Deep Dive: Bound for Chocolatetown – Monsters drop the puck on the Eastern Conference Finals
May 29, 2024SUBBAN’S START
Any series-clinching win is cathartic, but last week’s Game 3 win over Syracuse in the North Division Finals was more so than usual. With All-Star net-minder Jet Greaves out of the lineup, in stepped veteran backup Malcolm Subban, who hadn’t seen game action since an early-April appearance for the Blue Jackets after a late-season NHL recall. Subban, a beloved teammate and consummate pro, delivered in a major way stopping 25 pucks and giving his teammate a chance to win.
And win the Monsters did, in resilient fashion – rallying from down 3-2 entering the third period on the road at the raucous War Memorial in Syracuse to dispatch a talented and hard-working Crunch team in three games. In a nice post-practice moment on Memorial Day, Subban was surprised with the opportunity to brandish the Monsters’ signature spray paint and cross off the “9” on Cleveland’s now-iconic ‘Countdown to the Cup’ dasher board in front of the penalty boxes at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse. His teammates enthralled, they smacked their sticks on the ice as hard as they could in salutation. Moments like these – Subban’s grace under pressure in ‘Cuse, and meaningful recognition in its wake – are what binds a close team closer. Those moments are what the playoffs are all about.
BEATING THE BEARS
With a win in the North Division Finals, the challenge of Cup contention now crystallizes for Cleveland. It’s simple – you want to be the class of the league? There’s one route – through the AHL’s best team. That’s exactly what the Monsters’ next opponent is as one of the greatest single-season club performances in league history was turned in this season by Hershey behind their impressive head coach, Todd Nelson.
An imposing figure, Nelson was a mostly minor-league defenseman during his playing career (which took him to Cleveland with the IHL’s Lumberjacks in 1992-93 and saw him claim the Calder Cup with the Portland Pirates in 1994), but once he started coaching, the winning followed quickly. A two-time Colonial Cup Champion as head coach of the UHL’s Muskegon Fury (2004 and 2005), Nelson won his second Calder Cup as an AHL assistant with Chicago in 2008, and after an interim head coaching stint with the NHL’s Edmonton Oilers in 2014-15, Nelson became just the third person to win the Calder as a player, assistant, and head coach when he led the Grand Rapids Griffins to the promised land in 2017. Nelson added another Calder Cup, the fourth of his career, last season as he guided the Bears to a seven-game victory over Coachella Valley in the Finals.
Beyond their coach, Hershey doesn’t need to work hard to intimidate – the numbers leap off the page. Hershey went 53-14-0-5 in the regular season, never going more than one game without a point in the standings – just think about that! In the playoffs, Hershey has matched Cleveland with a 6-1 record through the postseason’s first two rounds and both teams are a perfect 4-0 at home. The Bears’ real strength is their efficiency. Currently leading the playoffs with a 3.71 goal-scoring average, Hershey is doing so despite flagging shots per game numbers (26.0, lowest among surviving clubs). The Bears also just so happen to lead the league defensively, limiting opponents to 1.57 goals and 24.6 shots per game. What’s it mean? The Bears don’t beat themselves and are a relentlessly opportunistic club – the Monsters will have to limit turnovers and score at even strength as Hershey’s penalty kill is also outstanding, allowing just two power-play goals to the opposition on 19 postseason chances (89.5%, 3rd in playoffs).
MONSTERS PLAYOFF MEMORIES…
It seems appropriate this week to think back to the only two Monsters playoff games ever contested at Hershey’s Giant Center – a pair of wins in the first two games of the 2016 Calder Cup Finals. That most memorable of playoff runs saw Cleveland dash past the Rockford IceHogs (3-0), the Grand Rapids Griffins (4-2), and the Ontario Reign (4-0) en route to Hershey where the Monsters started the series with a bang.
After future NHL’er Jakub Vrana started the scoring in Game 1, the Monsters settled into the series behind four unanswered goals the rest of the way, beginning with Daniel Zaar’s second-period strike that left things tied at one through 40 minutes of play. In the third, current Monsters Head Coach Trent Vogelhuber buried his second of the playoffs, the eventual game-winner, before Zaar and Markus Hannikainen sealed the win, with help from backstop Anton Forsberg and his 26 saves.
In Game 2, many of the usual suspects that year for Cleveland stood tall, including future Blue Jackets star Zach Werenski (1 goal), Oliver Bjorkstrand (2 goals), Lukas Sedlak (1 goal), and Zaar (1 goal, 1 assist), who all contributed to a 5-3 win, setting the Monsters up for home victories in Games 3 and 4, and the club’s first Calder Cup Championship, the tenth in Cleveland hockey history.