IT AIN’T OVER TILL THE FAT LADY SINGS… 

VERSUS

There’s an old cliché every sports fan knows…“it ain’t over ’til the fat lady sings.” For the Hartford Wolf Pack, while they aren’t mathematically eliminated from playoff contention, after Saturday night’s 4-3 loss to the last place Springfield Falcons at the XL Center, if you listen carefully you can hear her warming up in the wings.

Since we’re on the subject of clichés, it was “déjà vu all over again.” This game became a microcosm of all that has plagued the Hartford Wolf Pack this entire 2009 – 2010 season; whether it was playing from behind, inopportune turnovers, erratic and inconsistent play between the pipes, an ineffective power play and a lack of any kind of timely scoring.

“You hit the nail right on the head,” the always candid Wolf Pack right wing Dale Weise said when presented that theory. We tied it up 2-2 in the second and then they score and make it 3-2 on the next shift. That’s one of the biggest times in the game where we have to bear down: the last minute (of a period) and shifts after goals. We just didn’t do that, and that’s exactly the way it’s been all year.”

Matt Zaba started between the pipes for the home team and had a rough first period. Zaba allowed two goals on just seven shots and was relieved at the end of the first period.

“We were outshooting them for a large portion of the period,” Head Coach Ken Gernander said in his post game press conference. “We controlled play and we were down 2-0 so we needed to make a change.”

At 10:02 Springfield did what the majority of teams have done to Hartford all season long. They scored first.

Colton Fretter brought the puck into the Pack zone and fired a shot from the left circle. The puck rebounded off Zaba (5 saves) and slid out tot he crease. Liam Reddox beat Ryan Garlock to the puck and the Falcon left winger attempted to pass the puck back to Rob Hisey. The puck went through Garlock’s legs and hit the left skate of Jared Nightingale who stood between Hisey and Zaba and went into the far corner of the net.

Nightingale nearly redeemed himself with 2:47 left when he spotted Pack captain Dane Byers getting ahead of ex-Pack defenseman, and current Springfield assistant captain, Jake Taylor, in close to the net and put the puck right on the left winger’s stick.

Springfield netminder Bryan Pitton (33 saves, 2-2-0) held his ground and stopped Byers in front. Taylor tackling his former teammate certainly helped negate Byers getting much on his shot. Even bigger than that was referee Mark Lemelin not making a call on a blatantly obvious penalty.

The lack of a call became even bigger when with just 22.4 ticks of the clock remaining in the period, another ex-Pack, Dean Arsene blasted a shot from the left point hit Zaba’s pad and went into the net. It appeared on the replay that Zaba never saw the shot as there was lots of traffic in front of him.

So despite outshooting Springfield 17-7, the Pack entered the second trailing by two goals.

Chad Johnson (10 saves, 16-16-2) came into the game in relief to start the second period.

The Pack turned up the pressure to start the second period. Colin McDonald bloodied the lip of Anders Eriksson just 47 seconds into the period and gave the Pack four minutes of power play time on a high sticking call.

For most of the power play the few shots that the power play units did generate all missed the net. That was until there were only 7 seconds left in the four minute advantage. The American League’s third leading scorer, Corey Locke took a pass along the right wing half boards from recent Charlotte call-up Julien Brouillette. Locke put a move on Matt Nickerson and created space for himself in the slot. The Toronto native fired a hard rising shot that beat Pitton high to the glove side for his team leading 29th of the season cutting the Springfield lead in half.

1:17 later, at 5:51, the Pack knotted the score when Derek Couture’s backhander beat Pitton after following up on the rebound of his own shot. Garlock got the assist.

But Johnson could not keep his opponents off the scoreboard.

After starting off very hot and getting time in New York with the Rangers where he went 1-2-1, Johnson has struggled. The rookie netminder from Calgary, who the Rangers acquired from Pittsburgh for a fifth round draft pick before the season, set a team record losing seven consecutive starts before finally ending the streak by beating these same Falcons on March 12th, looked shaky again and gave up a goal just 21 seconds later.

Charles Linglet followed up a shot that a wide open Jordan Eberle fired right past Johnson.

Eberle was a hero for the Canadian National team in the World Junior Championship held earlier this year. In just two games played since his juniors’ season ended at Regina of the Western Hockey League, Eberle has five points (2g, 3a). The Pack had no answer for him all game long.

