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Really don’t know what to make of this one.

Syracuse has won three straight. They beat Hershey Saturday night in Hershey 5-0. Then the next night in Washington D.C. they beat the Bears again 5-2. Then they respond tonight, at home with a 4-0 shutout of the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins. They have outscored their opponents 14-2 in three games.

Are the Crunch making a push out of the East Division basement? May be too early to tell. I think tonight was more about Crunch goaltender Anders Lindback, down from parent Tampa Bay on conditioning, who pitched a 30 save shutout tonight and helped the Crunch to the win tonight.

There were moves today for the Penguins. As expected, Eric Hartzell was sent to Wheeling this morning and Peter Mannino was recalled. Then this afternoon, Tom Kuhnhackl and Anton Zlobin were sent to Wheeling also.

That left D Barry Goers as the only healthy scratch for the Penguins tonight. He is out for the weekend attending to a family matter. Harrison Ruopp was in for the Pens tonight as the 6th defenseman.

Jeff Deslauriers vs. the aforementioned Anders Lindback

First Period: Tanner Richard scored on the first shot of the game for the Crunch as he skated in from the blue line and beat Deslauriers for an early 1-0 Crunch lead. Penguins pretty much dominate the period, but Matt Taormina scores in the final minute to put the Crunch up 2-0.

That play was offsides:

Second Period: Matt Taormina scores again to put the Crunch up 3-0 and this ended Deslauriers night. Peter Mannino would out in his first work for Wilkes-Barre since November 8.

He’d promptly get scored on by Drew Olsen. It was 4-0 Crunch.

Then a boffo moment. Lindback misplays a puck in back of his net and inadvertently passes to Jayson Megna. Megna gathers himself and shoots, but Lindback makes it back in net in time to rob him to keep the Penguins off the board and preserve his shutout. That gaffe right there was probably the Penguins best chance at a goal tonight.

Third Period: Teams trade power plays. Nothing of either. Back and forth period with the Crunch outshooting the Penguins 11-8. Credit Syracuse for not letting off. No one would score though.

Three Stars: 3) Dana Tyrell (assist, +2) 2) Matt Taormina (two goals, +2) and 1) Anders Lindback (30 save shutout)

Around the Division: Binghamton lost up on The Rock to St. John’s 6-2. Hershey lost in a shootout 2-1 to the Hartford Wolf Pack and the Norfolk Admirals beat the best team in the AHL in the Manchester Monarchs by a score of 3-2.

Other Game of Relevance: The Bridgeport Sound Tigers win their seventh in a row with a 4-2 over the Providence Bruins. The Sound Tigers are making a push out of the 10th spot in the Eastern Conference to make it into the top 8. Right now, the playoff picture is 9 teams for 8 spots. Bridgeport wants to and probably will make it 10 for 8 really soon.

The AHL put out the Playoff Primer today, so if you have been saying it’s too early for me to be thinking about playoffs, think again. The Penguins magic number coming into the weekend was 43.

Standings: Binghamton 70 — Norfolk 68 — Hershey 65 — Penguins 65 — Syracuse 51

Conference: 1) MCH (80) 2) SPR (71) 3) BNG (70) 4) STJ (70) 5) NOR (68) 6) ALB (66) 7) HER (65) 8) WBS (65) 9) PRO (65) 10) BRI (55)

Wheeling Update: The Nailers were in Elmira tonight and were down 4-0. They score five goals in 14:58 and end up beating the Jackals by a score of 6-4. Eric Hartzell picked up the win. Anton Zlobin had a goal and an assist. Cody Sylvester had two goals.

SendToNews Highlights: Are not up yet. I will check again.

Penguins probably are bussing to Atlantic City tonight for their 5 p.m. start time with the rested Devils tomorrow in an important game for both. I’ll have the Gameday setup here on the blog at 1 p.m. tomorrow.

Let’s Go Pens!

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Teams on long losing streaks inevitably always find ways to win games. It always happens. The subsequent win always is an ugly one.

Tonight, the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins were involved in a seven goal third period and manage to eke by the now sliding Hershey Bears, losers of three straight by a final score of 6-5.

