Chirps from Center Ice

Nine game winning streak comes to an end in Hershey today as the Pens lost 4-3 in a shootout. The Pens do get a point with the shootout loss and are now the outright leaders in the Eastern Conference. The Pens are four points up on the Hershey Bears for the division lead.

But, the St. John’s IceCaps have two games in hand on the Penguins and the Hershey Bears have one.

Scott Munroe vs. Braden Holtby – no lineup changes for the Penguins.

First Period: The Penguins mastery at scoring shorthanded goals would continue as Brandon DeFazio would pick off Chris Bourque at the blue line and skate in and score. This is the 12th shorthanded goal for the Pens this year, good for tops in the AHL. But the Bears continued to pressure as the Pens were too cute in their own defensive zone and Sean Collins scored then Chris Bourque would score about 1:10 later. Zach Sill nearly tied things when he clunked a puck off of the top of Holtby’s net. Then the Bears were being called for a delayed penalty when Cody Wild fired a puck from the blueline which crawled up and over Holtby’s stick. In the process, Bryan Lerg got a stick on it and he got credit. Scott Munroe had to make a few good saves in the final five minutes to keep it at 2-2 into the…

Second Period: Sean Collins trips Brian Gibbons. Pens to the power play. This tweet sums up the power play:

Bears would easily kill it. Later, the Pens would get 1:41 of 5 on 3 power play and with one second left in the two-man advantage, Geoff Walker scored to make it 3-2. Would turn out to be a big goal at the time as the Bears were just pressuring the whole time.

Third Period: More Bears pressure, more Penguin turnovers. Finally, newcomer Mike Carman scored from the slot to even things at three. Brian Gibbons had a breakaway but did not score with under ten minutes. Pens defense held off the Bears charges and we went into overtime.

Overtime: Tomas Kundratek made the save of the game on an Alex Grant shot while Holtby was on the other side of the crease. Munroe never saw a shot in overtime.

Shootout: Geoff Walker was the only player to score for the Pens. Bears Cody Eakin and Ryan Potulny scored for Hershey in the third and fourth rounds.

Three Stars: 3) Sean Collins (goal, +2) 2) Bryan Lerg (goal, assist, -1) 1) Ryan Potulny (assist, shootout game winner, even)

Who does this win benefit more? The Pens or the Bears? If the Pens win outright it’s seven points on the Division. If the Bears lose, major changes come for the Bears most likely on and off the ice. Bears win, what now? Do they storm back and take the division by 13 points?

Around the Division: Springfield beats Norfolk 4-2 in the only action of East Division teams today.

Standings: Pens  63. Bears 59. Admirals 57. Crunch 45. Senators 43.

Conference: 1-WBS (63) 2-StJ (62) 3-BRI (51) 4-HER (59) 5-NOR (57) 6-MCH (56) 7-WOR (51) 8-CT (51)

Pens are off until Saturday when they host the Portland Pirates. The Bears are in Syracuse on Friday. St. John’s takes their two games in hand when they host the Providence Bruins Tuesday and Wednesday.

Next blog update, short of major breaking news, won’t be until Tuesday provided there is enough interesting parts to blog about.

Let’s Go Pens!