Chirps from Center Ice

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After a deadlocked 40 minutes, the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins score two goals in :11 and cruise to a 5-2 victory in Bridgeport and are on pace for a 76-0 record.

Alright, let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

Chris Conner and Harry Zolnierczyk both scored two goals a piece and are on pace to score 152 goals this season.

Okay, now I am just being silly.

Pens played a fundamentally sound game all night, caught the Sound Tigers napping for :11 in the third period, and won the hockey game. Jeff Deslauriers was sharp when he needed to be. Defense looked sharp. Promising start to the very young year.

The aforementioned Jeff Deslauriers vs. Anders Nilsson

Lines looked like this:

Kuhnhackl-Ebbett-Conner
Kostopoulos-Drazenovic-Thompson
Zolnierczyk-Gibbons-Megna
Leblond-Sill-Uher

Despres-Samuelsson
Harrington-Mikkelson
McNeill-D’Agostino

Deslauriers-Hartzell

Scratches were Peter Mannino, Peter Merth, Brian Dumoulin, Mike Carman, Anton Zlobin, Dustin Stevenson, Harrison Ruopp,, Bobby Farnham and Adam Payerl.

Payerl was an interesting scratch. After being arguably the best player for the Penguins in the 2013 Calder Cup Playoffs last season, he found himself a scratch in Game 1. Jonathan had some thoughts on this, indicating that Dom Uher essentially beat out Payerl for the spot.

First Period: Penguins jumped all over the Sound Tigers in the the opening twenty, they got an early power play but weren’t able to score. Unfazed by taking a penalty of their own, they continued to pressure Bridgeport. Then, Scott Harrington scored the first goal of the season then Tom Kostopoulos won a faceoff to Harrington’s left. Harrington jumped on the loose puck and had only the goaltender in front of him, shot and it went in.

Pierre Leblond fought Brett Gallant. Leblond was bloodied in the fight which was a draw.

First period was all Penguins really. Anything that the Sound Tigers threw at the Pens, Wilkes-Barre had an answer for.

Jeff Deslauriers had a heck of a save on a Ryan Stome shot when Simon Despres turned the puck over.

Second Period: Complete opposite of the first. All Sound Tigers. Anders Lee scored when Jeff Deslauriers was thinking poke check. Then, Kirill Kabanov finishes off a tic tac toe pass to him to push the Sound Tigers up 2-1 on a power play. Penguins go on a power play late, Brendan Mikkelson shoots from the top of the blue line and Chris Conner is right out in front to deflect the puck home to tie the score at two with 2.1 left in the period.

Third Period: Penguins didn’t register a shot 8:23 in the period in what I called at the time a winnable game for both sides at the time. Then, Chris Conner and Brian Gibbons work a 2-on-1 and Conner finishes off a pass from Gibbons to make it 3-2 Penguins. It’s going to be nice to see these two speedsters work together all season long.

Then, :11 later, Andrew Ebbett wheels around the Sound Tigers net, passes to Harry Zolnierczyk who scores to make it 4-2. Two quick bang-bang goals by the Penguins. Zolnierczyk then scored again when he looked off Tom Kuhnhackl on another 2-on-1 and shot it past Nilsson to make it 5-2 Penguins.

Three Stars: 3) Jeff Deslauriers (21 saves on 23 shots) 2) Harry Zolnierczyk (two goals, +2) and 1) Chris Conner (two goals, +1)

So a good win to start the year. A winnable game for both teams half way through the third period. Penguins step on the gas and blow it open. You want to see this trend continue.

Around the Division: Norfolk wins 3-2 up in Hartford in a shootout. Binghamton, down 3-1 at home vs. Syracuse, rally and win 4-3 in overtime. Hershey loses in overtime to the Adirondack Phantoms 4-3.

Standings: With points for every team tonight, it’s WBS / NOR and BNG with 2 points and SYR and HER with 1 point.

Conference: Will not recap a bunch of 2’s and 1’s and 0’s until the first team in the conference reaches 10 points.

SendToNews Highlights: Will throw a late edit up Sunday if they go up.

Wheeling Update: Nailers are in preseason. They lost 5-4 to the Elmira Jackals. Wilkes-Barre native Patrick McGrath had a goal and a fight in the loss.

Pens get a week off to rest and ready for their home opener next Saturday vs. Hershey.

Let’s Go Pens!