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3                                              5

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I’ll come right out and say it, Jake Guentzel has nothing left to prove at the AHL level.

Since returning from his first NHL assignment, and coming into tonight’s game, Guentzel had seven goals in seven games. Add on three more tonight for Guentzel, a hat trick, and its ten goals in eight games.

These numbers are ridiculous.

The Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins, as a whole, have benefitted greatly from the rookie Guentzel’s return. They have won their seventh straight game tonight, beating the Springfield Thunderbirds by a score of 5-3. In the seven game winning streak, the Penguins have scored four or more goals in every single game.

You would think that with all of what I just wrote there, that the Penguins would be leading the Atlantic Division by a mile. It’s not the case. To be at the top of this division you have to be a great team like the Penguins are, but it’s a tight lead the Penguins own on the second place Lehigh Valley Phantoms and two versions of bear in the form of Hershey and Providence.

Taking the veteran option regarding the lines tonight because I despise home work night hockey games. Here they are:

Notes: Gardiner and McGrath for Jarrett Burton and Ryan Haggerty up front with Goers for Ethan Prow on the blue line.

Tristan Jarry, backed up by Casey DeSmith, opposed Mike McKenna.

In the first, Springfield would score twice on the power play in the span of 9:18 to give the Thunderbirds a 2-1 lead.

Then Jake Guentzel started building his hat trick with a ridiculous, nearly end to end play where he bounced the puck off of the boards and beat McKenna five hole for his first act.

For his second act, Guentzel would bat in a puck laying in the crease that McKenna wasn’t able to control for a tie game.

Here’s a look at Guentzel’s two first period goals…

Couple things here. First, watch the video highlights below of the first tow goals by Guentzel for better looks but on the first goal, he throws a changeup at McKenna and beats him. On the second goal, he eats a crosscheck to the face and still scores.

Guentzel completed his hat trick when the Penguins were on a 5-on-3 power play, the second one where Guentzel drew the penalty to put the Penguins on the two-man advantage. He batted in a puck through McKenna’s legs to put the Penguins ahead 3-2…

Garrett Wilson made it 4-2 soon after when a puck went in off of a Thunderbirds player in front, it was Wilson’s third goal in three games and fourth in five games. David Warsofsky picked up the assist, giving him 15 points (3-12) in his last 10 games.

Pens had it on cruise control from there, smothering Springfield and not allowing the Thunderbirds a shot on goal for a very long stretch.

But if you have ever been on a long trip before and used cruise control, you know you can’t use it for the entire journey. Eventually Springfield scored to bring it to within one. I say that because the Thunderbirds had an initial goal washed out on account of goaltender interference. But later, a Mackenzie Weegar shot that hit the post, counted and made it a 4-3 game heading into the third.

In the third, which was the most even period of the night between the two sides with each club putting nine shots on the board and neither team scoring on two power plays in the period, the Penguins would hold on and tack on a Cameron Gaunce empty net goal from behind his own goal line in the final minute for good measure.

Coal Street didn’t GIF the Wilson or Gaunce goals in case you were wondering.

Note: Wilkes-Barre is a point away from clinching Clark Donatelli a spot at coaching at the All-Star Classic in January.

Three Stars: 3) David Warsofsky (three assists, +4) 2) Mackenzie Weegar (two goals, -1) and 1) Jake Guentzel (hat trick, +3)

Around the Division: Providence snaps Hartford’s four game winning streak with their tenth win in the month of December with a 3-2 win over the Wolf Pack tonight in Hartford. Every other team was off.

Standings: Penguins (.776 percentage points) –Lehigh Valley (.707) — Hershey (.690) — Providence (.661) — Bridgeport (.571) — Springfield (.482) — Hartford (.433)

Wheeling Update: Nailers lose in Toledo 4-3. Seven different Wheeling skaters recorded a point in the losing effort.

Video highlights…

But for breaking stuff, look for the next blog post to come Friday when Providence pays a visit.

Let’s Go Pens!

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5                                               4

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It has been one year since Clark Donatelli took the reigns as head coach of the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins. In a year…

-Has guided the Penguins to the second round of the playoffs last May.
-Has the best team in the AHL.
-Probably has the best NHL caliber player in Jake Guentzel ready to graduate to full time NHL work. Remember that Mike Sullivan had nothing to do with Guentzel here in Wilkes-Barre.
-Has a two-headed monster in goal with Tristan Jarry and Casey DeSmith.
-Manages an extremely deep lineup and keeps fringe players fresh by adding them into the lineup occasionally.

For as much as Wilkes-Barre has been a pipeline of players winning Stanely Cups at the next level so has the Diamond City been to the bench bosses that manage the team that calls Northeastern Pennsylvania home. In this game, a 5-4 Wilkes-Barre win over the Binghamton Senators, this is where excellent coaching comes into play.

