Two members of the Manchester Monarchs and two players from the Worcester Sharks have been suspended by the AHL for their participation in a pre-game incident Tuesday night.

Monarchs forward Richard Clune was suspended for one game and teammate Justin Johnson for three. Sharks Curt Gogol and Frazer McLaren will also miss one and three games respectively.

Both teams were also fined an undisclosed amount of money for the incident.

Monarchs head coach Mark Morris caught the tail end of the altercation and went on the ice to send his players back to the locker room.

He later watched a video recording to see how it all started.

“Guys are supposed to stay on their side of the red line (during warmups),” Morris said. “One of our guys is stretching there and one of their guys came up and sprayed him with snow and our guys took exception.”
The Worcester Telegram & Gazette reported that Johnson and McLaren threw punches before the officials broke it up. Worcester went on to win the game 4-1.

The Monarchs and Sharks have been heated rivals all season, with numerous fights in each meeting. Clune and Gogol alone have fought several times. Clune and Johnson declined to comment on the incident.

Already working without Andrei Loktionov (called up to Los Angeles Tuesday) and injured captain Marc-Andre Cliche, the loss of Clune and Johnson will be tough to patch up for Manchester.

“With precious points on the line and a depleted roster, the last thing we need is to worry about is guys being out for other reasons,” Morris said.

Manchester closes the regular season with a game at Connecticut Friday and 3 p.m. matinees at home at Verizon Wireless Arena Saturday (Hershey) and Sunday (St. John's).

The Monarchs were bumped to ninth place in the Eastern Conference after Portland's 2-1 win at home against Connecticut on Wednesday night.

Tuesday marked the second consecutive game to result in suspensions for the Sharks. In a 5-4 shootout loss at Portland Saturday, the teams were involved in an altercation at the end of the game.

Worcester's Jimmy Bonneau was suspended for eight games (an AHL season-high), Matt Pelech for four and assistant coach David Cunniff for one.

The game also had repercussions for the Monarchs. Portland's Brett Sterling scored one of the shootout goals.

But Sterling should not have been allowed to participate because he had been assessed a 10:00 misconduct penalty in overtime.

That extra point that Portland was able to secure pulled them into a tie at the time with Manchester for 77 points in the Eastern Conference standings.

The Monarchs own the tiebreaker thanks to more wins, but it could end up that Portland ends the season with one more point than Manchester and gets into the postseason while the Monarchs do not.

There is no process in place to appeal or alter the outcome of a game in the AHL.

Morris declined to comment on the Portland/Worcester situation.