Comments Off on Power Players — Pens WIN 6-1 (Series Tied 1-1)
Posted by nafsnep on May 10, 2014
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The Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins power play has been crud all season long. 28th overall in the AHL this season and just something that is never used the right way.
Not tonight. The Penguins scored three power play goals and crush the Providence Bruins by a score of 6-1 and even the series at a game a piece as the series shifts to Providence for Game 3 Wednesday.
Crush they did. The Penguins were scored on four times very early in Game 1 Friday, but continued to lay the body on the Bruins all night long. That continued into tonight and, with a little bit more sound defensive structure, wore the Bruins down to the point of frustration which reached its peak in the third period.
Let’s take a look at the penalties assessed in the third, shall we?
Nine misconducts. No fighting majors. 138 penalty minutes in sum.
One of the things that happened that isn’t listed in the box is after starting goaltender Niklas Svedberg was pulled after allowing the fifth goal to the Penguins, a Tom Kostopoulos power play goal that basically iced it, backup goaltender Malcolm Subban was called in for relief. After a scrum involving all 10 skaters on the ice not wearing pads, Subban skates out to his blue line and challenges Peter Mannino. Mannino would have none of it, basically coming halfway out and directing Subban back to his crease and laughing the entire situation off.
I guess you can say that the Bruins handled being blown out in a playoff game a lot worse than the Penguins did last night, because none of this stuff happened then. You could also say that the Bruins were tired of being pushed around and manhandled by the Penguins during play, that they decided to go after the Penguins after play.
I’m burying the lead here, and that is that Wilkes-Barre played a damn good hockey game.
After a scoreless first period, Conor Sheary got the scoring started cashing a rebound left by Svedberg for his first professional goal to put the Penguins ahead 1-0. Providence scored on a power play when Justin Florek roofed a shot over a sprawling Mannino that tied the game at one. Prior to, the P-Bruins were held without a shot for about the first ten minutes of the second period.
Then the floodgates opened, led by Anton Zlobin, back from injury.
Zlobin picks two corners from essentially the same spot on the left circle and it’s 3-1. His second goal came on a power play.
Simon Despres floats a shot in from the blue line that Chuck Kobasew got a piece of and the rout was on. 4-1 Wilkes-Barre. Three goals in the span of 4:02 for the Pens.
In the third, the Penguins put away the Bruins with a third power play goal from Tom Kostopoulos that chased Nik Svedberg. In between all of the shenanigans, Brian Dumoulin skates wire to wire and wrists home a seemingly innocent shot that goes under the glove of relief goaltender Malcolm Subban for a 6-1 Penguin lead.
I don’t know if any suspensions will come of all of the hijinks that ensued. Jared Knight for Providence left the bench to join in on a scrum and Bobby Robins, after being placed in the penalty box, leaves it to re-join the same scrum Knight got involved with.
Lineup wise, Anton Zlobin replaced Carter Rowney. Lines were jumbled, but that was the only move. Andrew Ebbett missed his second straight game.
Three Stars: 3) Simon Despres (two assists, even) 2) Tom Kostopoulos (goal, assist, even) and 1) Anton Zlobin (two goals, assist, +1)
Game 3 is Wednesday in Providence.
Elsewhere in the Eastern Conference: St. John’s takes a 2-1 series lead with a 5-3 win over Norfolk. Ol’ buddy Brad Thiessen stopped 26 of 30. Game 4 is Monday.
Wheeling plays Game 6 Monday against Greenville. They need a win to force a decisive Game 7.
SendToNews Highlights: Let’s do YouTube instead…
Sunday will be used to update and create charts. I’ll update the ones for Providence and Wilkes-Barre and do a head-to-head one as well. So it will actually be a grand total of eight charts. It’ll be a chart explosion! Check that out in some form Sunday evening.
Happy Mothers Day to all the moms out there, including my mom, who sometimes reads this blog. Love you, Mom!
Last Game: Last night in Wilkes-Barre, the Pens were blanked 4-0. Goaltender Niklas Svedberg had a 20 save shutout and Rookie Alexander Khokhlachev had two goals and an assist as the Providence Bruins snatched away home ice from the Penguins.
What to Watch For: Improvement. Penguins will need it tonight or else they head to Rhode Island next week down 2-0.
Comments Off on Next Time, I’ll Wear a Hat — Pens LOSE 4-0 (PRO leads 1-0)
Posted by nafsnep on May 9, 2014
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I walked out of my house this morning and didn’t realize that I had walked out of the house without a hat for tonight’s game. I forgot it. So tonight, I watched tonight’s 4-0 Penguins defeat at the hands of the Providence Bruins without one.
Suffice to day, when I walk out of the house tomorrow to come to Game 2, I will have a hat with me, on my head.
The Providence Bruins took it to the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins early in the first period.
