Bears Hold On for 5-4 Win Over Penguins

February 11, 2025

The Hershey Bears (29-13-5-0) battled to a 5-4 victory over the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins (26-12-4-0) on Tuesday night at GIANT Center, as the club continued its 2024-25 season, presented by Penn State Health.

Ethan Bear, Spencer Smallman, and Hendrix Lapierre each recorded a goal and an assist, as Hershey leveled its regular-season series with Wilkes-Barre/Scranton at 3-3-0-0. The two teams will next meet this Saturday at Mohegan Arena at Casey Plaza.

BOX SCORE

NOTABLES:

• Defenseman Andrew Perrott - recalled by Hershey from the ECHL's South Carolina Stingrays on Monday - made his Bears debut and gave Hershey a 1-0 lead with his first shot as a Bear at 4:40 of the first period off a face-off win by Garrett Roe at the right circle.
• Emil Bemstrom leveled the score at 1-1 at 7:30 and later assisted on a pair of goals by the Penguins to finish with a three-point night.
• Hendrix Lapierre scored his first of the season at 9:32 of the first period to give Hershey a 2-1 lead, marking his first goal in the American Hockey League or National Hockey League since Game 6 of the 2024 Calder Cup Finals on June 24, 2024.
• Several skirmishes broke out at the 15:51 mark of the first period, resulting in Justin Nachbaur and Dalton Smith receiving game misconducts for Hershey, while Vasily Ponomarev and Nikolai Knyzhov received game misconducts for Wilkes-Barre/Scranton; Hershey's Aaron Ness and Koivunen also received 10-minute misconducts. The Bears finished the night with a season-high 46 penalty minutes, while the Penguins finished with 53, also a season-high for a Hershey opponent.
• Spencer Smallman scored an empty-net goal for Hershey with two minutes left in the third period to give the Bears a 5-3 lead; that goal stood up as the eventual game-winner after Mac Hollowell brought the Penguins to within a goal at 19:07.
• With Hershey leading 5-4, Boris Katchouk appeared to have scored the game-tying goal for Wilkes-Barre/Scranton with 2.2 seconds remaining but the officials waved the score off for being directed in with a high stick.
• Bears head coach Todd Nelson earned his 126th win behind the bench for Hershey, tying Ralph "Cooney" Weiland for eighth in franchise history for wins by a head coach.

SHOTS: HER 30, WBS 29

GOALTENDING: HER - Hunter Shepard, 25-for-29; WBS - Joel Blomqvist, 25-for-29

POWER PLAY: HER - 1-for-4; WBS - 1-for-1

THEY SAID IT:

Bears head coach Todd Nelson on his the team's approach to tonight's game and the lineup juggling required for tonight:
"Play like men, come out, and work hard, outwork your opponent, win puck battles. We made quite a few changes since the last game. I know some guys are sick but this was the lineup we were going to go with anyways. And they came out and played a really good game. The guys we inserted played outstanding. Suzdalev was great, Hofer was outstanding, Nachbaur and Smith, they did their job. Perrot, excellent. We played a really strong game and I thought we deserved it. They're a good hockey team over there. You can't let up on them, but the game was probably closer than it should have been."

Nelson on refocusing after a wild first period:
"Our guys were focused for the whole game. We started taking on a bit of water there in the third where Wilkes got rolling in the O-zone, but our guys were pretty focused the whole day. We dropped that one to Wilkes 9-0. And then we have a stinker or our last game in here against Syracuse. And there was a really firm message this morning and the guys responded really well. I'm happy with the effort - we played physical, our guys worked hard.

Nelson on making lineup adjustments following the ejections of Smith and Nachbaur:
"We wanted to play a really simple hockey game. Our personnel may [tonight] may not be as skilled as the other guys that are sick or injured, but they made up for it with hard work. And so all I did is when Smitty and Nachbaur got tossed for the second period, I just rolled Philp's line with Riley Sutter, I doubled them up and then in the third I rolled with Lapierre's line, I doubled up and they did a good job. The guys weren't going to be denied tonight, but we made it interesting once again. And so I'm just happy the [Katchouk's] stick was above the crossbar. It was the right call."

Nelson on Hendrix Lapierre scoring his first goal of the season:
"Well he was working, he was skating. And when he's skating, look at the goal he scored: he blew the doors off the defenseman on the outside cutting to the net. That's Hendrix Lapierre when he is playing good hockey and he just has tremendous speed and skill, and when he wants to put the gas down, he gets after it."

Nelson on the play of Andrew Perrot in his Bears debut:
"I liked his game tonight. Played simple, played tough, he played gritty out there, made a good first pass, scored a real nice goal. We knew that he had some of that offensive ability, [he] runs the power play [in South Carolina], but I just liked the fact that he was simple. When you don't notice a defenseman a whole lot - you notice when he scored - but when you don't notice a defenseman a whole lot, that means he's doing his job and he's keeping his end clean. And that's what I thought he did really well tonight."

Hendrix Lapierre on whether tonight's goal does anything for his confidence:
"I think it's good. I mean, my confidence has been good for a while, but obviously scoring that goal and I think [tonight was] more of a statement win, after going into Wilkes' building last week and losing 9-0. So I think we really needed those two points and I think it's a good confidence-booster for the whole team."

Andrew Perrott on the feeling after scoring in his Bears debut and acclimating to the team:
"I'm excited. I was really happy and fortunate. [Garrett Roe] drew up the play right before the draw and it came right to me, so it was a great call by him and I was just very fortunate to put it in the back of the net and I was glad I got to help the team win in some regard. I've been trying to get my feet moving as quickly as possible. It's obviously way faster up here and just trying to listen to all of the veterans we gave, like [Bear], [Ness], those guys that have logged so many games in the American League, just trying to learn from them and soak in everything that they know and all their knowledge."

NEXT GAME:

The Bears continue the 2024-25 regular season, presented by Penn State Health, when they visit the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins on Saturday, Feb. 15 at 6:05 p.m. at Mohegan Arena at Casey Plaza. Hershey returns home to host the Penguins on Saturday, March 1 at 7 p.m. at GIANT Center for Penn State Health Drawstring Bag Night. All fans in attendance will receive a Bears drawstring bag, courtesy of Penn State Health. Purchase tickets for the game by CLICKING HERE.