It's become the hottest topic in our comments section - and it's something that really can't be ignored. Does the goaltending situation need to be re-evaluated?

The sample size continues to grow larger and more significant. It is getting to the point now where the questions about Mark Dekanich's play aren't "When will he revert to form?", but rather "Was last year a fluke?"

Last month we took a look at Dex' struggles. Since October 29th, when that last piece was written, Mark Dekanich has gone 2-2-1 with a 2.77 GAA and .892 save percentage. Instead of "righting the ship", he has actually been measurably worse in November than he was in October. And it's not the just the amount of goals...it's the type and the timing.

Dex has given up at least one 1st period goal in every game except one, and that usually translates to the Admirals playing from behind. Too often after games, we're talking about a goal that "he would like to have back." There's also a lot of "flopping" that is going on; Chris Jerina has snapped a number of pictures like the one to the right - where Dex is off his skates...or waving at the puck like he's playing whack-a-mole.

When you ask the players, they will say all the right things about supporting their goaltender. When you ask the coach he will tell you the skaters aren't clearing enough pucks from the crease area. That's great and all - but from a human psychology standpoint, it has to be deflating to see another stoppable shot find the back of the net 5 minutes into the game. It's also easy to say that Dekanich did not look like this last year.  

So - enter Chet Pickard? At the time of our first article, there was no other viable option for the Admirals, as Pickard had played only one game and got shelled at Abbotsford. That may no longer be the case.  

His season numbers still look awful; a 3.64 GAA and .871 save percentage. But take out that horrible professional debut in Abbotsford - and Pick's got a 1.98 GAA and .925 save percentage. The difficulty in evaluating Pickard is still the small sample size; he only has three starts under his belt. But watch him play and you see the poise and the positioning that makes him a top prospect in the Predators system. As uncomfortable as Dekanich looks, Pickard is beginning to look like he belongs.

The big question here is: Can you really trust a 19 year old to be your primary goalie? Grand Rapids is the only AHL team giving regular playing time to a goalie so young. Thomas McCollum is actually younger than Pickard - by a week - and has started most of the Griffins' games. However, he has also provided the types of peaks and valleys that can usually be expected with youth. He surrendered only 1 goal three times this year; but he also gave up six goals in a game...and 7 goals in another game.

I don't expect Lane Lambert to actually flip the goalie designations. I think Dekanich will remain the 'Number One Goalie". However, for the time being, I think the playing time may actually tell a different story.

The Admirals play six games in Texas before returning home. Would anyone be surprised if Pickard starts in three of them?

(Photos from Chris Jerina)

As this week progresses without a game until Friday, here are some of the things that we're keeping an eye on (along with everyone else).

As we mentioned last week, Colin Wilson is close to returning for the Predators. While they do not have to make a roster move to accommodate his return, they probably will. The possibilities are pretty obvious:

• Send Colin Wilson to Milwaukee on a conditioning assignment
• Send Colin Wilson down on a demotion
• Send someone else down
• Do nothing and keep a 23 man roster.

It makes it tuff to guess what will happen when the options are so varied.  

I think the "safe" option (other than doing nothing) is to send Wilson down on a conditioning assignment. That would buy them up to 14 more days to make a decision (or for someone else to get hurt). Of course, the team could save more money and gain even more flexibility by simply assigning him to Milwaukee. He's not waiver eligible, so the only reason you wouldn't do that is to protect his confidence or psyche.

If they think Wilson can step right in and go, maybe they send Santorelli down again....since Wilson would likely take his third line center slot. They could also move Santorelli to wing....again.....and send Thuresson down. However, previous comments to us by Barry Trotz indicate that moving Santorelli back to wing is unlikely.

Additionaly, a columnist in Ottawa indicates that the Preds are shopping Ryan Jones. I would say file this under the "No Duh" category. However - I would hope that he has actually heard this info from some reliable source. We've all figured out that Ryan Jones is probably not a part of the Predators' future. The question remains who will possibly trade for a player on a two-year, one-way contract that isn't producing at any level?

Jones finally broke into the statsheet with a goal this weekend, but he has been one of the biggest disappointments on the Admirals' roster this year.

"The one thing we have to continue to try and get him doing is moving his feet," said Admirals Coach Lane Lambert. "He's got to maintain possession of pucks and protect pucks and come out of the corner with pucks. Certainly this is a guy that we count on for quite a bit of offense and there hasn't been any so far. We have to help him find his game."

It could turn out that his game is actually with another franchise.

We've seen what Ryan Jones can do and if he can get back there, he could be a bargain at less than $1 million. Who is going to take that gamble, though?

