Providence Bruins head coach Ryan Mougenel believes his team needed a mental break from hockey as much as anything related to bumps and bruises.
After a 72-game regular-season gauntlet that concluded with a three-in-three weekend, Mougenel and his players just got away from it all.
“I think it’s important to get away and just not think about hockey, and that’s from the players to the staff. I think it’s just healthy…to have a little reset, heal some injuries, and more importantly have a clear mind.”
Now a fully rested Bruins team returns to the ice for the first time since Apr. 16 with Game 1 of an Atlantic Division semifinal match-up at home to Hartford tonight. After some time off to heal and decompress from the regular-season grind before the club returned to practice, Mougenel and Providence management added a wrinkle to the club’s preparations: Eric Hoffberg, a leadership and training speaker, visited with the team this past Monday. Hoffberg has a hockey background as well from his time as head coach at the Rochester Institute of Technology.
“We had a great meeting, and we have so many experiences to share with the Chris Wagners, the Anton Stralmans, and even some young guys that have been through playoffs in junior,” Mougenel said. “We just kind of thought outside the box a little bit.”
Back on the ice, the P-Bruins worked in scrimmage play and ratcheted up their practice intensity to face an opponent in the Wolf Pack that has gone on a 12-2-0-0 tear going back to March 18.
“Our competitive spirit’s been pretty evident in practice every day,” Mougenel said. “Kudos to our veterans. They bring it in every practice, every game. They’ve been amazing. Those are the guys that keep you sharp and keep the competitive juices going.”
Providence won the Atlantic Division regular-season title and finished first overall in the Eastern Conference. The club has strong Calder Cup hopes, but the Wolf Pack will present a tough early test.
“I think the challenge for us is understanding what we have to do longer and better,” Mougenel said of trying to handle Hartford. “We have a group up front [that] at times can be young, and that’s why we’re so blessed to have some of these veterans that show the way.”
The pursuit of a 12th Calder Cup championship opens tonight for the Hershey Bears in Charlotte.
While the Bears have been off since Apr. 15, they hardly concerned themselves with any potential opponent for this series. The Bears finished just one point behind Providence in the regular season.
“We’re going to have to play someone, so we weren’t too concerned about it,” Bears leading scorer Mike Sgarbossa said. “I mean, they’re a good team. They won for a reason. They finished where they did for a reason.
“They’re fast. They’re skilled. They have good veteran leadership that has been there and has played a lot of [NHL] games. We’ve had battles with them.”
But mostly the Bears are just excited to be back in the full swing of the Calder Cup Playoff mix. Last season they fell to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton in a best-of-three first-round series. They finished first overall in the AHL during the abbreviated 2020-21 campaign, but the Calder Cup Playoffs were not staged that season. Sgarbossa is hungry for a long playoff run; he was with the Bears when Charlotte eliminated them in a four-game sweep in the 2019 Atlantic Division finals.
“This is the goal,” Sgarbossa stated. “I think people are excited. The players are excited, the staff’s excited.”
Tonight the Rochester Americans will fight for their season.
If all goes well for the Amerks, they will have to do that at least two more times if they are to extract themselves from a 2-0 hole in their North Division semifinal series with the rival Syracuse Crunch.
“We know how good Syracuse is,” Amerks head coach Seth Appert said via the team website. “We have a lot of respect for them, their talent, their competitiveness, their structure. With that being said, I have confidence in this group. This group’s gone through a lot. There’s a lot of heart, a lot of character in that room, and we’ll need all that.”
Syracuse Crunch head coach Ben Groulx is never an easy person to satisfy.
But these days Groulx is feeling pretty good about his team as the Crunch could complete a sweep of Rochester with a Game 3 win tonight. Up 2-0, including a masterful Game 2 performance in a 3-0 shutout, there was not much for even Groulx to pick apart.
“We’re happy with our play,” said Groulx, who singled out rookie defensemen Declan Carlile, Max Crozier and Jack Thompson for their play, particularly with stalwart Darren Raddysh still on recall to the Tampa Bay Lightning and Sean Day injured. “I think the three of them brought us a lot of stability.”
“They compete, and what I like the most about them is they’re not perfect. But they play with their guts. For me, it’s a big quality when you have that on your team, you know you can count on people.”
Crozier, a 2019 fourth-round pick by the Lightning who joined the Crunch late in the regular season from Providence College, has made a quick impression on Groulx. After three assists in his first nine AHL games, Crozier pumped eight shots on net in Game 1.
“He’s a competitor,” Groulx said. “He’s mature. I think he’s fearless.”
The Crunch will be without captain Gabriel Dumont tonight as he serves the first of a two-game suspension for a kneeing incident in Game 2. Forward Jack Finley has missed the first two games of the series as well.
“We’re thin in the middle,” Groulx acknowledged, “but you know what? We’ve been having the same mentality here for years. It’s next man up. It’s an opportunity for somebody else to grab.
“We’re happy,” Groulx said, “but we know the toughest is in front of us.”
― Patrick Williams
