BY: Gerry Cantlon, Howlings
HARTFORD, CT – Joonas Koppannen and Edwards Tralmaks had three points to pace the Providence Bruins to a 3-1 win over the Hartford Wolf Pack Saturday night.
Providence won on Friday night, tossing a 5-0 shutout at home against the Hershey Bears, and now have two wins in a row and won five of their last ten.
With a whole week of rest, the Wolf Pack rust showed as passes weren’t crisp, and scoring chances went unfinished. They had no shots for the first half of the second period.
Wolf Pack Head Coach Kris Knoblach was non-committal on his lineup for Sunday.
The team struggled offensively.
“Sometimes we made that extra pass. We have to be creative and we don’t want to take away from that. In games like this when chances are hard to come by. The best way is to simplify our game, get pucks on the net, and our game will take care of the rest and those little things will help open things up more,” Matt Lorito spoke following his fourth game as a member of the Wolf Pack.
CRUCIAL SECOND PERIOD
The second period was crucial.
Just seconds after Johnny Brodzinski missed the net with a solid backhander; the Bruins found the back of the net.
“We started to build things after we got that goal. We had a lot of zone time, then we made mistakes in the second and third. We had that penalty in the third period that led up to their goal, but there were a lot of mistakes that contributed to our play that led up to that goal,” Knoblauch said.
Tralmaks, a Latvian native, got the power-play started on the right-wing. He hit Samuel Asselin with a cross-ice feed. Asselin entered the Pack zone on the left-wing side and sent a smooth cross-ice pass to Koppanen. From the top of the right-wing circle, at 16:36, Koppanen blasted a one-timer past Pack netminder Keith Kincaid for his seventh of the season and second of the game.
WOLF PACK GOAL
Lorito tallied the Wolf Pack’s lone goal from Ty Ronning at 10:16 of the second period. It was Lorito’s first as a member of the Wolf Pack and his first AHL goal in two years.
When he played in Bridgeport, Tanner Fritz, a former teammate, got in the zone along the right-wing boards. He fought off Cam Hughes and former Wolf Pack training camp invitee Blake Hillman, who is on a PTO deal.
The puck squirted back behind the net to Ronning. The 5’9 winger backhanded the puck in front to Lorito, who wasted little time taking the shot.
The Wolf Pack (23-14-4-2) remains in second place with a .605 winning percentage with the loss. The win puts the Bruins (21-13-3-3-5) closer behind the Pack in third place with a .600 winning percentage.
LINES
Gettinger-Brodzinski-Greco
Ronning-Fritz-Lorito
Richards-Khordorenko-Ruesschoff
Whalen-O’Leary-DiGiacinto.
Tinordi-Lundkvist
Giuttari-Robertson
Reunanen-Bitetto
Kinkaid
Huska
SCRATCHES
Pajuniemi
Taylor
Skinner
Wall
Luchuk
NOTES
Ex-Pack Nik Latta is the nephew of former New Haven Nighthawk Dave Latta. He leaves his team, the EV Weiden (Germany Division-3), coached by his father Ken and where his brother Louis also plays. He was loaned to EV Ravensburg (Germany DEL-2) for the rest of the season.
Frédéric Létourneau (Hotchkiss School) departs the Greenville Swamp Rabbits (ECHL) to trade the Idaho Steelheads. His father, Daniel Létourneau, is a former Division-II player from the late 1970s and early 1980s with the University of New Haven Chargers.
