On school day games, an old Mikko Rantanen story, and notes on Griffins-Marlies

I drove to Grand Rapids on Wednesday, let's empty the notebook before I drive home.

GRAND RAPIDS, Michigan — This story is somehow a decade in the making.

Well technically 9 years, 11 months and 24 days in the making.

On November 17, 2015, I drove to San Antonio to watch a school-day game between the Texas Stars and San Antonio Rampage. After the game I had an interview planned with a then 19-year-old Colorado Avalanche prospect named Mikko Rantanen.

The game happened, Rantanen had three assists and San Antonio won 5-2. Rantanen also had a unique penalty, for playing without his helmet, which led to the lead of a feature I wrote for The Hockey News’ 2016 World Junior Preview issue.

If you’d like to go down memory lane with me, I went and found that story from The Hockey News and you can read it here:

Anyways, about 10 years later, I made another drive for an AHL school-day game, this one a Wednesday matinee affair between the Grand Rapids Griffins and Toronto Marlies, featuring a crowd of 8,783, most of them screaming children.

School-day games are one of the weirdest spectacles in minor league and junior hockey. It’s the loudest it is all season, for about two-and-half periods, between most of the groups leave with 10 minutes left in the game turning it into an instant ghost town.

Red Wings defenseman Simon Edvinsson and I spoke about school-day games after the NHL team practice on Tuesday, how playing in a couple school-day games while in the AHL was one of the weirdest experiences of his career.

“I remember it was a break and I looked up and it was a close game and everyone is just up and leaving,” Edvinsson said. “They clearly didn’t care about the game, they were just there to scream.”

The same thing happened Wednesday, the Griffins won 3-2 in overtime, but most of those in attendance started heading for the exits while it was a 2-2 game in the third period.

I stuck around through the end of the game, I was working, so let’s empty the notebook on some various things.

• For starters, Maple Leafs goalie Joseph Woll played his second game of the season after missing the start of the season to attend to a family matter. Woll stopped 25 of 28 shots, he had some early scrambly moments, but seemed to settle into the game, particularly while the Marlies were shorthanded. This comes on the heels of an injury yesterday to Maple Leafs goalie Anthony Stolarz, which could signal Woll’s return to an NHL crease this weekend.

• On the other side of things, Amadeus Lombardi scored the game-winning goal in overtime, his first of the season, and he looks ready for an NHL call-up in my opinion. He’s playing an aggressive, but smart style of hockey right now and is disrupting things for the opponent in all three zones. He’s clearly a creative players, a pass-first guy, and I think with a little bit more selfishness he’d actually have more points and would probably already be in Detroit right now.

• This was the first time I’ve Michael Brandsegg-Nygård play live since he was sent back to the AHL after earning an NHL opening-night job. Brandsegg-Nygård was OK, but not overly impactful on this game and I’d like to see him create more shots at the AHL level. The fact is, the jump to North America has impacted him more than I expected.

• I’ll have more of a story tomorrow, I believe, on Erik Gustafsson and the human element of his season, his kids are back in Detroit right now and he drives back-and-forth each day for practices. But based on his AHL game, if the Red Wings decided that Axel Sandin-Pellikka needs a trip to the AHL, the elder Swede is ready to fill an NHL role as third-pairing defender and power play facilitator.

I’ll have more from this trip in various forms later this week, that’s kind of how this space works now. As always, thanks for reading.