□ Home □ Hockey □ Wolf*Pack □ Link to Story □ Back		Injuries Too Much For Tigers March 25, 2005 AHL / BRUCE BERLET Greg Cronin has never been a loser as a player or head coach in more than 20 years in hockey. The Bridgeport Sound Tigers coach might keep the streak intact this season, but it will not have been easy. "I've never experienced anything like this," Cronin said. "You try to use the morale thing, but you can only do so many Vince Lombardi speeches. That wears thin, and all of a sudden you've got a new roll call every day because you've got so many new players." Cronin's disappointment and self-doubt stem from a plethora of injuries to a team that started without three of its leading scorers and top five defensemen from last season. That includes the Wolf Pack's Jeff Hamilton, who led the AHL with 43 goals and a record 15 winners but signed with the Rangers in the off-season. When the injuries reached a peak of nine in late November and early December, the Sound Tigers went into a 2-12-1-1 tailspin, with the wins coming in shootouts. It left Cronin, 41, questioning himself despite having guided winning college and national teams and being an assistant for five years with the Islanders. "Everybody said it couldn't get worse than having five guys out for the playoffs last year," Cronin said. "We lost more man-games to injuries than we did the previous two years combined, but we've totally blown that away this year." The most costly losses were All-Star Sean Bergenheim, Justin Mapletoft, Justin Papineau, Matt Koalska, Richard Seeley and former Pack wing Barrett Heisten. Ryan Kraft, Blaine Down, Keith Aldridge and possibly Graham Belak are out for the season. Brendan Yarema left for Milwaukee March 5 and unproductive Jim Campbell was loaned to Springfield, splitting up a brother act with former Pack defenseman Ed Campbell. Then the Tigers all but conceded they wouldn't make the playoffs March 15 when they loaned Seeley, their captain, to Norfolk, with Ed Campbell taking his place. As if that wasn't bad enough, goalies Dieter Kochan and Wade Dubielewicz, the 2004 AHL rookie of the year, weren't as effective as last season, when they combined to allow 140 goals, 36 fewer than the previous league record for 80 games. "They've faced more shots but also let in some goofy ones that didn't happen last year," Cronin said. "We had a thin group, and luck didn't seem to be bouncing our way, and that's critical when you're banged up and have so many young guys." Things got so bad that when the Tigers went to Wilkes-Barre with 15 skaters, six of them call-ups from the ECHL and UHL's Danbury Trashers, former Sound Tigers defenseman Alain Nasreddine asked, "Where the heck is your team?" It's little wonder Cronin sought advice from Atlanta Thrashers coach Curt Fraser and Portland Pirates coach Tim Army, both of whom had experienced similar slumps. Cronin asked Fraser what to do when he had the "very sobering" thought he didn't have the resources to win. "Nobody wants to be embarrassed, which is something I learned when I was helping Shawn Walsh start to build the Maine program in the 1980s," Cronin said. "I've had this attitude that my energy and work habits would be able to influence a group, and I ate some humble pie this season. I'm not the type of person to look at injuries as an excuse because Hartford has had them and kept chugging along. I squarely look in the mirror and ask what I've done wrong, regardless of personnel." Improved health and goaltending have helped the Tigers get to 31-32-3-1 and give Cronin a shot to keep his winning streak alive. They are unlikely to make the playoffs, but the thoughts of embarrassment have disappeared. "Having so many mature players with substance and purpose come back makes my life so much easier," Cronin said. "I don't have to do all the yelling. It's nice to have someone else around who's been in the trenches to reinforce little things. It helps get you out of the bad spell because it's a lot more influential than me yelling at them on the bench." Falcons' Futility Springfield got veterans Shane Willis and Derek Bekar back last weekend, but it couldn't prevent the Falcons from being eliminated from the playoffs for the fourth time in five years. Back-to-back shutout losses to Albany (1-0) and Lowell (4-0) gave the Falcons 15 for the season, one more than the AHL record set by Norfolk last season. It also gave them a franchise-record 13 straight road losses. ... Lowell's Matt Lombardi had a goal in his first game since sustaining a concussion in the Stanley Cup playoffs last spring. Lombardi, 22, had 16 goals and 12 assists in 79 games with Calgary last season. ... Providence goalie Hannu Toivonen returned Sunday after missing 13 games with a knee injury sustained Feb. 20. He stopped 20 shots but lost 1-0 to Manchester on Tom Kotsopoulos' power-play goal on the first shot. ... The AHL and Professional Hockey Players Association has unveiled a 48-card collection of the AHL All-Stars, including the Pack's Jason LaBarbera and Lawrence Nycholat. The 1,000 sets are available at ahlstore.com.