Chirps from Center Ice

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It’s not so much that the Manchester Monarchs came into Wilkes-Barre tonight and won.

It’s not so much that they possessed the puck like fiends early, whipped it around and jumped out to a 2-0 goal lead early only to win 4-2 late.

It’s not even the fact that they exposed literally every weakness on this Penguins team. This Penguins team is a one line team (Drazenovic Kostopoulos Zolnierczyk) and the rest a bunch of checking lines.

It’s the fact that the Penguins were in this game late, and should have won. If you were at, listened to, or watched this game, you probably left saying one thing….

Man.

For a time, it did look like the Manchester Monarchs were going to steam roll the Wheeling Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins. It was 1-0 after one and really should have been 4-0. Then, it was 2-0 when the second period wasn’t even a minute old. Pens rally late in the second when Tom Kuhnhackl scores right off a face-off win to bring the Pens within one and tie about midway through the third on a Nick Drazenovic rebound of a Nick D’Agostino shot off the pads of starting goaltender J-F Berube.

Manchester responds with a furious rush right off the next face-off but starting goaltender Jeff Deslauriers was solid. All game really, even despite being down 2-0. The first goal was a puck off the back wall that Nick Shore collects and banks in off of him to put the Monarchs up 1-0. The second goal was a bloop shot by Brian O’Neill that doubled the Monarch lead.

The third Manchester goal? Let’s flashback to last year. Failed clear out by Wilkes-Barre and the other Deslauriers, first name Nick, scores to put the Monarchs ahead 3-2.

Pens nearly score off the opening face-off but Tom Kostopoulos was robbed by Berube. Tanner Pearson hits an empty netter in the final minute to make it 4-2.

Despite being what would seem badly outclassed by the big bad Monarchs, the shots were dead even at 26 a piece.

Personell wise, same lineup as last night.

Man. We should have had this one.

Three stars were Nick Drazenovic (goal, even) Brian O’Neill (goal, assist, +2) and Nick Deslauriers (goal, +1)

Divisionally, Binghamton beat Syracuse in a real barnburner up on the Southern Tier 6-5 in overtime. That’s 7 straight wins for the B-Sens, after losing a bunch before that before winning a bunch before that. Ex-WBS Penguin Captain Joey Mormina had two goals for Syracuse in the contest…..Hershey defeats Rochester 5-1 and scored three power play goals in the process……Norfolk sweeps Bridgeport this weekend by winning 3-2 in overtime.

Standings look like this: Binghamton 45 — Penguins 42 — Norfolk 41 — Hershey 34 — Syracuse 33

Conference? Like this…. 1) SPR (52) 2) MCH (52) 3) BNG (45) 4) ALB (43) 5) WBS (42) 6) PRO (42) 7) NOR (41) 8) ADK (38)

Let’s for a second concede the conference to either Springfield, Manchester or hell, Albany. So the best the Pens can finish is third as an East Division winner. But, slip, and let a few teams catch you and the margin for error is razor, and I mean razor thin. Three back of the lead for the division but in essence four ahead of eighth. There is some separation between eight and nine, but it isn’t much and those holes can close in the span of a Friday-Saturday.

Wheeling lost to Elmira up in New York 4-3.

Here is your SendToNews highlight package.

Pens and B-Sens square off for a 4:05 battle in Wilkes-Barre. A regulation win puts us right back where things were Friday afternoon. Gameday for that will hit the blog at high noon.

Let’s Go Pens!