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You have the best car in the employee parking lot. Everyone from accounting down to the mail room is talking about your new wheels. You are the talk of the office, the envy of your co-workers. Everything is great until you go to step into the car and it won’t start.

Why won’t it start? Well, for one thing, you forgot to put gas in the tank and it won’t turn over. Even if it will turn over, the oil hasn’t been changed in over 10,000 miles and so the internal parts won’t turn anymore. Oh, and two of the four tires are flat.

So all you are left with is a hunk of something that looks good, but when you ask that something to execute, you are disappointed.

That, in a nutshell, is what happened tonight at the Penguins game, a 3-1 loss to the Lehigh Valley Phantoms for the first loss on home ice this season and the third overall this season.

Going 0-for-6 on a power play is enough most nights to make teams lose when the battle is special teams. That is what the fourth ranked Penguins power play went for tonight against the Phantoms 27th ranked penalty kill.

Matt Murray opposed Anthony Stolarz.

Lines were…

Scott Wilson – Kael Mouillierat – Conor Sheary
Dominik Simon – Kevin Porter – Bryan Rust
Dominik Uher – Oskar Sundqvist – Tom Kostopoulos
Josh Archibald – J-S Dea – Carter Rowney

Derrick Pouliot – Steve Oleksy
Tim Erixon – Will O’Neill
Reid McNeill – Niclas Andersen

Matt Murray – Tristan Jarry

Tyler Biggs skated the extra. With Tom Sestito out with injury, Bryan Rust replaced Carter Rowney on the second line who replaced Sestito on the fourth.

First Period: Felt like a jagged start with face-off, stoppage, face-off, stoppage for the first two and a half minutes. Finally, Conor Sheary worked a puck from behind Stolarz’s net and whacked one in for a 1-0 Penguins lead early on.

It is usually rare that you get a games turning point within the first ten minutes of a game but the Penguins, when they came up empty on two consecutive power plays, set the tone for the Phantoms that they had at least something that can stop the Penguins on the man advantage. Wilkes-Barre came close a couple times with J-S Dea loudly ringing the post on a power play, but never scored another goal for the remainder of the contest.

Second Period: Anthony Stolarz is a 6’6 goaltender and a really good one at that. His numbers match those of Matt Murray’s but you rarely hear anything about him because of what Murray has accomplished with all of his awards. He was tremendous tonight for Lehigh Valley. The Penguins had a power play within the first five minutes in the second period and looked to have scored but Stolarz kept the Penguins from doubling the lead at the time.

Lehigh Valley hadn’t been on a power play advantage at all to this point. The Penguins top five power play hadn’t scored in three prior attempts. The Phantoms were about to go on one when Kael Mouillierat roughed Danick Martel near the benches. You guessed it! The Phantoms would score on the power play. Somehow the Penguins let Aaron Palushaj get about a fifteen foot headstart from his own blue line and score unabated on Murray to even things at a goal a piece.

The Penguins were on tilt at this point. Looked disjointed and frustrated. After referee David Banfield lost control of a situation where Conor Sheary gets bulldozed by Palushaj right in front of him in the neutral zone and after the eventual four on four that ensued, Mark Alt received a cross ice pass from the near wall and wasted no time in putting his team ahead 2-1.

Third Period: Both teams trade early power plays but come up empty. Penguins try a Steve Oleksy shot pass to the tape of Conor Sheary for a deflection type shot on Stolarz but he makes the save. Later, all types of shots from all different angles and he closes the door yet again.

Finally with 1:59 left in regulation, Davis Drewskie puts a puck into the stands from his own end and the Penguins head to a power play. Coach Mike Sullivan calls his time out, draws something up, thirty seconds later Matt Murray heads to the bench, but the Penguins salt away the game with a 180′ empty net goal scored by Taylor Leier which will also go down as a short handed goal against the Penguins.

What’s the old saying? When it rains, it pours?

The streak dies at 11 games. No other AHL team had been undefeated at home until tonight.

Three Stars: 3) Conor Sheary (goal, +1) 2) Mark Alt (game winning goal, +1) and 1) Anthony Stolarz (35 saves on 36 shots)

Around the Division: Bridgeport is shutout again, this time to the Springfield Falcons by a score of 4-0…Providence beats Portland 3-2 in overtime…Hartford downs Hershey 4-3 in a shootout.

Standings: Penguins (.842 percentage points) — Bridgeport (.630) — Hershey (.595) — Springfield (.525) — Lehigh Valley (.500) — Hartford (.455) — Portland (.447) — Providence (.405)

Wheeling Update: The Nailers hosted the South Carolina Stingrays tonight at Wesbanco Arena and won 3-2. Brian Foster stopped 38 of 40 shots. Zack Torquato picked up first start honors with a goal and an assist. The Nailers rematch against the Stingrays tomorrow night.

