Today's trivia winner is Kris J. Ilya Kovalchuk has scored 50 points against the Florida Panthers, four more than he has scored against the Carolina Hurricanes.

Listen. I'm as tired of losses as anyone and I'm not going to tell you that you should be okay with another one. But I like the way the Thrashers bounced back last night while playing the best team in the NHL in their own building. I know it doesn't seem like it, but if the team keeps playing like that they're going to get some wins. Their record really should be better than it is, but that's little comfort when you look at the standings. Still, I think November has the potential to be a huge month for this team.

Every game in the NHL is winnable, but of the 12 games on the schedule for November I'd say eight of them are on the softer side. October's schedule was unusually tough. November's is unusually light. If we play like we did last night I like our odds against Carolina, Florida, Washington, Toronto, Nashville, St. Louis, the Islanders, and the Blue Jackets. I honestly think that this team can play above .500 in November and earn more than 12 of the 24 available points. If they can do that they'll have some momentum heading into a tougher December.

What I really liked about last night:

What I'd like to see moving forward:

Next up- the Devils in New Jersey tomorrow night and then the Panthers back at Philips on Sunday afternoon.

 

There might not be a home game tonight but there's one on Sunday, so that means there's trivia today. I really like how we match up against the Panthers and I'm expecting a win. Come out and see it in person and get a spirit flag while you're at it (it's a roughly 18" x 12" Blueland flag).

Blueland Blog Trivia is back thanks to the generous support of Thomas Eye Group, and that means you have a chance to win a pair of tickets to each and every home game of the season. If you're new at this please read over the official rules and regulations below. If you've played before, welcome back. We're going to start off the season with an easy one.

Answer the question below and send your response to thrashers.mailbag@atlantaspirit.com by 2 pm and you could be the winner of two tickets to tonight's game. Please read all of the rules below.

Please read the official rules and regulations for the contest before entering and be aware that you will have to sign and return a form or two if you are selected. You also must be 18 years of age to win Submit your answers (thrashers.mailbag@atlantaspirit.com), and check back at 2:00 p.m. for the answer and to see if you've won!

Thank you to The Thomas Eye Group for stepping up and sponsoring the trivia contest for a second season.

ABBREVIATED RULES

NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. The Blueland Blog Trivia Contest sponsored by Thomas Eye Group (the "Contest") is open to legal residents of the U.S. and Georgia who are at least 18 years of age at the time of entry, reside within 75 miles of Philips Arena and have Internet access as of the date and time the Contest was first made known to the public. Subject to additional terms and conditions of the Official Rules. Click here for Official Rules. One (1) entry per person per Entry Period. Entry Period is from 10AM EST to 2PM EST each Thrashers home game day. Odds of winning depend on number of correct entries received. Total AMV of prizes: $64. Void wherever prohibited. Entry forms must be filled out in full. Contest ends April 11, 2009 at 2:00 PM EST.

Here is your update on Zach Bogosian:

I talked to Don Waddell and he said it isn't a displaced fracture, which would be more severe. He should be able to make a full recovery and the goal is to get him healed, rehabbed, and back in the lineup. The injury does not require surgery, so that's good news. At this time there are no plans to call up a seventh defenseman. Nathan Oystrick will take Bogosian's spot with Mathieu Schneider and the team will go from there.

The injury occurred when Bogosian was hit along the left boards. When he got hit he spun around and his leg hit the boards, causing the fracture.

For comparison's sake, Richard Matvichuk suffered a fractured fibula in 2003 and missed about five weeks (14 games). Jared Jeffries, a small forward/shooting guard for the Knicks, is out 6-8 weeks with the same injury but he has to be able to jump when he comes back so his recovery time may be longer than what a hockey player needs.

You may have already seen it on the AJC site or in the comments on this blog, but the lines have indeed been shaken up heading to NY and NJ. Here's how it looked from where I watched:

Kovalchuk- Christensen- Williams
Kozlov- White- Little
Thorburn- Reasoner- Armstrong
Sterling- Slater- Perrin
Boulton (I think we'll see Sterling tomorrow night over Boulton).

