Chirps from Center Ice

I was running that headline regardless of a win or loss tonight. Tonight, WBS lost 3-2 to the Checkers to drop game 1 and home ice to the Checkers.

Initial reaction on the Checkers: Speedy team. Dominated the neutral zone and controlled faceoffs.

But the entire team make up is the four lines. After that the defense has holes and I am still not impressed by Mike Murphy. He left big rebounds and was caught out of position some moments. It’s like night and day however when you look at WBS. We have solid goaltending and defense but very little up front. One cancels out the other and in order to win you must score goals and that comes from the forwards more often than not so there you have this game.

Brad Thiessen vs. Mike Murphy. No lineup changes for WBS from last game. Marshall was in. Lerg was out.

First Period: Off the hop, Mike Murphy took a delay of game for playing the puck in the no touch area. Lots of good chances, but the passes were not sharp (almost too hard at times all night really) and Chris Collins had about four chances in the slot but was unable to slip one by Murphy. Nice pace to start the game, we knew Charlotte was a speedy team, so Wilkes-Barre did it’s job in getting back to snuff out any rushes. Finally late though a failed clear by Keven Veilleux at the red line resulted in a Zac Dalpe snipe show from the far left circle. Dalpe just dangled in and fired it. Pens would have a late power play when Charlotte would get caught with too many men but not able to set anything up and it would be a 1-0 Checkers lead after 1. Shots 10-4 for the Pens.

Thoughts to this point: As was the case all night, we limited the Checkers in shots but they pounced and capitalized on any opportunities given.

Second Period: Nick Petersen was tripped down low by Casey Borer which resulted in a power play for the Pens. In it, Veilleux walked in and dished backhand to Geoff Walker who slammed it home to tie the score at 1. Right after on the next shift, Joe Vitale would get whistled for tripping and the Pens would have to kill a penalty. Horrible time to take it too as we were finally off to a good start in the period. Then, Tim Wallace would get nabbed for high sticking which gave the Checkers 1:04 of 5 on 3. Pens would kill of all but the remaining :11 of it before Jon Matsumoto scored on a one time to make it 2-1. There was no one on him. To this point the fans were really behind the Pens in the kill. Turning point of the game for sure. With 8:52 left to go in the second, the Checkers only had seven shots on goal. Big scare after that, as Brett Sterling was drilled hard into the boards by Jacob Micflikier. He would go down and stay down and skate off under his own power to the dressing room. David Marshall and Micflikier would sit for matching roughs. Sterling was only in the locker room for a short while before he came back.

Of note, Ben Street never came out for the second period. Check out Bombulie later for more.

Third Period: Another period and another opening Checkers penalty, this time Bryan Rodney for cross checking Joe Vitale. Then, Zach FitzGerald would go off for boarding and the Pens would have a 5 on 3 for :42. But, it would get negated by a Brett Sterling high stick then a Joe Vitale interference call. During this madness, a Chris Terry laser beam from the point would crumble Thiessen. It was so quiet you could hear a pin drop as Brad was down. He shook it off and continued. Later, Jon Matsumoto again would go upstairs on Thiessen when he was down in a scrum to put the Checkers up 3-1. Matsumoto would quickly go from zero to hero though as he would get whistled for hooking the next shift and the Pens would capitalize when Brett Sterling went five hole on Murphy on a nice feed from Tim Wallace. Pens would bring it, pounding the Checkers in the offensive zone and firing all kinds of pucks at Murphy he could not control. Jesse Boulerice would kill a bit of the momentum when he would get whistled for hooking Casey Borer. I said at the time that Borer sold it, and Boulerice’s reputation of a guy who takes a lot of penalties precluded him. Pens would kill it then get a late power play when Drayson Bowman got caught slashing. Pens couldn’t do anything with it with Thiessen pulled. A late time out with 16.7 left in the game would see Nick Petersen get a puck that he would act too quickly on and it eluded him.

Final shots on goal were 30-19 for the Pens. I don’t know what to do with this. You bottle up the lethal scoring threats yet Matsumoto post two on you. Better defensive effort needed? Capitalize on chances? Thoughts anyone?

Three Stars were: Brett Sterling (goal, even) Zac Dalpe (goal, +1) and Jon Matsumoto (two goals, one a game winner, even)

Game Two is Saturday night.

Elsewhere: The Binghamton Senators have a 2-0 series lead on the Portland Pirates in the Atlantic Division Finals after taking Game 2 tonight 5-3. Kaspars Daugavins had two goals and was a +2 in that affair. Game 3 in that series is Saturday in Binghamton.

I don’t like playing from behind in any series. Playing from behind only gets tougher from here. Gotta even it up Saturday.

Let’s Go Pens!