BY: Gerry Cantlon, Howlings
BRIDGEPORT, CT – Tim Gettinger scored a stupendous shorthanded goal and had an assist to pace the Hartford Wolf Pack to a solid 4-1 road win to break a modest two-game losing streak over the Bridgeport Sound Tigers before 5,427 at the Webster Bank Arena.
“We did a very good job today because it’s much easier to play when we have all four lines going as we did today,” remarked Wolf Pack head coach, Kris Knoblauch.
Nick Jones also contributed a goal and an assist while Darren Raddysh had two assists and ended the three-in-three weekend on a positive note with three periods of solid play.
The Wolf Pack record improves to 30-14-6-5 (71 points) and they are in second place in the Atlantic Division, just one point behind the idle Hershey Bears who hold a game in hand.
The winner of the Providence Bruins and Wilkes Barre/Scranton Penguins are three points behind the Wolf Pack.
Bridgeport’s record slips to 19-30-5-2 (45 points) are in last place in the Atlantic Division and 30th overall in the AHL.
In the third period, the Wolf Pack extended their lead to two goals.
With team captain, Steven Fogarty in the penalty box, Nick Jones took his place on the PK and hit Gettinger with a lead pass.
The rest was all Gettinger.
He motored up the right-wing side past Josh Ho-Sang who was trying to defend him.
Gettinger blew by him, pulled the puck in around Sound Tiger goalie, Jared Coreau, and did a backhand-to-forehand in mid-air a la Bobby Orr, and tucked his 13th of the season into the net at 6:16 and gave the Pack a 3-1 lead.
“Jonesy hit me right in the middle (of the ice) and I was able to drive to the net on the backhand. That was a big goal to keep us moving forward,” Gettinger said with humility and modesty.
Upon further prodding, he would let a smile sneak across his face.
“When we see a forward playing D like that, we try to take advantage of it. I was able to lower my shoulder and got a good head of steam going to the net…the rest was a blur, to be honest.”
Reunited with his original linemate from the beginning of the season, Jones, who was shaking his head, and marveled at the play.
“He was able to drive so fast, it was amazing he made a move going that fast. Just a hell of a play.”
Gettinger was very happy with the team win.
“We weren’t very happy how the first two games this weekend went. Friday we weren’t at our best. Last night we did a lot of good things, but it wasn’t enough. Tonight, we put it all together. We came out and wanted the two points and we picked up the win.”
As the architect of the team, Knoblauch got the desired results.
“They really seem to like one another and putting the line back together, we got exactly what we wanted out of it.”
The Wolf Pack got another specialty team goal. Nick Ebert took Matt Beleskey’s pass and waited at the right point patiently as Fogarty moved in to screen Coreau along with defenseman Grant Hutton.
Ebert whistled a wrist off the cross bar and in for his fifth goal and the second Pack powerplay tally of the afternoon.
“Really good play all-around. You get a better chance when you take away a goalie’s eyes,” commented Knoblauch.
The Wolf Pack jumped out to a 2-1 lead with all five players getting touches of the puck.
The whole series started on a smart dish off by Patrick Newell as Darren Raddysh saw an opening along the right-wing boards. He took the pass and filled in the gap, motored to the net, and put the puck to the net.
Gettinger got the first crack at it. Jones, as semi-trailer from behind the goal line, reached out on the loose puck and put it in out in during the mad scramble. It was his eighth of the season to match his jersey number at 5:29.
“It was a nice play all-around to get to that point. I just saw the loose puck. Everyone was hacking and whacking at the puck. I got the last one,” Jones said with a laugh of his first AHL game-winning goal.
The Sound Tigers, with the 30th worst powerplay which has awoken over the last two games, connected on their first chance of the game.
Sebastian Aho was at the right point and spotted Ho-Sang wide open at the Wolf Pack goal line. The shot was deflected on a tip try by Nick Schilkey.
Ho-Sang got the puck and darted around the net.
Ho-Sang completed the wraparound attempt for his third goal at 13:10.
The Wolf Pack answered back with a powerplay goal of their own. It will be in contention for the Wolf Pack goal of the year before Gettinger’s goal.
