Wolf Pack End Season With 3-1 Loss

The Hartford Wolf Pack ended their season in Hershey with a 3-1 loss
to the Bears. (Photo courtesy Hershey Bears)

Hersey, PA—The Hartford Wolf Pack saw their 2018-19 season conclude when they dropped a 3-1

decision to the Hershey Bears before 10,818 fans at the Giant Center on Sunday. Hershey forwards Chris McCarthy and Joe Snively each registered a goal and two assists, and Joey Leach’s second-period tally ultimately turned out to be the game-winner for the Bears.

Hartford's Darren Raddysh opened the scoring only 32 seconds into the contest. The 6-1, 23-year-old defenseman from Toronto broke up a Hershey clearing attempt in the right point and snapped a shot on net. Bear netminder Ilya Samsonov, just sent down by the parent Washington Capitals, got a piece of it with his glove. However, the puck snuck past him and into the net. Unfortunately, however, that would prove to be the extent of the Wolf Pack offense.

Hershey answered at 11:09, when Chris McCarthy scored his first goal in two games since being called up by the Bears from the ECHL. Shane Gersich sent a drop pass to McCarthy, a former member of the Wolf Pack, who moved up the slot and fired a shot that beat Wolf Pack netminder Adam Huska on the glove side.

The Bears scored the only goal of the second stanza in what would ultimately turn out to be the game winner. Joe Snively passed the puck out of the right corner across to Leach at the opposite. Leach then unleashed a drive that deflected past Huska’s left side for his first career AHL goal. Snively added an empty-net goal with 1:26 left in the third, assisted by McCarthy and Nathan Walker.

Hershey netminder Ilya Samsonov turned aside 23 shots taken at him by the Pack. Huska stopped 30 shots in the Hartford net.

With the loss, the Wolf Pack ended their season at 29-36-7-4 (69 points).

“I liked our start,” said Wolf Pack head coach Keith McCambridge after what would prove to be his last game as Hartford’s coach. The team’s parent club, the New York Rangers, announced on Monday that McCambridge had been relieved of his duties along with assistant coach Joe Mormina.

“I thought we came out with lots of jump, and then, a breakdown on the forecheck and an odd-man rush the other way, and then a bounce off of a net-front body for Hershey, and we were chasing the game from behind,” he continued.“ I thought as the games have gone along here, the ATO’s (Amateur Tryout players) that we’ve had in our lineup have been able to really showcase themselves in a good way.”

McCambridge served as Hartford’s head coach for two seasons after being named the sixth head coach in franchise history in 2017. He also served one season as an assistant coach with the Wolf Pack after joining the Rangers organization on August 3, 2016. Mormina served two seasons as an assistant coach (2017-18 and 2018-19).

While the Wolf Pack will miss the postseason for the fourth straight season, the Bears will move on to face Connecticut's outer AHL franchise, the Bridgeport Sound Tigers, in the first round beginning on Friday at the Webster Bank Arena.

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—Staff Reports