Allen vs Wichita Preview, Costantini Heads to Italy, ECHL Teams with Most Rookies, Most Veterans and More

 

It is game day for the Allen Americans as they host the Wichita Thunder tonight at CUTX Event Center (7:10 pm). The Americans will be trying to snap a six game losing streak, the longest of the season. Allen will see a steady stream of games against Wichita in the next month with seven of the next 15 games coming against the Thunder. The eight games in the next month not against Wichita will not be a walk in the park and include Kansas City (four games), Tulsa (three games ) and Idaho (1 game). 

- Before the last road trip I talked about Allen's upcoming 18 games were the toughest part of the schedule and would determine the fate of the team. Playing top teams with 11 of the 18 games on the road. After the first three games of this challenging schedule the Americans record is 0-2-1-0 and they have been outscored 18-5. 

 

- The next group of four games, this week's challenge, includes four games in five days with travel included. Three of the four games are against the Wichita. After home games against Wichita tonight and Friday night both teams will travel to Wichita (370 miles) where they will play again on Saturday night. After that game Allen will get on the bus and head for Tulsa (175 miles) where they play the Oilers in a Sunday afternoon game starting at 3:05 pm. ECHL scheduling strikes again.

- While Allen is on a six game losing streak, Wichita's record over it last six games is 4-1-1-0 which includes a 4-2 win over Allen on December 5. Here is how Allen and Wichita rank is some key stats this season:

• Ave. goals scored: Allen #22 (2.50) - Wichita #12 (3.28)
• Ave. goals allowed: Allen #28 (4.14) - Wichita #11 (2.72)
• Ave. shots for: Allen #28 (25.91) - Wichita #7 (32.00)
• Ave shots allowed: Allen #29 (40.23) - Wichita #25 (33.84) 
  
• Power play percentage: Allen #10 (20.0%) - Wichita #15 (18.1%)
• Penalty kill percentage: Allen #23 (78.8%) - Wichita #6 (85.3%) 

You can see Wichita has the advantage in goals scored and allowed. On average Allen scores 0.78 goals fewer than Wichita per game and allows 1.42 more goals per game than the Thunder.

- Head to head this season Allen's record against Wichita is 1-1-1-0. 

• 4-2 loss in Wichita (December 5)
• 4-2 win in Wichita (November 8)
• 5-4 OT loss in Allen (October 30)  
• Wichita has out shot Allen 122-84
• Allen's power play is 0-5 in the three games
• Wichita's power play is 2-9 (22.2%)
• Allen took 11 penalties for 25 minutes
• Wichita took seven penalties for 17 minutes

The last time these teams played Wichita had no penalties and Allen had one. Oh how the times have changed. Allen has only taken seven major penalties all season. Just five ECHL teams have taken fewer including Wichita with a league low of four major penalties. The days of Allen and Wichita being known for their toughness is long gone. 

- Special teams will play a key role in the three games against Wichita this week. The Allen power play has been in a drought for a while. At the end of November Allen had the #3 ranked ECHL power play at 26.1%. Since that time Allen has scored one power play goal in its last seven games. The Americans are 1-19 (5.3%) on the power play in the last seven games. The Allen penalty kill has also struggled recently. Since the beginning of December the penalty kill percentage is 68.8% (5-16). If Allen is going to be successful against Wichita it will have to do better on special teams.

 

- Despite a 1-1-1-0 record against Wichita the Americans scored first in all three games. Keep in mind across the entire league the team that scores first wins 75.7% of the points. The overall record for the teams that score first is 232-60-37-5. Even though Allen's scoring first record of 5-3-3-0 (.591) is one of the worst in the league and Wichita's scoring first record of 9-3-1-0 (.731) is below the league average, scoring first and playing with the lead will be critical in this series. Wichita is 5-1-0-0 when leading after the first period and Allen is 0-8-1-0 when trailing after the first period. The records are even worse after the second period. Wichita is 9-0-0-0 when leading after the second period and Allen is 0-8-2-0 when trailing after the second period. It is very clear the importance of the Americans getting off to good starts and avoid playing from behind.   

- Colin Jacobs, who was just acquired in a trade with Worcester for Ryan Mahshie, is scheduled to arrive in Allen today. Whether he will be in the lineup tonight remains to be seen. James Hardie was practicing yesterday wearing the green non-contact jersey. He is listed as day-to-day and should be available sometime this week, but tonight might be a little soon. Will have to wait and see on his status.

