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AJC > Sports > Thrashers > Blog > Archives > 2007 > January > 05

Friday, January 5, 2007

Hedberg in goal tonight

By Craig Custance | Friday, January 5, 2007, 03:48 PM

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Bob Hartley must have heard the fans calling for Johan Hedberg, because he’s getting the start in goal tonight against the Coyotes. Hedberg hasn’t played since a 6-0 loss to the Islanders on Dec. 16th.

The move makes sense - the Thrashers are playing back-to-back games, and are about to start a tough road trip that includes Washington, Montreal, New Jersey and Carolina. Plus, as Hartley pointed out this morning, Hedberg may be a little more familiar with a Western Conference team after playing for Dallas last year.

Hedberg said he was ready to go.

“[The Coyotes] have a lot of talent in that lineup… they got a big win last night, we have to be prepared to play a solid game and take it to them,” he said.

Phoenix coach Wayne Gretzky has been juggling a pair of hot goalies and spent a large portion of his morning talk with reporters chatting about his goalie situation. Curtis Joseph is starting tonight for the Coyotes. CuJo has two consecutive shutouts, while Mikael Tellqvist had 30 saves in the Coyotes win over Washington on Monday.

It didn’t seem like Gretzky minded a potential goalie controversy brewing out west.

“Listen, it’s not a controversy in a lot of ways, but maybe in some ways it is,” he said. “They both want to play every night. That’s okay, I would expect them both to want to play every night.”

Between Hedberg getting his first start in a while, and CuJo going for a third consecutive shutout, it should be an interesting game.

What I’m reading:

  • Nearly everybody around the arena this morning was talking about Patrick Stefan’s miss of an empty-netter last night that quickly became a Ales Hemsky goal, forcing overtime. There’s a link to the video on on this page. if you missed it. Stefan talked to Dallas Morning News reporter Mike Heika about the miss after the game.

  • Good to see the Americans bounce back from a tough loss to Canada and win the bronze medal in the world junior hockey championship.

  • Tough blow for the Calgary Flames, who lost Jarome Iginla for at least a week with a knee injury.

  • The Falconer updated his Thrashers Penalty Drawn stats to include December. Notice the big jump for Ilya Kovalchuk, who may not be scoring goals like we’re used to, but continues to help the Thrashers in other ways.

  • ESPN.com’s Scott Burnside has a good read on Peter Forsberg, who is fighting injuries once again. Burnside discusses what the latest injury does to Forsberg’s trade value. I’m sure Hartley wouldn’t mind being reunited with his former star for the right price, although that’s just pure speculation.

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