CANTLON: SENATORS FILIBUSTER WOLF PACK, 5-1
VERSUS 
BY: Gerry Cantlon, Howlings
HARTFORD, CT – A shortened Belleville Senators bench buried every Hartford Wolf Pack mistake and gave them a convincing 5-1 road win Friday night at the XL Center.
The Senators were paced by Christian Jaros and Max Reinhart who each posted a goal and an assist. Francis Perron had two assists while goalie Danny Taylor did his part with 35 saves.
“We hustled and were hungry and worked hard tonight and capitalized on our chances. We were opportunistic,” said Belleville head coach, Kurt Kleinendorst.
Kleinendorst’s roster was down four players. Two were out serving suspension (Max McCormick and Vince Dunn). The team’s leading scorer, Chris DiDomenico, was on recall to the NHL after Ottawa sent for him that morning. They also lost their most veteran defenseman, Eric Burgdoerfer, to a knee injury after a mid-ice collision with Adam Tambellini in the first period.
The Senators scored twice in the third.
Daniel Ciampini poke-checked the puck from a returning Vince Pedrie, who made his regular season debut. Ciampini fed Max Reinhart who went in and made a nice forehand move off a deke and slipped his first of the season by Chris Nell.
“That was a huge goal,” said Kleinendorst. “Ciampini really made the effort and epitomized how determined we were and Max made the right move and if we battle like that night-in and night-out we’ll be fine.”
His counterpart Keith McCambridge wasn’t too enthralled.
“We gave them chances on the ice that just shouldn’t happen. We got to manage the puck better in some spots.”
The Senators put wrapping paper on it when Tyler Randell scored an empty-netter off a pass from Perron. That goal made Kleinendorst very happy.
“That was such an unselfish play. (Perron) could have easily put it in the empty net, but he passed it to Tyler instead.”
The Pack had chances in the third to close the gap. The first came during a five-on-three power-play. Tambellini was in a perfect spot on the right wing but had his stick shatter allowing the puck to escape the zone as they lost 15-20 seconds regrouping and reentering the Belleville zone.
Ryan Graves had a backdoor opportunity at 11:32, but was turned aside by Danny Taylor.
“He made huge, huge saves for us tonight and (the Graves stop) might have been the biggest of the night,” Kleinendorst said of his veteran goalie who is just back after playing the previous two years in the KHL.
In the middle of the second, the Senators kept the Pack hemmed in their own end for over a minute when defenseman Brandon Crawley lost his stick. Eric Selleck gave him his stick, but it allowed Belleville to build momentum forcing an eventual tripping penalty by Alexei Bereglazov.
“That kept us on our heels a lot longer than you would like,” McCambridge said. “It’s an example how we have to be more effective in getting the puck out of our end and allow us to regroup, which was harder (on that shift).”
Then 13 seconds into the Bereglazov penalty, the Sens powerplay made it a two-goal lead at 3-1.
Perron fed Jaros at the top of the left circle with a perfect cross-ice pass which that he ripped to Nell’s short-side. The goal was Jaros’ first pro goal.
“That’s the type of shot he has and he’s our top guy on the powerplay,” Kleindorst said with a laugh. “We tell our guys to stand near the net, but not in front of the goalie because he shoots it so hard and sometimes you don’t know where it’s going to go. He is the quarterback on our powerplay. There was nobody between him and the goalie and he got it cleanly in the net. That tells you just how much power he has. Getting a two-goal lead on the road was a major plus for us at that point.”
For McCambridge, it might have epitomized the whole night for his team. The preceding play and a penalty that the other team took advantage of.
“Mistakes will happen we just have to keep them at a manageable level.”
Cole Schneider summed it up best. “(It’s) very hard to win a hockey game when you play just one solid period of hockey.”
The Pack seemed to be unable to get two passes together for most of the night. While they had just one chance, not a second or third attempt, despite generating 35 shots.
“We had several good chances even when their guy went to the net. We didn’t find a way to put them in,” said Schneider.
The defense seemed to have a hard time handling the Belleville forechecking.
The Pack fell behind early on a defensive zone turnover that led to the eventual scoring play.
The Pack gave up the biscuit and that allowed Senator Nick Paul to go on a breakaway. Nell pulled the team out of the fire with a big stop. The Pack struggled in vain to get the puck out of the zone. Janos fired a shot from the right point and Jack Rodewald won a one-on-one battle with John Gilmour and swept in his second goal of the season at 4:29.
The Pack did show their own quick-strike capability to even the game just 48 seconds later.
A newly constructed line with Lettieri was instrumental in the tally that could have been designed on an eraser board. The team got the puck deep. Matt Puempel got to it behind the back of the net and along with Chytil outworked defenseman Thomas Chabot and Ander Englund.
Chytil picked up the loose puck and made a semi-blind backhanded pass up the middle and right on the stick of Cole Schneider. The UConn alum made a nice deke move to put Taylor on the ice and flipped a backhand up top for his third goal of the season.
“I was yelling at him and I think he just saw me and Pump made a good play starting things off and I was able to finish that one.”
NOTES:
Lettieri is out day-to-day with a lower-body injury.
Alexander Georgiev will start in goal tomorrow in Wilkes Barre/Scranton.
McCambridge said he will be making an unspecified lineup change for the Wilkes Barre/Scranton game.
Scratched were Garrett Noonan, Lettieri, and Gabriel Fontaine.
Burgdoerfer’s injury will sideline him for the rest of the weekend pending more evaluation. “We hope he will be back with us next weekend. We have four rookies on defense,” said Kleinendorst, whose team is playing on the road for the first month while the renovation of their new home arena, The Yardmen Centre, is completed.
Howlings learned after the game that winger Malte Stromwall, playing in Greenville with the Swamp Rabbits, was placed on unconditional waivers by the Rangers, Stromwell is heading back to Europe to play the rest of the season.
Fellow Swede Robin Kovacs, went through the same thing earlier this month
Stromwell played two games and had a goal and an assist.
The Hartford 15th ranked powerplay was 0-for-6. The Senators are 22nd with the man-advantage. On the PK, the Pack are sixth and the Senators are sixteenth,
The Pack lines were:
Chytil-Puempel-Schneider
Tambellini-Nieves-Komaschuk
Whitney-DeSalvo-Gropp
Selleck-Fogarty-Catenacci
The defense pairings were:
Graves-Pionk
Bereglazov-Pedrie
Gilmour-Crawley
Ex-CT Whale, Andre Deveaux, signed with the Sheffield Steelers (England-EIHL). Former Sound Tiger defenseman, Kevin Mitchell, left Japan and will play Canadian senior league hockey with Dundas Real McCoys in the Ontario based Allan Cup Hockey League (ACH).
Belleville assistant coach Paul Boutilier is a former New Haven Nighthawk.
Senators captain Mike Blunden leads the AHL in PIM with 29 entering the weekend. The Senators are 13th overall in the conference.
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