Hrivik Enjoying His Slovak Spring

Sitting in an airport in Toronto two hours away from heading to Vienna on his way to his home in Zilina, Slovakia Republic after completing his overage season with the QMJHL Moncton Wildcats eliminated in the first round of the playoffs by the Halifax Mooseheads he got a surprise phone call.

His agent Gerry Johanssen told him there would be a change in plans and he would likely be heading to the AHL Connecticut Whale (Hartford, CT) the top farm team of the NHL New York Rangers.

"My agent called me the day before I was going on the flight., but there were some things that were unclear. So he said it's not a 100% sure, so just get ready to go home. So I was ready to go home and I left two hours later," remarked Hrivik

Once the ATO (Amateur Try Out) deal was signed he was off to a place he had no idea about it.

The whole reason he was even under consideration was because the Whale under the AHL post season roster rules and were limited on recalls to their Double AA affiliate Greenville Road Warriors (ECHL) and were desperately in need of a forward, since fellow rookie Andrew Yogan had gone down with a season ending knee injury March 30 against Wilkes Barre/Scranton.

Enter Marek Hrivik who stepped off the airplane the next day, early afternoon to play that night against the Adirondack Phantoms.

Hrivik since he hopped off that plane has made an immediate impact for the Connecticut Whale and for an undrafted player that is a tough thing to do.

He also wasn't alone when he entered the locker room. having a former junior teammate Kelsey Tessier greet him made a difference too.

"I played one year with Tess, he was traded at Christmas time. We had a great year he helped me a lot to establish my game here. When you arrive at the end of the season everybody here has his own spot. So you just have to get out and prove it to the coaches that you can play and just battle your ass off. " commented Hrivik.

Head coach Ken Gernander paired him with Casey Wellman and fellow rookie Steve Moses and they seemed to click right off the bat.

"We played pretty well" said Hrivik "We had a lot of chances,but I just couldn't put the puck in the net,".

His patience paid off with back to back two goal games in a three game first round sweep of in-state rival Bridgeport Sound Tigers in the AHL Eastern conference playoffs best-of-five series.

On Sunday, his first goal came with a correct read of the play driving down the left wing after Sound Tigers defenseman Ty Wishart made a fateful decision to play Andre Deveaux at the his blue line and Deveaux at the wall chipped it into the wide open left wing lane and Hrivik made it count blasting a 35 feet shot over the shoulder of Sound Tigers netminder Kevin Poulin.

"You want guys that aren't afraid to take a shot. A couple of his goals were shooter's mentality. He didn't try to force a pass. He didn't try to look for something that wasn't there," commented Gernander.

His second goal late on the powerplay sealed the victory on the powerplay this time going high stickside catching Poulin cheating off his right post.

"He's a good all around player. He has been producing for us which is great. We have no qualms about using on a regular shift because he is good defensively and makes sound plays with the puck. That enables him to get the responsibility and lots of ice time. He really has made the most of it," said Germander of his new prodigy. As the spring weather warms up like his torrid scoring he might bring a championship back to Slovakia.

Notes: EHN has learned from a highly reliable source in Bridgeport that some of the CT Whale home playoff games in round two will be played at the Webster Bank Arena at Harbor Yard because the Whale's home arena the XL Center in Hartford will have scheduling conflicts because of several upcoming previously scheduled events. The Whale Media Relations Director Brian Ring confirmed the possibility with a caveat "the maximum amount of games would be one, but everything depends on who we play" .

The source indicated to EHN two games were likely, but everything is contingent on when the other three series wrap up in the Eastern conference. Norfolk-Manchester , Hershey-Wilkes Barre/Scranton and Syracuse-St. John's. Norfolk, Wilkes Barre and St. John's are all ahead two games to one and the opponent won't be known till likely Saturday night/Sunday morning.

The AHL re-seeds after the first round and with the Whale sweep of the Bridgeport Sound Tigers they have had the whole week off.

Three of the four Western conference series are wrapped up except Chicago and San Antonio tied two games apiece and game 5 on Friday. San Antonio netminder Dov Grumet-Morris who started the season in Norway is 0-2 in the series as the #1 netminder Swede Jacob Markström is in Florida on emergency recall for the Panthers with Jose Theodore injured and Game 7 against New Jersey tonight.

 

Advanced player search

Tweets by @eurohockey