Here is the infographic. If they Penguins put up video highlights and I can edit them in, I’ll do so.

[tweet https://twitter.com/WBSPenguins/status/672989484573720576]

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Penguins host the Hartford WolfPack tomorrow at 7:05. Gameday for this will be up Saturday afternoon at 3.

Let’s Go Pens!!!

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Much closer this time for the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins and Hershey Bears but if you just watched the first 19:45 of the second period, you wouldn’t have thought that. That was when the Penguins scored three goals in their most productive period of the season for them and held on and defeated the Hershey Bears for their tenth consecutive win on home ice by a score of 3-2.

No lineup changes for the Penguins from Friday nights win over Providence.

Tristan Jarry opposed Justin Peters. If I asked you coming into this game who the better goaltender was statistically between Jarry and Matt Murray, who would you say that it was?

If you said Matt Murray, you are wrong:

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Jarry has Murray beat in every statistical category but you would not think for a second about starting Jarry over Murray when it comes to say a playoff game. It’s a dangerous two-headed monster.

Anyway, to the game. The teams traded chance after chance in the first period with neither finding the back of the net. It was a show put on by the goaltenders who were really good with glove saves on both ends of the ice. There were sticks in passing lanes too.

In the second, the offense came to life for the Penguins. Kevin Porter got a step on the Bears defenders at the blue line, raced in and backhanded one past Peters at :26 of the first to put the Penguins ahead 1-0. It was his 200th point at the AHL level.

Later, Niclas Andersen scored from the blue line off a perfect screen by Dominik Uher in front that doubled the Penguins lead. About five minutes later on a power play, J-S Dea flipped a casual backhander at the net that somehow slipped past Peters and in for a 3-0 Penguins lead.

Peters would come up with a big save on Kevin Porter while the Penguins were on another of their six power plays of the night, this time robbing Porter with the glove as Porter was left unmarked on the near side.

The Penguins had held Hershey to just one shot in the second period until the Bears got a late barrage on Jarry and one of them snuck in for a goal. It was Erik Burgdoerfer scoring it at 19:46 that seemed to slow all momentum built by the Penguins at the time carrying over to the third period. The goal ended a goalless drought of 129:34 for the Bears in Wilkes-Barre.

In the third. Riley Barber threw a seemingly harmless shot at Jarry that squeaked in for a goal that gave the Bears life as all of a sudden it was a one goal game. Hershey had opened the period with lots of pop in their skates and were really flying.

But the Penguins slowed that momentum by going on the power play. Paul Carey clipped J-S Dea with the stick, drew blood and the Penguins were on a 4:00 power play that they ultimately would not score on. Peters came up big for his team in net. Penguins would get another chance on the power play later but would not be able to score a goal on the leagues worst road penalty killing unit. Tristan Jarry had to stop Dustin Galley shorthanded.

Hershey would get the games last power play as Dominik Simon was stick handling near the Penguins bench during a change leading to a too many men on the ice call. Chris Bourque hit the post with Peters vacated but that was as close as the Bears came to tying the game before time ran out on them.

Three stars were 3) Kevin Porter (goal, +1) 2) Tim Erixon (two assists, +1) and 1) J-S Dea (game winning power play goal, even)

Patrick Williams from of the Winnipeg Sun was in town tonight. Williams covers the Manitoba Moose for the Sun and used to cover the Penguins a long time ago for the Times-Leader. He’s an AHL observer and has a weekly feature on the AHL on NHL.com. He had this to say about the Penguins:

https://twitter.com/pwilliamsahl/status/670777997511688192

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Obviously I don’t see the amount of Western Conference teams that Williams does, so I will gladly take him for his word and say here that it was an honor meeting the man.

Around the Division: Bridgeport beat Hartford 5-2 to stay in second place in the Atlantic behind the Penguins….Utica beats Portland for the weekend sweep of the Pirates 6-3…Albany beats Springfield 4-3 and Providence shuts out Lehigh Valley 3-0.

Standings: Penguins (.889 percentage points) — Bridgeport (.690) — Hershey (.600) — Springfield (.528) — Lehigh Valley (.452) — Hartford (.429) — Portland (.412) — Providence (.375)

Wheeling Update: The Nailers lost to the Brampton Beast 6-3 tonight. Eight Nailers recorded points. Matia Marcantuoni did not have a point.

I have given up on waiting for the Penguins to put infographics out timely or video highlights in time for the blog to publish. That said, if I get a chance to work an edit in I will, if not, if you really want to see the highlights you will need to go to them direct.

Check out the Week 8 Power Rankings come Monday at 4 p.m. here on the blog.

Let’s Go Pens!