The defense pairings were the same aside from Oystrick stepping in for Bogosian who got an x-ray last night and an MRI this morning. No word on the results of those. I'll get you an update when one is available. He won't be on the road trip to New York and New Jersey.

As for last night's game- the only player I spoke to about it was Mathieu Schneider. He's been around so long that this isn't the first time he's been in a situation like this. He's been through bad losses and he's played on elite teams, so I figured he was best suited to talk about what happened. His response was (in my eyes) pretty much perfect. Here's what he had to say.

I like the fact that the players met about the game. I like the fact that they spent a good chunk of the morning in meetings- both group and 1-on-1 and with coaches. As much as some people would like to see the players punished for last night, you have to bounce back and get ready for tomorrow. The only way for them to redeem themselves is by winning games and you can't beat yourself up over one that you blew.

Here are John Anderson's comments to the media this morning- the media being me, Mike Knobler and Matt McConnell. the audio was edited for time, dead space, and chatter. The last 30 seconds or so are priceless. Ask a stupid question...

I'm heading over to the practice at Philips in a little while and if nothing else I at least hope to get an update on Bogosian's injury. I'll also be paying close attention to the line combos to see if there are any changes. Bryan Little started the game last night with Kovalchuk and White and finished it with Slater and Boulton. I don't know if that was a promotion for Thorburn to see if a physical presence could help the Kovalchuk line or if it was a demotion for Little. Maybe a bit of both.

It'll be interesting to see what kind of practice Anderson runs after what I think everyone would agree was the worst effort of the season from top to bottom. There's a fine line to walk between going over last night's mistakes and holding guys accountable and putting the game behind them to prepare for the Rangers tomorrow night.

I have some meetings right after lunch so I might not have an update for you until mid or late afternoon, but I will have one.

Sterling is out tonight and Eric Boulton is back in. Sterling has played well but when you're going up against the Flyers, who lead the league in fighting majors, you want a little bit of extra muscle in the lineup. Keep an eye on Riley Cote, who leads Philly with six fighting majors.

On defense Zach Bogosian is still in and still here and Nathan Oystrick is the scratch. There don't appear to be any line on D-pairing changes in store tonight, and Kari Lehtonen will get the start in goal. All indications are that Antero Niittymaki will get the start for Philly. Lehtonen's Finnish rival is 9-0-0 all-time against Atlanta with a 1.68 GAA and .940 save percentage. The Flyers will be without Daniel Briere  who is out for about a month with a torn abdominal muscle according to the team's web site.

The Thrashers haven't beaten the Flyers since November 18, 2005 and are on an 0-33 stretch against them on the PP, but don't let those stats bother you. This is a new Thrashers team with a new coach a and a new attitude. I don't expect any of the past problems with Philly to carry over. That doesn't mean they'll beat them, but I don't think the issues that caused the Thrashers to lose to the Flyers in the past will persist tonight.

Zach Bogosian is playing in his eighth game tonight and is on the verge of finding out if he'll be sent back to the OHL or not. the questions is, does the first year of his contract kick in when he plays 10 games or is on the roster for 10 games? In other contract situations being on the roster counts. For example, Steve Rucchin was on our roster all of last season (on the IR) but he didn't play a single game. It still counted as a year towards his contract though. On the other hand, rookie status is determined by games played, not games on a roster. The CBA says "10 games played" so maybe Bogosian could play on Thursday too without the contract kicking in. My guess is that it's a moot point. I'm fairly confident that Bogosian isn't going anywhere.

John Anderson spoke to the media at length today and I'll post the full mp3 later if I have time here's the mp3 (10.5 MB). He had some very interesting things to say about hits to the head, the difference between the NHL now and back when he played, and what he has seen from the team so far.

The gist of it is this- he really likes what he has seen overall from the team and while he isn't happy with the record he thinks the record could be better than it is.

"I think we've snatched defeat from the hands of victory way too many times this year," he laughed. Only because I've seen it in the American league where I've had 8 or 9 new guys every year- it is a process. I've had championship teams that start off this way."

