Opening statement
It has been two full seasons since goaltender Adam Courchaine put in his last of four cameo appearances in the AHL, all of them with the P-Bruins. He enters his second year as a full-time professional on the heels of backing up league-leader Gerald Coleman and the Alaska Aces en route to an ECHL Kelly Cup championship.
2010-11 Highlights (With Reading and Alaska)
· Ranked No. 5 among all ECHL backstops with a 2.52 goals-against average in 29 games-played.
· Tied colleague Gerald Coleman for the league lead with four shutouts.
· Posted a 33-save shutout in his Alaska debut, blanking the host Bakersfield Condors, 3-0, on Oct. 30.
· Improved to 4-1-0 on the year upon laying his second goose-egg, a 23-save performance in a 3-0 win over the Idaho Steelheads Dec. 3.
· Went unbeaten (7-0-1) in nine total appearances in the month of February, which featured a personal seven-game winning streak.
· Won each of his last five regular-season decisions, including two more shutouts.
· Won his only playoff start for the Aces, stopping 35 out of 37 shots, including all 16 in the second period, to win Game 3 of the Kelly Cup semifinals, 6-2, at Victoria.
2010-11 Lowlights
· Chased from his only appearance with the Reading Royals after giving up four goals on nine shots in a mere 7:13 of clock time. He eventually received a no-decision as Reading compensated the 4-0 deficit, but lost to the Trenton Devils, 6-4, on Oct. 17.
· Lost five consecutive decisions, including four straight in regulation, during the month of January. Courchaine gave up 16 goals on 97 shots in that span for an acrid .835 save percentage.
· Forked out at the 3:43 mark of the second period in a Feb. 4 game at Victoria. He had given up two goals on only nine shots.
2011-12 Outlook
Never in their first 19 years of existence have the P-Bruins gone the full length of a regular season with any fewer than three goaltenders seeing crease time. And even with the schedule shaved from 80 to 76 games, that trend has next to no chance of ending.
With Matt Dalton out of the equation, this leaves Courchaine as the most likely candidate to periodically step in, especially if and when presumptive starter Anton Khudobin is summoned to Boston.
