@      

  0                                           5

–

Jonathan Bombulie summed up the current state of the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins lack of experience up front in a single tweet:

–

The results were predictable. St. John’s goaltender Eddie Pasquale stops all of twenty shots faced and Wheeling Wilkes-Barre loses 5-0.

The two teams rematch tomorrow night.

News of the day was the recall of Harry Zolnierczyk to Pittsburgh and Andrew Ebbett to injured reserve with a fractured ankle. Mike O’Brien said on the pre game show that Ebbett is expected to be out 4-6 weeks. He also stated that Nick Drazenovic is about a week away from returning. He is hopeful for a return Wednesday vs. his old team the Springfield Falcons.

Eric Hartzell vs. Eddie Pasquale. With the Zolnierczyk recall, it was all hands on deck up front for the Pens.

First Period: Bobby Farnham fought J.C. Lipon for the hit Lipon put on Tom Kuhnhackl a few weeks ago in Wilkes-Barre, where Lipon was suspended for the hit. The Pens struggled to get shots in close on Eddie Pasquale. Seemed that anything from the face-off dot or higher that the Pens shot at Pasquale, he saw like a beach ball.

Finally, just past the halfway mark of the period, Eric O’Dell wheeled around the Wilkes-Barre net, threw a weak shot at Hartzell and Carl Klingberg backhanded it home over the left shoulder of the Penguin net minder.

Other than that, Hartzell was pretty flawless otherwise for the Pens in the period, stopping shots in traffic, on a power play and even on a give away at the blue line that saw Patrice Cormier skate in unabated.

Second Period: Pens came out with much more life to start the period. They’d be rewarded with a power play, and that seemed to halt all momentum as the Pens would gain center red and dump and chase.

Then, Peter Merth and ex-Penguin Ryan Schnell are fighting for a puck along the wall and Blair Riley comes flying in with a check on Merth. Merth’s head collides with Schnell, cuts him badly, and then Merth and Riley fight. Merth would pick up the extra minor. Then, my AHL Live feed wet the bed. During the outage and me rushing to bring it back, Carl Klingberg scored his second of the game with a one timer in front for a 2-0 St. John’s lead. Then, Zach Redmond scores on a power play to extend the IceCaps lead to three.

The Penguins obviously weren’t doing themselves any favors taking lazy penalties. They needed to kill a carryover one heading into the….

Third Period: They would, then would get a power play but about fifteen seconds later would take a penalty. But that wasn’t the story of the period. It was this:

What little offense the Pens could muster at Pasquale and the IceCaps, the St. John’s net minder handled easily. This display was the most heat in his kitchen all night, and he came up with ten bell save after ten bell save.

Oh, that thing I said about the Pens getting a power play then taking one? Happened again. Seemed that any momentum the Pens got rolling they just applied the brakes themselves with dumb penalties.

Jerome Samson and Andrew Gordon strike in 1:05. Samson strips Brian Gibbons, skates the length, and fires a shot on Hartzell that was deflected by a stick. So, it badly changed the speed and the angle as the puck approached Hartzell. It was an ugly goal. Then, Zach Redmond fires a shot on goal that Andrew Gordon gets a stick on that appeared to be a high stick. I have an iPhone 5S that has a slo-mo camera on it. I looked at the goal again. It looked like, to me, that Gordon’s stick was legal at the point of contact then a split second later, as Gordon was raising his stick, illegal.

Referee Darcy Burchell must have saw it that way too, as he emphatically ruled goal and there wasn’t a replay.

That was it. Five goals scored against. Ain’t that enough?

Three Stars: 3) Eddie Pasquale (20 save shutout) 2) Zach Redmond (goal, assist, +1) and 1) Carl Klingberg (two goals, +2)

Around the Division: Hershey storms back after being down 2-0 in the second period and get by the B-Sens 4-2 in Binghamton. Norfolk does the same and wins 4-3 in a shootout in Syracuse for Brad Thiessen’s first win on North American soil this season.

