Game Story: Charlotte - 4 at W-B/Scranton - 2 (1/6/23)

WILKES-BARRE, Pa. - The Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins jumped out to a 2-0 lead, but four unanswered goals from the Charlotte Checkers turned the tides Friday night in a 4-2 victory for the Checkers in the rematch of Wednesday night's affair.

Grigori Denisenko was a game-changer for Charlotte Friday night, tallying two goals and adding the primary assist on what ended up being the game-winning tally from Riley Nash. Santtu Kinnunen also tallied for the Checkers in the win, while Mack Guzda stopped 20 of 22 to improve his personal record on the season to 8-3-2.

Filip Hallander and Alex Nylander tallied first period goals that had the Penguins off and running, but it wasn't enough as the Checkers flipped the script. Taylor Gauthier suffered his first career loss at the AHL level in his third career start, stopping 30 of the 34 shots he faced.

The Penguins began the game picking up right where they left off Wednesday night, opening the scoring 5:17 into the first period after starting the game with six of the first seven registered shots on goal of the contest.

Hallander started the play down low, getting the puck up top to Colin Swoyer. Swoyer left it at the right point for Houde and Hallander was left untracked heading to the slot. Houde saw the opening, zipped a pass through to Hallander and Hallander did the rest - firing a quick shot over the blocker of Guzda for his eighth of the season.

Gauthier began to see some more consistent pressure as the period approached its midway point as Corey Andonovski took a pair of penalties three and a half minutes apart - giving Charlotte some extended looks on the man advantage - but the penalty killers held and the Pens later extended their lead to 2-0 with exactly 5:00 left before the first intermission on Nylander's 13th of the season.

Houde created another scoring chance, faking like he was going to bring the puck out from the corner - instead sending it back down low to Valtteri Puustinen. Puustinen threaded the needle to Nylander coming off the left wing wall and Nylander sniped one from the slot past Guzda.

Charlotte got one back to cut the Penguins' lead to 2-1 with 2:38 left before the first intermission, as Denisenko finished off a cycle play in front after his linemates Henry Bowlby and Patrick Giles won puck battles behind the net to maintain possession.

The Checkers really put the Penguins on their heels to begin the middle frame, perhaps gaining momentum from that late first period tally in scoring three goals in a span of 3:45 to turn a 2-1 deficit into a 4-2 lead.

Denisenko, in particular, seemed to be carrying the Checkers' attack. He tied the game up at 2-2 just 2:17 into the middle frame on another quick, laser of a shot, from the left-wing circle.

Less than three minutes later, Nash re-directed a Denisenko shot in past Gauthier to give the Checkers their first lead of the game at 3-2. Then, on the next shift, Anton Levtchi set up Kinnunen for a blast from the center point for his fourth of the season and second in as many games against the Penguins this week to push the Checkers' lead to 4-2.

Charlotte continued to control large portions of the second period, at one point out-shooting the Penguins 14-3 in the middle frame before an Ethan Keppen interference minor late in the period gave the Penguins a few chances on a power play.

The Penguins came out attacking to begin the third, drawing two Checkers' penalties less than a minute apart to get an early-period 5-on-3 power play opportunity, but were unable to hit the net - often times having their shots from high quality areas of the ice hit the back glass behind Guzda.

From there, a trio of Penguins penalties really prevented them from generating much of an attack to get back into contention. In fact, the Checkers held the Pens to just three shots on net in the period heading into the final five minutes of regulation.

A Checkers' penalty with 3:30 left in regulation gave the Penguins a chance, and they pulled Gauthier for the extra attacker but were unable to cash in.

Quite a scary scene to end the game as a collision between Checkers' defenseman John Ludvig and Penguins' forward Filip Hallander in the Penguins' offensive zone cornerboards resulted in Ludvig awkwardly falling onto the head/neck area of Hallander - who immediately fell to the ice and initially laid motionless on the ice. Most of the players on the ice at the time, with 1:12 left to play, simultaneously turned and were waving for the medical staffs of both teams to enter the playing surface.

Play was stopped.

A stretcher was brought onto the ice.

Hallander was immobilized and later placed on the stretcher, taken out through the Checkers' locker room tunnel and transported to the local hospital.

