HERSHEY, PA – Madison Bowey puts his stick on his head after the Hershey Bears fell in Game Two of the Calder Cup Finals Friday night. (Kyle Mace / Chocolate Hockey)
Outplaying a team doesn’t always mean you will win. That’s what happened Friday night in Chocolate Town. The Hershey Bears very much outplayed the Lake Erie Monsters on in Game Two of the 2016 Calder Cup Finals, but it just wasn’t their night.
HERSHEY, PA – Daniel Zarr celebrates his third period goal in Lake Erie’s 4-1 win in Game One of the Calder Cup Finals. (Kyle Mace / Chocolate Hockey)
Wednesday night marked the twenty-third time in Hershey Bears history the Calder Cup Finals have come to visit Chocolate Town, USA. The Bears faced off against a team from Cleveland for the first time since 1954, looking to claim the first game of the 2016 Calder Cup Finals.
From the time the Hershey Bears stepped off the bus at Giant Center Monday morning at exactly 12:00 am after beating the Toronto Marlies in the Eastern Conference Finals to puck drop of Game One of the 2016 Calder Cup Finals, 67 hours will have passed. That’s the quickest turnaround the Bears have had these playoffs, only a few hours less than a 72 hours turnaround they had against Wilkes-Barre in the second round.
But despite the short turnaround, the Bears are sticking to their game plan against Lake Erie. “Our message tomorrow morning is going to be ‘Play to our identity,'” Bears head coach Troy Mann said Monday morning at Bears practice.
Toronto, Canada – Bears players mob Justin Peters after Hershey clinched the Eastern Conference Title in Game 5 Sunday night. (Kyle Mace / Chocolate Hockey)
It was the result nobody expected (except me). The Hershey Bears are heading back to the Calder Cup finals for the first time since 2010 and beat the best team during the regular season in the process. After taking a 3-0 series lead, the Bears lost to Toronto in game four on Friday night, 5-0. But Sunday afternoon was the Bears day, as they pulled out a 3-2 victory over the Marlies, giving them the AHL’s Eastern Conference Title.
Toronto, CA – Ryan Bourque joins Zach Sill after Sill gave Hershey a 3-2 lead late in the second period of their 8-2 win over Toronto Wednesday night. (Kyle Mace / Chocolate Hockey)
Just like we all predicted: the Hershey Bears would score eight goals en route to an 8-2 win over the best team in the American Hockey League. Sure.
It was one for the record books: Eight goals, two shorthanded goals on one penalty kill, and a new all-time playoff points leader for the Bears.
HERSHEY, PA – Hershey Bears players celebrate Carter Camper’s OT goal against Toronto on Saturday night. (Kyle Mace / Chocolate Hockey)
Despite being outshot 40-23 on Saturday night, the Hershey Bears are heading north of the border with a 2-0 series lead over the Toronto Marlies. With goals from Chandler Stephenson, Jakub Vrana, and Carter Camper in OT, Hershey never seemed to be out of Game Two against the Marlies despite going down in shots 15-2 in the first and 27-7 after two periods.
Below the jump, my best photos from Saturday night’s game.
HERSHEY, PA – Aaron Ness joins teammates after Carter Camper scores Hershey’s first goal of the game Friday night. (Kyle Mace / Chocolate Hockey)
The Hershey Bears won their first game one of a series Friday night against Toronto. The Bears now hold a 1-0 after a 3-1 victory over the Marlies with goals from Carter Camper, Liam O’Brien, and Zach Sill.
Below the jump, my best photos from Game One.
HERSHEY, PA – Former Hershey Bear Connor Carrick will make his return to Giant Center Friday night for Game One of the Eastern Conference Finals. (Kyle Mace / Chocolate Hockey)
It wasn’t difficult for Connor Carrick to walk past his old locker room on Thursday before the Toronto Marlies practiced at Giant Center. “I just kept going. Got the memo awhile ago.”
After spending parts of three seasons in a Chocolate and White sweater, the 22-year-old defenseman was traded to the Toronto Maple Leafs right before the trade deadline in February. “A lot of confusion,” Carrick said about when he first learned of the trade. “A lot of trying to figure out the logistics of where am I going, when [I am going], where am I playing, who am I playing, and that kind of thing.
“You kind of going into a survival mode. You try and figure out ‘Alright, what time is my flight, what time should I eat, what can I eat at the airport?’ And try not to forget anything important in the move. You try and roll with the punches and just try and figure out one thing at a time.”
For the first time since 2010, the Hershey Bears are back in the Eastern Conference Finals where they will face one of the best teams to come through the AHL since the 2010 Hershey Bears team, the Toronto Marlies. This season’s Marlies team finished with 114 points and a 54-16-5-1 record. The teams only faced each other twice this season, each winning in the other team’s building.
With both teams coming off of a series that went the distance, we could be in for another long match-up between these two division winners.
I did a Question and Answer on Twitter tonight over on the blog’s account @ChocHockey. There were a lot of questions and wanted to save some of the best ones to give a bit longer than 140 characters to answer. Here are all of those questions.