The Penguins had the jump to open the period. Superstar rookie sensation Alexander Khokhlachev scores on a busted play by the Penguins to put the Bruins on the board just 1:33 in. Just a weird sequence where the Bruins pounced on a Pens player on the wall and dish to Khokhlachev, who scored.
Then the Penguins took a penalty and here is where the game spiraled out of control for the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins.
Craig Cunningham knee drop one-timer on the far post on a nice tic-tac-toe pass play. 2-0 Providence at 7:03 on the power play.
Pens quickly respond off the face-off with a line of Jayson Megna Adam Payerl and Harry Zolnierczyk and almost make it 2-1. They don’t. Back the other way, a man unmarked in front of starting goaltender Peter Mannino and it was 3-0 Providence. That unmarked man was Andrew Cherniwchan. Goal comes :45 after the Cunningham power play goal, at 7:48.
Before the Pens knew what hit them, Alexander Khokhlachev finishes off a 2-on-1 and it’s 4-0 Providence at 8:03.
Yep, if you followed that correctly, that was three Providence goals in the span of sixty seconds.
It’s the second playoff game in a row that the P-Bruins have scored four first period goals and the third game in a row that three goals are scored in the first period. Credit.
Penguins buttoned down from there. They started to hit and out skate the Providence Bruins.
But, the forgotten man in all of this was none other than Niklas Svedberg, who was outstanding tonight for the Bruins in goal. He smothered up all pucks sent his way tonight and was seeing the puck large. Several Wilkes-Barre one time attempts were stopped by Svedberg.
Penguins had a late 5-on-3 but didn’t score in the second period. The Penguins did all they could to get back into the game in this period but couldn’t get anything past Svedberg.
In the third period, the Providence Bruins bucked down and locked down the Penguins. They didn’t allow a single Wilkes-Barre shot for the first sixteen minutes. If you are a team that needs five goals in twenty minutes, not registering a shot on goal in the periods first sixteen minutes isn’t going to help your cause.
The Penguins were at one point down to four defenseman. Reid McNeill broke a skate and Brendan Mikkelson took a shot up high that drew blood but both returned.
Three Stars: 3) Matt Lindblad (two assists, +2) 2) Alexander Khokhlachev (two goals, assist, +2) and 1) Niklas Svedberg 20 save shutout.
This game reminded me a lot of Game 1 in the Eastern Conference Finals against the Syracuse Crunch last year, a game that the Penguins won. In fact, the ONLY game that the Penguins won. The Pens had just completed a historic comeback against this same Providence Bruins club after being down 0-3. Nothing was going to stop them in Game 1. The Providence Bruins are in the same boat. They needed a pair of 6-3 victories against the Springfield Falcons to survive and advance after being down 3-1 in the best of five.
I don’t know. The Pens played one bad minute that cost them big and couldn’t get any pucks past Svedberg or muster anything resembling a great chance.
Lineup Notes: Anton Zlobin took warmups but was scratched. Conor Sheary played again. Andrew Ebbett did not, out with what the Pens are calling an “upper body” injury. Nick Drazenovic went in Ebbett’s place. Jayson Megna played, didn’t really notice him. Blueline was intact.
Elsewhere in the Eastern Conference: Game 3 of St. John’s and Norfolk gets going again tomorrow at Scope. The series is tied 1-1.
Wheeling Update: The Nailers are on the brink of elimination after being defeated by the Greenville Road Warriors tonight by a score of 4-1. Greenville goes up 3-2 in the best of seven series. Game 6 is Monday in Wheeling.
SendToNews Highlights: I don’t think that Coal Street is making a YouTube highlight package for this one and rightfully so. SendToNews highlights are here.
Game 2 is tomorrow. Gameday for this will be up at 3:00 p.m.
Season Series: Jan 17: WBS 1 @ PRO 5 — Jan 19: WBS 5 @ PRO 1 — Feb 22: PRO 4 @ WBS 3 (SO) — Mar 26: PRO 2 @ WBS 1
Top Four Scorers for the Penguins vs. the Bruins: 1. Spencer Machacek (7 GP, 5-1-6, +3) 2. Nick Drazenovic (4 GP, 1-2-3, even) 2. Tom Kostopoulos (4 GP, 1-2-3, +1) 4. Cominik Uher (3 GP, 1-2-3, +3) (note: Mahachek’s production vs. PRO includes six games played with Springfield before his trade to Wilkes-Barre)
Top Four Scorers for the Bruins vs. the Penguins: 1. Craig Cunningham (4 GP, 3-2-5, -3) 2. Alexander Khokhlachev (4 GP, 2-2-4, +1) 3. Justin Florek (4 GP, 2-1-3, -1) 4. Zach Trotman (2 GP, 1-2-3, +3)
How the P-Bruins got here: They defeated the Springfield Falcons in five games, winning games 4 and 5 by a score of 6-3.
