Chirps from Center Ice

        vs.          

2                                              5

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The Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins ring out 2013 with a win, 5-2 over the Syracuse Crunch.

After Syracuse scored on two of their first three shots, they chased starting goaltender Eric Hartzell and led 2-1. This was after they had something like nine shots to Syracuse’s three with all the momentum, Hartzell just let in some tough goals.

Put the Penguins persisted, and finally cracked the dam that was the Syracuse defense and starting goaltender Cedrick Desjardins.

Gritty, hard-nosed, tough hockey. That’s what you come to expect when you buy the ticket.

Eric Hartzell vs. Cedrick Desjardins

With Brian Dumoulin and Harry Zolnierczyk back from recall yesterday, the lines looked like this:

…and defensively…

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Bobby Farnham was listed as an injury scratch, despite Coach Hynes telling Jonathan yesterday it was a, “maintenance day.” Also, Wheeling call-up Carter Rowney was a scratch as well.

First Period: Philip Samuelsson chips a puck out of his own zone, lasers a cross ice pass across the ice and banks it off the far boards to Paul Thompson, who zooms in and puts the Penguins on the board early. At one point, the shots were 6-0 in favor of the Penguins, who were all over the place early on. Then, the Crunch score two bang-bang goals. First on a power play then later on a seemingly harmless wrist shot from the point. Both shots seemed to confuse Hartzell. At this point, Jeff Deslauriers name was called.

As a professional goaltender, you always have to be ready, no matter if you are the starting goaltender or coming in cold, at any point of the action. When Deslauiers number was called, he did not let Syracuse score on him, stopping all 21 shots that came his way.

Second Period: The Harry Zolnierczyk / Nick Drazenovic / Tom Kostopoulos was dynamite all night long for Wilkes-Barre. A Philip Samuelsson blast from the point was deflected in front by Nick Drazenovic. It was really a neat deflection. Even neater, was a Tom Kostopoulos goal, on his stomach, sweeping the puck in at Desjardins goal crease.

Essentially, this was all that the Pens needed. Any Syracuse rush was short-lived and snuffed out promptly.

Third Period: Tom Kuhnhackl and Anton Zlobin come in on a 2-on-1. Kuhnhackl shoots, Desjardins leaves a big rebound (he was leaving them everywhere all night) and Zlobin stuffs in the rebound for his first AHL goal of his career for a 4-2 lead.

Another furious Syracuse rush, this time it dies on the pad of Deslauriers who could not be beaten tonight. Cody Sylvester pots an empty netter for a 5-2 win and that was all she wrote.

Three Stars: 3) Anton Zlobin (goal, +2) 2) Tom Kostopoulos (goal, +1) 1) Jeff Deslauriers (21 saves on 21 shots)

Around the Division: Binghamton beats Norfolk 3-2 in the only other divisional action tonight.

Standings: Binghamton 41 — Penguins 40 — Norfolk 37 — Hershey 31 — Syracuse 30

Conference: 1) MCH (49) 2) SPR (48) 3) BNG (41) 4) ALB (42) 5) WBS (40) 6) PRO (40) 7) NOR (37) 8) STJ (35)

Wheeling Update: Nailers have been pillaged by call-ups, and it’s starting to show. A 4-1 loss to the Reading Royals.

SendToNews Highlights: Are here.

Pens will probably skate Thursday before boarding a bus to Hartford for their Friday game vs. the WolfPack. I don’t know if there will be any blog updates till then, Happy New Year! I got my year end report from WordPress this year and my humble blog was viewed nearly 50,000 times during the year. I maintain that if the blog was only viewed by just 10 people all year, I’d still do what I do, so thank you, thank you, thank you for reading, sharing and interacting with me this year. I’m getting a feeling that 2014 will be the best year yet for the Penguins.

Let’s Go Pens!