CANTLON: (THUR) PACK DROP A CLOSE GAME TO SOUND TIGERS  

BY: Gerry Cantlon, Howlings

BRIDGEPORT, CT – The Hartford Wolf Pack returned from their holiday break and dropped a 3-2 decision to the Bridgeport Sound Tigers on the front end of a home-and-home series with their in-state rivals before 5,098 at the Webster Bank Arena on Thursday night ending a three-game winning streak.

The Wolf Pack record drops to 14-15-1-2 (31 points) and they fall into a seventh-place tie in the Atlantic division with the Providence Bruins. They are four points behind the Wilkes Barre/Scranton Penguins and the Springfield Thunderbirds.

Bridgeport remains in second place in the Atlantic division as their record improves to 19-9-4-1 (43 points) and trail the first place Charlotte Checkers by just five points.

“We made mistakes at critical junctions of the game,” said Pack head coach, Keith McCambridge. “They forced us into some of those mistakes (and) that hurt us.”

The Pack was putting pressure on their hosts late in the game looking for the equalizer, but with just 3:03 remaining, team captain, Cole Schneider, made their task more difficult when he took a costly five-minute major penalty.

Schneider crosschecked Connor Jones in the chest in the Wolf Pack zone. He then followed that up with a series of haymakers. Bridgeport’s 5’6 Stephen Gionta, fresh off a three-game suspension, jumped into the fracas and for some unexplained reason was not called for being the third man in.

Clearly, Schnieder was angry after taking a dangerous hit to the head.

“Did you see the hit to the head?“ McCambridge shot back when asked about the penalty. “That’s about the safety and well-being of a player. It was not a good hit at all.”

McCambridge said he would send the tape to the AHL offices for review for a suspension.

Schneider was hit with an instigator, a major for fighting and issued double game misconduct penalties for the fighting major in the last five minutes of the game, and as the aggressor in a fight. Jones only got a roughing minor.

Schneider’s 27 PIM total on the play resulted in a one game suspension with the major in the last five minutes of the game and the aggressor penalty.

Sound Tigers head coach Brent Thompson was amazed anything happened. “To be honest, I missed it. I was shocked, I was watching (other) things, next thing a fight broke out. Things happen in hockey, I missed (what led up to it).”

A review of the AHL Live game video afterward showed Jones hitting Schneider along the left wing boards in the Sound Tiger zone. The replay appeared to make it seem more like a typical hockey play where a player is rubbed out rather than a deliberate targeting of a shot to the head. At very least, the video appears to be inconclusive.

Schneider was able to skate up the ice to engage Jones and never fell down.

The Pack’s John Gilmour had two solid scoring chances of his team-leading six shots for the game. Both of them were stopped. Dustin Tokarski (28 saves) flat out stole a goal away from ex-Pack, Chris Bourque with a glove save with 1:03 left and the whole top portion of the net wide open.

The Sound Tigers had solid early chance in third to extend their lead as Scott Eansor in the Wolf Pack zone was able to create space and slipped a neat backhand pass to Sebastian Aho at the right point and his low to the ice wrist shot through traffic hit the post at 4:57.

The Wolf Pack clanged one off the iron themselves as Rob O’Gara put a shot to Jeremy Smith’s (23 saves) stick-side connected solidly with the post and went to the corner.

The two teams continued their pace of the first period in the second and each goalie came up with solid saves.

Tokarski faced several good shots from former QU Bobcat, Travis St. Denis, and stopped all three of them and the Pack tied the game shortly thereafter.

At 10:52, while on the Sound Tiger powerplay, St. Denis tried a toe drag shot from the slot. Tokarski stayed with it and then made a left pad save at 12:16.

“Dustin played very well for us. He gave us a chance. I have no complaints with his game tonight,” McCambridge said.

Steven Fogarty came out of the penalty box and nearly converted a steal into a breakaway. On the very next offensive zone at 13:20 Fogarty tried, off a quick two-on-one, to zip a pass over to Vinni Lettieri on the left-wing. In one motion, on a shot off his back foot, Lettieri drilled his eighth goal past Smith to tie the game at two.

“A real quick shot, a true goal scorer’s goal,” McCambridge said of Lettieri. He has had seven points in his last five games and was getting a post-game medical examination after getting hit with the puck below his right eye. He left the game with 11 seconds remaining.

The Pack had a late power play and a chance to go ahead before the second period expired, but it would be Bridgeport that did.

Gilmour overhandled the puck in the Wolf Pack end of the ice and fell down. Scott Eansor took the puck and skated in. He made a shake-and-bake move and went from a forehand deke to slipping a backhander past Tokarski with 22.9 seconds left. It gave the Sound Tigers an emotional lift going into the locker room with his second goal of the game.

“That was one of the mistakes at critical junctures.” That was all McCambridge would say about the eventual game-winning goal.

“Scott’s been playing well lately. His offense is coming on and it’s nice to see him get rewarded,” Bridgeport head coach Brent Thompson said. “He has been one of those players who has created offense off the penalty kill. Right now, he’s playing a solid 200-foot game.”

In a swift skating, very up-tempo first period, the Sound Tigers led 2-1 at the intermission.

The Sound Tigers scored first of an O’Gara turnover that went right to Tanner Fritz which became an instant two-on-one. Fritz spotted Eansor on the left wing and drilled his fourth goal past Tokarski at 2:17.