Standings: Penguins 29 — Binghamton 29 — Norfolk 26 — Syracuse 25 — Hershey 21

Conference: 1) MCH (34) 2) SPR (30) 3) WBS (29) 4) BNG (29) 5) ALB (28) 6) PRO (27) 7) STJ (27) 8) NOR (26)

Wheeling Update: You’d think that you should feel sorry for the ECHL affiliate Wheeling. Yeah, no. The Nailers beat the defending Kelly Cup Champion Reading Royals 4-3 at home in a shootout. The Nailers are 9-0-2 in their last 11 games and are a point factory despite being stripped of all their players by call ups.

SendToNews Highlights: Are here. Not much to look at if you are a Penguin fan.

Rematch tomorrow on The Rock between these two teams. Gameday will be here at 2 p.m.

Let’s Go Pens!

          @          

2                                                3

–

With the state of the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins now, with half of their scoring on recall to Pittsburgh, a dogfight in Hershey was going to be expected. The Bears are underachieving right now, and they did not want to get outclassed by their rivals in Wilkes-Barre by going 0-fer in the season going into December.

So the Penguins get a point tonight in Hershey with a 3-2 overtime loss to the Bears and lead the Eats Division coming into December.

They also accomplished this feat by yet another third period comeback, down 2-0 after the second intermission.

Jeff Deslauriers vs. David Leggio

Peter Merth was in for Dustin Stevenson. Dominik Uher needs “further evaluation” per Mike O’Brien on the pre game show from his upper body injury suffered Wednesday in Adirondack.

First Period: Pierre-Luc Letourneau Leblond and Joel Rechlicz fought in a dandy of a fight. Then, the Pens took a penalty and Stan Galiev scored to put the Bears ahead 1-0. Pens go 0-for-2 on the power play the rest of the way. The Bears really did a nice job of bottling up the Pens all period long.

Second Period: Pens fail to score on extended 5:00 major for charging on Garrett Mitchell on a hit from Brain Gibbons. Pens couldn’t do anything with it. Tempers flared as custom between these teams. Dave Leggio makes a nice save on Scott Harrington, Harry Zolnierczyk had about five chances all game to score but did not. Bears double the lead on a backhander just as a power play for them expires from Jeff Taffe.

Penguins really owned the period, but could not solve Leggio and gave up a goal to Taffe for a 2-0 deficit heading into the….

Third Period: Pierre Leblond scores his first goal for the Penguins on a firecracker of a shot from below the blue line to cut the Bears deficit in half. Hershey would then play full on prevent defense but Mike Carman would score in a scrum to tie the game late. Brian Gibbons and Harry Zolnierczyk were magic all night but just could not connect all night and missed one late. Deslauriers with a save on a Bear from the point. Penguins ice the puck three times in the final third seconds and it was onto…

Overtime: Mike Carman strips a Bear of a puck, feeds a streaking Kostopoulos but the captain misses. Then the Bears score with 6.6 left as David Kolomatis would receive a pass from the corner after Deslauriers directed a puck there. The Penguins goaltender was out of position as Kolomatis let loose and the Bears would take this one in overtime.

Three Stars: 3) Casey Wellman (two assists, +1) 2) Mike Carman (goal, +1) and 1) David Kolomatis (game winning OT goal, even)

Around the Division: Brad Thiessen loses in his 2013-14 AHL debut with the Norfolk Admirals 3-2 as the Providence Bruins sweep the weekend series with the Admirals. The Binghamton Senators lose 4-3 in a shootout to the St. John’s IceCaps and remain tied with Wilkes-Barre in points, but remains second in the division due to tiebreakers. The Syracuse Crunch bus broke down and arrived late for a game with the Adirondack Phantoms in Glens Falls but the Crunch still won 1-0 anyway.

