Report from the Rock: Growlers Game Day Notes

For the first time in 590 days, it’s a Newfoundland Growlers game day.

The Leafs’ ECHL affiliate opens the league’s new season on the road against one of its new teams, the Trois-Rivieres Lions, who are the ECHL affiliate of the Montreal Canadiens.

First things first, the opening right roster was released this morning. Since our last update on the Growlers (which you can find here), the team has released forward Kyle McGrath from his PTO and accepted two more players on loan from the Manitoba Moose (Winnipeg’s AHL affiliate), forwards Todd Burgess and Issac Johnston.

Some other roster notes from my colleague Kyle Cushman:

The Growlers’ leadership group this season will consist of returning captain James Melindy, and three alternates consisting of St. John’s local boys Zach O’Brien (who previously wore an A), and Marcus Power. Fan favourite Todd Skirving will also wear an A. All four players plus the currently injured defenceman Garrett Johnston and forward Derian Plouffe have previously played for the Growlers during the 2019 Kelly Cup championship run.

A third of the team are professional hockey rookies and the team’s average age is 24.5. This feels like the first season in which Kyle Dubas’ vision of the Growlers as the true first step into the Leafs organization for young players making their North American pro hockey debuts.

And now that the news is out of the way, enjoy some prime Newfoundland content:

I figure it would be good to take a moment to break down TLN’s coverage plan for the Growlers this season, since I’ll be taking the lead on this initiative. I’m currently based in St. John’s and I’m going to be attending as many home games as I possibly can. The plan at the outset of the season is to do a recap of games on a weekly basis, with particular analysis on the players who have been assigned to the team from Toronto, as well as deeper insights on the team as a whole and whatever storylines develop throughout the season. And if you don’t wanna wait a full week for the next article, you’ll be able to find my up-to-the-minute thoughts on the team on my Twitter account (@dylanmurphy329).

ECHL games will stream a free audio-only broadcast on Mixlr, which you can find right here: https://www.nlgrowlers.com/radio. There will also be a video stream of all games on a premium service called FloHockey, a season-long subscription costs $150USD.

Puck drops at 7PM eastern tonight (8:30 in Newfoundland).