The Wolf Pack answered back just 1:41 later. Ville Meskanen was in the right circle. He zipped Chris Bigras’ rebound off a right point shot past Smith for his seventh goal of the year.

Meskanen now has four points in his last five games.

“He has a strong knack of being in the right spot. He makes really nice plays in high traffic areas. He had a very good release with quickness on that shot,” McCambridge said.

The Sound Tigers got the lead as the Wolf Pack had a goof up at the bench on the power play with a too many men on the ice penalty not getting a chance to attack the Sound Tigers PK which usually is in the top five currently is in the bottom five of the AHL number 27 entering the contest.

The Sound Tigers quickly used the extra ice in the four on four in just 12 seconds.

Parker Wotherspoon fed defense partner Kyle Burroughs and the Sound Tiger captain circled the Wolf Pack net and hit Kieffer Bellows with a pass who was wide open in the right wing circle. Bellows down to the shooters one knee nailed a no-mistake-about-it-slapshot past Tokarski at 10:36 for his eighth of the season.

The two teams kept up a strong pace with Tokarski stopping St. Denis at 12:49 and with 2:58 left in the period, Smith denied the Pack bid on his doorstep.

WOLF PACK LINES:

Fogarty-Schneider-Lettieri
Fontaine-Beleskey-Meskanen
O’Donnell-St. Amant-Drew Melanson
Butler-Leedahl-Wallin

Gilmour-Hajak
Bigras-O’Gara
Day-Pedrie

PACK SCRATCHES:

Tim Gettinger (concussion)
Ryan Lindgren (lower body)
Brandon Crawley (lower body)
Ryan Gropp (healthy)

NOTES:

The Wolf Pack roster rotation continues. Both defenseman, Sean Day and Ryan Gropp, were recalled from Maine (ECHL) and have jersey numbers 74 and 11 respectively.

In 19 games, Day posted 4 goals and 11 assists. He was a plus-4 and had six penalty minutes. He skated in 6 games with Hartford in the season’s first month before being assigned to the Maine Mariners on November 5^th. He was recalled as a result of the injuries to Ryan Lindgren and Brandon Crawley.

Gropp posted eight points in eight games (5g. 3a) in Maine. In the 19 games he’s appeared in before being reassigned to Hartford, he had two goals and three assists (5 pts).

The team was without their leading scorer, Peter Holland (31-9-18-27). He has a team-best three game-winners and four points in his last three games. Holland was handed a two-game suspension by the AHL on Canada’s Boxing Day as punishment for a check to the head in Saturday’s game against Rochester. He was not penalized on the play but did set off a mini-ruckus near the end of the game in the Pack’s 5-1 victory.

Rochester’s Yannick Veilleux was also handed a two-game suspension for his actions during the late game scuffle.

Cole Schneider’s four-game point scoring streak came to an end.

Vince Pedrie played for just the seventh time this season. He’s been a healthy scratch for 22 of the team’s 29 games.

Ex-Pack defenseman, Ryan Graves, was recalled by the Colorado Avalanche from the Colorado Eagles (AHL) and another Caleb Herbert goes from Utah (ECHL) to Colorado (AHL).

Ex-Sound Tiger, Alan Quine, is returned to Stockton by Calgary.

Jake Marchment, the nephew of former Hartford Whaler, Bryan Marchment, and the cousin of current AHL’er Mason Marchment (Toronto), was recalled from Utah (ECHL) by San Diego.

Ex-Pack, Desmond Bergin, signs a PTO deal with Milwaukee. He was with Adirondack (ECHL)

Ex-Pack and Sound Tiger, Taylor Beck, switches KHL teams again going from Kunlun (China-KHL) to his first KHL team Avangard Omsk at the KHL Trade deadline.

SPENGLER CUP

The Spengler Cup, a Christmas tournament, is underway in Davos, Switzerland. The host, HC Davos, has two ex-Wolf Pack players in Andres Ambuhl and Bobby Sanguinetti. Among the other five teams participating are several ex-Wolf Pack, Sound Tigers, and a smattering of ex-Whalers. The Nuremberg Ice Tigers (Germany-DEL) have Brandon Segal and Chris Brown and a pair of ex-Sound Tiger in Jake Newton and Jason Bast. HC Ocelari Trinec (Czech Republic-CEL) has ex-CT Whale, Tomas Kundratek, David Musil, who’s the nephew of ex-Whaler, New York Ranger and New Jersey Devil, Bobby Holik. They also have ex-Sound Tiger, Tomas Marcinko. Metallurg Magnitogorsk (Russia-KHL) has ex-Pack, Alexei Bereglazov. Team Canada under co-GM’s Sean Burke, and Ron Francis, with their head coach, Kevin Dineen, are all ex-Whalers. The assistant coach is ex-Wolf Pack and Ranger, Gordie Dwyer. On their playing roster is an ex-Pack Dominic Moore, who was also a Ranger, Kodie Curran, and Adam Cracknell, plus Torrey Mitchell (Hotchkiss Prep). KalPa Kuopio (Finland-FEL) is led behind the bench by ex-Whaler, Sami Kapanen, who is also the franchise owner and Chairman of the Board. Kapanen’s assistant coach is an ex-Sound Tiger from their first season, Marko Tuomainen.