Gamethread for Traverse City Prospects Tournament: Hurricanes vs NY Rangers

This is the first and only time that we've been able to watch the Hurricanes prospects in Traverse City on television since becoming part of the tournament, which is organized by the Red Wings, in 2009. This year, the New York Rangers MSG network is carrying all the Blueshirts' games; NHL Network has kindly picked up their coverage. The game starts at 3pm and - if you miss it -  will be repeated at 7pm tonight and 8am Wednesday morning, also on NHLNetwork.

The Hurricanes are winless in two outings thus far, having lost to the Dallas Stars (8-2) on Saturday and the St. Louis Blues by a score of 2-1 Sunday afternoon. The Rangers are putting their 2-0 record on the line, having handily beaten both those same teams over the weekend. Today is the 3rd and final game of the round robin portion of the tournament which will determine seeding for the games Wednesday.

As best I can tell, no matter the outcome of this game, the Canes will face the 4th seed from the other bracket to play for the dubious distinction of 7th place. Similarly, the Rangers will go to the Championship game no matter how they do in this game vs Carolina.

Running the bench, Jeff Daniels is the head coach, joined by Geordie Kinnear, also of the Checkers. During practices, the players have worked with Rod Brind`Amour, Glen Wesley and Tom Barrasso. Jim Rutherford and Paul Maurice made the trip and are evaluating from above.

According to Kyle Hanlin, the Canes media man who is with the team, Daniels will start the same lines as they did vs St Louis, which is to say 2011 draft pick Matt Mahalak will not be in goal today, in favor of undrafted invitee Mavrik Parks. Mahalak played the opening two periods against the Stars Saturday, giving up 7 goals on 26 shots. He hasn't played since.

I've got those lines after the jump, plus links to scoresheet and other stats to follow along.

Carroll is the undrafted invitee who scored the first goal Saturday. He is currently with the Guelph Storm (OHL) coached by Scott Walker. The other two Canes goals were scored by Swedes Rask and Lindstrom.

Note that only 6 of the 12 starting forwards are Hurricanes prospects, 3 of whom will likely be with the Checkers (Staal, Shugg, Lindstrom). Rask and Sutter are possibilities for Charlotte, while Hofmann is expected to return to the Swiss League for this next season. 

Defensive pairings:

Rasmus Rissanen - Justin Faulk (C)

Keegan Lowe - Justin Krueger

Austin Levi - Ryan Murphy

Invitee Mavrik Parks in goal.

Three of these are expected to play in Charlotte this year: Faulk, Rissanen and Krueger. The last two may even spend time in Florida with the ECHL Everblades. Rutherford commented this week that of the whole team, Faulk is closest to being ready for the NHL.

For more details on the names on the roster, here's the Canes .pdf page for the tournament.

Today's scratches are Matt Mahalak  (G),  Tyler Stahl (D) , Barclay Goodrow (F - invitee). Stahl, a late round pick in 2010, did not play this week, and I haven't heard if he was injured and or perhaps wasn't able to attend.

Other helpful links:

Here are the pages for scoring, penalties, and other statistics for this game:  Boxscore and Gamesheet 

The tournament standings for both brackets (to further check out all eight teams) is here. To see the cumulative tourney stats for the just Hurricanes, look here.