he took up an entire intermission's worth on VOX with a press conference and they had to cut him off to get back to the game on time? Fun times.

Voltigeurs news: Oh right, there was also a game last night.

GOALS	1	2	3	Total
P.E.I.	1	0	0	1
Drummondville	1	2	2	5

PEI: Marcotte.
Drummondville: Milson (2), Murray, Malouin (2). Alliteration goals for the win (literally).

Guindon made 22 saves. Graham was back as his backup, seemingly recovered from his injuries.

Jérôme Verrier, in addition to picking up two helpers last night, made it onto the Q site. Read about Drummondville's leading scorer (en français) here.

Around the league: It would appear our trading BFFs have a new head coach.

Stephane Leroux@StephRDSJunior

Officiel Danny Dupont est le nouvel entraineur chef du #Titan contrat de 3 ans

Also, Étienne Boutet is apparently the new Glen Metropolit, picking up an assist essentially right after being traded from Rimouski to Gatineau and merely having to cross over one dressing room to suit up for the game.

W is a favourite letter in the alphabet.

So the Voltigeurs have kicked off opening weekend with two wins, first on Friday with a 4-3 victory against the Memorial Cup-winning Cataractes and then on Sunday as they beat the newest team in the league, the Sherbrooke Phoenix, 2-1.

Things that are cool in light of these wins:

• Forever annoying #theshawi when they actually have things to celebrate by beating them.
• Olivier Archambault keeps passing to people and some of these plays turn into goals. Including one of his own.
• Newcomer Lukas Balmelli's first goal in the league proved to be the game-winner against Sherbrooke.
• Dexter Weber got his first point in the league against #theshawi.
• Domenic Graham got a night off AND Louis-Philip Guindon fared rather impressively in his place in what was his first taste of real QMJHL action yesterday afternoon. Fellow rookie Daniel Audette was unable to score his first goal because of him.

Things we like a little less:

• One-goal games. But unlike last year, so far the Volts seem to be on the right side of them.
• Nikolas Brouillard losing teeth and being unable to finish said Sherbrooke game.
• The power play is 0-for-12. Guy Boucher is somewhere launching baseballs at people's heads with a hockey stick because of this.

Up next: Rouyn Noranda (home opener!). These guys have split their weekend with a 5-3 loss against the Armada and a 2-1 win against Victoriaville. Jean Sébastien Dea and Sven Andrighetto have combined for nine points in those two games.

Guy Boucher is intense.

It would appear that a certain former Voltigeurs' coach's passage did not go unnoticed yesterday.

However, Bryce Milson, in addition to being fitness champion, also wins the hashtag challenge:

Whatever the speech was (or its actual length, given the conflicting reports of the players above), it certainly amounted to something later on the ice, as team Black sought and claimed revenge on the Reds for their defeat the night before with a 7-5 win (categorized as "intense," much like that day's guest) in last night's intersquad game.

Goal scorers for the B's: Jérémie Malouin, Charles-David Beaudoin, Raman Hrabarenka, Jérôme Verrier, Bryce Milson, Matthew Boudens and Toliver Bergeron. The Reds got goals from Alexandre Grenier, Jean-Benoît Beaudry, Lucas Balmelli, Alex Baskakov and Francis Lambert-Lemay.

Cuts were just announced on the Volts' website:

• Alexandre Veronneau
• Alexandre Bilodeau (what do you mean they cut a gold medalist?!)
• Xavier Labonté
• Gabriel Labbé
• Jonathan Rizzo
• Joe Fleschler
• Sacha Harnois
• Kevin Bernillon
• Gabriel Dubois
• Olivier Roquebrune
• Dylan Montcalm
• Andrew McCann
• Toliver Bergeron

The last of the four invitees left is Dexter Weber (!). Meanwhile, Bergeron, acquired from the Armada, was considered to be one of the potential newbies to crack the lineup, but alas, it was not to be this season.  Veronneau, of course, was Graham's backup for some time last year. Louis-Philippe Guindon, Kevin Darveau, and Gabriel Forcier are the remaining three contenders for this position.

