Hockey Hockey Hockey

My ads are pointing to weird stuff so you'll have to excuse the weird title. Just cleaning up some items that I haven't really covered over the last couple of weeks.

- Nice article on Scott Jackson this morning by Grigg Drinnan http://gdrinnan.blogspot.com/. Tonight will be Seattle's (and Jackson's) final trip to Kamloops for the season unless somehow the Tbirds and Blazers were to meet up in the post season. Tonight's road game would go a long way towards Seattle getting to that #5 seed and any shot at the #4 seed.

- James McEwan was not dropped by Kelowna at the deadline and it appears that the Rockets captain (and former Tbird) will be back in the lineup before the end of the season. This from Regan Bartel's blog:

Rockets captain James McEwan says he should have his cast taken off of his wrist by January 28th. In an interview this morning, McEwan anticipates rejoining the team on the ice by early March. McEwan underwent surgery on his wrist after having two tendons cut with the skate blade of Giants enforcer Garet Hunt.

- Former Tbird Bretton Stamler was traded at the deadline to the Swift Current Broncos and has gotten off to a good start with 1 goal and 2 assists in 5 games with the Broncos to go along with 2 fights and 20 PIM's. I know Bretton had been excited to play in his hometown of Edmonton but if the season ended today the Broncos would finish ahead of the Oil Kings for the 8th spot in the East. It would be nice to see Stams able to finish his career on a playoff team one last time.

- Aaron Gagnon recovered from another shoulder injury suffered back in November. Gagnon healed and was sent to the AHL Iowa Stars for a 12 game run where he started several games before being sent back down to the ECHL's Idaho Steelheads for 3 games where he collected 1 goal and 3 assists. He has now been sent back to Iowa again and has played the last 2 games. Gagnon has yet to collect his first point in the AHL. http://stats.theahl.com/stats/player.php?id=1852

- After playing in Johnstown last season, Ryan Gibbons was recently signed by the Charlotte Checkers, http://www.gocheckers.com/roster.php. This is also the same Charlotte Checkers who earlier in the season had released former Tbird Clayton Barthel after 4 games.