JUST LIKE THAT 

VERSUS

Connecticut Whale head coach Ken Gernander, along with just about every coach from Pee-Wee on up, preaches to his players about playing the full 60 minutes. In Gernander’s case he’s been saying it in Hartford back to when he was on the ice as a player himself.

The Whale played reasonably well for 58:52 in their second of their four game road trip. But they broke down all over the ice during that other 1:08 and it cost them two standings points as they surrendered three-goals over that span and lost 5-2 in front of 4,891 at The Scope  in Norfolk to the Admirals on Friday night.

The first of the three, and what would prove to be the game winner, came at 11:22 of the final frame. There was a faceoff in the Whale defensive zone to Chad Johnson’s right. Blair Jones cleanly beat Tim Kennedy off the draw and sent the puck straight back to Mike Vernace at the top of the high slot. The Admiral defenseman unloaded a hard, rising shot through traffic that Johnson never saw and went into the back of the net.

Just 23 seconds later Jones, the game’s First Star, dug a puck out of the right corner away from Tomas Kundratek and found  Mike Angelidis in front of the net. Angelidis beat Valentenko to the front of the net and took the pass and jammed it in past Johnson. The goal made it a 4-2 score.

The Admirals scored again just 45 seconds later completing the trio as Durno, the game’s second star, took a cross ice feed from Pouliot who got it past Jyri Niemi over to the right circle. Durno then unloaded a hard shot that hit Johnson in the glove but he couldn’t stop it for what was the game’s final tally at 12:30

Johnson (35 saves, 13-13-3) was solid, but not spectacular in the net for the visitors, but across the ice he was opposed Cedric Desjadins (24 saves, 13-5-1) who was so outstanding that he demonstrated that he clearly has no business, at this point, being in the AHL.

Desjardins, who won both of his NHL starts for the parent Tampa Bay Lightning, including a stellar performance in a 2-1 victory over the NY Rangers, the parent team of the Connecticut Whale, was playing in his first game back in the American League. Why is anyone’s guess.

Tampa Bay was sitting on four goaltenders after they traded for Dwayne Roloson with the New York Islanders, so someone had to go. But in a VERY puzzling move, instead of dumping either of their other struggling goaltenders in Dan Ellis or Mike Smith, they sent truly the best goaltender of the four in Desjardins to Norfolk.

How used to seeing these kinds of great performances from Desjardins must the local media be when the Edmundston, New Brunswick native puts on an NHL-caliber performance that was simply Lundqvist-ian in it’s brilliance and he isn’t even among the Three Stars of the Game?

The Whale were just not the team that entered the game 13-2-0-3. Right off the opening faceoff, something didn’t seem right and they paid for it when just 17 seconds into the game they gave up a goal.

Tomas Kundratek got caught pinching along the right wing boards after failing to get the puck deep and that mistake turned into a 3-on-2 odd man rush back-up the other way. Chris Durno made an outlet pass to Marc-Antoine Pouliot who brought the puck into the Whale zone to the left wing point. Brodie Dupont went over to pick up the Admiral center, but he made a quick pass that got by Dupont to the slot that found Johan Harju’s stick. Harju blew past Pavel Valentenko and came in one-on-one against Johnson. Harju won that mini-battle snapping a low stick side shot just past Johnson’s outstretched right leg for the 1-0 lead.

To their credit, the Whale came right back and drew a penalty on Vladimir Mihalik and that’s when Desjardins went to work.

Kris Newbury was stopped cold in front following up on a Michael Del Zotto rebound and then Desjardins made, simply put, a highlight reel goal when he robbed the Whale’s Todd White. The 35-year old White was positioned on the right side doorstep and took a cross crease pass and Desjardins stayed right with it sliding across the crease and flashed the glove to rob White of a sure goal. White could do nothing more but skate away in frustration after such a stellar save.

But Desjardins wasn’t done. No, not by a long shot…pardon the pun.

Del Zotto, playing in his second game with the Whale after being sent down to rediscover the game that made him a member of the NHL All-Rookie team last season, fired another strong shot on goal. The puck rebounded out to Del Zotto’s defensive partner Stu Bickel and Desjardins again stoned a Whale dead red scoring chance.

But the Whale were persistent and kept getting chances and at 8:45 Dupont broke through for his teammates to knot the score.

Pierre-Cedric Labrie attempted the always dangerous across the slot pass in his own zone and it was intercepted by Dupont, who had another strong game for the Whale. Dupont was stopped by Desjardins on the first shot, no surprise there, but Kelsey Tessier dug the puck out and fed Dupont in the low slot for a second try. Dupont, wit ha defender hanging all over him, spun and fired a backhanded shot that eluded Desjardins and wound up in the back of the net for Dupont’s 6th of the season and his third goal to go along with three assists over the last seven games.

The Whale recovered from their bad start at 12:19 into the game led in shots 14-3, but then the tide turned on them and the momentum shifted the other way. They did catch a couple of breaks as Norfolk put a couple of their shots off the pipe and by the end of the period Norfolk had the last seven to make the shot total 14-10.

The second period saw the Whale come back and take the game back at the Admirals. But again, Desjardins rose to the occasion. His best stop coming early when he denied Evgeny Grachev off an odd-man rush.

But Norfolk responded and then just kept on coming as the 11-5 shots differential would later show.