He added that "I've seen this process happen... it's not instant mashed potatoes here. It's a process that we have to go through to become a team, to become a championship team. Certainly I wish our record was better and maybe it should be. Maybe our record should be from how we've played but it isn't and we have to push from here. That's spilt milk and I'm very confident in our team. I've loved what I've seen. I've seen some exciting things, and we play we play an exciting brand of hockey. You can see the intensity level has picked up. So I'm happy with what I've seen but I'm not happy with the results right now and there' a few things that we still have to work on."

I asked Anderson if he was encouraged by the way players are buying into the team-first mentality by sacrificing their bodies to make big plays, whether it's Armstrong setting up a goal after being leveled by Chara, Slater going down to block two shots in a row after clearly being hurt by the first, or Reasoner taking a shot off the knee and playing the next night. Anderson said it's just a sign of what to come. He loves it and thinks it will have a domino effect on the rest of the team. He said that if the whole team gets to that point then "there's no telling where this team can go."

In player movement news, Mike Hoffman has been assigned to Chicago (he cleared waivers) and Ken Klee, who was put on re-entry waivers by the Ducks, was claimed by the Coyotes.

Answer the question below and send your response to thrashers.mailbag@atlantaspirit.com by 2 pm and you could be the winner of two tickets to tonight's game. Please read all of the rules below.

Please read the official rules and regulations for the contest before entering and be aware that you will have to sign and return a form or two if you are selected. You also must be 18 years of age to win Submit your answers (thrashers.mailbag@atlantaspirit.com), and check back at 2:00 p.m. for the answer and to see if you've won!

Thank you to The Thomas Eye Group for stepping up and sponsoring the trivia contest for a second season.

ABBREVIATED RULES

NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. The Blueland Blog Trivia Contest sponsored by Thomas Eye Group (the "Contest") is open to legal residents of the U.S. and Georgia who are at least 18 years of age at the time of entry, reside within 75 miles of Philips Arena and have Internet access as of the date and time the Contest was first made known to the public. Subject to additional terms and conditions of the Official Rules. Click here for Official Rules [insert link]. One (1) entry per person per Entry Period. Entry Period is from 10AM EST to 2PM EST each Thrashers home game day. Odds of winning depend on number of correct entries received. Total AMV of prizes: $64. Void wherever prohibited. Entry forms must be filled out in full. Contest ends April 11, 2009 at 2:00 PM EST.

There are some practice reports out there for you to read today here, and here, and here.

The gist of it is this- Anderson likes what he's seen from Williams at center (where he played the bulk of his time on Saturday), the D pairs might get tinkered with (Hainsey and Bogosian?) and Armstrong is fine after his hit to the head. People have asked if I thought Chara's hit n Armstrong was clean or not. I think it's the same kind of hit that Andy Sutton used to throw when he was here- one where he didn't necessarily intend to hit the player's head but because he's so tall it's sometimes unavoidable unless he pulls up and doesn't hit him at all. I'd rather not see any hits to the head, but that's just me (and Jim Rutherford). As for whether the league saw it as clean, there's a litmus test you can use- is it in the nightly highlight package from the game?

In other news, a Montreal paper has a feature on Angelo Esposito. Did you know he figured skated between the ages of 3 and 10? Me neither. Thanks to the Montreal Canadien's web coordonnatrice (that's her title in French, not a typo) for the link.

Is the glass half full or half empty?

Saturday night's loss in Boston was one of the most entertaining games I've seen the Thrashers play in the last year. Yes, it stinks that they lost and the officiating was perplexing at times, but I was entertained from start to finish. I probably enjoyed that game more than I enjoyed any single loss of last season.

You could look at the Thrashers' 2-4-2 record and say they're struggling, or you could look at it and say that of six losses four were by a single goal and one of the other two was only a two-goal loss because of an empty-net goal. You could say that the Thrashers are 12th in the Eastern Conference, or you could point out that they're only four points out of the division lead and third place in the conference.

John Anderson warned at the beginning of the season that there would be a learning curve and some struggles and that's what we're seeing now, but I'm impressed that the team is keeping every game close and not getting blown out like they did last year on a pretty frequent basis. The Thrashers are showing improvement in many aspects from game-to-game (PP, PK, going to the net, getting second and third chances) and at some point that improvement is going to translate into wins. The October schedule has been loaded with tough opponents but November looks much friendlier with weaker opponents and some nice 3-4 day gaps between games during which they can do some serious practicing.

