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I don’t think you can blame the fact that Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins lost three defensemen to injury Friday against Rochester in a blow out loss Friday or the war that they were in Saturday night in an overtime loss against the Utica Comets for this loss Sunday afternoon in Allentown.

Going 0-for-7 on the power play while your opponent goes 2-for-8 goes ahead of those actions I listed above.

Wilkes-Barre loses 4-1. 0-2-1 on the weekend that if you stack it all up, was a bad weekend because of the reasons I listed.

Lehigh Valley gets some breathing room now on the Penguins for first in the Atlantic, but the Penguin will have an insane five games in hand on the Phantoms when they play host to the Rockford IceHogs Friday night in Wilkes-Barre.

Games in hand mean nothing if you don’t win them, by the way.

Casey DeSmith opposed John Muse. Dustin Tokarski backed up, their parent team lost Michal Neuvirth to injury meaning Dustin Tokarski may head up to Philadelphia. I think Mark Dekanich is Phantoms property and he plays for Reading in the ECHL. We will see. Nothing is decided yet.

Lines were….

Thomas Di Pauli – J-S Dea – Reid Gardiner
Garrett Wilson – Jarett Burton – Daniel Sprong
Adam Johnson – Greg McKegg – Joseph Cramarossa
Cody Wydo – Gage Quinney – Troy Josephs

Kevin Spinozzi – Ethan Prow
Jeff Taylor – Kevin Czuczman
Dylan Zink – Jarred Tinordi

Casey DeSmith – Anthony Peters

Lineup Notes: Troy Josephs replaced Patrick McGrath on the fourth line. That was the only change. Colin Blackwell was suspended two games by the AHL for his hit on Lukas Bengtsson Friday. Here is an alternative view of the hit.

First Period: Penguins had two power plays that they couldn’t score on. Lehigh Valley scores on theirs when Oskar Lindblom was the only one paying attention on the ice when a puck came right to him and he scored here to give the Phantoms a 1-0 lead…

Greg Carey put two shots on DeSmith that the Penguins netminder saved, but everyone lost Lindblom who popped one in to give the Phantoms the lead. Casey DeSmith thought the puck ricocheted into the corner.

John Muse on the other hand, didn’t see much work in the first period but did stop the Penguins on a 3-on-1 and then later a shorthanded 2-on-1.

Second Period: Greg Carey scored to double the Phantoms lead. Puck in the corner to DeSmith’s left drew the attention of one too many Penguins, pass to Carey in the slot who didn’t miss.

Mike Vecchione scored a power play goal when he was in the right spot after a big shot from the point that DeSmith stopped, caromed right to him for the goal that made it 3-0 Phantoms.

Penguins weren’t moving their legs and it was costing them opportunities.

Third Period: Penguins keep the puck in as a four-on-four was about to turn into a penalty kill for the visitors. J-S Dea tipped in a shot from the point to bust up Muse’s shutout and gave Wilkes-Barre a rare shorthanded goal.

Wilkes-Barre misses two attempts at a power play, time dwindles, and the Phantoms hit an empty net with DeSmith pulled.

Three Stars: 3) Greg Carey (two assists, +2) 2) Travis Sanheim (two assists, even) and 1) John Muse (22 saves on 23 shots)

Around the Division: Bridgeport whitewashes a Hartford team that had a hellish week of travel 4-0…Syracuse splits the weekend series with Charlotte and beat the Checkers 3-1…Springfield beats Providence 3-2…Hershey was off.

Standings: Lehigh Valley (.676 percentage points) — Penguins (.650) — Providence (.625) — Charlotte (.583) — Bridgeport (.538) — Hartford (.518) — Hershey (.462) — Springfield (.454)

Wheeling Update: With half of the Nailers regulars on the trip to Allentown with the Penguins today, results were about where you expected them to be. Wheeling was shutout 6-0 by the Reading Royals.

If Lehigh Valley puts out a highlight package it will run in this space.

Week 20 AHL Power Rankings will hit the blog at noon Monday because of all the President’s Day games being played Monday afternoon. If you have the day off, unlike me, enjoy it.

Let’s Go Pens!

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I am going to go out on a limb and declare that the Utica Comets as a playoff team this season for the 2018 Calder Cup Playoffs.

You don’t get points in 15 straight games, this late on in the season, and not make the playoffs.

You don’t come into Wilkes-Barre, against one of the better teams in the Atlantic Division and scrap with a team that makes a living scrapping with other teams and walk away with the two points if you aren’t a playoff team.

The Utica Comets are a pesky team. They are in a division full of good teams with Toronto who are running away with the division, Rochester who are a surprise and Syracuse who are better than Belleville, Binghamton and Laval. Anyone is better than Belleville, Binghamton and Laval, by the way.