Eberle would assist on what would prove to be the game winner by another ex-Pack in this game. Chad Wiseman, a teammate of Gernander’s, scored a goal that should never have gotten past Johnson but did. Johnson was squared up to Wiseman on the right wing circle, but just plain missed the wrist shot form the veteran winger.

It wasn’t like the Pack didn’t have their chances to score goals.

Much like it has all season, the Pack power play let them down with a one-for-seven performance. Lemelin gave the Wolf Pack four power play opportunities in the third period and the Pack came up empty on all of them.

“What more can you ask for?” Weise said. “We just got to capitalize. Our power play has been hot at times and it’s really been really cold at times. We needed to score and we didn’t. What else can you say?”

“We had some good chances on the power play,” Gernander said. “Maybe we could have used a little more screening than tipping, we had some good deflections that just missed” He said. “There were some good chances generated. We did have one power play goal tonight.”

That’s been pretty symptomatic of the Pack’s entire season as well. Blown opportunities off ineffective man advantages.

The Pack made it interesting…much as they’ve done all year…When Brodie Dupont took a sweet cross ice feed from Garlock and redirected it past Pitton for his 16th of the year

One last great opportunity was afforded the Pack with less than a minute to go to get the equalizer, but Locke could not handle a solid cross ice pass from P.A. Parenteau and flubbed his shot which gave Pitton time to cover it.

“Shots were pretty good in our favor (36-19), and we controlled play for large portions of the game,” Gernander said. “I don’t know which portion of the game we were clearly outplayed.” said the clearly exasperated Pack head Coach.

Weise tipped his hat to the Springfield netminder. “I thought we had enough chances to win, but I thought their goalie played great. Just on me alone, I thought he made three saves on which I should have scored. There were a couple breakdowns that led to goals, and they aren’t really the goalie’s fault a couple of mistakes led to the goals. We gave them opportunities.”

With Wilkes-Barre defeating Rochester 5-4, that leaves the Wolf Pack ten points out of a playoff berth with just 11 games to play for the final spot in the Eastern Conference.

It’s sure looking like the team streak of twelve consecutive playoff appearances is going to come to an end.

When it’s all done, the Tune that the Fat Lady sings will probably be off of the Led Zeppelin album, “The Song Remains the Same” because it’s been the same things over and over all season long.

Bruce Berlet’s story can be read at Hartfordwolfpack.com. Dan Hickling was in the XL Center and he takes you inside the winner’s locker room at MassLive.com.

Bob Crawford has a nice profile of the Pack’s P.A. Parenteau at TheAHL.com.

Springfield Falcons 4 At Hartford Wolf Pack 3 – Status: Final

Mar 20, 2010 – XL Center Veterans Memorial Coliseum

Springfield 2 2 0 – 4

Hartford 0 2 1 – 3

1st Period-1, Springfield, Reddox 17 (Fretter, Bendfeld), 10:02. 2, Springfield, Arsene 2 (Linglet, Eberle), 19:37. Penalties-Byers Hfd (high-sticking), 12:44.

2nd Period-3, Hartford, Locke 29 (Brouillette), 4:34 (pp). 4, Hartford, Couture 9 (Garlock, Soryal), 5:51. 5, Springfield, Eberle 2 (Linglet), 6:12. 6, Springfield, Wiseman 21 (Eberle, David), 12:42. Penalties-McDonald Spr (double minor – high-sticking), 0:47; Trukhno Spr (hooking), 6:38; Locke Hfd (interference), 8:06; Dupont Hfd (hooking), 14:07; Newbury Hfd (high-sticking), 16:38.

3rd Period-7, Hartford, Dupont 16 (Garlock, Eriksson), 15:53. Penalties-MacMurchy Spr (tripping), 4:15; Trukhno Spr (tripping), 8:37; served by Fretter Spr (bench minor – too many men), 12:55; Arsene Spr (slashing), 15:39; Newbury Hfd (slashing), 15:39; served by Fretter Spr (bench minor – too many men), 17:37; Eriksson Hfd (interference), 19:16.

Shots on Goal-Springfield 7-8-4-19. Hartford 17-9-10-36.

Power Play Opportunities-Springfield 0 of 5; Hartford 1 of 7.

Goalies-Springfield, Pitton 2-2-0 (36 shots-33 saves). Hartford, Zaba 6-11-2 (7 shots-5 saves); Johnson 16-16-2 (12 shots-10 saves).

A-4,694