The Admirals spent most of the night playing catchup, only to surrender a game-winning power play goal with 16 seconds remaining in the game, as the Peoria Rivermen defeated the Admirals 5-4 Saturday night in Illinois.

Special teams were only special for the Rivermen, as they scored on three out of their four power plays chances on the ngiht, while the Admirals went 0-for-3 with the man-advantage.

As you'll see from the highlight reel below, some of the Admirals goals were kind of fluky, and there were some mad scrambles in front of Mark Dekanich with Admirals bodies flying everywhere. 

What's missing from this "highlight package" was Robert Dietrich getting in someones face at the end of the game.  Quoting the recap from the Peoria Star:  "The Admirals went down fighting at the final horn seconds later, as defenseman Robert Dietrich thrashed around with Peoria goaltender Hannu Toivonen".

Wait....Dietrich, and the goalie?  This we need to see...we'll see if we can link to some other video highlights later...... Whatever it was, it earned both parties unsportsmanlike conduct penalties, and Ryan Reaves got a game misconduct out of that scrum as well.

Referee Nygel Pelletier, who had put his whistle away for the first 19:33 of the third period, saw fit to call Ryan Jones for a slashing penalty at the 19:34 mark.  Ten seconds later, the game wasn't tied anymore.

The game didn't start particularly well for the Admirals either, as Mark Dekanich gave up a goal just 19 seconds into the game -- the fastest score by the Rivermen in their AHL history.  It was also the 11th time in 12 games this season that Dekanich has allowed at least one first period goal. He turned aside 23 of 28 shots in this loss.

The Admirals goals went to Cal O'Reilly, Hugh Jessiman, Mark Matheson, and Teemu Laakso -- who scored his first of the season, but looked to go down hard to the ice after a collision with Yan Stastny during his follow-through.

Nolan Yonkman was on the ice for four out of the five Rivermen goals, and as evidenced in the video above, he did a lot of standing around.

The Admirals are going to have lots of time to stew over this one -- the next game isn't until next Friday when they start their Texas trip in Houston.  As for some payback against Peoria, they'll get their chance the first game back home after this road trip concludes.

(photo credits:  Chris Jerina) 

The Admirals started their eight game road trip with a tilt against the Grand Rapids Griffins, and the Ads come away with a point, after a 3-2 loss in overtime.

Glass is half full:  the Admirals scored the first goal of the game for the 3rd straight game, and have gotten at least a point in 5 out of their last 6 games.

Glass is half empty:  The Admirals blew two one-goal leads in this game, and ran out of gas when the puck was dropped to start the 3rd period.

Ryan Jones tossed aside the monkey from his back, and recorded his first point of the hockey season -- a goal at the 10:11 mark of the first period.  How big was that monkey?  It was his first point in 7 Admirals games, and 8 Predators games.  It was a 5-on-3 power play marker that beat Thomas McCollum five-hole, assisted by Cal O'Reilly and Robert Dietrich (both of whom rank in the top 10 in assists in the league).

The Griffins tied it up with a power-play marker of their own at the 6:46 mark of the second period, as Admirals goaltender Chet Pickard left a juicy rebound after a shot from the point for Mattias Ritola to pounce on, his fourth goal of the season.

Dave Scatchard gave the Admirals back their one goal lead about 8 minutes later with a power-play goal.  After a shot from the far side (I thought it was Jones with the shot, but they gave Jon Blum the primary assist), McCollum gave up a long rebound that bounced around in the slot.  Scatchard didn't get everything he wanted on the shot, but it was enough to beat McCollum, who was struggling to get back into position.

The Admirals were then outshot 11-3 in the third period, and outscored 1-nil, on a tough luck goal against Chet Pickard.  Griffin defenseman Doug Janik took a shot from the far left point that was deflected by Patrick Rissmiller on its way into the net.

24 seconds later, the Admirals went back on the penalty kill (their 7th of the night) when Teemu Laakso was called for tripping, and they couldn't get any sustained offensive pressure the rest of the game.

The game winner came 1:21 into overtime, and it was another shot from the point by Janik, this time from the right side near the boards.  The puck appeared to be deflected on its way to the net, and Nolan Yonkman appealed to the referee that it was played by a high stick, but the ref gave the goal to Janik, and that was the game.

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Odds 'N Ends

- Tonight's referee was David Banfield.  You may remember him from the game Thursday night in Milwaukee.  And he picked up right where he left off -- 12 more infractions tonight, all minor penalties.  Funny story from the penalty box area about that game on Thursday night at the BC.....for two of the Admirals goals, he didn't know who scored them.  He just came over to the scorer's table and shrugged.  Okay, buddy.