Eric Hartzell started this game in goal for the Penguins. He did not finish it. Ironically, he received his January Goaltender of the Month Award by the Pens executives. Feburary has been nothing short of a disaster for the rookie goaltender, who doesn’t seem to be exuding any type of confidence whatsoever. I would not be surprised to see him sent to Wheeling to slow down the game again for him, and a recall of Peter Mannino.

But I don’t coach the team, I just blog about it.

Hartzell was opposed by David Leggio. Barry Goers and Denver Manderson, both up from Wheeling, were in for the recalled to Pittsburgh Simon Despres and Brian Gibbons.

First Period: Tale of two periods for the Penguins. Come out gangbuster, Mike Carman finishes a behind the net pass from Bobby Farnham to put the Pens on the board 1-0.

Then, the Pens start taking penalties. Pierre Leblond on a goaltender interference call. Dane Byers gets a piece of a deflected puck past Hartzell and its a 1-1 game.

Spencer Machacek trip. Pens kill it, but a second later Casey Wellman rips one past Hartzell for a 2-1 Bears lead.

Here’s how bad the situation was for Hartzell: One save on three shots. Three.
Here’s how bad the situation was for the Penguins in whole: They dominate the period, and kill all momentum by taking avoidable penalties.

It seemed like the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins lacked swagger.

Second Period: Okay. Back to basics. Penguins cycled the puck and possessed it for a large part of the period. Bobby Farnham scores on a rebound of a Pierre Leblond shot to make it even again 2-2. Control the pace, dominate on defense. Limit chances. It was exactly what was needed and the Pens outshot the Bears 14-4 in the period and the score was 2-2 heading into the…

Third Period: Dane Byers. :28 in. Whips a shot past Hartzell.

All goaltenders get scored on. Name one who has never been. When they do, it doesn’t look like they just let in the game winning goal in game seven of a quadruple overtime game. It looked like it on Hartzell tonight.

Little did he or anyone else know that this Byers goal would be a preview of coming attractions.

Three straight goals by Wilkes-Barre. Brendan Mikkelson shorthanded laser beam to tie it at three again. Then, Dustin Gazley clips Mike Carman with a high stick and draws blood. A 4:00 power play to the Penguins, who waste no time because :43 later, the Pens tack on two more goals and its a 5-3 Wilkes-Barre lead.

The Hershey Bears would have none of it.

Jeff Taffe. Snaps a shot that Hartzell gets some of, but not all. What he didn’t ended up in the net.

Hynes said enough. Enter Jeff Deslauriers. Hartzell to this point stopped 12 of 16. He has looked shaky all night and Hershey still had 9:59 left to work with to get the fifth and sixth goals.

They only got the fifth. But not before the Pens found their sixth, a Spencer Machacek boomer to put the Pens up two again.

Nic Deschamps for the visitors. 6-5 Penguins.

After a goal extravaganza, Pens calmed down and defended the lead. They get a penalty kill and keep Hershey from scoring with the extra attacker and hold on.

Probably the easiest three save win in Jeff Deslauriers career. He was the goaltender of record tonight and will pick up the win.

Three Stars: 3) Dane Byers (two goals, even) 2) Andrew Ebbett (goal, two assists) 1) Spencer Machacek (two goals, -2)

Around the Division: They all watched us.

Standings: Pens lose six straight but still trail Binghamton by five points and sit in second: Binghamton 70 — Penguins 65 — Norfolk 64 — Hershey 64 — Syracuse 49

Conference: 1) MCH (80) 2) SPR (71) 3) BNG (70) 4) STJ (68) 5) ALB (66) 6) WBS (65) 7) PRO (65) 8) NOR (64)

Wheeling Update: The Nailers did not play tonight.

SendToNews Highlights: Here they are.

Pens now off until Friday. Binghamton plays Toronto tomorrow and Norfolk plays Charlotte. Other than that, everyone is back Friday.

Content wise, I will have a photo blog of the Penguins Hall of Fame probably sometime tomorrow which I will run here as a buffer between tonights game and Friday’s one in Syracuse. Check back then.

Let’s Go Pens!!