EVANSVILLE, Ind. – First, the Evansville IceMen dropped in the standings. Then, they dropped their coach. Now, the players are dropping like flies.
The IceMen, once the last ECHL team to lose their first game in regulation this season, struggled through a 1-9-2 December that gave the team a 9-16-4 overall record as the calendar turned to 2015. Having fallen to 12th in the 14-team Eastern Conference, Evansville fired Dwight Mullins as head coach – the first mid-season coaching change in franchise history.
Veteran coach Al Sims was hired as the organization’s new bench boss on New Year’s Day, but did not actually take the helm until a week later due to work visa issues. He was thrown right into the fire, as the IceMen played 13 games in a 23-day span to conclude the month of January. Evansville posted a 3-8-2 mark during that stretch and fell into the Eastern Conference cellar at 12-26-6, as Sims attempted to evaluate the roster and implement a new system without the benefit of much time for practice.
Further complicating matters, the new coach lost captain and top-pairing defenseman Guy Lepine as well as goaltender Scott Greenham to the Binghamton Senators, the club’s AHL affiliate. Forward Jakub Culek, under contract with the Ottawa Senators, was recalled and subsequently released by the NHL team. Culek has since returned to his native Czech Republic.
A capacity crowd of 9391 celebrates an IceMen power-play goal against the Cincinnati Cyclones on Jan. 17. Colin Murray’s tally gave Evansville a 2-1 lead in the second period, but the visiting Cyclones stormed back to win 4-3 at the Ford Center.
Sims was able to make a pair of moves of his own along the way, acquiring forwards Thomas Frazee and Robin Soudek via trades. Frazee came from Fort Wayne in exchange for forward Matt Lowry, while Soudek arrived via Rapid City in exchange for forward Kale Kerbashian. The two newcomers were placed on a line with Patrick Kennedy, who had been named Lepine’s replacement as team captain. The Kennedy-Frazee-Soudek trio found immediate chemistry, and Sims thought he had a solid top line to build around as February began.
However, Kennedy was recalled by AHL Utica before the IceMen played a single game in February, and the month’s first weekend proved to further deplete the roster with nightmarish rapidity.
Already missing forwards Andre Bouvet-Morrissette (concussion) and Danny Hobbs (knee) along with defensemen Randy Cure (groin) and Zack Currie (separated shoulder), a half-dozen more IceMen players sustained injuries in February’s first three games.
Indy Fuel forward Vincent Arseneau single-handedly eliminated three Evansville players, handing out head injuries like candy on Halloween. Arseneau had already been responsible for Currie’s injury, having left his feet to drill the defenseman in the final minute of a 4-1 game last month.
The assault barrage continued on Friday, as Arseneau took out IceMen forward Jim McKenzie with a high hit that was not penalized. The one-man wrecking crew completed his path of destruction on Saturday, earning an Illegal Check to the Head minor for an elbow to the cranium of Evansville defenseman Joe Sova and a Charging major for a targeted shot to the noggin of IceMen blueliner Bo Driscoll.
For his injurious efforts, Arseneau was suspended for two games by the ECHL. McKenzie, Sova and Driscoll have all been diagnosed with concussions, and are out indefinitely.
Evansville’s Sunday game in Fort Wayne was no less damaging. Forward Myles Bell sustained a scratched cornea, forward Colin Murray took a skate to the face and suffered a laceration that required 29 stitches to repair, and defenseman Donnie Harris was left in a walking boot due to an ankle injury. All three are considered day-to-day, although Harris could miss significant time if a pending MRI reveals a fracture.
Pink paint fills the Ford Center ice prior to Evansville’s annual “Pink the Rink” game against the Gwinnett Gladiators on Jan. 31. With a donation to Susan G. Komen, fans were allowed to paint on the ice the names of loved ones affected by all forms of cancer. A crowd of 7605 took in the game, as the IceMen fell 5-3 to the Gladiators.
So now, as Sims and his squad hit the road for six straight games before finally returning home on February’s final day, the injury list includes 10 players and the IceMen have surpassed 140 man-games lost to various ailments. Evansville has already dressed 45 different players this season, just one shy of last season’s total – with 25 games still left to play.
Frazee succinctly summed up the team’s woeful health situation: “I’ve never seen anything like it.”
The banged-up IceMen, mired in a 4-22-4 skid, have won the fewest games in the entire ECHL. Sitting 15 points out of a playoff spot and 13 points behind the expansion Fuel, a last-place finish in the North Division and another post-season absence appear all but guaranteed.
Thus, the focus now becomes the future. Sims is a championship-winning coach, and he was hired to eventually bring a title to Evansville. Perhaps the final 25 games of the disastrous 2014-15 season will give the coach a head start on the 2015-16 campaign. The ultimate goal is obviously a Kelly Cup championship, but at this point, IceMen fans would likely be satisfied with simply making the ECHL playoffs for the first time.
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