Maine Hockey Journal

Pirates disappoint in return from All-Star break

Portland Pirates regular season contest against the Hartford Wolf Pack at the Cross Insurance Arena in Portland, Maine on 2/5/2016. (PHOTO: Michael McSweeney - Portland Pirates)

Portland Pirates regular season contest against the Hartford Wolf Pack at the Cross Insurance Arena in Portland, Maine on 2/5/2016. (PHOTO: Michael McSweeney – Portland Pirates)

PORTLAND – Terrible…

That was the only way Portland Pirates head coach Scott Allen could describe his team after the five-day American Hockey League All-Star break.

The Pirates drop their second straight game Friday evening, falling 5-0 to the Hartford Wolf Pack before 2,769 at the Cross Insurance Arena.

“I thought our defense as a whole, as a unit played their worst game of the year,” Allen said. “I thought we had too many guys that weren’t prepared to dig in up front. It was like we were still on the break.”

The Pirates (26-17-1-0) have lost four of their last six games which includes another 5-0 loss back on Jan. 23 to the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins. Portland dropped a 6-2 decision to the Springfield Falcons before the All-Star break.

“It disappoints me more than it surprises me,” Allen said of Friday’s loss. “Over the course of a 76-game season, you’re going to have some bad games. I’m disappointed in how we had back-to-back bookend games around the break. It’s not good.”

Hartford goaltender Magnus Hellberg made 35 saves for the shutout as the Wolf Pack (24-20-2-0) won for the 10th time in their last 11 games, moving to within three points of the Pirates for third place in the Atlantic Division standings. It won’t get any easier for the Pirates as they host the Providence Bruins Saturday, who haven’t suffered a regulation loss in their last 12 games. They will then board a bus for a seven-game road trip over a 12-day span that will see the team travel to Lehigh Valley, Wilkes-Barre/Scranton, Utica, Rochester, Toronto and Hartford.

“We know we have our hands full,” said Allen. “Providence is better than these guys. We got a tougher opponent tomorrow than we did tonight, and we basically got our asses handed to us.”

“It’s the toughest month of the season,” Allen added. “We’re going to find out a lot about our team.”

Trailing 1-0 on a goal by Hartford’s Tommy Hughes late in the first period, the floodgates opened against Portland in the second period.

Portland would begin the second period with a power play for 1:38 but failed to get a shot on goal. They’d get a second power play only 20 seconds later when Brady Skjei was whistled for holding.

With 34 seconds left in the power play, an errant pass by defenseman Cameron Gaunce was intercepted by Oleksuk, who chipped it to Brian Gibbons for a breakaway. Pirates’ goalie Mike McKenna stopped the breakaway, but Ryan Graves trailing the play was able to clean up the rebound for a 2-0 Wolf Pack lead.

Only two minutes later, Hartford made it 3-0 when Ryan Bourque scooped up a rebound in the right circle, beating McKenna for his 10th goal of the season.

Allen took his timeout and was very animated behind the bench.

“I’ll just leave that between them and me,” he said when asked his message to the players during the timeout.

The Wolf Pack would be awarded a penalty shot at 7:54 of the second period when Gaunce tripped Shawn O’Donnell on a breakaway. McKenna stopped the penalty shot, but off the ensuing faceoff only two seconds later, Tommy Hughes ripped a booming slap shot for his second goal of the game.

That ended McKenna’s night, who finished with 21 saves, as Sam Brittain came into the game in relief.

“He didn’t get pulled because he was playing bad,” said Allen. “We needed to do something. We needed to change it up. There’s only so many things you can do as a coach, but that definitely wasn’t on Mikey McKenna.”

Brittain stopped all 14 shots he faced.

Allen looking to get one goal pulled Brittain with nearly seven minutes left in the period. Adam Tambellini scored an empty-net goal only 25 seconds later.

“They outshot us. They out chanced us They outplayed us,” Allen said. “Even though the score was 1-0 (after the first period) they were the better team all night. We beat ourselves. We chased our own puck, we forced turnovers, we threw pucks into coverage, and they capitalized, and we were chasing all night.”

NOTES: Pirates captain Brett Regner earned his first career call-up after the Florida Panthers recalled him from Portland earlier in the day. Regner has 12 points (2G, 10A) in 43 games for the Pirates… The Pirates made a corresponding move by recalling Josh Brown from the Manchester Monarchs of the ECHL. It’s Brown’s third recall to Portland this season as he’s posted one goal, 10 assists for 11 points with a plus-15 rating in 44 games with Manchester.

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