- The Griffins are still undefeated at home, now an 8-0 record, outscoring their visitors 30-15.

- Scatchard's goal was his third in as many games with Milwaukee, and his fifth goal in six games with the Admirals.  It was also his third power-play goal, but he was on the ice for the game-tying and game-winning goals.

- Chet Pickard made 26 of 29 saves, and I have to say, he didn't look like a rookie goalie to me.  In fact, he did a great job in the 3rd period just to keep the game tied and send it to overtime.

- Here's a picture of the Yonkman delay-of-game-penalty-du-jour.

- The Admirals finish their first 3-games-in-3-days stretch Saturday night with their 4th game of the year against the Peoria Rivermen.

It took four games - but the Milwaukee Admirals finally figured out a way to beat the Abbotsford Heat Thursday night. Oh - and they won the game, too. The 4-1 Admirals victory featured four fights from four different Admirals, and a combined 76 penalty minutes. 

Newly re-assigned Dave Scatchard wasted little time making an impact. Nine minutes into the first period, Scatchard took a feed from Cal O'Reilly and beat Leland Irving for his fourth goal of the year. Cal O'Reilly made a couple of great plays in the sequence. He started it all off by flipping a nice saucer pass from the red line out to Scott Ford at the Blue Line. Ford stepped up - and fired a pass back to Cal at the side of the net. Irving slid over to stop the one-timer...but Cal didn't shoot. (Irving clearly doesn't read our blog...or he would have known that). Cal held the puck nicely...and sent a backhanded pass to Scatchard waiting at the top of the circle. Irving never had a chance, and the Ads had a 1-0 lead.

Scatchard's honeymoon period didn't last long, though. 

While on the man-advantage, Scatchard* tried a pass along the offensive blue line. It was intercepted by Carsen Germyn who took off into open ice. Scatchard* gave pursuit, but decided to dive for Germyn instead of catching up to him. Naturally, he was called for tripping. 

(*Lane Lambert says Scatchard was at fault, we all swore it was Peter Olvecky.)

That gave Germyn a penalty shot against Dekanich. Wanna take a guess as to what happened?

Yeah. Red Light. 1-1 game.

(photo credits:  Chris Jerina)

On the very next shift, Olvecky was called for hooking....giving Abbotsford a power play. The Ads would kill it off - but it destroyed any momentum Milwaukee had built. 

In fact, it was the Heat that seemed to turn it up after that. They started playing with much more aggression in the second period, and started putting a ton of pressure on the Admirals in their zone. It seemed that an Abbotsford goal was inevitable. Then - the strangest thing happened. The Admirals from 2008 showed up for about 2 minutes. 

"I thought our team was in a lull for about ten minutes. I didn't like it," said Lane Lambert. "Yonkman took it upon himself to actually go in and forecheck and run somebody and create some excitement and get our guys going a little bit."

The Admirals got their second goal at 12:57 of the second, as Ben Guite shot  puck from the point while Triston Grant provided a screen in front of Irving. By the time the puck got to the net, Grant was almost behind Irving, and the puck trickled in. Grant got credit for the goal...his second.

Less than a minute later, Jon Blum got control of the puck in the neutral zone and fired a pass to Hugh Jessiman trolling at the blue line. Jessiman had an uncontested breakaway on Irving and - after making 34 deke moves - slid the puck past Irving's left pad. Just like that, the Admirals had a 3-1 lead.

"I think we played a better game the last time we played them and lost two-nothing, to be honest with you," said Lambert. The difference to him? Timely goals and better goaltending. Mark Dekanich earned #1 star status with 22 saves.

Mark Matheson added a goal in the third, set up by a big hit in the corner from Triston Grant. Grant then provided a screen for Matheson. 

NOTES

The four Admirals with FIghts were Nick Spaling, Nolan Yonkman, Scott Ford, and Triston Grant. Spaling's fight was his first professional fight, and Spaling was able to get up off the ice twice to reach what most observers considered a draw.  When a guy like that throws down, it certainly ignites the team.

"When you look at a guy like that who's not the fighting type, that means he's into it and everybody else needs to step up and get into it," says Wacey Rabbit.

Rabbit, who has "five or six" professional fights, isn't about to offer any critiques. "I don't think I'm the guy to give pointers. I think I try to just not get punched."

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A special get-well goes out to PA Announcer Matt Moore, who missed one of the few games in his illustrious career Thursday night. Ryan Miller did a fine job filling in - but it's just not the same. Come Back, Matt!