By: Jason Alwang, Howlings
HARTFORD, CT: The Hartford Wolf Pack could not withstand a first-period storm by the visiting Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins, which silenced the 7,833 in attendance at home. It was another tough XL Center loss as the Penguins beat the Wolf Pack, 4-1, as they lost more ground in the playoff race.
Wolf Pack Head Coach Grant Potulny attributed the opening period as the deciding factor in the loss, “I didn’t think we had the proper response in the first period. I did think we responded well in the second, it would’ve been nice to have one more in the second.”
The Penguins scored their game-winning second goal at 12:03 of the first period on a 5-on-3 man-advantage.
Avery Hayes capitalized when the Penguins got a shot to the net with traffic in front and tapped the puck past Wolf Pack starting netminder, Louis Domingue, for a 2-0 lead.
Domingue made 24 saves to keep the Wolf Pack in the game, but defensive woes would be their downfall.
“I’m focused on where our effort is.” Potulny said. “We just got to keep with it, stay with it, and work on getting better every day.”
Rutger McGroarty scored his seventh goal of the season from alone in the circle. His wrister came off a feed from Tristan Broz and beat Domingue for a 1-0 lead 29 seconds into the first period.
The Penguins’ offense shined throughout the first period. The Wolf Pack seemed lost defensively, which resulted in a Boris Katchouk one-timer tallying his 16th goal of the season past a diving Domingue, who had no chance as the Penguins took a 3-0 lead at 15:58 of the opening period.
The Wolf Pack cut into the Penguins’ lead on a Maxim Barbashev tally, his first AHL goal after his callup from the Pack’s ECHL affiliate, the Bloomington Bison, which came among a slew of Thursday roster moves. A point shot from Brett Budgell got to the net, creating a rebound opportunity that initially pounced on Blake McLaughin’s stick, which then bounced back out for Barbashev to tap it in past Penguins’ goaltender Filip Larsson (26 saves). It put the Wolf Pack on the board at 7:34 of the second period.
“Max has good energy, he’s got good speed, he’s physical.” Potulny on his newest call-up. “When you have guys called up, that’s what you’re hoping to get out of them.”
With Domingue pulled for the extra skater, Mark Johnstone scored his 5th of the season with a shot into the empty net with 28 seconds left in regulation time to put the game away at 4-1.
Forwards Alex Belzile and Anton Blidh were removed from the lineup minutes before warmups for “nontransactional reasons.” Brett Berard and Brennan Othmann were sent back to Hartford by the NHL parent New York Rangers for Friday’s game. Zac Jones played his first AHL game under his conditioning stint after being sent down by the Rangers.
The Wolf Pack record is now 20-25-5-1 with a game back at the XL Center Saturday night against the Providence Bruins.
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