article from Time Leader(Wilkes Barre paper):
WAY TO GO JIMMY!!!!!!
Pens' opening-night roster set
Starting with Thursday's opener against Philadelphia, head coach Glenn Patrick
hopes he has put together a physical team that will wear down AHL opponents.
By STEVE SEMBRAT
WILKES-BARRE TWP. - Glenn Patrick unveiled a team on Monday he hopes nobody in
the American Hockey League will want to play.
It's a team with room for free agents Jim Leger, Jean-Philippe Soucy, Steve
Parsons and Mark Scally.
It's a team that's bidding adieu for now to veterans Boris Protsenko and Aleksey
Kolkunov.
It's this season's Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins.
"I want the kind of team that nobody wants to play against," said Patrick, who
enters his second season as Wilkes-Barre/Scranton's head coach. "That's a team
that's going to finish checks at both ends of the rink. It may be a team that
does not score a lot of goals. I think we have enough talent to score goals, but
we're going to wear teams down. We're going to win games in the third period."
Leger, Soucy, Parsons and Scally each was signed to a 25-game contract, and will
join 16 other healthy players and two who are injured on the roster. That's the
team that will open the AHL regular season on Thursday against the Philadelphia
Phantoms (7:35 p.m. faceoff, First Union Arena, 172 tickets left as of Monday
afternoon).
Here's the opening-night roster:
Forwards: Greg Crozier, Dylan Gyori, Tom Kostopoulos, Leger, Jason MacDonald,
Alexandre Mathieu, Eric Meloche, Parsons, Toby Petersen, Martin Sonnenberg
(injured), Billy Tibbetts, Darcy Verot, Alexander Zevakhin.
Defensemen: Brendan Buckley, Sven Butenschon, Trent Cull (injured), Andrew
Ference, Chris Kelleher, John Slaney, Soucy.
Goalies: Joel Laing, Scally.
The two players conspicuous by their absence are Protsenko and Kolkunov, who
were with the local Penguins during their entire inaugural season. They were
assigned to Wheeling (W.Va.) of the East Coast Hockey League, along with
defensemen Mark Moore, Chris Newans and Doug Schmidt, and goalie Craig Hillier.
"They weren't among the top 13 forwards," Patrick said of Protsenko and
Kolkunov. "It wasn't that difficult. I like them both, personally, but the team
comes first."
To comprehend some of the roster moves that may seem shocking, keep in mind that
the financial outlook for the entire organization is much healthier. When last
year's team was assembled, it came less than a month after a bankruptcy judge
approved Mario Lemieux's plan to head an ownership group. As a result, Lemieux's
group became owners of Pittsburgh and Wilkes-Barre/Scranton, and money was tight
at first.
"Last year, with the bankruptcy situation, we were stuck with the players we had
under contract," Patrick said. "I knew they'd be with me, and I had to deal with
that."
This year, he was given approval to go with the best performers in camp. "We had
a couple of free agents who came in and were among the top players."
Up front, that's Leger and Parsons.
"I'm happy, but I don't want to be satisfied with just this," Leger said. "I
want to go out and keep working hard. I'm just going to go out and work hard and
play my game."
It's that kind of attitude that earned the 24-year-old rookie out of the
University of Maine a spot on the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton roster.
Leger didn't participate in workouts during the first eight days of Pittsburgh's
camp. He had no goals or assists in preseason games, and had nine goals and nine
assists in 40 games for Maine last season.
"When I started to see what kind of player he is, I told him don't worry about
points, worry about doing your job, which is to stop the other team from
scoring," Patrick said. "He's very coachable. He fits in to the type of team I
want to have this year."
Parsons made the team as its enforcer. While he fills the spot left by Dennis
Bonvie, who made Pittsburgh's roster, his job description will be a bit
different.
"Last year we only had Bonvie to be the enforcer and everybody relied on him,"
Patrick said. "This year, we have Parsons and nobody relies on him. He takes
care of the things he wants to take care of, and everybody else sticks up for
teammates. We have a lot more team toughness."
Still, Parsons will have something to fight for, literally, as the season
progresses.
"Last year, I said Bonvie was the toughest player in the league," Patrick said.
"I don't want to say that about Parsons yet, but he is as tough as anybody in
the league."
Soucy also fought his way to a roster spot, impressing Patrick with his
toughness in Sunday's preseason finale. He was involved in three fights, two
with former teammate Hugues Gervais, responding to what the Penguins perceived
as cheap shots.
Wilkes-Barre/Scranton will start the season with two goalies who were in college
last season. Joel Laing out of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute was named the
No. 1 goalie following Sunday's preseason finale against Hershey. That was a 5-2
victory, in which Laing stopped 28 of 30 shots.
Scally, who played for Penn State's club team last season, was named the backup.
"I came in here thinking I had to work my butt off," Scally said. "I wanted to
work hard, have confidence, and whatever happens, see it as a positive. I'm
really excited to be here."
Hillier, Pittsburgh's first-round pick in the 1996 NHL entry draft, continues to
be haunted by last season. He started in Wilkes-Barre/Scranton, struggled, was
demoted, and continued to play poorly for three ECHL teams. He played well on
Saturday in a 2-1 preseason victory at Hershey, but has yet to fully redeem
himself.
"I'm not upset with Hillier. He might be the best goaltender," Patrick said. "He
has to prove to us that he can play more than one good game in a row. I don't
have the time for that. I can't watch him have a bad game.
"If he goes down and wins 10 in a row in the East Coast league, he'll be right
back here playing good games for me ... Scally showed he comes to play hard
every day."
Which is exactly the kind of players Patrick selected for his team.
"There's always an amount of difficulty when you are dealing with a person's
career, but I felt that the ones we have chosen to be here have earned the
position," Patrick said. "We kept guys who wanted to make this team."
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-----Original Message-----
From: David Bauer [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Monday, October 02, 2000 10:19 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: LEGER
Hey all you Mainers, Just wanted to let the fans know that former
Black Bear Jimmy Leger has signed with the Wilkes/Barre
Scranton Penquins of the AHL. Leger attended camp as a free agent, and
beat out many veterans. The Penguins open the regular season Thurs.
night vs. the Phila. Phantoms. Hi Nonni
Coach B
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