At 10:06, Norfolk regained the lead. The line of James Wright centering Matt Fornataro and Paul Szczechura had a strong shift in the Whale zone. Fornataro, the right winger was able to wrestle the puck out behind the net from the Whale defense and sent it out to Wright at the left-wing faceoff dot.  Wright ripped a high shot that went over Johnson who was thoroughly screened by Szczechura restoring the Admirals lead.

Just shy of five minutes later the Whale would knot the score for the second time.

At 15:00 newcomer, veteran Jason Williams had the puck on the left doorstep. He went to center the puck back to Chad Kolarik, playing in his first game since missing two games with an undisclosed injury. But Scott Jackson went down in front of the pass and ended up redirecting it past a helpless Desjardins for his second goal in his fourth game since signing a Professional Try-Out contract on December 27th.

The Whale would have another great scoring chance 1:05 later. Jyri Niemi passed to a wide open Newbury who had the whole net to shoot at with Desjardins down and out, but the Whale’s leader in assists fired a shot that hit the post.

It was that kind of a night for the visiting Whale.

Even with the loss the Whale (19-14-2-5, 45 pts.) remain five points behind the first-place Manchester Monarchs, who lost 3-0 in Providence and the Portland Pirates, who beat Springfield at home, 4-1, moved into a second-place tie with the Whale. Portland has four games in hand on the Whale. The Pirates will make up two of those games, Sunday at Springfield and Tuesday at Worcester.

The Norfolk win broke a five game winless streak for the Admirals (0-3-1-1).

The two teams face off Saturday at The Scope at 7:15 before the Whale are off until next Friday night when they travel to Portland.

Bruce Berlet didn’t make the road trip, so Bob Crawford handles the recap at CTWhale.com. Jim Hodges has the Norfolk story at HamptonRoads.com.

GAME SUMMARY and OFFICIAL SCORERS SHEET

NOTES:

* When the team is tied after 2 the Whale are 7-2-2-1, in games decided by 3 goals, the Whale are 3-4-0-0 and in games where they are outshot, the team is 6-8-0-2

* Over the last five years the Whale are 8-8-2-0 against Norfolk.

* In the 20 games where the Whale have scored first they are 14-2-1

* The Whale are 5-6-1-1 against the East Division and 14-7-1-4

* Mats Zuccarello scored for his 2nd game winner in a row for the NY Rangers. “The Norwegian Hobbit” scored the only goal in the shootout with a fantastic move to beat Kari Lehtonen.

* Ryan McDonagh made his NHL debut and head coach John Tortorella said that he was impressed with the rookie’s skating. He didn’t access the rest of his game until he has had the ability to review the game tape.

LINES:

Dupont – Newbury – Tessier
Grachev – Kennedy – Jeremy Williams
Kolarik – White – Jason Williams
Soryal – Garlock – DiDiomete

Valentenko – Kundratek
Del Zotto – Bickel
Niemi – Nightingale

Johnson
Talbot

(Assistant Captains Bold and Italicized)

SCRATCHES:

Wade Redden – Lower Body, Day-to-Day
Oren Eizenman – Healthy Scratch

THREE STARS:

1. NOR – B. Jones
2. NOR – C. Durno
3. NOR – M. Vernace

ON ICE OFFICIALS:

Referee:
Jeff Smith (49)

Linesmen:
Mark Hamlett (81)
Scott Pomento (25)

NEXT GAME:

The Whale look to rebound from a rough Friday night and get back the winning way on Saturday starting at 7:15. After the game the team travels back to the Connecticut snow blanket. They’re off until the following Friday when they travel to Portland for a return meeting with the Pirates.  Bob Crawford and the pregame hit the air at a half an hour before the puck drops.

To watch the game live, you can purchased it for $6.99 at AHL-live.

For Ticket information for all home games, call (860) 548-2000.

Too far away or can’t make it? Listen live at WTIC.com or from your cell phone or computer visit www.twitter.com/howlingstoday for complete live in-game coverage of all games both home and away.

SCORE-SHEET:

Connecticut Whale 2 at Norfolk Admirals 5 – Status: Final
Friday, January 7, 2011 – Norfolk Scope

Connecticut 1 1 0 – 2
Norfolk 1 1 3 – 5

1st Period-1, Norfolk, Harju 15 (Pouliot, Durno), 0:17. 2, Connecticut, Dupont 6 (Tessier), 8:45. Penalties-Mihalik Nor (holding), 1:55; Nightingale Ct (roughing), 15:20; Labrie Nor (roughing), 15:20.

2nd Period-3, Norfolk, Wright 11 (Fornataro, Szczechura), 10:06. 4, Connecticut, Williams 2 (White, Nightingale), 15:00. Penalties-No Penalties

3rd Period-5, Norfolk, Vernace 6 (Jones), 11:22. 6, Norfolk, Angelidis 12 (Jones, Berry), 11:45. 7, Norfolk, Durno 11 (Pouliot, Quick), 12:30. Penalties-DiDiomete Ct (interference, misconduct), 13:09.

Shots on Goal-Connecticut 14-5-7-26. Norfolk 10-11-19-40.
Power Play Opportunities-Connecticut 0 / 1; Norfolk 0 / 1.
Goalies-Connecticut, Johnson 13-13-3 (40 shots-35 saves). Norfolk, Desjardins 13-5-1 (26 shots-24 saves).
A-4,891
Referees-Jeff Smith (49).
Linesmen-Mark Hamlett (81), Scott Pomento (25).