Thursday stuff

More is becoming known about the death of ex-Silvertips forward Jordan Mistelbacher today. The initial reports that he was found outside in a snowbank are untrue, for starters. He was found unresponsive inside a home in Winnipeg, and overconsumption of alcohol is one of the factors being investigated. His death occured at the end of an evening in which he was out celebrating his 19th birthday with friends.

Bunch of stories available this morning if anyone wants to read more. There's articles worth reading in the Everett Herald, Winnipeg Sun, and Winnipeg Free Press.

Team Orr beat Team Cherry 6-1 last night in the CHL Top Prospects game in Oshawa. I would rank the game in the middle of the pack as far as Top Prospects games have been. It was a little more chippy than many of the games we've seen in past years but overall not as exciting or entertaining. Big story is that John Tavares was injured in the 3rd period on a hard (but clean) hit from the OHL's Zack Kassian and left the game favouring a shoulder. No more information is available yet about the severity of the injury.

Cody Eakin probably had the best game of all the WHLers there, with 2 goals for Team Orr. Jared Cowen had two assists and was a +2. Brayden McNabb was a +3. On the other side of things, Ice goalie Nathan Lieuwen didn't help his cause by allowing 5 goals on 18 shots for team Cherry in 31 minutes of action. He was replaced by the OHL's Edward Pasquale, who faced the same Orr shooters and only gave up 1 goal on 21 shots. And also for Cherry, Evander Kane was held pointless with a horrible, game-worst -5. Game summary is here if you're interested in how anyone else did.

In the big picture, I doubt that what the kids do in one game like this has a really huge impact on their draft status. But a good game certainly can't hurt you, just as a poor one certainly can't help you.

Two rare Thursday night games in the WHL tonight, Calgary at Kootenay and Vancouver at Edmonton. Hitmen and Giants tuning up for their big 'clash of the titans' game tomorrow night in Calgary perhaps....