Reading, PA – The Reading Royals of the ECHL, affiliate of the Toronto Maple Leafs of the National Hockey League and the Toronto Marlies of the American Hockey League, today announced that the team has agreed to terms with forward Kirk MacDonald.
Last season, MacDonald (6'2/210) (24), who hails from Victoria, British Columbia, scored fourteen goals and picked up twenty assists (thirty-four points) in forty-three regular season games with the Florida Everblades of the ECHL. MacDonald, who will be entering his second full season as a pro, also played eleven regular season AHL games last year with the Albany River Rats, scoring a goal and adding an assist.
MacDonald's first stint in the AHL came late in the 2006-07 season when he played eleven regular season games and four playoff games with the River Rats after the conclusion of a stellar four season and five year career at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. After leading R.P.I. in goals (16) and points (36)—and being selected the team's MVP—in his junior season (2004-05), MacDonald was diagnosed with testicular cancer, which resulted in four surgeries, a series of chemotherapy treatments, and a significant loss of weight that kept him out of action the following year. However, in 2006-07, MacDonald not only returned for his senior season, but he once again led the team in goals (12) and tied for the team lead in points (27). For his efforts, MacDonald, who served as the team captain that season, was voted as R.P.I.'s Most Inspirational Player. That year, MacDonald was also recognized by the Rensselaer Alumni Association with their Community Service Award and was a finalist for the Hockey Humanitarian Award, which is awarded to college hockey's finest citizen.
Last season, MacDonald started the year in the AHL with the River Rats, scoring a goal and registering an assist in eleven games before being assigned to the Everblades, where he played for current Royals' Head Coach Jason Nobili, who was then Florida's associate coach. Offensively, MacDonald hit stride by mid-December, scoring nine goals over a span of thirteen games from December 21, 2007 through January 18, 2008. MacDonald remained with Florida through the end of the team's season, playing to a team-high plus-23 and leading the Everblades with three short-handed goals in forty-three regular season games. MacDonald also played in all three games in Florida's first round playoff loss to the Columbia Inferno. In those games, MacDonald scored two goals, including the Everblades' lone goal in the 3-1 loss to the Inferno in Game Two of that series. After Florida was eliminated from the playoffs, MacDonald was recalled to Albany, where he bagged a huge overtime game winner in Game Six of the epic East Division Semi-Final match-up between River Rats and the Philadelphia Phantoms. That goal, which gave the River Rats' a 1-0 win at the 10:38 mark of the first OT, sent the series to a deciding Game Seven, which was won by the Phantoms.
