Chirps from Center Ice

Just a few notes on the eve of Game 3…

— No idea who is starting in goal for Game 3 Wednesday for the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins. It’s a good problem to have really, when you have two Class A goaltenders to choose from. If I am Coach Hynes, I give the net to Brad Thiessen until Jeff Zatkoff gives me a reason to give it back to him. Providence scored 12 goals on Zatkoff. Say what you want about the situation, but the Penguins played a much calmer and overall better game in front of Thiessen in the second and third period. And oh, by the way, Thiessen didn’t allow a goal in 40 minutes played.

— No suspension for Warren Peters for his hit on Zach Trotman in Game 2.

— Dylan Reese will not be available for Game 3 tomorrow. He skated Tuesday but won’t tomorrow night at seven.

— Boston recalled D Torey Krug today. This leaves Providence with 5 defensemen. The issue that the Penguins have had in the series hasn’t been anything on the Providence blue line. It’s been Chris Bourque and the deadly Providence power play. The P-Bruins could have rolled out an ECHL blueline and still likely would have won Games 1 and 2.

Elsewhere outside of this series…

— The Hartford Wolf Pack are back. I don’t know why they switched from the Connecticut Whale to Wolf Pack midseason a few seasons ago. Seemed silly to me.

— The Vancouver Canucks, who bought the Peoria Rivermen franchise, will not skate a team full of prospects next season. That means that the Canucks prospects will be spread out all over the AHL next year and the league will retract back to 29 teams unless a last second Hail Mary is called.

— The aforementioned Peoria Rivermen are apparently taking the elevator down three levels to a league called the Southern Professional Hockey League (SPHL) with a team from the Central Hockey League (CHL) named the Bloomington Blaze. I know minor league team movement doesn’t interest nearly as many people as it does interest me, but there is a lot of movement below the AHL in the ECHL possibly gaining two if not three teams and the SPHL expanding and the CHL drying up completely.

Back to this P-Bruins / Penguins series finally, and an op-ed piece from yours truly. We have come way too far in the last couple of seasons for this to be the end of things for a fourteenth season. The summit is not and should not be second round of playoffs and out year after year after year. I am not going to Game 3 tomorrow expecting to lose. I am not going to Game 4 Friday to attend a funeral. This series has to be won on the road. Flashback to July last year and the boatload of talent signed by Pittsburgh earmarked for Wilkes-Barre in the Fall. This team here in the middle of May is still that same team, only better with additions of Derek Nesbitt and Chad Kolarik. We are not out of this series yet. We can, and I expect to win this series in either six or seven games.

Gameday for Game 3 will be here Wednesday afternoon at 3 p.m.

All in.