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3                                                4

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Penguins play a sloppy, undisciplined first period then have to claw their way back for the remainder of the game, tie the game, then lose late when ex-captain Ryan Craig gets two whacks at a rebound and puts it behind starting goaltender Jeff Deslauriers by a final score of 4-3.

One point to show this week for the Penguins after the shootout loss Wednesday to Syracuse and the regulation loss to Albany Friday.

Jeff Deslauriers vs. Jeremy Smith

Three lineup changes for the Penguins. Anton Zlobin (making his pro debut) Paul Thompson and Reid McNeil were in for the Pens and Tom Kuhnhack, Pierre-Luc Letourneau-Leblond (out with a lower body injury per Mike O’Brien on pre game) and Nick D’Agostino.

First Period: Springfield gets four power plays in the period. What you need to know here is that they have scored on FOUR of those power plays in prior games all SEASON and scored TWO in the first period. Their power play was ranked dead last in the AHL. In todays first period, it didn’t look like it.

Tim Erixon on a shot where Deslauriers was screened and then Spencer Machacek on a tip of a Frederic St. Denis shot put the Falcons ahead 2-0.

Second Period: Simon Despres scores on a two on one rush to put the Pens behind by just one. Penguins slowly were coming to life, peppering Smith with shot after shot, but then Frederic St. Denis scores from the blue line on a shot that seemed to surprise Deslauriers as he may have been partially screened on that shot too.

Penalty filled period and overall game to this point. Since I rag on other real media outlets for complaining of referee’s calls, I won’t emulate the out of town act.

Brian Dumoulin would get one back for the Pens while Wilkes-Barre was on a 5-on-3 to make it 3-2 Springfield.

Third Period: The story of this week is going to be the Penguins inability to score on a 5-on-3 situation. Penguins got three looks at this situation but came up empty every time but for the Dumoulin goal late in the second period.

Simon Despres scored to tie the game as a five-on-three expired for the Penguins, who failed to even register a single shot on goal. Then, Craig scored late on a Darryl Boyce blast that the Springfield Captain gets two whacks on before it finally goes in past Deslauriers.

With the Wilkes-Barre net empty, the Penguins never found the equalizer.

Three Stars: 3) Simon Despres (two goals, +2) 2) Frederic St. Denis (goal, assist, even) and 1) Ryan Craig (game winning goal, assist, +1)

Around the Division: Binghamton beats Hershey in a shootout 5-4 in the only other divisional action.

Standings: Syracuse 19 — Penguins 18 — Binghamton 18 — Norfolk 17 — Hershey 10

Conference: 1) MCH (21) 2) SYR (19) 3) SPR (17) 4) WBS (18) 5) BNG (18) 6) NOR (17) 7) PRO (16) 8) ADK (16)

Wheeling Update: The Nailers lost to the Reading Royals 2-1.

SendToNews Highlights: Are here.

The Week 6 AHL Power Rankings will be out later Monday. That’s because there are two Veterans Day games. Look for them ideally around 7 p.m. tomorrow.

Let’s Go Pens!

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6                                                5

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There are some games you get up for and others you don’t.

Tonight was one where the Penguins woke up and asked, “Whaaaa happened??”

Anchored by a four point night by Mike Sislo (3-1-4) the Albany Devils skate away from the Penguins 6-5.

Now you may look at the score and think it was a close game. You’d be wrong. The Devils controlled this game from the first second and never really looked back or stayed down. The Penguins didn’t help themselves any by sleepwalking though a good portion of the first half of the game. A sloppy, sloppy game all around from defense to goal.

Colin Riccobon is a sports anchor for the local TV news. He also moonlights on color with Mike O’Brien from time to time. He said at the end of the game that for the first time this season the Pens didn’t have their “all together game.” — That pretty much hit the nail on the proverbial head right there.

Peter Mannino vs. Keith Kincaid.

No lineup changes for the Penguins.

First Period: Dominik Uher in the penalty box and Reid Boucher cashes in the slot for a 1-0 Devils lead. Then, Rostislav Olesz snipes from a strange angle and it’s 2-0. Penguins sleepwalking, arisen a bit by a Harry Zolnierczyk goal to cut it to 2-1. But right after that, Sislo gets his first to put the Devils up by two again. They also exposed Mannino a bit as the Pens defense was hanging him out to dry.

Second Period: Scott Harrington scores on the power play to cut the deficit to one again. Then, the Penguins are given a power play. Wilkes-Barre is coming back, right? Wrong. Nick D’Agostino with a turnover and Mike Sislo makes it 4-2 on a shorthanded goal. Wait, Tom Kostopoulos scores on the power play anyway to make it 4-3 and the Pens trailed by one again!

At this point, the gloves were off. This was a slugfest.

Kelly Zajac scores a goal that Mannino should have had, it was 5-3 Albany.

Zach Sill did this:

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Then the Penguins found themselves with 1:17 of 5-on-3. They didn’t score. Let’s come back to this in a bit, shall we?

Third Period: Penguins score :24 apart, once from Mike Carman and once from Chris Conner and the score was tied. The Devils players were stunned. Don’t believe me?

Stunned, I tell you.

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Anyway, then the chances opened up for both sides. Brian Gibbons had a breakaway but was denied. Andrew Ebbett pounced on the rebound and was denied on the backhand. Then, Sislo completes his hat trick when his blast hits Deslauriers and is caromed in by Brendan Mikkeslon.

