Happy New Year / Happy Birthday

Shane McColgan (Steve Hiscock)

Well a Happy New Year for the New York Ranger and New York Islander prospects who got to play on New Year's Day. Both players saw their team earn wins and in the case of one it was a badly needed win.

For Shane McColgan (NYR 2011 5th), it was both Happy New Year and Happy Birthday as the Ranger prospect celebrated his 20th birthday with a goal and an assist to lead his Saskatoon Blades to a 6-2 win over the Medicine Hat Tigers. The win broke a 4 game losing streak for the Blades and got their 2013 part of their season on the right foot.

Saskatoon jumped on Medicine Hat for 3 first period goals with McColgan scoring the 3rd of the three. McColgan took advantage of a puck falling in front of him in the slot firing it in for his 11th goal of the season at 7:31 of the first.

In the 2nd period, McColgan fired a shot that bounced in off the body of Lukas Sutter to earn a primary assist on Saskatoon's 5th goal. The goal scored at 16:54 of the 2nd period was a power play goal and was McColgan's 28th assist of the season.

The Blades would make it 6-0 in the 3rd period before Medicine Hat would score 2 third period goals to make it a 6-2 final score. That turned McColgan's goal into the game winner (his 4th) and he is now 11-28-39 on the season.

Andrey Pedan (NYI 2011 3rd) and his Guelph Storm spent their New Year's Day in Oshawa taking on the Oshawa Generals stealing a 2-1 win with a last minute goal in the 3rd period.

Pedan earned his 17th assist on the year with a primary assist on Guelph's 1st goal which came at 5:54 of the 1st period and in between Pedan's trips to the penalty box. Pedan was called for roughing at 3:29 of the first and 25 seconds after Pedan left the box earned his assist at 5:54.

Then 9 seconds later at 6:03, Pedan was sent back to the penalty box this time for tripping. In the 2nd Pedan took his 3rd minor of the game on an interference call at 17:32.

Pedan after the assist and 6 minutes in penalties is now 9-17-26 and 78 PIMs. Pedan is 5th in the OHL in penalty minutes.

USA vs the Czech Republic

Since most people will be reading this after the game had been played then the best thing to offer is forget any fancy plans by Team USA. If they won the game then hopefully it will have been because they remembered how they played against Slovakia.

If that USA team showed up then we would be talking about USA/Canada 2 in the semi-finals. If the USA played like they did in the games against Russia and Canada then it will be a loss because in those games the USA played to stop those teams instead of forcing those teams to stop the USA.

This is a very young USA team and really anything they do this year will greatly help them next year when they should be seen as a top favorite. If you are up at 4 AM EDT/1 AM PDT then catch me on twitter.