GAME FIVE – DUPONT GIVETH AND DUPONT TAKETH AWAY

VERSUS

The Connecticut Whale fought back valiantly from a three-goal deficit, not once but TWICE, and finally tied it early in the third on a Brodie Dupont goal. But as has been the case with this team all season long with the entire team, Dupont’s undisciplined penalty just five seconds after his goal set up the Portland Pirates for what would be the game winner, and a 5-4 win at the Cumberland County Civic Center in Game Five of their best-of-seven AHL Atlantic Division semi-final series. Portland now holds a 3-2 series lead over their Connecticut neighbors.

“It keeps coming back to the little things,” Whale head coach Ken Gernander said to reporters after the game. “The majority of our guys battled hard. But it’s the penalties and little mistakes that take us out of it.”

PIRATES HARPOON THE GREAT WHALE

VERSUS    

There’s a popular old saying that goes, “Better Late Than Never.” However if you asked the Connecticut Whale players what they thought about that saying and how it played a part in their Saturday night demise, a stunning 3-2 loss on a goal with just 7.5 seconds remaining, they’d likely vote to unanimously change it to, “Better Never Than Late.”

OT SPECIALISTS

VERSUS    

You’ve heard of shootout specialists, well Tim Kennedy is becoming the Connecticut Whale’s overtime specialist when he buried his second OT winner in a row, both against his former team no less, and gave the Whale a 5-4 win in Portland against the Pirates Saturday night.

It was, to quote NY Yankee Hall-of-Fame catcher Yogi Berra, “Déjà vu all over again”