Penguins would then get ANOTHER five-on-three for 1:21. Here’s where I thought at the time that Head Coach John Hynes should have used his time out. You didn’t score on the last five-on-three you had earlier in the game and you NEED to score here to even it. He never did and the Pens didn’t score. Game over.

Notes: This is the first regulation loss for Jeff Deslauriers…..Albany was outscored 10-2 in their last three games, they came to play tonight.

Three Stars: 3) Chris Conner (goal, assist, even) 2) Reid Boucher (goal, assist, +1) and 1) Mike Sislo (three goals, assist, +3)

Around the Division: Syracuse beats Norfolk in regulation 2-1 and Binghamton beats Rochester 3-2 in overtime. Hershey was off.

Standings: Penguins 18 — Syracuse 17 — Norfolk 17 — Binghamton 14 — Hershey 7

Conference: 1) MCH (19) 2) WBS (18) 3) HFD (16) 4) SYR (17) 5) NOR (17) 6) SPR (15) 7) BNG (14) 8) ADK (14)

Wheeling Update: Wheeling beats Fort Wayne in Indiana tonight by a score of 6-2. Carter Rowney a hat trick.

SendToNews Highlights: Are here. It’s basically a Mike Sislo highlight reel. Blech.

Pens are off tomorrow then travel to Springfield for a 3 p.m. game in Massachusetts vs. the Falcons. Gameday for that will be up Sunday at 11.

Unless news breaks Saturday, the next update will be Sunday morning.

Let’s Go Pens!

        vs.          

4                                                3

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Alright, so the headline doesn’t pay justice to what actually happened during the shootout. The Pens failed to score once in the novelty act, the Crunch scored twice and skate away with the extra point, winners 4-3.

But the actual game itself felt like a shoutout. An even shootout, too.

The last time these two teams met, the Pens scored five goals in the third and cruised to a 6-3 victory.

Not tonight. This game was about as even as one could imagine, with the score 3-3 at the end of regulation and the shots 25 a side.

Jeff Deslauriers vs. Kristers Gudlevskis

Mike Carman replaced Nick Drazenovic who did not play and Reid McNeill took warmups but was scratched.

First Period: Andrew Ebbett turns the puck over in his own zone to Danick Gauthier who skates the length and scores to give the Crunch a 1-0 lead. Pens at one point had a power play where for 1:30, they could not get past the center red line. Later, Harry Zolnierczyk pounces on his own rebound and scores to tie the game at one. During the celebration, Bobby Farnham does something that referee David Banfield didn’t like and put the Crunch on the power play. They would score on said power play when reigning AHL Player of the Week Nikita Kucherov corrals a Vlad Namestnikov shot and passes to Nikita Kucherov who scores to put the Crunch up 2-1. It was a silly penalty for the Pens to give, really.

Second Period: More even hockey. Teams would skate up and down the ice for a good eight minutes straight with no whistles or anything. Finally, Andrew Ebbett takes a puck off the back wall, skates up, turns, fires and beats Gudlevskis far post to tie the game at two. Overall, an extremely even period for both teams.

Third Period: More even hockey. More end to end, no whistles back and forth. It was really fun to watch. Andrew Ebbett scores to put the Pens ahead 3-2 when Gudlevskis tries a poke check and Ebbett stuffs it past the Crunch netminder and into the net. You’d think that East Division netminders would take note and not try that when Ebbett is bearing down on them.

Anyway, Jeff Deslauriers makes a save on a JP Cote shot, leaves a rebound that Evan Rankin corrals and stuffs past Deslauriers to tie the game. When Syracuse plays desperate they play dangerous.

The other note in the period was an injury to Dom Uher. He was crunched along the door where the Crunch exit to the locker room and went down in pain. He favored his left leg going off and did not return. Edit: Bombulie says in his blog post game recap that Uher was back on the bench at the end of overtime. Terrific news.

Overtime: Harry Zolnierczyk is awarded a penalty shot but does not score. That was the most eventful thing that happened.

Shootout: Tom Kuhnhaxkl, Brian Gibbons, Andrew Ebbett and Chris Conner all fail to score for the Pens. Tanner Richard, Nikita Kucherov score for the Crunch and that was the ball game.

Three Stars: 3) Danick Gauthier (goal, assist, even) 2) Andrew Ebbett (two goals, even) and 1) Nikita Kucherov (assist, -1, shoot out goal)

Around the Division: They all watched us.

Standings: Penguins 18 — Norfolk 17 — Syracuse 15 — Binghamton 12 — Hershey 7

Conference: 1) MCH (19) 2) WBS (18) 3) HFD (16) 4) NOR (17) 5) SPR (15) 6) SYR (15) 7) BNG (12) 8) ADK (12)

Wheeling Update: The Nailers played a kids day game and lost 3-2 in a shootout to Kalamazoo. Christiaan Minella was a +2 and Eric Hartzell stopped 32 of 34.

SendToNews Highlights: Aren’t up yet. If the Pens put a YouTube package up instead, I’ll run it here in the morning.

Two things. First, this game was the first one I think that the Pens have lost when holding a lead at some point in the third. Second, Syracuse and Norfolk, both hot on the tails of the Penguins, play this weekend in Virginia. What you’d like here ideally is a split by both teams with NO overtime and the Penguins to, obviously, beat Albany Friday and Springfield Sunday.

If I think of anything Thursday or if news breaks, I’ll have something then. If not, Gameday for Albany will be up on the blog at 3 pm.

Let’s Go Pens!!!