ORLANDO, Fla. — The dog days of August are gone and Labor Day – the unofficial end of summer – has passed by. Baseball is closing in on the home stretch. College football is ready to swing into action and the NFL season opener featuring the Super Bowl champion New York Giants is this week. If you ask fans of pro hockey, they will say that this is the time of year when their teams can make or break the upcoming season with player signings. For those who follow the Southern Professional Hockey League, that means checking email boxes for press releases and wearing out the “favorites” buttons while surfing team websites. Since the mid-summer update, there has been a flurry of activity with signings and even a three team trade deal. Let’s get caught up on the transactions In Columbus, Fayetteville and Huntsville. Columbus Cottonmouths: General Manager/Head Coach Jerome Bechard knows what he likes in players who wear the Cottonmouth crest. So far, his summer signings have fallen along that plan. Of the ten announced deals made, eight are players who have played in Columbus. Returning for another go around are forwards Orrin Hergott, Tim Green, Ryan Rutz and Ryan McCarthy, defensemen Jason Schulz, Andrew Dwyer, Tyler Johnson and goaltender Ian Vigier. The new faces on the roster belong to defenseman Lance Smith and forward Brad Patterson. Hergott (187 points in 200 regular season games with Columbus), Green (264 points in 198 games) and Rutz (200 points in 220 games) have consistently been among the team leaders in points as well as in the locker room. McCarthy is an energy-type player who scored 20 points in 37 games after joining the Cottonmouths midway through last season. Dwyer and Johnson were the two anchors of the Columbus defense from start to finish last year. Schulz added a good deal of toughness and a booming shot from the point following his arrival late last season. Vigier, one of two rookie net minders last year, posted a 13-12-4 record with a 3.19 goals against average, numbers that earned him SPHL all-rookie honors. Smith, a college teammate of McCarthy at SUNY-Potsdam, scored 22 points in 61 games during his college career and will add size and toughness to the blue line corps. Patterson, 27, grew up in the same hometown as Cottonmouths’ captain Craig Stahl and has played 270 regular season games between the CHL and the EIHL in England. Fayetteville FireAntz: Head Coach Tommy Stewart continues to tinker and reload his Antz team with returning and new talent. The lone resigning by Stewart was a big one as forward Justin Keller re-upped with the Antz. Keller, who joined Fayetteville following a late season trade with Huntsville, netted 25 points in just 21 games with his new team. Overall, Keller finished the year with 70 points in 52 games. Fayetteville added three known quantities during August with the signings of defenseman Craig Geerlinks and forwards Rob Colangelo and Emery Olauson. Geerlinks, who was chosen by the Antz in the Jacksonville dispersal draft, was a key cog in Jacksonville’s drive to the SPHL championship series. Colangelo, acquired in a trade with Columbus, made a name for himself last season in Jacksonville with 48 points in 52 games and speed and hustle to spare. Olauson, who joins the Antz from Huntsville, brings experience in both the SPHL and the CHL to the table. Last season with the Havoc, he tallied 26 points in 26 games. The newest member of the Fayetteville family is forward Ryan Ford. Ford’s resume includes 225 points and a championship in four seasons at the junior level as well as 63 points in 28 games last season across the pond in Finland. Huntsville Havoc: Head Coach Eric Soltys is slowly but surely putting his stamp on his new Havoc squad. A while back, Huntsville made a decision to invite several core group players to training camp in October. Dan Buccella, Craig Bushey, Matt Carmichael, Matt Curley, Tim Hockley, Jonathan Lounsbury, Mill McCreary, Beau McLaughlin, Mike O’Sullivan, James Patterson, Bobby Siers, Jeff Valdes and Edan Welch all signed on the dotted line to return. Additionally, the team added forwards Samuel Bergeron and Jean-Philippe Roy-Vallieres out of the junior ranks in Canada. Bergeron tallied 158 points in 106 career junior games in the QMJHL and the QJAHL. Ray-Vallieres was just as impressing, scoring 109 points in 103 games. Add in former Jacksonville forward Pat Doherty who signed as a free agent and Huntsville had a good start to a roster. Since then, the Havoc have signed two more players and made a deal. In the trade that was announced on August 22, Huntsville sent the rights to forwards Beau McLaughlin and Kyle Sheen to Richmond in return for defenseman Martin Kubaliak. Kubaliak, who played for the Havoc in 2006-2007, spent most of last season between the CHL and ECHL, recording nine points in 57 total games. The first of the two new players to join the Havoc was forward Ray Ortiz. The second year pro comes to Huntsville from the New Mexico Scorpions of the CHL where he played for Soltys last season. In 64 games, he tallied nine goals and 14 assists. Prior to that, he played his collegiate hockey at Northeastern University in Boston where he had 42 points in 128 games. Two days after Ortiz arrived, it was announced that forward Tristan Lush had signed on. Lush, who spent time in the USHL before embarking on a solid college career at Clarkson University, played six games in the ECHL with the Mississippi Sea Wolves during the 2004-2005 season. He is also the co-owner of a sport specific training facility with his brother Zach in Melbourne, Florida. Up next: Knoxville, Richmond and Twin City. Contact the author at don.money@prohockeynews.com
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