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February 24, 2004

Generals: No week to be weak

With four home games in five days, Greensboro seeks to fill the coliseum and fulfill its playoff aspirations.

BY LARRY KEECH
Staff Writer

GREENSBORO - Seldom if ever have the Greensboro Generals faced such a momentous week, both on and off the ice.

With slightly more than a month remaining in the ECHL season, the Generals will play four of the last eight home games on their regular-season schedule in the next five days.

Not only do the Generals need to win most of those games if they are to meet theu~ short-term goals of achieving a high playoff seed and making a strong run at the Kelly Cup championship, but they also need to attract large crowds and prospective 'investors to preserve the future of the franchise.

"We're putting some pressure on ourselves because there's no reason why we can't win these four games," said Mike Bayrack, the Generals' leading goal-scorer with 29.

The most challenging of the four games figures to be today's 7 p.m. matchup against 'the Southern Division-leading Columbia Inferno.

Greensboro's 65 points are seven behind Columbia's total, and the Generals have a game in hand. The Florida Everblades have 66 points but have played three more games than Columbia and four more than Greensboro. South Carolina (61 points), Charlotte (59) and Roanoke (56) are still in the hunt for the division's fourth playoff berth.

Rick Adduono, the Generals' second-year coach, has had a hand in two Kelly Cup championships. He was an assistant coach when the South Carolina Stingrays won the 1997 title and head coach when South Carolina captured the 2001 cup.

Adduono and the Generals' nucleus of veteran players fell short of the championship goal a year ago when they were eliminated in the second round of the playoffs by the eventual champion Atlantic City Boardwalk Bullies. They immediately recommitted themselves to winning the title this year.

"If we can win these four games, we'll be at least one win ahead of last year's pace," Adduono said Monday. "We'll also be closer to first place. Then it will be a matter of maintaining our consistency the rest of the way."

To underline their goal of winning the Kelly Cup, the Generals have arranged for it to be on display at the Greensboro Coliseum on Thursday and Friday for games against the Charlotte Checkers and the Augusta Lynx. The cup will travel 7,681 miles to be placed on display in nine ECHL cities before returning to Atlantic City at season's end.

First-round playoff pairings will match the division's first-place finisher against the fourth-place team.

The second- and third-place finishers will meet in the other series.

The survivors then will play for the division title, followed by a conference playoff. After this week, the Generals will play 10 of their last 14 games on the road. Their 15-10-1 road record has been one of the best in the division.

The Columbia-Greensboro game will match the Southern Division's two most explosive offenses. Columbia's scoring leaders are Tim Smith (70 points, 24 goals), Alexandre Burrows (24 goals), Robin Carruthers (24 goals), Barrie Moore (52 points) and rookie Jesse Schultz (20 goals). The Generals will counter with Bayrack (55 points), Mark Turner (61 points, 21 goals), defenseman Geno Parrish (43 assists) and Eric Fortier (23 goals).

The Generals will close the homestand with another game against Charlotte on Saturday night, and chief operating officer Matt Brown announced Monday that 8,018 tickets already had been sold and that he anticipated a sellout crowd of 8,570.


Contact Larry Keech at 373-7080 or lkeech@news-record.com