Bears vs Hamilton preview, 2/11

Hershey Bears
record ~ 35-13-0-4 74 points
standings ~ 1st in East Division
most recent game ~ 3-2 Loss vs Portland, 2/8
last 5 games ~ 3-1-0-1
home record ~ 19-6-0-2
goals for ~ 200
goals against ~149
power play ~ 18.3% (9th)
penalty kill ~ 80.9% (24th)


Hamilton Bulldogs
record ~ 30-19-2-0 62 points
standings ~ 3rd in North Division
most recent game ~ 1-0 Win vs Lake Erie, 2/8
last 5 games ~ 2-3-0-0
road record ~ 14-9-1-0
goals for ~ 174
goals against ~ 136
power play ~ 21.0% (3rd)
penalty kill ~ 80.3% (25th)

last time teams met - Hamilton won 6-0 at home on October 29th.

Players to watch:

Hershey:

LW Oskar Osala (12)- After scoring 16 goals and adding 5 assists in his first 2 months (24 games) he has hit the wall. In his last 25 games he has 3 goals and 7 assists. Including NO points in his last 9 games.
RW Graham Mink (21) - After having a couple month slump in December and January (5 g, 5 a) he is lighting it up in February. In 3 games this month he has a goal in each and 2 more assists.
G Daren Machesney (1) - Has been no better than average most of the season and hopefully he forgot about the previous meeting with Hamilton. In that game he faced 30 shots and allowed 6 goals.

Hamilton:

RW Mike Glumac (15) - He is the team leader with 21 goals. In his last 8 games he has 4 goals and 2 assists.
C Ben Maxwell (91) - Second on the team in assists (23) and points (36). He has 5 goals and 6 assists in his last 11 games.
C Yanick Lehoux (85) - He leads the team in assists (30) and points (45). He hasn't scored a goal in his last 11 games but he does have 5 assists in those games.


News and Notes:

• Last season the home team won each game.

• This game marks the first of a 5 game road trip for the Bulldogs.
• The first 4 games of the trip are against the East division (WB, Phil, Nor)
• They have NOT lost more than 2 road games in a row this season. And they have lost their last 2 road games.

• After starting the season 15-3-0-0 at home the Bears are 4-3-0-2 in their last 9 games.
• In those 9 games 4 have gone to a shootout. In the previous 18 only 1 went to a shootout.

Wow...That Was Ugly

It is tough to do the review when the game was so bad. Nothing seemed to go right for the Bears in Hamilton last night as they lost 6-0.

Here are the only 2 positives I can really bring out of this game and 1 of them is barely positive considering the outcome.

• The Bears outshot the Dogs 37-30
• The Bears only gave them 3 power plays

Unfortunately for the Bears they allowed 1 goal on those power plays and gave up TWO shorthanded goals last night.

I have to give credit though to Marc Denis. He played very well and earned the shutout with 37 saves. He never appeared to be out of position or in any real trouble in goal last night.

And in our own end the Bears were TERRIBLE all around. There is a lot of blame falling on Daren Machesney today and that isn't entirely fair. Was he good last night....not really. But the defense was NON-EXISTENT! Numerous times I saw players standing wide open in the slot just waiting for a pass.

It was definitely not a good game for the Bears and I honestly didn't think they would get beaten like this with the offense they have. I thought that they would manage to at least score a goal or two in every game. And I think that is a testament to the Bulldogs defense and Denis.


My Three Stars of the Game

1. Marc Denis
2. Max Pacioretty
3. Matt D'Agostini

Grading the Performance:

• Power Play - F - 7 opportunities and no goals. And really no great looks. I said it before and I will say it again...this team needs to quit trying to make the perfect pass and the pretty goal and just start going to the net. They pass it around the perimeter too much. They obviously shoot but they to go TO THE NET MORE. This grade would have been passing but they gave up 2 shorties and that is UNACCEPTABLE.
• Penalty Kill - C - They were only out for 3 Hamilton power plays and they stopped 2 of them but they still seem to be skating around too much. On the goal Gordon (I believe) ended up getting way to low in the zone. He was standing next to the 2 defensemen instead of back in the middle where there was a WIDE OPEN man.
• Even Strength - C - They got their chances they just couldn't score. Denis shut them down completely. And they gave up goals and couldn't seem to play any defense. But this team still outshot the opposition and seemed to play okay at times but Denis was the deciding factor.
• Overall - F - I would say that this is good for the team. By getting destroyed they will hopefully realize that they can't just coast through games. They better be focused on defense today at practice cause they need to learn how to play in their own zone. Stop skating around chasing the puck and start covering the open guys.