They just have to get through this next week. Four games in six nights. Games against Philly (who the Thrashers haven't beaten since Nov. 18, 2005), the Rangers (at MSG where there are still demons to exorcise), at New Jersey (against the snooze-inducing Devils) and then at versus Florida (who have a worse GF/GA ratio than Atlanta but have won more games). I'd love to see them start the week off with a win over the banged up Flyers tomorrow night no national TV. The Thrashers are 5-3-0 on Versus since they started carrying the NHL. Philly is missing Briere and has a very raw blueline that is giving up almost a full goal per game more than the Thrashers. The big questions is if they'll start Antero Niittymaki against Atlanta. If Kari Lehtonen has a nemesis it's Niittymaki. He's never beaten him on North American soil and Niittymaki has a tendency to play lights out hockey against us (He's 9-0-0 with a 1.68 GAA and .940 save % all-time versus the Thrashers). Keep in min das well that Flyers coach John Stevens and Thrashers coach John Anderson are well-acquainted with each form their days in the AHL. The two met in the Calder Cup final in 2005 and Stevens (and Niittymaki) came out on top.

It should be an interesting game tomorrow, and an interesting week overall for the Thrashers.

TORONTO/BOSTON (October 25, 2008) – The Boston Bruins and National Hockey League announced a change in game format for their game tonight against the Atlanta Thrashers at TD Banknorth Garden.

The  third  period  in  tonight’s game will be split, with the team’s switching  ends  at  the first stoppage in play after the 10-minute mark of the  period.   The  Bruins and Thrashers will begin the third period in the same  ends  that  they  finished  the  second  period.  Following the first stoppage  after  the  10-minute  mark  of  the third period, the teams will switch ends, and the face-off will take place on the opposite side of where play ended.

The  change  in  format is occurring due to incorrect markings on the West  End (visitors bench side) of the TD Banknorth Garden ice. In the West End,  the  two  face-off  dots  are  24 feet from the goal line – four feet longer  than  NHL  specifications.   The corresponding face-off circles are
also four feet further away from the goal line.

The  ice  sheet  will  be  replaced  prior to the Bruins next game on Saturday, Nov. 1.

 Way to go Boston.

Welcome to the NHL's Super Saturday. 15 games. All 30 teams The action starts at 4pm if you have Center Ice and the Thrashers hit the ice at 7 in Boston. The league has rolled out enough stories to keep you busy for the afternoon and you can find them all right here. They asked each team to contribute a piece and while not every team was able to, Thrash was happy to type something up for our contribution. You see him around every game, but you won't really appreciate how much work he puts into a game until you read his story.

My quick thoughts on the Detroit game:

The AJC reported earlier this week that Mike Hoffman has been sent down to Chicago. While I don't doubt that it will probably happen, it hasn't happened yet. You'll note that he's still on our roster and not on Chicago's.

I came across this article in the National Post about Maple Leaf skating instructor Graeme Townshend's encounters with racism in Louisiana in the 90's. I have two questions about the article. Does the use of the phrase Deep South make it sound like these issues persist all across the region and is it fair to write an article about what happened a decade ago without talking to people in the town now to see if anything has changed?

The only reason the article caught my eye is because it's about Townshend who was the second pro hockey player I ever met. He played a season for the PEI Senators back in the day and I met him in Charlottetown. He was teammates with an 18-year-old Pavol Demitra at the time. In case you were curious, the first pro player I ever met was Dean Prentice (1378 NHL games played), who retired before I was born.

No news out of Boston. If that changes I'll let you know.

The Lightning go and win one game and all of a sudden their owner is riding high. Here is what Len Barrie had to say yesterday about why the Lightning waived David Koci:

Someone should tell him that the Thrashers lead the Southeast in fighting majors with five. The Lightning are last in the Southeast with one. The Lightning are also last in the Southeast. On the other hand the Red Wings have zero fighting majors so maybe there's something to the whole "keep the gloves on" thing. The Blues and Senators don't have any either and they're second and fourth in their respective divisions.

