CANTLON: (SAT) CHECKERS KNOCKED OFF 5-2 BY PACK IN SEASON OPENER 

BY: Gerry Cantlon, Howlings

HARTFORD, CT – It was the rookies that were touted, but it was the veterans on the Hartford Wolf Pack roster that provided the balance of the offense while rookie goaltender, Igor Shesterkin, shut the door on the Charlotte Checkers in an opening night 5-2 victory before the lowest home opening night crowd in franchise history, 5,040, at the XL Center Saturday night.

“(We) didn’t look great at the start, but we needed to settle down and we didn’t get rattled. That was important and answered back. When we made mistakes, Shesty was great back there. He made the saves we needed. One thing though, we can’t rely on (the goalie) holding the fort all the time,” Kris Knoblauch said after his first win at the AHL level and as the Pack’s new head coach.

The veterans consisting of Danny O’Regan (three assists), Matt Beleskey (two goals), Vinni Lettieri (goal and an assist), and Vincent LoVerde (goal and an assist) were the offensive fulcrum for the Wolf Pack.

The Wolf Pack built a commanding 5-1 lead at 24 seconds into the third period when Beleskey, in a net-front special, on a LoVerde play, tallied his second of the night.

“I was happy for Matt who played so well for us. He overcame his disappointment with Rangers camp and (the veterans) showed their maturity. (They) did the little things, made quality plays all over the ice, from dumping in pucks to making good passes. I’m very happy for all those guys. I hope some of those younger players were watching, not that the young guys played bad, they did good, but, there is a learning curve. You need your leaders to lead, and they did that tonight,” Knoblauch said.

The Checkers made a game of it scoring twice to make it a two-goal game. David Gust put a rocket of a shot over Shesterkin’s glove hand at 4:10 to make it 5-2. Julien Gauthier followed when he was all alone in front of Shesterkin and swept in the rebound of ex-Pack, Brian Gibbon’s shot at 10:22 to make it 5-3.

It seemed like that queasy feeling of a season ago where leads would disappear quickly and often felt like it could be making a comeback, but the difference over last season was in the net in the form of Shesterkin.

“We didn’t play bad, but more passive than I would like, and Shesty was the difference,” Knoblauch said so succinctly.

Morgan Geekie, Hunter Shinkaruk, and Gauthier all tested the Russian rookie, but were all denied. Plus the Pack defense, led by Ryan Lindgren, blocked shots either fully or partially to aid their goaltender’s efforts.

Hanging in his stall was the Wolf Pack team’s “World Heavyweight Championship Belt” for his performance in the game.

“He bailed us out, if he doesn’t make some of those saves, we wouldn’t have the two points,“ Beleskey, who pointed out the belt, said.

In the second period, it was Beleskey who outworked the Checkers defenseman, ex-Ranger, Frederick Claesson, with a forehand sweep as he took the rebound of O’Regan’s shot to make it a 3-1 Hartford lead.

“Well, when I’m playing well, that’s the staple of my game. Getting rebounds. Winning battles, taking a few whacks, giving a few whacks back. That’s what makes me effective.”

Shesterkin had a quiet first period, but showed the dazzling form that had the Rangers salivating at the prospect of him being on Broadway midway through the second period.

He turned a series of shots over a three-or-four-minute period from the Checkers as they peppered him with four quality shots and owned the puck inside the Wolf Pack zone.

Eutu Luostarinen, then Gauthier from the right-wing circle, a deflection by Gibbons, and then defenseman Jake Bean’s drive, all acrobatically turned aside.

The Pack made it a three-goal advantage late in the second period.

Newly-minted captain, Steven Fogarty, beat two Checkers, Bean and his defensive partner, Ross McKeown, to the puck behind the goal line and flipped a backhand pass to Lettieri just coming into the right-wing circle. He wasted little time unleashing his shot and the puck was in the back of the net at 17:05 and the Wolf Pack had a three-goal lead.

The Wolf Pack earned their way to an early two-goal advantage

The second period saw the other part of the Russian connection, Vitali Kravtsov, pinned to the bench by the head coach after a listless first period of play. A little early-season tutorial for the prized prospect, a first in Pack history, or likely anywhere else in hockey that a player, no less than a prized first-rounder was parked on his keyster in Game 1.

Knoblauch addressed it head-on.

“It’s tough for players to adapt because they are so close to playing in the National Hockey League, and getting sent down here can be disappointing. A lot of players think its gonna be easy.

“I experienced it a lot in juniors. A kid is so close to making the NHL team and he comes back and they’re terrible for a couple of weeks. If you don’t work, and you wait for the puck to come to you, you won’t have much success. Vitali is a good player, and he will be a very good player. He just has to fight through the disappointment.”

The Checkers started where they left off from last season scoring early on the Wolf Pack.

Just 1:28 in, off a two-on-one off the right-wing, Janne Kaukonen, whose season last year was cut short by injury, banked his shot off the inside of Shesterkin’s left pad and gave the Checkers a 1-0 lead.

To the Wolf Pack’s credit, they answered back quickly.

Joey Keane came off the right point in the faceoff circle received a perfect cross-ice pass from O’Regan, who exercised great patience with the puck, and Keane beat goalie Alex Nedejlkovic to the far side for his first professional goal at 4:03.

Boo Nieves started the whole sequence off with some strong forechecking.

“We had a pretty balanced attack I thought. We have a lot of talent up front and the veterans kind of led the way,” said O’Regan.” I had the puck a little longer than I wanted, but he was pretty wide open, and Boo made a great first play on that and I was happy for him (Keane) getting his first pro goal. We did good job getting the puck and getting shots off.

“It was a strong start to the season. We have a good team playing hard, playing the right way. He (Shersterkin) played a great game. Good teams, have good goalies and he stood strong.”

The Wolf Pack gained their first lead as the veteran, right-handed shooting LoVerde, took a cross-ice pass from rookie Patrick Newell and beat Nedejlkovic from the lower part of the faceoff circle to the far side at 12:06.

NOTES:

The Pack record low attendance beat the previous mark by a 1,000 set in 2017-18.

Pack Scratches:
Jeff Taylor
Brandon Crawley
Ryan Gropp
Ville Meskanen

Lines:

Fogarty-Lettieri-Di Giuseppe
Fontaine-Chytil-Kravtsov
Gettinger-Jones-Newell
O’Regan-Nieves-Beleskey

The Checkers lineup included Gibbons (Salisbury Prep) whose one season in Hartford was an exercise in futility. The other local products were Chase Priskie (Quinnipiac University) and ex-Sound Tiger Colin Markison.

Friday night the AHL’s first action of season 84 featured eight games, six were decided by two goals or less and there were two shutouts Ontario 5-0 over San Jose and Tucson 2-0 over Texas.

Last Wolf Pack off the ice was Kravtsov. He was preceded by Lettieri, Gabriel Fontaine, and Di Giuseppe.

Fan Wolf Pack hockey jersey of the night; #44 Mike Ouellette, #41 Stu Bickel, and #17 Ryan McDonagh.

Other jerseys of note; Beast of New Haven #24 Steve Washburn, and a favorite player and jersey #16 Michel Goulet, of the Quebec Nordiques.

A very nice tribute to the late Bob Guarente, the long-time Chief of Off-Ice Officials who passed away over the summer after his second battle with throat cancer. He served from 1975 till last February when he retired.

Now the longest-serving off-ice official is Frank Camera of Bridgeport who served with six different teams in New Haven including the last three AHL teams in the Elm City, the Nighthawks, Senators, and Beast of New Haven.