Chirps from Center Ice

The rematch is set.

The Providence Bruins knocked off the Springfield Falcons tonight in Springfield, MA by a score of 6-3 and advance to the second round of the Calder Cup Playoffs to face the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins. The Penguins will have home ice as the high seed.

You must be thinking, “Higher seed? Wait, the Penguins were a 6 seed I thought I saw you write a few weeks ago?” Right. All three division winners (Manchester, Springfield and Binghamton) were bounced in the first round by their opponents.

Here’s the schedule:

Eastern Conference Semifinals – Series “J”
6-W-B/Scranton Penguins vs. 7-Providence Bruins
Game 1 – Fri., May 9 – Providence at W-B/Scranton, 7:05 
Game 2 – Sat., May 10 – Providence at W-B/Scranton, 7:05 
Game 3 – Wed., May 14 – W-B/Scranton at Providence, 7:05 
Game 4 – Fri., May 16 – W-B/Scranton at Providence, 7:05 
*Game 5 – Sat., May 17 – W-B/Scranton at Providence, 7:05 
*Game 6 – Mon., May 19 – Providence at W-B/Scranton, 7:05 
*Game 7 – Wed., May 21 – Providence at W-B/Scranton, 7:05 
*if necessary… All times Eastern

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St. John’s and Norfolk play in the other Conference Semifinal. That should be fun. Norfolk didn’t play St. John’s this year. Second time this postseason that the IceCaps fly blind into a series where they haven’t faced an opponent. The IceCaps played the Albany Devils in the first round.

Anyway, I’ll run a stats pack at you Sunday similar to what ran last Sunday. I already built the Wilkes-Barre one courtesy of Joy’s tweets earlier today and will build the Providence one tomorrow.

Since we are talking next Friday before we start, a lot of time to break down the series. The Series Preview will run Thursday here on the blog.

Let’s Go Pens!