After taking two of last weekend’s three contests, the Hartford Wolf Pack hosted the division rival that defeated them to start the season, the Lehigh Valley Phantoms. The 4-3 shootout loss from over two weeks before was avenged by a 4-3 overtime win at home. Hartford continued their hot start at home, improving to 3-0 at the XL Center.
Brett Berard kicked off the scoring between the two sides as Benoit-Olivier Groulx found him wide open in front of Phantoms goaltender Alexie Kolosov in a three-on-one rush into the zone. Lehigh Valley returned the favor just minutes later as forward Rodrigo Abols was given space to move to the slot and buried his first goal of the season under the glove of Dylan Garand.
Hartford nearly took a 2-1 lead in the second as defenseman Connor Mackey cut down the boards and sent a pass through the slot to forward Nathan Sucese, who was denied by Kolosov’s outstretched glove. The Phantoms then took the puck for a three on one into the Wolf Pack zone. Garand made the initial two saves on forwards John Randall Avon and Elliott Desnoyers before forward Oliver Eklind picked up the loose change and put it past Garand.
Hartford would tie things at the end of second period with the help of defenseman Matthew Roberston’s first goal of the season. The Wolf Pack would jump to an early lead just under a minute into the third period with a shorthanded goal from Jake Leschyshyn. After a turnover off of the faceoff, Leschyshyn jumped on a loose puck that had been poked away by forward Adam Sykora and took it all the way into the Lehigh Valley zone himself, firing it over the glove of Kolosov. After some zone time on the powerplay, and some solid passing, Phantoms forward Samu Tuomaala, fired a one-timer past Garand to knot the game at three each.
The score would stay the same to end the period, forcing yet another matchup between the two squads to go to overtime. However, this time it only took 39 seconds for the game to be decided. After a couple of Lehigh Valley chances, Hartford took the puck into the Phantoms zone, where Benoit-Olivier Groulx was left wide open in front of the net. Brett Berard found Groulx who made a move and slid the puck between the pads of Kolosov to seal the game in his team’s favor.
However, the Wolf Pack’s unbeaten streak at home came to halt against another division rival in the Springfield Thunderbirds. After a thrilling 6-5 win over the Thunderbirds to kick off the season, Benoit-Olivier Groulx picked up right where he left off two nights before scoring the opening goal midway through the first period. Springfield however, would score five unanswered goals as forwards Drew Callin and Tanner Dickinson, and defenseman Hunter Skinner, each notched their first goals of the season. Hartford could not come back even with the help of forward Dylan Roobroeck’s first goal of the season. Hartford would have another chance to gain some ground back at home on Wednesday night.
After giving up five straight goals just a few nights before, Hartford gave up the first two goals to the visiting Grand Rapids Griffins. The Griffins took the two-goal lead early in the second period with a power play goal from Dominik Shine. Three Hartford defenders were left with their backs to Shine as a cross-ice pass from Joe Snively gave Shine all the space he needed to pick his corner over the glove of Dylan Garand.
Hartford wouldn’t respond until early on in the third period as Roobroeck would tally his second goal in as many games to cut the Grand Rapids lead in half. Adam Sykora evened the score inside the final five minutes with a deflection goal to beat Griffins goaltender Sebastian Cossa and send the game to overtime. It would take another deflection in overtime, this time by Ryder Korczak, to give Hartford the win. Korczak deflected Sykora’s shot from an angle for his first goal of the year and to complete the comeback in Hartford.
Hartford once again goes 2-1 in the week and will kick off next weekend’s action on the road first heading to Syracuse to take on the Crunch, then down to Wilkes-Barre to face the Penguins. The Wolf Pack will round out the week returning home to host the Syracuse crunch on Wednesday night.
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