October 11, 2012

HERSHEY, Pa. – The HERSHEY BEARS announced today the 26 players who comprise the club’s opening night roster. The announcement was made by BEARS President/GM Doug Yingst.

The complete roster is as follows, and is also attached:

GOALTENDERS (2): Braden Holtby, Dany Sabourin

DEFENSEMEN (9): Julien Brouillette, Tomas Kundratek, Kevin Marshall, Patrick McNeill, Steven Oleksy, Dmitry Orlov, Cameron Schilling, Garrett Stafford, Patrick Wellar

FORWARDS (15): Barry Almeida, Mathieu Beaudoin, Mike Carman, Matt Clackson, Jon DiSalvatore, Stanslav Galiev, Zach Hamill, Jon Kalinski, Boyd Kane, Garrett Mitchell, Matt Pope, Ryan Potulny, Mattias Sjogren, Ryan Stoa, Jeff Taffe

Both goaltenders and seven of the BEARS’ nine defensemen played all or part of the 2011-12 season in Chocolatetown, while seven forwards will return for this season.

In all, the roster includes 10 United States-born players, 12 who hail from Canada, two from Russia and one native each of the Czech Republic and Sweden.

Team captain Boyd Kane returns to lead HERSHEY into its 75th American Hockey League season opener this Saturday, October 13, when the BEARS visit the Syracuse Crunch for a 7:30 PM faceoff. Fans may listen to the game on the HERSHEY BEARS Radio Network of stations WQIC-FM 100.1, WTKT-AM 1460, WRBT-FM 94.9 HD-2 and via the iHeart Radio application for Apple and Android devices.

The BEARS will play their home opener on Saturday, October 20 with a 7:00 PM faceoff against the Rochester Americans. The first 8,000 fans will receive a team schedule magnet courtesy of PNC Bank. Individual tickets for this game and all HERSHEY BEARS home games are currently on sale at the GIANT Center box office, by calling (717) 508-BEAR, or online at TicketMaster.com.