January 14-16

A rare Saturday with nothing on the schedule, my usual visit and lunch with Jenny was effectively all that happened all weekend. On Monday morning we were up and at it early as the ladies were along for afternoon hockey at the Sovereign Center and the start of a four-game homestand. With a road loss on Saturday the Royals hit the midpoint of the schedule with a mark of 15-15-6, on this day the South Carolina Stingrays were in town for the first game of the season's second half. With a special 1:00 start time on Martin Luther King Day we had a lot of youngsters in the house but unfortunately the end result was all too familiar. This was another frustrating come-from-ahead loss as the 'Rays took it 4-3, the Royals held three separate one-goal leads but were caught each time. Dennis McCauley, Yannick Tifu and Kenny Ryan (another recent assignee from the Toronto Marlies) lit the lamp for the Royals, Karel St. Laurent played well in goal but suffered the hard-luck loss. In seventeen games at home the club's record is just 4-10-3, the boys are next in action on Friday the 20th versus the Kalamazoo Wings. Take care, thanks for reading.