New Jersey Devils Prospect Update: Comets Winless Streak Comes to a Merciful End

It took a power play goal with under two minutes left, but the Comets finally win a game.

Comets Win

It took a Mike Hardman power play goal with under two minutes left to break the 3-3 tie on Friday night for Utica to earn its first win of the season. Here it is in all it’s “finally, it’s over” glory.

Unsurprisingly with three points, two of them goals, including the game winner, Mike Hardman was the star of the game for Utica. Seamus Casey and Adam Beckman also had strong nights, potting two points apiece. Isaac Poulter stopped 26 of 29 for his first win of the season.

On Saturday night, the Comets won again with a 5-1 drubbing of the Rochester Americans. Nico Daws lost the shutout bid with eleven seconds left in the game, stopping 35 of 36. Brian Halonen scored twice for the Comets with Seamus Casey adding another two assists. Casey now leads Utica with 13 points and is 10th in the AHL in points per game amongst players suiting up for a minimum of ten games with 1.18. Also of note, Simon Nemec recorded his first point since returning to the AHL in the Comets’s win, the primary assist on Halonen’s second of the game.

With the weekend wins, the Comets’s record increased to 2-10-1-2 on the season, still dead last in the entire AHL, but hey, the first rule of holes is to stop digging. The Comets did that. Now, they need to build off it if they ever want to climb out of the cellar. To paraphrase the great Coach Brown of Major League, one more win in their next outing and that’s called a winning streak.

Around the Pool

• Lenni Hameenaho may have lost the golden helmet to linemate Jan-Mikael Järvinen, but the 20 year-old winger was 12th in the Liiga in points as of Saturday morning with 21 points in 22 games.
• Brantford Bulldogs winger Cole Brown has been red hot lately, recently scoring two goals in a comeback win. It was slow moving out of the gate for Brown, who now has more points in the OHL (17) than much more highly-touted winger Cam Squires does in the QMJHL (16). Squires has played four less games, but Brown has been hot lately and Squires has gone cold after a strong start to the season.
• Cam Squires seems to be taking some of his frustrations out with his fists.

• Center Matyas Melovsky continues his strong season and is now 5th in the QMJHL in points per game with 1.50 (27 in 18). As has been typical in his career, the majority (20) of Melovsky’s points have been helpers. Still, the double-overager is on pace for a staggering 93 points in 62 games. Even as a double overager, Dobber’s PNHL model projects this production rate at 42, which is the potential of a future 2nd line center in the NHL. While such a projection may be a bit lofty, it would be surprising at this point if Melovsky is not at least offered an ELC at the end of his season.

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