Hershey Falls 2-1 to Pens in Second Pre-Season Game

Wilkes-Barre celebrates one of their 2 goals as they come back to beat Hershey (Kyle Mace)

It’s getting closer. With the start of the regular season less than a week away, the Hershey Bears play the second of their three pre-season games Saturday night at Giant Center. And although the results don’t count in the standing, the Bears dropped their second straight to Wilkes-Barre Scranton, 2-1.

The game was typical of many pre-season contests; fights, goals, and more fights with many players still trying to earn a spot on the roster. Hershey showed they meant business minutes into the game, Matt Pope showing Mark French that he wants a spot on Bears by putting one past Scott Munroe.

Then in classic Hershey/Wilkes-Barre rivalry form, there were a few fights. First, Christian Hanson decided to dance with Zach Sill in a nice bout. (As I said on Twitter, who would want to fight a Hanson Brother’s son? That’s just asking for trouble.) Danny Richmond and Danick Paquette would both decide to have a fight of their own as they dropped the gloves with Alex Grant and Devin DiDiomete respectively.

Between both fights, Julien Brouillette would hook down Chris Barton and cause a penalty shot. Barton would miss, and as Scott Stuccio pointed out, Wilkes-Barre has only “only two successful penalty shots in 12 years.” Mid-way through the second period, Zach Miskovic would be hit along with boards by Zach Still. Miskovic had to be helped off the ice with what appeared to be a badly injured nose, and Still would receive a match penalty.

The Penguins scored two unanswered goals in the third period, first with Ben Street’s goal :26 seconds into the third, and then Brian Gibbons with just over three minutes left in the game. “You look for things to build on uite frankly after the first game there wasn’t a lot of things you could build off of,” said Bears head coach, Mark French. “Tonight, we’re still trying to put some systems in place, that we’ll at least have some ability to break it down and show guys. I thought the effort was good”

Tonight’s Notes:

• Braden Holtby was reassigned to Hershey right before tonight’s game
• After the game, the Bears cut 10 players: Phil Aucoin, Olivier Labelle, Jean-Michel Rizk, Matt Pope, Daren Machesney, David de Kastrozza, Danick Paquette, Philipp Grubauer, Maxime Lacroix and Phil Oreskovic

More photos by Kyle Mace:

Matt Pope scores against Scott Munroe

Zach Miskovic is tended to by Dan Stuck after being hit along the boards

More blood as Carl Sneep is hit in the face with a stick

Brian Gibbons’ goal makes Hershey’s pre-season record go down to 0-2