The IceCaps (24-23-7) close out a six-game homestand at Mile One Centre with matchups tonight and Saturday against the Albany Devils (30-23-2), and they’ll need to win both those contests just to get their home record over .500.
St. John’s is 11-12-3 at Mile One so far this season, a record that’s reflective of the IceCaps’ win-one/lose one (or vice-versa) trend against visitors.
Of the 13 two-game series St. John’s has played at Mile One so far this season, nine have seen the teams split. Three times — including twice in the last month — the IceCaps have dropped both ends of the series (with a couple of extra-time setbacks). Only once, has St. John’s won both meetings and that was back in November against the Utica Comets.
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How important is it for the IceCaps to improve on that home-ice performance? Put it this way: while St. John’s continues to hold on to fourth place and what would be the final playoff berth in the American Hockey League’s North Division, it is one of only two of the 16 AHL clubs currently in a playoff position which have lost more games at home than they have won.
The other is the Iowa Wild, who benefit from having one of the best road records (15-9-2) in the league. St. John’s, 13-11-4 in away games, doesn’t have the same sort of make-up effect on the road.
Of course, the enigma that seems to be wrapped up in a St. John’s home schedule consisting of back-to-back games against the same opponent involves more than what the IceCaps do or don’t do.
There’s the team on other side and how it approaches these games.
Ask St. John’s winger Bobby Farnham, who has a good idea of the visitors’ attitude when they come to Mile One. For three seasons, he travelled to St. John’s as a member of the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins.
“You’re getting teams’ best efforts when you come here… you always are,” Farnham said earlier in this homestand. “I know when I came up here with Wilkes-Barre, we always wanted to play particularly well.
“It’s a fun road trip. It’s something different for most teams, so you know you’re always going to get their best.”
“Having said that, there’s no excuse for us not to be better at home. Yes, it’s tough playing teams back-back, but we have to better and we know we can be better. We have shown spurts of it, but that’s the problem …. It’s only been spurts of what we can be.”
Notes
Start time for both games is 7:30 p.m. … This is the Devils’ second visit to St. John’s. Albany, which is in second place in the North Division, was here five weeks ago and — as is the norm — came away with a split, although the IceCaps took away three points since its loss to the Devils came in overtime … This weekend should mark the IceCaps debut of defenceman Keegan Lowe, who was acquired earlier this week in a trade between the Carolina Hurricanes and parent Montreal Canadiens. Lowe was traded for rearguard Philip Samuelsson , who joins Lowe’s old team, the Charlotte Checkers … After taking on the Devils, the IceCaps will be gone on a six-game road trip as Mile One is converted to curling mode for the Tim Horton Brier, beginning here next week …