Next up for the Bears....Friday night @ Albany. Check back for the preview tomorrow morning.

LET'S GO BEARS!!

Bears @ Hamilton Preview

Hershey Bears
record ~ 7-1-0-0 14 points
standings ~ 1st in East Division
most recent game ~ 8-3 Win vs Rochester, 10/26
last 5 games ~ 4-1
road record ~ 4-0
goals for ~ 44
goals against ~ 25

Hamilton Bulldogs
record ~ 4-2-1-0 9 points
standings ~ 3rd in North Division
most recent game ~ 2-0 Loss vs Quad City 10/26
last 5 games ~ 2-2-1-0
home record ~ 2-1
goals for ~ 23
goals against ~ 19

last time teams met - First meeting this season.

Players to watch:

Hershey:

LW Alexandre Giroux (12) - He is leading the Bears and the AHL in goals with 8. He is second on the Bears with 12 points and also with 21 PIMs.
RW Andrew Gordon (10) - Lost amongst the MAG line's incredible start are some other guys having good years. Gordon is one of them. He has 5 goals and 4 assists through 8 games.
D Sami Lepisto (37) - He is obviously not an offensive force like the MAG line with 1 goal and 5 assists through 8 games but he is leading the team with a +10.

Hamilton:

RW Matt D'Agostini (22) - D'Agostini is the leading scorer for Hamilton through 7 games this season. He has 4 goals and 6 assists and is a +2.
C Yanick Lehoux (85) - Lehoux is second on the team in scoring with 4 goals and 3 assists through 7 games. When healthy he is a dynamic player that is capable of 70 point seasons.
C Kyle Chipchura (17) - A familiar name from the Calder Cup finals a couple seasons ago. He has played in 5 of the games this season and only has 2 assists but is always dangerous.



Former Bear Marc Denis is the number one goaltender for the Bulldogs this season. So far he is having a very good season with a 4-1 record, 2.37 goals against average, and a .931 save percentage. He will more than likely get the nod Wednesday night against the Bears.

LET'S GO BEARS!!

Oh Canada

The Bear's need to stay south of the border it would seem. At least when it comes to Hamilton. Last season in the Calder Cup finals the Bears did not win a game north of the border and after last night's game, the Bears hope to never go back.

The Bear's lost last night 3-2 at Copps Coliseum. Hamilton's defenseman Mathieu Biron deflated the Bear's in the Calder Cup finals with his physical presence. Last night he deflated the Bear's with a game winning goal. His goal came about halfway through the third period to give Hamilton the win.

Referee Kyle Rehman called 15 total penalties, 8 on Hershey and 7 on Hamilton. Hershey converted on 2 of the 7 power plays and Hamilton scored 1 goal on the power play, although another Hamilton goal was scored right after a power play ended.

Hershey got goals from Andrew Gordon, his 12th of the year and first in 10 games, and Alexandre Giroux, his 21st of the year and 2nd with the Bears. Sami Lepisto assisted on both goals and now has 6 assists in his last 3 games. Hamilton goals were scored by Manlow (10th) and Corso (6th).

The goalies both had good games. Hershey had 33 shots and Hamilton goalie Yann Denis stopped 31 of them. In goal for Hershey was Daren Machesney and he made 28 saves on 31 shots.

Hershey fell to 3rd in the division behind Albany but still 3 points ahead of Wilkes-Barre. Hershey has 3 games in hand on Albany yet this season.

One more game in Canada for the Bear's. Hopefully this one goes more like the first one they played there on Wednesday. Today's game is against the Toronto Marlies, who are leading the North Division with 81 points this season.