The Hershey Bears found themselves in an exceptionally unusual position before Saturday night’s game against Lake Erie: confronting the possibility of an actual losing streak. On Friday night the Bears traveled to Adirondack and lost a 2-0 lead, succumbing to the Phantoms 5-3. Hershey, however, doesn’t lose a lot. The Bears last lost consecutive games just before Thanksgiving, and one of those came in a shootout. The team’s last consecutive losses in regulation play occurred October 23rd and 24th — around the time of the World Series.
Saturday night’s game, while not a highlight reel affair of exceptional skill, featured lots of open ice skating, an impressive amount of impressive puck movement, and most especially quality netminding from Jason Bacashihua, all of which led to the end of the Bears’ one-game losing streak. The Bears tied an American Hockey League record Saturday by winning for the 19th consecutive game at home, downing Lake Erie 4-1 before a sellout crowd. They can establish a new record for home ice excellence late Sunday afternoon when they host Albany.
Oskar Osala opened the scoring at 5:52 of the first period, and the line of Osala, Andrew Joudrey and Jay Beagle would be just about the best on the evening for head coach Mark French. The line accounted for all three Hershey tallies before Andrew Gordon added an empty net marker after Lake Erie brought some late drama to the evening, slicing the Bears’ 2-0 lead in half on a Brian Willsie (yes, that Brian Willsie) marksman wrister with just under five minutes remaining.
French has a glut of quality goalies to juggle during this Olympic break for the NHL, with Braden Holtby, Michal Neuvirth and Bacashihua all competing for minutes. Bacashihua on Saturday night staked a strong claim for more minutes, turning aside 24 of the 25 Lake Eris shots he faced. He was named the game’s no.1 star.
It wasn’t the best of nights for John Carlson — his appearance on the scoresheet was limited to his taking three minor penalties.
More so than with other Bears’ games I’ve attended I noticed a conspicuous amount of Capitals’ red-clad fans crammed into Giant Center Saturday night. The red was especially evident in section 112, and afterward, at the Hershey Lodge, home of the Bears’ Den, scores of red Caps’ sweaters and t-shirts were being modeled by victory-happy out-of-towners clustered throughout the Lodge’s lounge area. You got the sense that this weekend’s pair of home games in Hershey has drawn no small number of Capitals’ fans up north for a fix of some live hockey on the farm during the Olympic break.
Call it a slightly weird coincidence, but on Saturday the AHL hosted its first-ever outdoor game, up in Syracuse, and in the middle of Saturday night’s game in Hershey word moved fast through the Giant Center press box that Washington had surged to front of the contending pack to host the 2011 Winter Classic, at Nats Stadium. The reported opponent? Our friends in Pittsburgh.
The Hershey Bears it seems could play indoors or outdoors, but so long as they called it home, odds are excellent they’d win.
photo by Gary Kriebel
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