#voltstrainingcamp

News items of note (thank you, l'Express) that have happened before or as of the start of training camp:

• Nikolas Brouillard was invited to but cut from U-18 camp (Ivan Hlinka). It should be noted he had quite a bit of opposition on the blueline. In the one intersquad game witnessed by yours truly, I thought he performed rather well.
• Four free agents, notably Ontario-born 17 year old defenseman Dexter Weber (!), have been added to the list of 43 camp attendees. Weber, who has drawn comparisons to former Voltigeur Andrew Randazzo, joins Andrew McCann from the Pickering Panthers, a centre aged 19 who collected 30 points last season, 17 year old goaltender Joe Fleschler, a 6'4" New Jersey minor hockey product, and Olivier Roquebrune, an 18 year old right winger recently let go by the Saguenéens.
• One spot in the Volts' offensive crew has been freed as Lucas Venuto has been released from camp after failing his physical. Venuto recorded two goals and five assists in 44 games last season.
  "We had a very clear agreement with Venuto : his physical condition must be excellent upon his arrival to camp. Last year, he encountered difficulties respecting our standards in this matter. We outlined some clear objectives for him to attain during this summer, but as he was far from reaching them, we preferred to let him go." - Dominic Ricard. [1]
• On the opposite side of the fitness spectrum, 19 year old forward Bryce Milson won the title of "fitness champion" for passing his tests with flying colours.



Frédéric St-Denis getting his game face on. Watch out, he has had extensive Guy Boucher-face training. (Photo: obviously from Journal L'Express. View more pictures from the first primetime intersquad game by clicking over here)

• If you used to play for Drummondville and haven't received an invite to participate in this 31st edition of training camp somehow, colour me shocked. The opening of training camp saw former captain Marc-Olivier Vachon, now playing for the McGill Redmen, and Canadiens' prospect Gabriel Dumont take part, and the first batch of intersquad games featured another former wearer of the "C", André Bouvet-Morrissette, and Frédéric St-Denis behind the benches (St-Denis' Reds beat Stilts' Black team 8-2). Today, Guy Boucher is supposedly in town.
• Morning intersquad games are lined up to be three-on-three by turning the ice surface 90 degrees. Regular, properly-facing five-on-five games are slated for primetime. First cuts will take place tomorrow, and the first real pre-season matchup gets underway on Friday against the shiny brand new Sherbrooke Phoenix at 7:30 p.m. at the Centre Marcel Dionne.
• Don't expect a captain nomination anytime soon, or maybe even this season. According to Ricard, there's more of a dynamic group team leadership thing going on right now. (IMO, hopefully it stays that way. After three captains last year it became a little bit of a kerfuffle by the end.)

Back with more soon! (Sooner than three months from now, hopefully.)

A Plea for Sweater Vests, and Some Other Stuff

There was a distinct lack of this in 2011-12:

Borrowed from @EP31's blog. And no doubt, Journal L'Express.

And it showed.

Regardless of shared theories pertaining to sweater vests, Mario Duhamel will remain a Voltigeur for the next three years. He signed an extension recently, along with Louis Robitaille. In fact, the whole coaching staff is here to stay.

Onto serious business now. Arguments in favour of Duhamel bringing back the sweater vest:

1) President's Cup hangover didn't happen. Sure, Couturier and Palat helped out a little, but it was really the sweater vest. Wins would happen more frequently if he wore it. Check your VOX footage.

2) It gives off the homey grandpa feel without aging the rest of him. In fact, he's just about the youngest-looking coach I've ever seen, which means a lot given the season he's just endured.

3) Original!Coach, Guy Boucher, can have a freakout episode like the best of them. Shades of Richard Martel, sometimes. He can even match ties with suits to a varying degree of success, like Duhamel. But he didn't have the sweater vest. The wave of reminders and/or comparisons to Boucher came to a screeching halt in that department. Which is good, because everyone that comes after him usually wishes there was some sort of buffer zone beforehand. That buffer zone is secretly shaped like a sweater vest...