The decision was made to not play the final 1:12 of regulation and call it a 4-2 final score, and the two teams exited the ice.

Charlotte Checkers Lineup Notes

Mack Guzda got the start in net for Charlotte Wednesday night. Alex Lyon served as the Checkers' backup goaltender.

Zach Uens slotted in on defense in place of Dennis Cesana, and Riley Nash drew in to the lineup at the team's top line center position for Chris Tierney who was called up by Florida Thursday.

Tag Bertuzzi took the warmup skate, but was the 13th forward - not partaking in line rushes - and the final healthy scratch for Charlotte.

Checkers Scratches: Dennis Cesana, Logan Hutsko, Tag Bertuzzi, Justin Sourdif, Serron Noel and Chris Tierney

Lines/Pairings:

Aleksi Heponiemi - Riley Nash - Henry Bowlby Anton Levtchi - Connor Bunnaman - Gerry Mayhew Cameron Morrison - Dominic Franco - Grigori Denisenko Ethan Keppen - Patrick Giles - Riley Bezeau

John Ludvig - Lucas Carlsson Calle Sjalin - Santtu Kinnunen Anthony Bitetto - Zach Uens

Mack Guzda - Alex Lyon

W-B/Scranton Penguins Lineup Notes

Taylor Gauthier got the start in net for the Penguins Wednesday night against Charlotte.

Goaltender Tommy Nappier was called up from ECHL Wheeling and backed up Gauthier, with Filip Lindberg heading back to the injured list after backing up Gauthier Wednesday night.

Josh Maniscalco (loaned) and Justin Addamo (released from PTO) were reassigned to Wheeling, as Taylor Fedun, Corey Andonovski and Tyler Sikura returned to the Penguins' lineup.

Penguins Scratches:  Filip Lindberg, Adam Smith, Sam Poulin, Jamie Devane, Kyle Olson, Sean Josling and Xavier Ouellet

Lines/Pairings:

Filip Hallander - Sam Houde - Alex Nylander Drake Caggiula - Jonathan Gruden - Valtteri Puustinen Lukas Svejkovsky - Raivis Ansons - Nathan Legare Ty Glover - Tyler Sikura - Corey Andonovski

Jon Lizotte - Jack St. Ivany Taylor Fedun - Colin Swoyer Chris Ortiz - Mitch Reinke

Taylor Gauthier - Tommy Nappier

GAME SUMMARY

1st Period

5:17: WBS - Hallander (8) - Houde, Swoyer 8:20: WBS - (PP) Andonovski, minor (high-sticking) 11:49: WBS - (PP) Andonovski, minor (slashing) 15:00: WBS - Nylander (13) - Puustinen, Houde 17:22: CHA - Denisenko (7) - Giles, Bowlby 18:06: CHA - Mayhew, major (fighting) 18:06: WBS - Gruden, major (fighting) 18:06: WBS - (PP) Gruden, minor (unsportsmanlike)

2nd Period

2:17: CHA - Denisenko (8) - Ludvig, Carlsson 5:08: CHA - Nash (11) - Denisenko, Carlsson 6:02: CHA - Kinnunen (4) - Levtchi, Bitetto 9:59: WBS - (PP) Ansons, minor (holding) 15:46: CHA - (PP) Keppen, minor (interference)

3rd Period

2:03: CHA - (PP) Mayhew, minor (slashing) 2:51: CHA - (PP) Giles, minor (slashing) 5:57: WBS - (PP) bench minor, too many men (served by Nylander) 11:55: WBS - (PP) Swoyer, minor (slashing) 14:13: WBS - (PP) Lizotte, minor (delay of game) 16:30: CHA - (PP) Giles, minor (hooking)

BOXSCORE

Charlotte     1 - 3 - 0 = 4 W-B/Scranton  2 - 0 - 0 = 2

Shots

Charlotte     10 - 14 - 10 = 34 W-B/Scranton  10 - 6 - 6 = 22

Goalies

CHA: Mack Guzda (20 saves - 22 shots) WBS: Taylor Gauthier (30 saves - 34 shots)

Power Play

CHA: 0-for-7 WBS: 0-for-4

Penalty Kill

CHA: 4-for-4 WBS: 7-for-7