After the Sound Tigers’ Jeff Kubiak blew out a tire on a rush attempt, Raddysh picked up the puck and put a short pass to Vitali Kravtsov at center ice.
Kravtsov weaved thru the middle of the ice and as he crossed the Sound Tigers blue line and put short pass in Vinni Lettieri’s wheelhouse.
Lettieri let loose a vintage one-timer on a 40-foot shot that went to the short-side, on Coreau’s stick-side who seemed shocked at both the power and speed of the shot for his team-leading 24th of the season at 15:08.
“It was a great shot off of two nice plays, and we have to have the powerplay working. You can’t rely solely on five-on-five scoring all the time. We could have had some more points this weekend if we capitalized on them (powerplays), even possibly a win on Saturday,” said Knoblauch.
Newly acquired goalie Jean-Francois Berube, in his second start for the Wolf Pack, kept things steady in the first period especially on an early breakaway by the Islanders 2019 first-round pick Simon Holmstrom with a clear shot, but a rolling puck Berube calmly stopped it.
He then took away a short-side attempt from Oliver Wahlstrom off a blast from the left-wing faceoff circle that made the difference for the Wolf Pack and two of the toughest of his 18 saves for the game.
“That save was crucial because if they score on that breakaway might be a whole different game for us. He’s veteran has Calder Cup experience. We’re glad to have him,“ remarked Jones of Berube’s first win as a member of Hartford.
The head coach thought the early part of he game set up the rest of the game.
“It really could have gone haywire early had they got the goal on a broken play really and JF was right here for that breakaway early on
LINES:
Fogarty-Kravtsov-Beleskey
Jones-Newell-Gettinger
O’Regan-Lettieri-Gropp
McBride-Dmowski-Ronning
Hajek-Raddysh
Ebert-Geersten
Crawley-LoVerde
SCRATCHES:
Boo Nieves – Upper-Body – Out Indefinitely
Yegor Rykov – Healthy – Seventh time in the last nine games.
Jake Elmer – Healthy
Gabriel Fontaine – Shoulder Surgery – Season Over
NOTES:
The Sound Tigers have now lost four in a row (0-3-0-1).
On the powerplay the Wolf Pack are 28th at 12.8% the Sound Tigers 30th at 11.3%.
On the PK the Wolf Pack is 5th best if the AHL at 85.3% and the Sound Tigers at 10th at 83.6%.
Two good things in yesterday’s Rangers 3-2 win over San Jose.
First, the Rangers won extended their recent record to 7-1 all with Igor Shesterkin in goal. The other is they are four points out of the playoff race for the second wild-card spot.
The bad thing, Phil DiGuiseppe played his tenth game which now requires the Rangers to pace him on waivers if they want to send him to Hartford. So, he will be in New York for the rest of the season.
Ex-Pack Shawn St.-Amant has signed a PTO with Chicago.
Ex-Pack defenseman Hubert Labrie was released from his deal by Belleville and assigned to parent Ottawa.
Two ex-Sound Tigers are on the move the brothers Holmstrom. Ben goes from Norfolk (ECHL) to Cincinnati (ECHL) and Josh exits Norfolk for Wheeling (ECHL).
They’re not related to the current Sound Tiger Simon Holmstrom as he is from Sweden, they’re from Colorado Springs, CO.
Not only players or coaches get recalls, but so do team’s staff.
The only voice of the Wolf Pack, Bob Crawford, gets his second recall to do a Rangers game. The first one was at MSG this one will be on the road at the Bell Centre in Montreal on Thursday.
The regular Rangers radio voice, Kenny Albert has a broadcast conflict and Crawford will have Rangers great from the 1970 and 1980’s Pete Stemkowski alongside to provide color commentary.
While the English language Canadiens broadcast on TSN 690 can be heard here at night you can go to the Rangers website and click on the audio section to catch the broadcast.
The game is being bumped off ESPN radio 98.7 to 1050 AM which is not a very strong signaled station the Rangers radio home because of a scheduling conflict.
Montreal will put out the Bienvenue sign for Crawford.
