Chirps from Center Ice

       vs.       

5                                          2

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Alright, so before you say it, I will say it for you. The Penguins didn’t have an issue in goal tonight.

Anthony Peters started the game for the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins tonight and looked solid in goal. After a scoreless first period and the Penguins jumping out to a 1-0 lead after a Teddy Blueger tip in of an Andrey Pedan shot that set off the abalone of stuffed teddy bears, the Penguins would normally settle in and take control of a game in which they had the lead.

Only it didn’t happen that way.

Here’s how the goals were scored by the Americans tonight and I will do my best to deflect away from it being the goalies fault because the goalie isn’t named Casey DeSmith.

Goal #1: Eric Cornel scored on a rebound when Frank Corrado lost his man in the corner and Nick Baptiste got alone in front of Peters. Baptiste put a shot on that Pters stopped, but the rebound bled to Rodrigues for a tie game at one.

Goal #2: Seth Griffith breaks in behind the defense, doesn’t have the puck under control enough to shoot a good shot, stops, waits for his trailer to come down the line, makes a pass that is slammed home for a 2-1 Rochester lead. It’s a high skill play that you rarely see in the AHL because guys in that situation will just shoot it to see what happens or make a bad pass to the trailing teammate. Evan Rodrigues had the goal.

Goal #3: Garret Ross scored when Peters was down and out after making a skate save. Ross found the puck and put it over Peters for a 3-1 lead.

Goal #4: On a 5-on-3 power play, Rodrigues is planted in front of the net and a pass from C.J. Smith deflects off of Rodrigues’ skate and right under Peters and in.

All of the goals for the Americans came in the second period. They would add an empty net goal with Peters pulled when Smith beat Andrey Pedan to an icing call and flipped the puck into the vacated space to make it a 5-2 final score.

If you want to be mad that the Penguins lost tonight, by all means be my guest. Blame the officials, who I thought were particularly awful tonight, completely unaware how to handle a face-off and letting the game get out of hand. Blame the Penguins lack of urgency at times but be sure to credit Rochester’s defense, who did an excellent job of containing the Penguins dangerous offense tonight. Just please don’t blame the goaltending.

Penguins got their second goal when Teddy Blueguer chased down Rochester goaltender Linus Ullmark forcing him into a turnover that Blueger put into an empty net for at the time a 4-2 lead for the Amerks.

I mean, that’s it. Rochester had seven power plays to the Pens one, but the Amerks only scored on one power play after the Penguins were deep in the hole. Dominik Simon left the game after the first period when he blocked a shot in the first. He looked OK after, but most likely for precautionary reasons, they kept him out the rest of teh way. Clark Donatelli told Tyler postgame that he didn’t have an update.

No decision on who starts Sunday afternoon in Hershey.

Here are the goals the Penguins scored in GIF format.

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Here were the lines…

Zach Aston-Reese — J-S Dea — Ryan Haggerty
Dominik Simon – Colin Smith – Christian Thomas
Garrett Wilson – Adam Johnson – Josh Archibald
Thomas Di Pauli – Teddy Blueger – Daniel Sprong

Andrey Pedan – Kevin Czuczman
Chris Summers – Zach Trotman
Jarred Tinordi – Frank Corrado

Anthony Peters – Colin Stevens

Sprong and Tom Sestito swapped spots on the fourth line, Summers and Lukas Bengtsson did the same on the back end.

Around the Division: Toronto beats Hartford in overtime 4-3…Utica edges Bridgeport in a shootout 2-1…Hershey shuts out Milwaukee 3-0…Lehigh Valley loses in overtime to Laval 4-3 and Providence beats Binghamton 4-2. Springfield and Charlotte had the night off, they meet Sunday afternoon in Charlotte.

Standings: Penguins (.711 percentage points) — Providence (.650) — Lehigh Valley (.630) — Bridgeport (.619) — Charlotte (.614) — Hershey (.500) — Hartford (.417) — Springfield (.396)

Wheeling Update: win in overtime against Reading 5-4.Nailers Garrett Meurs potted the game winner 2:10 into the extra session. Will King picked up the win. Nailers host Fort Wayne Sunday at 3:05.

Pens travel to Hershey for a 5 p.m. start against the Bears. Gameday setup will hit the blog Sunday afternoon at 1.

Let’s Go Pens!