SHARKSPAGE

WorSharks powerless to stop Manchester, lose 2-1

The Worcester Sharks continue to have offensive troubles, but on Saturday night against the Manchester Monarchs they reached a new low by going 0-9 on the power play and managing just a single shot in the third period in a 2-1 loss to the Monarchs. Freddie Hamilton had the lone WorSharks goal 1:02 into the contest, and the total lack of offense wasted a 27 save performance from goaltender Troy Grosenick.

Worcester Sharks forward Rylan Schwartz attempts to stop after his tip attempt
of a centering feed goes wide of Manchester goaltender Jean-Francois Berube during
the WorSharks 2-1 loss to the Monarchs. Photo courtesy of THE WORCESTER SHARKS

For video highlights we’ll look toward the Worcester Sharks YouTube channel.

Scratches for the WorSharks were Andrew Blazek, Taylor Doherty (hand) and Petter Emanuelsson (shoulder). After Friday’s defensive debacle against the Hartford Wolf Pack Worcester summoned Nick Jones from the Indy Fuel (ECHL). Jones was with the Fuel as they were taking on the Florida Everblades, and with direct flights from Florida to Worcester he arrived fairly early in the day. He recorded his first AHL point with the secondary assist on Hamilton’s goal.

It looked like we might see a true heavyweight bout as the WorSharks had enforcer Jimmy Bonneau dressed and Manchester had Paul Bissonnette (AKA BizNasty2point0) in the line-up, but the closest the two came to dropping the gloves was them grabbing on and laughing at each other while Worcester captain Bryan Lerg and Manchester captain Vincent LoVerde wrestled behind the Monarchs net. The game did see one battle, and the fact it involved Manchester’s Andy Andreoff isn’t surprising. What is shocking is it was Konrad Abeltshauser that dropped the gloves with him. It was the first pro fight for Abeltshauser, and he didn’t look all that bad despite Andreoff getting the edge.

It was “IceCats Night” Saturday with the WorSharks wearing jerseys modeled after the 1994-95 inaugural IceCats jerseys. With the IceCats wearing the blue road inaugural season jerseys in their last game ever Worcester went with the home whites for the occasion. In this writer’s not so humble opinion, they looked pretty sharp.

The three stars of the game were
1. MCH – 7 Andrew Bodnarchuk (gwg)
2. MCH – 14 David Van der Gulik (g)
3. WOR – 12 Freddie Hamilton (g)

The Sharkspage player of the game was Troy Grosenick.

With all the festivities surrounding “IceCats night” I neglected to note what the even strength lines were, and of course this is the game head coach Roy Sommer spends fiddling with them so guessing it tough. We’ll just forgo them for today.

BOX SCORE

Manchester 1 0 1 – 2
Worcester 1 0 0 – 1

1st Period-1, Worcester, Hamilton 6 (Burish, Jones), 1:02. 2, Manchester, Van der Gulik 5 (O’Brien, Weal), 19:10 (PP). Penalties-Gravel Mch (hooking), 9:11; Ebert Mch (hooking), 12:25; Trupp Wor (tripping), 17:30.

2nd Period- No Scoring.Penalties-LoVerde Mch (roughing), 3:19; Lerg Wor (roughing), 3:19; Forbort Mch (tripping), 4:09; Bonneau Wor (holding), 9:22; Bodnarchuk Mch (interference), 9:35; Schultz Mch (tripping), 11:27; Oleksuk Wor (hooking), 16:43.

3rd Period-3, Manchester, Bodnarchuk 1 (O’Neill, Schultz), 7:51. Penalties-Haley Wor (holding), 2:29; Bodnarchuk Mch (holding, unsportsmanlike conduct), 3:41; Carpenter Wor (boarding), 8:12; Taormina Wor (hooking), 10:06; Andreoff Mch (fighting), 12:12; Abeltshauser Wor (fighting), 12:12; Dowd Mch (high-sticking), 13:11; LoVerde Mch (hooking), 15:07.

Shots on Goal-Manchester 8-10-11-29. Worcester 8-6-1-15.
Power Play Opportunities-Manchester 1 / 6; Worcester 0 / 9.
Goalies-Manchester, Berube 13-4-1 (15 shots-14 saves). Worcester, Grosenick 7-4-0 (29 shots-27 saves).
A-4,116
Referees-Tim Mayer (19).
Linesmen-Todd Whittemore (70), Robert St. Lawrence (10).