The Falcons closed the regular season with two road games – both of which they lost. Fortunately, the team already clinched the Northeast Division so I’m guessing this weekend was “don’t get hurt and let’s try and figure out the roster”.
Starting on Friday, the Falcons fell to Hartford by a score of 2-1 with ex Jacket David LeNeveu picking up the win. In the loss, Carter Camper scored the Falcons goal and Mike McKenna made 18 saves. In the season finale against Albany, it was ugly with a capital ugh as the Devils rolled out to a 4-0 lead including a goal seven seconds into the game. The scoring barrage ended Mike McKenna’s night early in the second when he turned things over to Anton Forsberg. The Falcons finally scored in the third period when Tim Erixon fired a shot from the point that bounced off the backwall right to Jake Hansen who scored. Less than three minutes later the Falcons scored again when Marko Dano skated in and fired a backhand that the Devils goalie would stop but the rebound going right to Darryl Boyce in the slot to make it 4-2. The Devils added an empty net to make it 5-2, Mike McKenna stopped nine of 13 and took the loss while Anton Forsberg stopped all 10 shots he faced.
As for the season overall, the Falcons won their second straight Northeast Division title, set team records for wins in a season and were only the second AHL team in Springfield to hit the 100 point mark. The Falcons used a balanced offensive attack and were one of only four AHL teams without a 20 goal scorer to make the playoffs. The Falcons had 17 players with at least 20 points overall although two didn’t finish the season in Springfield (Jack Skille and Jonathan Marchesault) and three were traded for and didn’t pick up all 20 points with the Falcons. Carter Camper led the Falcons in scoring with 51 points (31 points in 41GP with Providence 20 points in 19 with Springfield) while Michael Chaput led the Falcons in scoring among players that spent the entire season in Springfield. He also led the team in goals with 19. Tim Erixon led the Falcons defensemen in scoring with 38 points in 40 games and also led the team in assists with 33. As for rookies, AHL signed Alex Aleardi led the Falcons with 16 points while Lukas Sedlak had 14 points. 2013 first round pick Marko Dano had six points in 10 games with the Falcons including two power play goals. Dano also had five points in 41 KHL games this season. Mike McKenna was the Falcons’ top goalie leading the team’s goalies in GAA, save percentage wins (by only one over Jeremy Smith) and shutouts. Anton Forsberg was impressive in his four appearances (three starts) going 3-0 stopping 90 of 94 shots with a 1.13GAA and .957 save percentage.
In the playoffs the Falcons will face the Providence Bruins in a best of five series opening in Providence tonight (Apr 23). In the season series the Falcons won the season series with a record of 6-2-0-2 with each team going 3-1-0-1 in their home rink. This will be the third time the teams have met in the playoffs – the Falcons have won each series. The AHL playoffs are little odd with the first round as a best of five. This means game one is in Providence and games two and three will be in Springfield.
Sean Collins led the Falcons in scoring in the season series collecting nine points with six goals and three assists. Jeremy Smith (who is up with the Jackets) played in seven of the 10 games; Mike McKenna played the other three going 2-0-0-1 with a 1.62GAA and a .944 save percentage. As for the Bruins, well this is a bit awkward, as current Falcon Carter Camper led that team in scoring in the series collecting nine points with two goals and seven assists. He also picked up three assists in the two games he played with Springfield against the Bruins. The player that Camper was traded for, Blake Parlett, had an assist in one of the three games against his old team. Niklas Svedberg was the Bruins top goalie this season and played in six of the 10 games going 3-3 with a 2.99 GAA and a .910 save percentage.
As for a prediction I believe the Falcons will sweep the Bruins leading to (if the don’t reseed the bracket after this round) a matchup between the East’s top two teams assuming Manchester defeats Norfolk.
I’ll be back after the first round to let you know how the team is doing!
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