In a game where the Penguins were totally outplaying their opponent and one that it seemed that the opposing team used a cheat code to score to take a multi-goal lead, Donatelli kept his team on point and managed to come back and win early on in the third period.

Trailing 4-3 coming into the third period, Wilkes-Barre strikes :11 into the period then 3:24 later to take the lead and ride Casey DeSmith the rest of the way to hold on and win.

Casey DeSmith, who started tonight for the Penguins, has yet to lose in regulation for Wilkes-Barre and you are ready to throw away your 2016 calendar and put the fresh 2017 one on your wall that you won from the office Secret Santa pool. The AHL season started in October by the way. DeSmith is 8-0-2 this year and 15-4-4 as a professional goaltender. Wilkes-Barre wins its sixth straight.

He opposed Matt O’Connor.

Lines were…

Dominik Simon – Kevin Porter – Tom Kostopoulos
Garrett Wilson – Oskar Sundqvist – Josh Archibald
Jake Guentzel – Teddy Blueger – Danny Kristo
Tom Sestito – J-S Dea – Ryan Haggerty

Tim Erixon – Stuart Percy
David Warsofsky – Lukas Bengtsson
Cameron Gaunce – Ethan Prow

Casey DeSmith – Tristan Jarry

Lineup Notes: Ryan Haggerty slotted in for Reid Gardiner and Ethan Prow rejoined Cameron Gaunce on the defensive pairing. Carter Rowney skated in the morning skate but was still out of the lineup tonight and is still week-to-week per Donatelli as told to the WBS media postgame.

First Period: Pens started out like sharks in chum in the middle of the ocean. No flies on either the Pens or the Senators in the first period after the long Christmas break for both teams. It was the Senators getting on the board first via a Mike Kostka power play goal. The Binghamton Senators last place power play beat the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins top rated penalty kill. Cameron Gaunce had lost his stick and DeSmith was partially screened. This snapped a streak of 20 successful penalty kills for the Penguins.

A few minutes later, the Penguins tied the game. Watch this pretty setup by Jake Guentzel…

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Guentzel is falling down, dishes back to Kostopoulos who stuffs it home. NHL caliber play by an NHL caliber player right there.

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Second Period: Game looked like one where the better team wasn’t the one that was winning on the scoreboard. Binghamton did not register a shot for more than five minutes into the game and they score on their first shot of the period when Mike Blunden scored on a quick rush to give the B-Sens a 2-1 lead.

Example. Matt O’Connor was spilling rebounds all over the place. Penguins weren’t able to corral one and score on one and continue to smother the Binghamton defense. Senators get loose and score to take the lead.

Chris Carlisle scored to give the B-Sens a 3-1 lead. But :24 later, Jake Guentzel broke away and scored here…

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…and made it 3-2. Garrett Wilson was not able to push across a puck laying in the crease after a pad stop by O’Connor that didn’t carom into Section 14.

Bounces. Bounces. Bounces. Binghamton re-establishes a two goal lead when Jack Rodewald scored to make it 4-2. A puck deflected off of a linesman, off Cameron Gaunce’s skate, off DeSmith’s pad and into the net.

Oskar Sundqvist scored right after to make it 4-3…

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Four goals within 3:37 between these two teams.

Third Period: :11 in, Garrett Wilson scored to tie it for the Penguins…

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Then Jake Guentzel scored on the power play, through a Tom Kostopoulos screen, that made it 5-4 Wilkes-Barre.

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12 points (7-5-12) for Guentzel in 8 games since returning from NHL assignment.

In case you were wondering about the Penguins coming out of Christmas holiday games. Seth dug this stat up…

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Wilkes-Barre held on through a Binghamton power play late and an extra attacker with O’Connor vacated but the Senators were never able to find the equalizer.

Three Stars: 3) Jack Rodewald (goal, assist, -1) 2) Oskar Sundqvist (goal, assists, +2) and 1) Jake Guentzel (two goals, assist, +1)

Around the Division: Hershey thumps Lehigh Valley in Allentown 5-2. That result will widen a tight lead that the Penguins already had on the Phantoms. Providence continues their tear with a 4-2 win over Albany. Hartford wins three fourth straight as Bridgeport drops their fifth straight as the Wolf Pack win 5-2. Springfield was off, they may already be in Wilkes-Barre for their Tuesday game with the Penguins.

Standings: Penguins (.768 percentage points) — Lehigh Valley (.709) — (Hershey (.690) — Providence (.650) — Bridgeport (.571) — Springfield (.500) — Hartford (.448)

Wheeling Update: The Nailers were off, they are back in action this week.

Binghamton may post video highlights and if they do I will edit and put them here.

Pens are home for a Tuesday game against the Springfield Thunderbirds. Gameday setup for that will be up on the blog Tuesday afternoon at 3.

Let’s Go Pens!