BY: Gerry Cantlon, Howlings
HARTFORD, CT – Six months of hard work with all the peaks-and-valleys a season can bring, all boils down to one weekend and a four-game stretch.
The Hartford Wolf Pack sporting a 31-16-6-5 record (73 points) sit in third place in the AHL’s Atlantic Division have their third straight three-in-three weekend as well as next Wednesday’s meeting with the Providence Bruins, are all division games.
This set of games starts with a pair of XL Center home games on Friday and Saturday night against the Hershey Bears, who the Pack trail by three points.
“Every game we play is important and we’ll say the same thing next weekend and the weekend after that,” Pack head coach Kris Knoblauch said while trying to lower the pre-game temperature. “Unless you’re out of the playoffs, as the season wears on, all games are important.”
At 3 PM on Sunday afternoon the Pack play the Springfield Thunderbirds before the meeting on Wednesday with the Bruins.
“We want to finish as high as possible. First place in the division gets home-ice advantage. We are going to have to play against Hershey in back-to-back games and then Springfield. That’s our immediate task,” said Knoblauch.
Playing three-of-the-four games at home, and then a short 20-mile drive to Springfield takes some of the physical edge off and works in their favor.
Knoblauch, as the captain of the ship, is keeping his eyes on his troops and not much on Hershey. The Bears, however, are a quick counter-attack team and present a real tough test for the Wolf Pack.
“We’re not focusing as much on Hershey, but on our game. Getting a little more structure in our offensive structure. We just have had as much as we should. We need to get back to that.”
Having the puck more than the other team sounds trite and simplistic, but was a key to the Pack’s early-season success as well as getting off to fast starts and not playing from behind.
“It’s a big part of our identity, getting that first goal is important to get the other team to open up and take advantage of that.
Being prepared goes a long way, especially as this time of year rolls around.
“This time of the year, every game is big, but against those guys all points are big. We’ve spent the week preparing for this, now it’s just time to get out there,” the first-year pro, Patrick Newell, said.
Getting good starts in the first period was also a point of emphasis.
“We addressed getting off to better starts, not be on our heels so much,” veteran defenseman Vincent LoVerde said. “Something the group is looking to this coming weekend.”
Special teams will be a critical role in the weekend’s fortunes.
“It gets more critical as your season wears on, but so does five-on-five hockey. The teams are so close; special teams can make the difference and will likely factor this weekend,” Knoblauch said while keeping everything close to the vest.
For Newell, it’s some small adjustments that will help.
“We’ve been fine-tuning things. We have some success lately. You’re going to have those stretches. The good work will pay off for us.”
The goaltending, a source of strength all season while Igor Shesterkin was with the Wolf Pack, will be tested as the Wolf Pack go with veteran J.F. Berube who gets the nod for the next game.
“We solidified our goaltending in acquiring him. We have every confidence (in him) as we do in Adam (Huska). We don’t need for him to steal a game with a 58 save shutout. We need solid goaltending, and conversely, we need goal-scoring support from the team for the goaltending,” remarked the coach.
The goalscoring issue is not secondary, rather it’s the Wolf Pack’s primary scorers.
“We have gotten goals from our third and fourth lines. We need them (the other two lines) to contribute more to the mix. We don’t have any top-leading scorers of the league here, a top gun guy. It’s not where it should be or where we expect it to be. We need scoring from all of our forwards,” said Knoblauch.
A player with a keen understanding of Berube and what he can do is LoVerde, who won a Calder Cup with him during the Manchester Monarchs last season in the AHL before departing for Ontario.
That spring the Monarchs swept the Wolf Pack in the conference finals, the last time Hartford tasted playoff hockey.
“I’m very familiar with him having won a championship in Manchester and played with him in Ontario. (He’s a) very solid goalie. He knows how to play in crunch time. He’s a winner and he wants to win. He has solidified us back there. He’s a talker like Tom (McCollum) was, and we appreciate him and wish him the best, and Adam has been super all year. We have full confidence in our goaltending,” remarked LoVerde.
One element of surprise this weekend could be the return of Boo Nieves, who’s missed 13 games since January 31st. Knoblauch hopes to fill a gap that’s been occupied in his absence by a variety of players.
“We hope so (to have him play). We have missed him. We have filled the gap with Fogs (team captain Steven Fogarty), Newell and Gettinger. He has so many valuable minutes from five on five, penalty kill and the power play. We would love to add to our lineup,” Knoblauch said. The coach was clearly hoping his practice time and contact will allow Nieves to return.
NOTES:
One worry Knoblauch has and has no control over is what happens with the Rangers who have two emergency recalls left while they are doing a roster high-wire act.
“We’ve been fortunate so far this year with the Rangers (on the injury front), but right now they have no extra forwards or extra defenseman. So as soon as they get an injury, somebody has to go. They have no spares,” Knoblauch said.
The AHL Trade deadline on Monday only produced one trade, but it might have an impact on the Wolf Pack as the defending Calder Cup champions, the Charlotte Checkers, solidified their lineup by picking up the former captain of the Wolf Pack, Ryan Bourque, from the struggling Bridgeport Sound Tigers. The trade sent Cedric Lacroix and Terry Broadburst to Bridgeport. The first time he was traded was at the NHL Trade deadline five years ago to the Hershey Bears for Chris Brown. Ironically, Brown just signed a contract extension for another year with Nuremberg (Germany-DEL).
As they did last season, a few days ago, the Checkers also picked up a veteran goalie for the playoff run. Keith Kinkaid was loaned out from the Laval Rocket after spending most of the year as the number two man in Montreal behind Carey Price.
Hershey reassigned ex-Wolf Pack, Chris McCarthy, to the South Carolina Stingray (ECHL). The Springfield Thunderbirds recalled goalie Ryan Bednard from the Greenville Swamp Rabbits whose first AHL win was against the Wolf Pack.
The Sound Tigers also made some roster moves calling up Arnaud Durandeau and goalie Jakub Sharek from Worcester.
The Utica Comets received from the Vancouver Canucks, ex-Sound Tiger, Justin Bailey and from Kalamazoo, Mitch Eliot, the son of former New Haven Nighthawk, Daren Eliot.
The first Division I college signees have started signing ATO deals. Sami Tavernier Merrimack (HE) signs with Syracuse and his teammate Griff Jesks. They head down the road on I-90 to 290 to Worcester (ECHL).
There are five Division I players and six Division III players that have signed so far.
