Game Story: Syracuse - 1 at W-B/Scranton - 4 (12/13/23)

WILKES-BARRE, Pa. - The Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins (12-9-3) put together one of their better performances - from start to finish - on the season Wednesday night in taking care of North Division foe Syracuse Crunch 4-1 on home ice at the Mohegan Arena at Casey Plaza.

Rem Pitlick opened the scoring in the first period and Jack Rathbone extended the lead to 2-0 in the middle frame, but the turning point came late in the second period in how the Penguins responded after Syracuse's Shawn Element scored to draw the Crunch within a goal with 4:59 left in the 2nd period.

The Penguins restored their two-goal lead on the next shift, thanks to a deflection goal from Austin Rueschhoff, and scored shorthanded, courtesy a Matt Filipe breakaway goal, to extend the lead to 4-1 and take a commanding lead heading into the third period.

Magnus Hellberg shut the door from there for the Penguins, stopping all but one of the 25 shots he faced to pick up his fourth win on the season.

Element tallied the lone goal for the Crunch in the loss, getting 22 saves on 26 shots from Matt Tomkins in net.

The Penguins controlled large portions of the opening frame, but it wasn't until the final minute of the period that they were able to break the scoreless tie.

Andonovski caught, and quickly dropped, a puck that darted up into the air between the face-off circles in the Pens' offensive zone before chopping it back to the left point for a quick shot from Xavier Ouellet. Colin White and Pitlick were at the net front with the latter getting a piece of Ouellet's shot to give the Penguins a 1-0 lead with 38.8 left before the first intermission.

Wilkes-Barre/Scranton's strong play continued in the middle frame, as they limited Syracuse to just two shots on goal in the opening 11 and a half minutes of the period - extending their lead to 2-0 on a snipe from Rathbone.

The puck was tied up along the right-wing wall for what seemed like an eternity before Andonovski muscled the puck loose to Jagger Joshua, who slid it up top to the center point for Rathbone. Rathbone showed good patience to wait for a defender to get out of his shooting lane before sniping one past Tomkins for his fifth of the season.

Things seemed to open up a bit for both teams late in the middle period, especially after Syracuse made it a one-goal game off a bit of a broken play off of an offensive zone face-off - with Element getting to a loose puck in the left wing circle before firing a quick shot past Hellberg with 4:59 left before the second intermission.

The Pens got it right back on the next shift after Lukas Svejkovsky and Peter Abbandonato forced a turnover on a forecheck.

Abbandonato got the puck to the right point for Dmitri Samorukov, and Rueschoff was in position in the high-slot - getting a piece of it and getting it to go past Tomkins to restore the Penguins two-goal lead at 3-1 just 20 seconds after Syracuse had scored.

The Crunch had another chance to make it a one-goal game in the final 2:59 of the period, but instead it was Joona Koppanen digging a puck loose off the right-wing boards and sending Filipe off to the races on a shorthanded breakaway.

Filipe converted to give the Penguins a commanding 4-1 lead heading to the third period.

From there the Penguins really locked things down in the third period, drawing back-to-back power plays in the opening five minutes of the period and not allowing their first shot on goal against in the third frame until there was less than five minutes left to play.

Hellberg made the necessary stops in the waning moments of the contest to preserve the Penguins' 4-1 lead to victory.

Post-Game EXTRA!

Head coach JD Forrest

On if he thought tonight's game was the team's most complete game from start to finish:

"Yeah, I would agree with that. We did a lot of good things right from the start, and we stuck with it throughout the whole game. That's a good team over there. And I thought we did what we set out to do from the beginning of the game. It was a good game. Our guys played well, every forward and every [defensemen]. And our goalie. It was nice to see."

Defenseman Jack Rathbone

On his goal in the second period, making patient hesitation move to open shooting lane:

"Yeah, their guy did a really good job kind of getting out of that pile and getting in the [shooting] lane. So I just tried to give him a little false info, and luckily was able to get it through."

Forward Matt Filipe

On the team needing to string some wins together consistently:

"That's something coach has brought up - that we have to start to string some wins together and you know, we can't just be satisfied with a win and then a loss.  We got to turn the page here, and again, string some wins together. And you know, I think tonight, like you said, was a good blueprint for it. So, we'll watch video and take some things, learn some things from tonight and hopefully take that into the weekend and start a little win streak here before the break."

Syracuse Crunch Lineup Notes

Matt Tomkins got the start in net for the Crunch Wednesday night. Hugo Alnefelt served as Syracuse's backup goaltender.

Crunch Scratches: Gabriel Fortier, Joe Carroll, Max Crozier, Ilya Usau

Lines/Pairings

Matt Tomkins (Backup: Hugo Alnefelt)

Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins Lineup Notes

Magnus Hellberg got the start in net for the Penguins Wednesday night, with Joel Blomqvist serving as the team's backup goaltender.

Dmitri Samorukov cleared waivers and was reassigned to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton in advance of Wednesday night's game.

Penguins Scratches: Garret Sparks, Sam Poulin, Libor Hajek, Sam Houde, Tanner Laderoute, Avery Hayes and Justin Addamo

Lines/pairings:

Rem Pitlick - Colin White - Alex Nylander Austin Rueschhoff - Peter Abbandonato - Lukas Svejkovsky Jagger Joshua - Raivis Ansons - Corey Andonovski Matt Filipe - Joona Koppanen

Xavier Ouellet - Ty Smith Will Butcher - Jack St. Ivany Jack Rathbone - Dmitri Samorukov Taylor Fedun

Magnus Hellberg (Backup: Joel Blomqvist)

GAME SUMMARY

1st Period

2:57: SYR - (PP) Walker, minor (hooking) 3:42: WBS - (PP) White, minor (tripping) 10:15: WBS - (PP) Rueschhoff, minor (slashing) 19:21: WBS - Pitlick (7) - Ouellet, Andonovski

2nd Period

7:21: WBS - Rathbone (5) - Joshua, Andonovski 9:13: SYR - (PP) Walcott, minor (tripping) 15:01: SYR - Element (3) - Walker, Allard 15:21: WBS - Rueschhoff (4) - Samorukov, Abbandonato 17:01: WBS - (PP) White, minor (slashing) 17:30: WBS - SHG Filipe (2) - Koppanen 19:06: WBS - Ouellet, major (fighting) 19:06: SYR - Element, major (fighting)

3rd Period

1:38: SYR - (PP) Allard, minor (tripping) 4:45: SYR - (PP) Walcott, minor (hooking) 10:59: SYR - (PP) Robert, minor (holding) 18:57: WBS - (PP) Koppanen, minor (high-sticking)

BOXSCORE

Syracuse      0 - 1 - 0 = 1 W-B/Scranton  1 - 3 - 0 = 4

Shots

Syracuse      8 - 11 - 6 = 25 W-B/Scranton  10 - 10 - 6 = 26

Goalies

SYR: Matt Tomkins (22 saves -  26 shots) WBS: Magnus Hellberg (24 saves - 25 shots)

Power Play

SYR: 0-for-4 WBS: 0-for-5

Penalty Kill

SYR: 5-for-5 WBS: 4-for-4