Alaska brings NHL power to Bakersfield on Friday
By The Bakersfield Californian
When it comes to NHL talent in the ECHL, the Alaska Aces are at the head of the pack.
Stacked with four NHL fowards, all Anchorage natives, the Aces are flush with talent, even with one of those four — Brandon Dubinsky — out with a broken hand.
Joey Crabb, Nate Thompson and Scott Gomez are the other NHLers on the roster. All told, the four have combined to produce 36 percent of all Aces goal this season and 32 percent of all points.
The Aces make their only stop of the year in Bakersfield on Friday night, giving fans a chance to see how much of an impact a bevy of NHLer’s can make on a squad at this level.
The impact has been greater that the overall stats in the last three games (al;; wins) as Thompson and Crabb alone have had a hand (either goals or assists) on nine of the 16 goals scored in those three games. That’s a whopping 56 percent.
The latest victim of the Aces was Stockton on Wednesday night as a 6-2 Alaska drubbing snapped Stockton’s seven-game winning streak on home ice.
Crabb (144 NHL games) has eight goals and 13 assists in 18 games and leads the Aces with 21 points.
Thompson (265 NHL games) has six goals and 12 assists in 19 games and Dubinsky had eight goals and four assists in 12 games before the injury.
With Dubinsky out, the Aces signed Scott Gomez, who had been practicing with the team. Gomez has two goals and three assists in five games.
Friday night will be the second chance for longtime Condors fans to see Gomez. He played for the Aces during the 2004-05 lockout and had his season come to a crashing end in Game 4 of a first-round playoff game at Rabobank Arena. Bakersfield’s Ashlee Langdone checked Gomez hard, sending him hip first into the opening of the bench door at the exact moment the trainer opened it for a line change. Gomez suffered a broken pelvis.
The ECHL handed Langdone an eight-game suspension for the hit but in essence, it was a one-game suspension. Langdone announced his retirement after the series.
The Condors lost the series in the deciding Game 5 in Alaska, where they were Public Enemy No. 1.
Facebook
Twitter
Mobile
RSS
Most CommentedMost Popular
About two dozen protesters stood in front of Kern County Superior Court next to the Liberty Bell Thursday morning to make a statement about police brutality.
The death of a man in custody following a prolonged struggle with Kern County Sheriff's deputies and CHP officers and the subsequent fracas over confiscated witness cellphones have gained international attention and raised concerns here that the incidents could tarnish the county's emerging...
Sheriff’s investigators served a search warrant on Kern Medical Center and the Mary K. Shell Mental Health Center seeking medical records to find possible reasons for David Sal Silva’s behavior prior to and during his encounter with law enforcement, The Californian learned Friday.
The Kern County Sheriff's Office is out of control. That's one conclusion many people will draw based on the events of the past two weeks and in the context of recent years.
Blood stains are still visible on the sidewalk at the corner of Flower Street and Palm Drive, where a Bakersfield man struggled with as many as nine officers and later died this week.
Responding to what he called a case that “has consumed the media and our community,” Kern County Sheriff Donny Youngblood said Tuesday he has asked the FBI to conduct a “parallel” investigation into the death of Bakersfield father of four David Sal Silva, who died May 8 after he was beaten by deputies.
Classes were canceled at Bakersfield High School Monday after three small bottle bomb explosions struck campus, authorities said.
Two cellphones confiscated last week from witnesses to the in-custody death of David Sal Silva were returned Wednesday to the attorney representing the witnesses.