In other web news:

When the Thrashers played the Red Wings in the pre-season Marian Hossa sat out. Both games were the second of back-to-backs for Detroit and he wasn't the only NHL vet to sit. You have to wonder if it had anything to do with the opponent though. Well, tomorrow night Hossa will suit up against the Thrashers for the first time since being acquired before the 2005-06 season. The Penguins played the Thrashers after Hossa and Pascal Dupuis were dealt for Colby Armstrong, Erik Christensen, Angelo Esposito and a draft pick but Marian was injured by then and didn't play.

So now we get to see how he reacts to playing the Thrashers. It would be tougher for him if he was playing in Atlanta, so maybe this won't be a big deal given that the game is in Detroit. Maybe it will. And maybe it'll be a big deal to some of his former teammates. Last year the Thrashers went into Detroit and won 5-1 on the strength of a Hossa hat trick. Wouldn't you love to see Ilya Kovalchuk torch the defending Cup champions for a hat trick of his own?  And will former Red Wings Jason Williams, Mathieu Schneider and Slava Kozlov pull out the stops in a building where they all had so much success?

There are more questions than answers heading into the Friday night matchup. Will Johan Hedberg get his first start of the season? Will Brett Sterling get into a game? Will the offense step up and score more than twice in regulation for the first time since opening night? The thrashers are 2-2-2 heading into their meeting with the Red Wings and have only given up one more goal than they've scored. Only one of the losses has been by more than a goal and they haven't been blown out, unlike the early portion of last season. While coach John Anderson hasn't been happy with all of the results he has been happy with the effort. Will that effort be rewarded with a win in Motown?

A reminder that Friday night's game will be live on SportSouth and on SportSouth HD. JP Dellacamera will be back in the booth on Friday and Saturday.

It's true that the Thrashers haven't scored a power-play goal since opening night, but it could be worse. The Capitals had a nine-minute power play last night against Calgary and only got three shots off, none of which went in. And it wasn't some weird string of consecutive penalties that overlapped or ran together. Rene Bourque of the Flames was assessed 19 minutes in penalties for an altercation and nine of those minutes gave Washington an uninterrupted nine-minute man advantage. I would like to think that with nine straight minutes of PP time the Thrashers would end their power outage.

In another story from yesterday, a sports collectible show was charging fans in Edmonton $25 for Sam Gagner and Andrew Cogliano autographs. I have my share of sports keepsakes but I've never been a big autograph guy except when the piece has some sort of meaning to me. In my 3+ seasons with the Thrashers I've gotten one thing signed- the jersey I wore when Garnet Exelby took shots on me while I was in full goalie gear. I actually tried to get a puck singed by Mark Recchi but our PR guy lost it. It was the puck that Rex hit me with at the morning skate one day. So maybe somebody that is a memorabilia collector can enlighten me on why people would shell out $50 for a pair of Oilers autographs. Regardless, it makes you grateful for the access that our fans have to players at practices and other events, doesn't it?

Funny side story, or at least funny to me. Without fail, every time I go on the road with the team I get asked to sign at least one autograph on the way from the hotel to the team bus, or going into the arena. So I get to be the jerk that doesn't sign autographs. I wonder who they think I am.

Tonight's game was a roller coaster of emotions. The Thrashers came out sluggish in the first and Tampa jumped all over them. Lehtonen, who said the team had a bad start, kept them in it. I call it good goaltending. He said his team was lucky to only be down 1-0. I thought the Thrashers played a decent second period, outshooting the Lightning 13-10 after being shelled 18-5 in the first. John Anderson saw it differently and remarked after the game that his team only played 20 minutes. Trailing 2-0 entering the third the Thrashers battled back and dominated the Lightning for stretches, outshooting them 15-8 and outscoring them 2-0 thanks to a last-minute goal by Todd White who played a whale of a game. He had a goal, an assist, was +2, had two shots and was credited wit a takeaway. He had an off night in the circle, winning 44% of his draws.

The issue tonight, as John Anderson saw it, was that chances were being wasted.