Standings: Penguins 29 — Binghamton 29 — Syracuse 24 — Norfolk 24 — Hershey 18

Conference: 1) MCH (34) 2) SPR (30) 3) WBS (29) 4) BNG (29) 5) ALB (26) 6) STJ (25) 7) SYR (24) 8) NOR (24)

Wheeling Update: The Nailers shutout the hapless Toledo Walleye 3-0 tonight in West Virginia. The Walleye have been shutout in three straight game. Anton Zlobin had a goal for the Nailers in the win.

SendToNews Highlights: Here they are. Or, alternatively, watch this…

Content wise, if anything breaks Sunday, I will have it here. If not, the Week 9 AHL Power Rankings will be here Monday afternoon at 4 p.m.

Let’s Go Pens!!!

          vs.      

  0                                        1

–

It took 20 games, but the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins have their first shutout.

Against a divisional foe.

By a rookie goaltender starting his second ever AHL game.

For first place.

Anchored by a 25 save performance by Eric Hartzell, the Penguins get a goal from Harry Zolnierczyk in the second period and ride solid defense the rest of the way to win 1-0 over rival Binghamton and are now in first place in the division.

Nathan Lawson vs. Eric Hartzell

Dominik Uher was listed as out with an “upper body” injury. Carter Rowney made his WBS debut for Uher. Peter Merth took warmups but was the lone healthy scratch.

Pre-game, the Pens announced that Jeff Deslauriers was signed to an AHL contract for the rest of the year. This should surprise no one. It wasn’t a matter of if they were going to sign Deslauriers, it was a matter of when.

First Period: Penguins went 0-for-7 on the power play and it showed early, especially with the second one of the night in the first period where the Penguins couldn’t get a single thing going. Late, shorthanded, Brian Gibbons hits the top of the goal post and the puck goes in at the buzzer. Only problem is, the puck went down and not in then was pushed in but after time expired. Replay confirmed the call.

Second Period: Eric Hartzell must have had six eyes and eight legs this period because he had every puck hit him this period. A redirect from in close? Saved. Penguins defensive turnover? Dial 555-BAIL – Eric is there to bail you out. A shot that goes through nine bodies on the ice that mere mortal goaltenders never see? Insured by Hartzell, we keep pucks out of the net! He saw everything and let everything hit him, closed his angles and was on money all period.

Then, Brian Gibbons takes a puck off the near low corner, sweeps it to Harry Zolnierczyk for the backhander to put the Pens up 1-0. Pens kill a 4:00 Brian Dumoulin high stick call, thanks in large part to the stout penalty kill and one Eric Hartzell.

Third Period: More terrible power play by the Penguins. A scary moment when Hartzell goes down and doesn’t move. The arena was quiet because most fans knew there wasn’t another goaltender in Wheeling for a call-up. Turns out, by my eyes, it was nothing but a cramp, as I saw trainer Kyle Moore mouth “cramp” while walking to the bench. Binghamton would have a power play to mess with after, but Hartzell and the stellar Wilkes-Barre penalty killing unit would deny all chances.

Three Stars: 3) Nathan Lawsn (25 saves on 26 shots) 2) Harry Zolnierczyk (goal, +1) and 1) Eric Hartzell (25 save shutout)

Around the Division: Syracuse guts out a 4-2 win at home vs. St. John’s, Norfolk loses 5-4 to Providence. Hershey was off.

Standings: Penguins 28 — Binghamton 28 — Norfolk 24 — Syracuse 22 — Hershey 16

Conference: 1) MCH (32) 2) SPR (28) 3) WBS (28) 4) BNG (28) 5) ALB (24) 6) NOR (24) 7) STJ (23) 8) SYR (22)

Wheeling Update: The Nailers win in Elmira vs. the Jackals 3-1. Anton Zlobin had a goal in the winning effort.

SendToNews Highlights: Better yet, how about a YouTube package?

Wilkes-Barre travels to Hershey tomorrow for a 7 p.m. gave with in-state rival Bears. Gameday for that will be up at 3 p.m.

Let’s Go Pens!!!