The Penguins had a 1-0 lead on the Comets tonight for a large part of the first half of the game. Then Utica scored three goals in a 1:02 to stun the Penguins and the crowd that braved the snow at the Mohegan Sun Arena at Casey Plaza and shades of last night’s throttling at the hands of the Rochester Americans were starting to creep in again.

But the Penguins used horribly undisciplined play from the Utica Comets and found themselves on three straight power plays which were unsuccessful, then a 5-on-3 for a full two minutes which kickstarted the comeback.

Garrett Wilson’s double to right gave the Penguins the lead after he batted a puck out of the air and into the net, but Utica tied it late, then as the Comets do, forced overtime.

Utica wins tonight 5-4 in overtime. My Rapid Recap said 4-3 initially, sorry about that if it confused you.

Casey DeSmith opposed Thatcher Demko

Lines were…

Thomas Di Pauli – J-S Dea – Reid Gardiner
Garrett Wilson – Jarrett Burton – Daniel Sprong
Adam Johnson – Greg McKegg – Joseph Cramarossa
Cody Wydo – Gage Quinney – Patrick McGrath

Kevin Spinozzi – Ethan Prow
Jeff Taylor – Kevin Czuczman
Dylan Zink – Jarred Tinordi

Casey DeSmith – Anthony Peters

Lineup Notes: The Penguins made three recalls today from Wheeling. Jeff Taylor, Dylan Zink and Kevin Schulze were recalled from the Nailers today. Taylor was a Pittsburgh assignment, Zink is on AHL contract and Schulze was signed to a PTO. Word after the game was that Frank Corrado may be the one that took the worst of the injuries Friday in Rochester according to Tyler postgame…

First Period: Joe Cramarossa jammed in a puck to give the Penguins a 1-0 early lead. He later added an assist, for three points (to go along with his assist Friday in Rochester) in two games this weekend for the Penguins. So far, so good.

Shots were 12-12 after one period. Initial impressions on the Utica Comets were they block a ton of shots and Thatcher Demo leaves rebounds all over the place.

Second Period: Penguins had two breakaway chances, but Demko stopped everything. Casey DeSmith looked sharp. But then…

This all happened in the span of 62 seconds. The wheels came off and they came off in all different directions.

The best thing to happen to the Penguins was the whistle to end the second period. Regroup, and come out for the…

Third Period: First power play came and went with nothing. Second one was the same as the first. The third one ended up as a 5-on-3 for a full two minutes. The Penguins HAD to score here.

They did.

Daniel Sprong shot, Jarrett Burton deflection. One goal game…

Pens think they score to tie it on the back end of the second power play but Demko closed the door…

But the Comets, who I said earlier block a ton of shots, blocked on in a sequence that would see Ethan Prow score to tie the game at 3-3 here…

Second assist for Cramarossa there.

Game settled for a bit, got tense, then Garrett Wilson scored to make it 4-3…

The hand / eye coordination by Wilson was exquisite. I can’t thank Taylor enough for GIFing these and allowing me to run them on this blog.

Demko stopped Wilson again on the breakaway and Hart has jokes…

Pitchers and catchers have already reported and the Mets look OK this year. Could contend for a wild card if the pitching holds up.

Anyway.

Utica tied it late with 2:40 left in a hack and whack similar to what Cramarossa did to open the scoring in the first.

Utica’s modus operandi is to just get the game to overtime. It worked here.

Overtime: Wilkes-Barre had one possession in the final frame, then Utica got the puck, had DeSmith all out of sorts and Patrick Wiercioch scored from the blue line to win it…

Three Stars: 3) Joseph Cramarossa (goal, assist, even) 2) Garrett Wilson (goal, assist, +2) and 1) Patrick Weircioch (game winning overtime goal, assist, +3)

Around the Division: Charlotte shuts out Syracuse 2-0. The Checkers are on the come again and are separating themselves from fifth in the Atlantic….Hershey shuts out a hapless Belleville team 3-0….Lehigh Valley coughs up a lead in the third and Hartford takes them down in a shootout 3-2….Providence beats Springfield, who is getting the 2019 All-Star Game next year, 3-2 in overtime. Bridgeport was off.

Standings: Lehigh Valley (.670 percentage points) — Penguins (.663) — Providence (.637) — Charlotte (.594) — Bridgeport (.529) — Hartford (.528) — Hershey (.462) — Springfield (.443)

Wheeling Update: Nailers game was postponed due to a flooding concern.

Video Highlights: 

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Pens close out the weekend Sunday afternoon in Allentown against the Lehigh Valley Phantoms at 5 p.m. Gameday setup hits the blog Sunday at 1.

Let’s Go Pens!