AVERY IN, OFFENSE OUT 

    VERSUS   

When Sean Avery was sent by the Dallas Stars to the Hartford Wolf Pack, which has generally been seen as a prelude to his being reunited with the Rangers in New York, he was supposed to come in and spark the team and then go to New York and spark them there. Well, since being sent in to play in Hartford, “The Grate One” has inspired the team two it’s second consecutive loss and has led the team to scoring a grand total of one goal in two games as the Wolf Pack dropped their second straight and fourth in five with a 1-0 loss at home in front of 3,583 at the XL Center Wednesday night.

After the game, which wasted a phenomenal performance by the games first star, Pack goaltender Matt Zaba, Avery told reporters, “As far as battles go and getting hits, it was better on the lungs than in the first game, so I’m happy about that.”

Avery, was on the ice for the game’s lone goal in the first period.  With 2:18 remaining the Tiger’s Joe Callahan fired a shot from the blue line in on Zaba (31 saves) which he made the initial stop on, but the puck dropped into the crease. “The rebound was kind of lying to the side, and I slid over into my butterfly,” Zaba said afterwards. “I was there, but he (Tiger center Kurtis McLean, who had beaten the Pack’s Patrick Rissmiller to the puck) made a nice play. He hesitated, then moved over a little and I had to kind of open up and he put it through my five hole.”

Wolf Pack head coach Ken Gernander, was proud of the effort of his netminder. “He played dynamite,” Gernander told reporters. “He has played well for us, and that was a very good game for him.”

The Sound Tigers came out hard and pressed the Pack with a hard forecheck that kept the Pack pinned into their own end for long stretches. The Tigers took advantage of that by pouring 18 shots on Zaba with only McLean able to beat the Pack’s netminder.

“We didn’t have a very good start, and if you’re having trouble creating offense, you can’t afford to wait until the second or third period to really sense desperation or jumpstart your game,” Gernander remarked. “We were turning over a lot of pucks. Instead of playing along the walls and having puck possession with a ground game, we were just trying to do aerial saucers and toss things into the middle of their coverage.”

Zaba didn’t quite see it the same way, but the end result was the same. “I thought we started well, and then kind of went into a lull and they got the momentum,” the rookie netminder from Yorkton, Saskatchewan said. “We weren’t generating much offense, and they were doing a good job of staying disciplined and keeping our power play off the ice, which was pretty much the game.

In the second period, Gernander made some moves that at least woke up the crowd and got the team playing with more intensity bumping Brodie Dupont off the team’s top line and swapping him with Avery.

With Zaba standing on his head keeping the Pack in the game making great stops on Chris Lee, Ben Walter on two separate occasions and an amazing back-to-back stop on Pascal Morency and Sean Bentivoglio, Avery finally made his presence felt.

1:22 remained in the second when Avery drew the ire of rookie Joe Joensuu and drew a tripping call. On the ensuing power play, Avery did his best to treat Tiger netminder Nathan Lawson (23 saves) like Martin Brodeur and it almost paid off. Avery was right in front of Lawson and was yapping at him right on the tip of the crease. Avery got bumped and fell on top of Lawson which sent the Calgary native into a temper tantrum. He got up and took a poke at Avery and the two nearly came to blows. That sent the entire Tigers bench into an uproar, particularly Tyler Haskins who would have ended up fighting Avery had the officials not kept them apart.

On the next faceoff, Avery was lined up alongside Haskins on the far wall. With referee Ian Croft distracted with talking to Lawson, Avery took the opportunity to slap Haskins in the face. That sent Haskins into a mini frenzy and nothing was called on the play. As the period ended, Avery stood at the Pack bench door and had a giant  smirk on his face as he leered at the Tiger bench.

“They were coming at me from the start of the game, and I was a little quiet, which takes a little away from my game. Then I started to give back a little of what I was getting, which makes me play better.” Avery said. “I’m targeted, but I know I did it eight years ago. They’re all trying to get to the next level, so they wouldn’t be doing their job if they didn’t go after me. I’m not too happy about the loss, but I feel better for sure.”

If the intermission was a chance for the Tigers to relax and move on, Avery didn’t waste a moment to rile them up again. At the start of the third period, Avery got ahead of the defense on a shot that Lawson easily stopped. Avery rewarded him with a tsunami of a snow spray that once again flipped out the Tigers.

To give credit where credit is due, Avery tried his best to inspire his teammates and clearly had the attention of the Tigers entire bench. But the lack of a scoring punch since winning 6-2 against Lake Erie on a week earlier is an issue that needs to be dealt with if the Pack are going to make the playoffs in the extremely tight Atlantic Division.

Zaba tried his best to reassure the team’s supporters. “I felt good, but for whatever reason, we were a little flat. We definitely didn’t have our ‘A’ game, but we’ll get it back together for the weekend.”

Bruce Berlet has his take on the action at Hartfordwolfpack.com and the NY Post was there covering Avery and for Bridgeport’s perspective Mike Fornabaio does his masterful work once again in the Connecticut Post.

GAME SUMMARY and OFFICIAL SCORERS SHEET

NOTES:

* This was only the second time this season that the Pack were shut out.

* If you happen to be keeping score for the GEICO Cup, which the Pack have never lost since it was put in five years ago, the series is now tied at 4-4.

* This was the Tigers only win in four tries at the XL Center.

* After winning three straight in convincing fashion where they outscored their opponents 11-5, the Pack have lost five of their last seven being outscored 24-19.

* The Pack have totally displayed how dependent they are upon Artem Anisimov and P.A. Parenteau to put pucks in the net for them. In the Pack's three game win streak, Parenteau had a goal and four assists while Anisimov chipped in with a goal and two assists. Over the five games the team has lost, the two combined have added in two goals and one assist for Parenteau and just three assists for Anisimov. If the Pack are going to make a run at this someone is going to have to step up and start put
ting the puck in the net.

LINES:

Dupont  – Anisimov – Parenteau

Avery – Rissmiller Weise

Pyatt – MOORE – Zaborsky

DiDiomete – Ouellette – Ford

Sanguinetti – Potter

Urquhart – Sauer

Nightingale – Fahey

Zaba

SCRATCHES:

Owens – Oblique – Day-to-Day

Sugden – Suspension

Denisov – Suspension

Byers – Knee – Season

Soryal – Hand – Five Weeks

THREE STARS:

1. HFD – 30 Matt Zaba
2. BRI – 52 Nathan Lawson
3. BRI – 71 Kurtis McLean

ON-ICE OFFICIALS:

Ian Croft (87), Referee
Brent Colby (7), Linesman
Kevin Redding (16), Linesman

SCOREBOARD WATCHING:

In the only game affecting the Pack, Lowell topped Albany 3-2

STANDINGS:

                                       Games  Wins   Losses     OT   SOL   Pts

SCHEDULE:

Friday night Portland is on the road in Philadelphia, Providence hosts Manchester while Springfield entertains the visiting Worcester Sharks

NEXT GAME:

HUGE game for the Pack as the “red hot,” pardon the pun, Lowell Devils host Hartford. Here’s hoping that Avery confuses Jeff Frazee for Martin Brodeur and can lead the team out of this slump in his first road game in a Wolf Pack jersey.