Around the league: Saint John sneezed yesterday and Etienne Brodeur erased their win-streak. They were bound to mess up at some point, right? But let's not let it happen again because I want a full ten points in my pool.

Also, J-P Mathieu is beasting it up in Rimouski, in case you haven't seen. Someone (non-repulsive) better snatch him up this offseason.

Alum-watch: Most guys are on vacation, and Scott Howes' AHL team was eliminated this week, but his season's not over. He reports to Alaska, who won their opening-round series against Stockton, before they take on the Las Vegas Wranglers. He's last year's ECHL Playoffs' MVP...

(The only sad part about that is that Eric Lampe is going to be on the other side now, which will cease my I love Lamp(e) jokes for the time being.)

You saw what Sean Couturier did in the NHL playoffs recently, no doubt. Wait. No?



Mike Hoffman is also up with the Senators, but hasn't seen any action yet. 

Where irrational happiness reigns

The following is happening tonight:

Photo: L'Express' archives from about a million years ago, please don't sue me, I wasn't at the Q draft of 2006 so I don't have my own pictures.

Of course, the two men pictured here (although to be honest I still have trouble believing Dumont isn't 16 anymore) will be on different sides. As for which one will come out of it smiling, this has yet to be determined.

Also yet to be determined is the number of public disturbance complaints I am getting tonight (my guess is 21 272).

Nanananananananananananananananana playooooooffffs!

They start tonight!

Game 1 : Tonight!, 7:00 p.m., Drummondville @ Québec
Game 2 : Monday, March 26th, 7:00 p.m., Drummondville @ Québec
Game 3 : Tuesday, March 27th, 7:00 p.m., Québec @ Drummondville
Game 4 : Thursday, March 29th, 7:00 p.m., Québec @ Drummondville
Game 5 : Saturday, March 31st, 7:00 p.m., Drummondville @ Québec*
Game 6 : Sunday, April 1st, 7:00 p.m., Québec @ Drummondville*
Game 7 : Tuesday, April 3rd, 7:00 p.m., Drummondville @ Québec*

*if necessary

In news of the depressing variety, the Golden Puck Awards are Voltigeur-less in their entirety, meaning not even a single nominee (though ex-Volts Jonathan Brunelle and Jean-Philippe Mathieu are up for the Marcel Robert, which has to count for something) for the first time that I can actually think of.

(The famous tank-year of 2007-08 won Best Fail and Best Result of Best Fail, if I remember correctly.)

Also, I am left asking myself why exactly the worst power play results in stronger penalty kills. Was it always like this? Habs fans know what I'm talking about (heck, so do Yotes' fans) but this is also reflective of Drummondville, who find themselves with only one team worse than them on the man-advantage and are somehow fourth-most effective league-wide with one LESS guy on the ice.

Anyway.

Around the league: I know I said I wasn't doing predictions, but there's a neat little QMJHL playoff pool over at RDS that made me reconsider. No, I'm not telling you what my answers were (that's cheating! And anyway, you'd also fail). But for the français-challenged, here are the rules:

Before each round, there's the usual pick-your-team-in-each-series-and-how-many-games-it-will-take-them-to-crush-their-opponents challenge. Five points if you get the team, a perfect ten if you get both the team and the amount of games.

Then, pick two forwards, a defenseman, and a goalie to carry you through said round. But, be careful here, because you can't pick the same guys come next round, or for the rest of the playoffs. So you can't really coast through this riding on Hoobadoo's coattails or anything of the like.

Bonus points (10 for each) are awarded to whoever gets the championship team and MVP right. Goals and assists are one point each. Goalies get two points for a win and two extra if it's a shutout. You have until Game 1 starts to get your picks in!

Alum-notes: All I have for you is this:

"I have the choice, either I start crying — which I felt like — or I just look at it as it is ridiculous and you just have to go with it," - Guy Boucher on the growing infirmary otherwise known as the Lightning.

This...can probably be applied to most of this hockey season in general. Sigh.