"It's not that we don't have the talent or that we're not getting chances," he said after the game. "The last three games we shouldn't be snakebit. Empty nets we're missing. Breakaways we're losing the puck in the corner. Just little things like that. Maybe it's just not bearing down."

Anderson doesn't like to talk about lineup changes right after a game, but I'll be surprised if he goes with the same lineup in Detroit on Friday night. I'm expecting to see Sterling. With the team struggling to finish it makes sense to put the team's leading pre-season scorer in the lineup. The question is who comes out, and I'll leave that to Anderson to answer.

On the defensive end, Kari wasn't thrilled with his game. He said the first and third goals hit defensemen's sticks, which is beyond his control. The second should have been stopped though in his opinion. He made the initial save but then the puck bounced up on him. He lost track of it and it hit him in the shoulder as he turned to see where it was. By then it was on its way into the net.

I don't want to pile on anyone in the loss, but there were a few pivotal errors and miscues in the game. Christensen missing a prime scoring chance with the puck in the crease in front of an empty net. Kari losing the puck on the second goal. Little taking the tripping penalty in overtime (he said he was trying to play the puck). Enstrom getting his stick tied up on the ensuing power play. It's a game of mistakes, and the Thrashers probably made more of them than Tampa did tonight. And in case you were counting, Prospal is up to 51 points in 44 games versus the Thrashers. Ouch.

The good news is that the team is generating chance after chance. If they can start finishing with any regularity they could turn into an offensive juggernaut. The defense added two more assists (Schneider and Hainsey) and Todd White continues to be the most improved forward. With six points in six games the Thrashers are six points ahead of where they were at this point last season. Now they just have to shake off the OT loss and get ready for a tough weekend in Detroit and Boston.

Both games will be on SportSouth and JP Dellacamera will be back in the booth. 

It's about half an hour to Game time and I'm up in he St. Pete Times Forum press box. New rule- arena names have to be two words or less.

Anyway, I'll be doing a live b log of the game since you can't watch it on TV. Make sure you listen along with Dan Kamal on 680 The Fan or via the audio feed on the front page of the main site. It's the link that says 'Listen'. As always during live blogs, the new content goes at the bottom. It make sit easier for people joining late, and we know Atlanta sports fans aren't known for being on time.

Speaking of that, warm-ups just started and I swear I could count the number of people in the stands in two or three minutes. I would guess that there are less than 200 so far. Hopefully everyone else is just getting food and drinks.

This building is one of the weird ones for the visiting team. A few years ago the Lightning decided to block off the tunnel that goes from the visiting locker room to the visiting bench. They covered it and put seats over it, so now the visitors have to walk out of the locker room, down a hall, through the club bar/restaurant, and out of a tunnel like the Zamboni tunnel. It's a bit of a nuisance, but it isn't the only arena like it. Edmonton and Toronto have similar setups, and it let the Lightning put in 56 more lower bowl seats right behind the bench. If those seats go for about $100 each (I'm guessing- I don't have a price chart in front of me) then that's over $200,000 in revenue over the course of the season if they sell them all.

Time to go get my game-time snacks.

*** UPDATE ***

"When the puck drops, Lightning strikes."

Now that's a cheesy intro line. In case you missed the giant blog post earlier in the day, Lehtonen is in goal. Oystrick and Sterling are the scratches (they're sitting 20 feet away form me). No line changes that I know of. The teams are on the ice for the anthem and we're about to start.

*** UPDATE ***

Game on. Lightning win the draw and get the puck deep. Kovalchuk's line took it the other way and kept it in the TB zone and got a line change. No shots yet.

Worth noting- Schneider and Exelby were together for their first shifts. Exelby went of for the faceoff. Schneider stayed and was joined by Bogosian. Must have been a bad change.

*** UPDATE ***

Yuck. A bad turnover in the neutral zone (I think it was Slava) led to a partial breakaway that Enstrom had to break up. Tampa got control after the initial save and Kari had to scramble a bit. Shots are only 2-0 TB.

*** UPDATE ***

1-0 Tampa. Mark Recchi beat Kari high stick side to get it just under the cross bar as he came down the right side.

*** UPDATE ***

As I expected, T