 

 

- Here is the complete updated Allen roster that I am pretty sure is accurate as of this morning. The transactions this afternoon could make changes to the status of some players. With the Christmas waiver/trade freeze four days away and Allen on a six game losing streak, it won't be a surprise to see more roster changes before the 22nd.

Goalies 

• #1 Logan Neaton 
• #35 *Anson Thornton

Defensemen

• #91 Ayo Adeniye -  reserve
• #23 JC Brassard
• #82 Cole Fraser - 14-day IR
• #3 Ryan Gagnon 
• #66 Artyum Kulakov 
• #44 Nolan Orzeck 
• #21 Mike Van Unen
• #2 Quinn Warmuth 

Forwards

• #26 Spencer Asuchak 
• #42 Robbie Baillergeon 
• #24 Harrison Blaisdell
• #22 Easton Brodzinski 
• #28 Brian Chambers
• #16 *Kyle Crnkovic
• #8 Mark Duarte 
• #10 *Will Gavin - 14-day IR
• #84 Liam Gorman 
• #14 Brayden Guy
• #86 James Hardie - reserve
• #17 Colin Jacobs
• #70 Dakota Seaman - 14-day IR
• #11 Rylan Van Unen 
• #92 Brayden Watts
  

 *AHL contracted players

 

- Here is the game/series preview from the Allen Americans: https://allenamericans.com/news/2024/12/americans-open-a-four-games-in-five-nights-stretch-this-evening-againt-wichita

OTHER COMMENTS

- Goalie Marco Costantini is headed to Europe. He has signed with an Italian team, Asiago Hockey 1935, in the ICEHL. The ICEHL is made up of teams from Austria, Hungary, Italy and Slovenia. Former Allen players Zane Franklin, Corey Mackin, Alex Lavoie, Kale Kerbashian, Josh Atkinson and Jason Fram all  play in the ICEHL. Asiago is currently in 11th place in the 13 team league with a record of 6-16. 

- Blake Murray who along with Bennett MacArthur was a big part of Allen's turnaround last season. They were both under NHL contract last season, Murray (Carolina) and MacArthur (Tampa Bay) and assigned to their ECHL affiliates. Somehow coach Chad Costello was able to convince their NHL teams to send them to Allen, (neither NHL team was affiliated with Allen) for development. It was a big piece of the puzzle that turned around Allen's season and got them to the playoffs. This season MacArthur is playing for the top team in the league (Wheeling). and Murray is playing for the last place team in the South Division, Atlanta.Congrats to Blake who was just selected as the ECHL Player of the Week. Here is the press release: https://echl.com/news/2024/12/atlantas-murray-named-inglasco-echl-player-of-the-week  

-  The ECHL season is already close to one third completed and the top and bottom teams are well established: Here are the top and bottom five teams in point percentage. Notice all of the top teams are in the Eastern Conference:

• .833 - Wheeling
• .775 - Trois Riviéres
• .761 - Norfolk
• .750 - Florida
• .750 - South Carolina

• .250 - Cincinnati
• .261 - Utah
• .354 - Rapid City
• .385 - Reading
  
• .404 - Worcester

- There are six games on the ECHL schedule tonight and three of them are in the Mountain Division. In addition to Wichita at Allen, Rapid City is at Idaho and Tahoe is at Utah. Here are the previews: https://echl.com/news/2024/12/echl-today-dec-18  

DID YOU KNOW: The ECHL Stats post today is about rookies and veterans. With the trade this week Allen lost a rookie and gained a veteran. The Americans now have 11 rookies and two veterans.

Here are the ECHL teams with the most and fewest rookies and veterans on their roster. Teams with point percentages above .600 are marked with an asterisk. Most telling from these stats is seven of the nine teams with the fewest rookies are above .600. The five teams with the most rookies have point percentages of .261, .354, .385, .409 and .500.

 

ROOKIES

 

Most

17: BLM

15: ADK

14: REA, UTA, RC

 

Fewest

6: *JAX, *KC, *TOL, *FW, IDH

7: *FLA, MNE, *NOR, *TAH

 

 

VETERANS

 

Most

4: *FLA, IDH, ORL, *TOL

 

Fewest

0: ADK, BLM, *IA, MNE, SAV, WOR