Friday notes

Few things this morning.....

First, Kamloops goaltender Kurtis Mucha broke a WHL record on Wednesday night when he played his 12,775th minute - breaking the record held by former Swift Current Bronco goaltender Kyle Moir (2002 - 2007).

With the Blazers having 23 games left to play yet, - although Mucha won't play them all - he should be able to put another thousand minutes or so worth of distance between his eventual final total and Moir's, and make it a heckuva lot harder for anyone to break this record in the future.

This will be a hard record for anyone to break - although I know we said that in 2007 when Moir finished his career as well. But think about it - Mucha played a couple games as a 15 year old, and then was a starter from midway through his 16 year old season through an overage season. There just aren't that many goalies who play at 16, let alone be starting goalies at that age - and many of the ones who ARE good enough to start at 16 are also playing pro at 20. Such as Calvin Pickard - good enough to start last year at 16 but he isn't going to be in the WHL at 20....

Still on the WHL/pro angle, the Vancouver Giants got a big boost yesterday when the Tampa Bay Lightning (who surely must be the NHL's worst run franchise) sent forward James Wright back to the WHL. The Lightning burned a year of Wright's rookie contract and a year of his waiver exemption, and only used him for half the year before dumping him back to junior in order to open up a roster spot for Nate Thompson - who has 10 points in 86 career NHL games and was on waivers. I'm sure Lawton/Barrie/Koules are really some super-geniuses that the rest of us just don't understand because they're so much smarter than us.

Anyway, getting Wright back is going to really help the Giants - he brings some size which the Giants have needed this year and of course having spent 48 games in the NHL is going have made him a much better player as well. Look for him to average a point a game or better the rest of the season....

Wright brings the number of current WHLers with NHL regular season experience up to four, by my count. The others are Portland defenceman Luca Sbisa, Tri-City goaltender Alex Pechurskiy, and Brandon forward Brayden Schenn. Pechurskiy and Schenn played only one game each though.

In the OHL, they have meted out the punishment to Windsor Spitfire forward Zach Kassian for a head shot to Barrie forward Matt Kennedy, and it's stiff - 20 games. Now we wait to see what the QMJHL will do with Patrice Cormier.

I think the punishment to Kassian is fair - when you watch the video of his hit, you can see it's actually a clean hit apart from the victim not having the puck. Of course that "not having the puck" part makes it a dirty hit, but the hit itself was not otherwise vicious....you could make a case that there was no intent to injure there. Cormier, on the other hand.....he used his elbow, left his feet, targeted the head, the victim didn't have the puck.....it's much worse. The QMJHL will announce its punishment for Cormier on Monday and personally, I think nothing less than a lifetime ban from the QMJHL is going to be enough for that guy. That will end his junior career but allow him to play professionally next season, which was going to happen anyway.

One last note for today - a reader passed along a link to the John Reid memorial AAA bantam tournament going on this weekend in St. Albert. This is one of the better AAA bantam tournaments held every year and there are a number of top prospects for the 2010 bantam draft playing in the tournament, if you're interested in checking out the tournament (or even just the website) for names that you might hear called early in the morning at this year's draft.

Some of the players/names to watch for.....the team to watch is definitely the L.A. Selects, who could have a couple first rounders if the kids are willing to commit to the WHL. Top of the list there is forward Brian Williams, who will go in the top five and maybe even #1 if he commits to the WHL. Others on the Selects are forwards Adam Erne and Andrew Ogilvie, defenceman Scott Savage, and goaltender Eric Comrie. Comrie might be the best goalie available in the draft this year; he is the brother of former WHLer and current NHLer Mike Comrie. (The Comrie family now lives in southern California, which is why Eric plays there).

Others in this tournament - Torrin White of the Airdrie Xtreme, Anthony Ast and Joe Carvalho of the Burnaby Bruins, Morgan Klimchuk of the Calgary Bisons, and Cory Millette of the Notre Dame Hounds. All should hear their names fairly early in this year's draft.