How the Penguins got here: They defeated the Binghamton Senators in four games.
What to Watch For: Special teams. Both squads have been vanilla on the power play / penalty kill so far. The first team to gain an advantage in this category gains advantage in the series.
Comments Off on Tuesday Notebook
Posted by nafsnep on May 6, 2014
With a whole week between games, there’s not much to blog about. One post down is an in depth look at some numbers between Providence and Wilkes-Barre that’s been up since Sunday. I probably won’t blog again until the Series Preview between the Pens and P-Bruins. But I managed to scrape together the following….
— Wilkes-Barre got help today in the form of Jayson Megna. He wasn’t seeing any playoff ice time with Pittsburgh, so they sent him to Wilkes-Barre where he will undoubtedly be inserted into the lineup for the Penguins.
Megna is an interesting case this year. I’ve sort of carried the schtick that he’s not my favorite player in spite of the fact that he has seen more NHL games (36) than AHL (25) this year. So with only 61 games played this season, you can bet that he’s going to be chomping at the bit to get into a game and knock some bodies around and hopefully score some goals in the process.
— Glens Falls will have a team again next season, in the form of Calgary prospects. The AHL’s Board of Governors approved the move Monday. Good that the League maintains a 30 team marriage with the 30 clubs in the NHL.
I thought about this and it’s been debated on Twitter, Facebook and beyond, where do you put the new Glens Falls team? The Eastern Conference? The Western Conference? Do you go 16 East teams and 14 West teams? Realignment is usually announced in July. I think that the AHL goes back to the four division format and adapts the same concept in the NHL presently.
— The Norfolk Admirals are becoming the unscratchable itch. They steal home ice away from the St. John’s IceCaps with a 3-1 win Tuesday. Goaltender John Gibson was stellar again for the Admirals, stopping 42 shots. Seemed like to me, if I was following the game the right way on Twitter, that Norfolk used, “bend but not break” and ground out a huge road victory. Gibson was beat on a deflection on the tail end of a power play and the Admirals answered right back minutes later. Game 2 is Wednesday.
Anaheim is in a battle with Los Angeles, currently down 2-0 in that series. If the Ducks do get bounced, they could get Emerson Etem, Devante Smith-Pelly and Rickard Rackell back from recall. That’s quite a calvary.
But let’s not get ahead of ourselves in Wilkes-Barre, shall we?
The Pens / P-Bruins Series Preview will be up Thursday at noon.
Comments Off on Penguins – Bruins Stats Pack
Posted by nafsnep on May 4, 2014
With a whole week to go before Game 1 between the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins and the Providence Bruins on Friday night in Wilkes-Barre, there is a lot of time to sit back and breakdown the series. I really liked Joy’s charts from a week ago when she looked at the Penguins and B-Sens so I figured I would bring them back for the Pens and Bruins.
First the Penguins. Built by Joy, copied by me so that I can maintain them for the second round.
— Get used to a lot of Ryan Spooner, Craig Cunningham, Matt Fraser, Seth Griffith, Zach Trotman, Nick Johnson and Joe Morrow. They are on the ice a lot when goals are scored. Trotman and Spooner are power play forces.
— John Hynes & Company are going to need to concoct a plan to shut down Seth Griffith, Ryan Spooner and Matt Fraser.
— Bruce Cassidy and his crew are going to need to do the same for Tom Kostopoulos and Adam Payerl, who still haven’t been on the ice when the Penguins have had a goal scored against them. Same goes for Chuck Kobasew and Andrew Ebbett.
— The Penguins are going to benefit from home ice in this series. Just watch. Get a Providence defensemen out there like Moore or Casto stuck on an icing, Ebbett and Kobasew are jumping over the boards.
— I’d still like for Simon Despres to get going. No one seemed to mention Brendan Mikkelson at all during the Binghamton series. He was held without a point in the series. If he breaks out and Wilkes-Barre maintains production, watch out.
I still haven’t made a prediction for the series and won’t officially until Thursday here on the blog. I like what I see from both sides. Providence’s youth outlasted Springfield’s experience. After Game 2, Wilkes-Barre turned the tide on Binghamton in a big way in Games 3 and 4. Providence has a two headed monster in goal with Niklas Svedberg and Malcolm Subban. The Penguins are Peter Mannino and that’s it. I haven’t looked yet at power play and penalty kill numbers and other intangibles and have all week to do so.
I might be burning all of the candle before the night comes with this blog post, but I am sure I will come up with something this week to write about between now and Thursday.
But for now, I am going to ice my brain down. All these numbers crunching gave me a headache.
Comments Off on So You Wanna Win Your Division?
Posted by nafsnep on May 3, 2014
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 earliertoday 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.
WBS News
