Like it did for the parent club in New York, the 2009-2010 Hartford Wolf Pack season came to an end on Sunday, though with decidedly less suspense.  Thanks to a 9-2 trouncing by the Worcester Sharks on Wednesday and a Bridgeport Sound Tiger victory over the Lowell Devils on Friday, the Pack’s extremely slim playoff hopes were officially dashed Friday night, even as the team rebounded to take a rematch against the Sharks, 3-2.

To their credit, the Pack came out and gave fans a good show in their final game at the XL Center on Saturday, riding a franchise record seven goal second period to a scrap-filled 7-5 whitewashing of the lowly Springfield Falcons.  They wrapped up the season in Bridgeport on Sunday with a 2-1 win over the Sound Tigers, capping off a 10-5-0 end-of-season run that proved to be too little, too late.

I’ll dig deeper into the whys and wherefores behind the Wolf Pack’s first finish outside the AHL’s playoff picture — and take a closer look at some individual performances — over at Beyond the Blueshirts in the coming weeks.  In the meantime, click below for three high-level issues that helped sabotage the Wolf Pack’s unlucky thirteenth season:

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The week got off to a rough start for the Hartford Wolf Pack when they lost Wednesday night’s match-up with the division-leading Worcester Sharks, but Hartford’s Heroes bounced back over the weekend with two convincing wins over the Lowell Devils and Springfield Falcons.  When coupled with a pair of losses by the Bridgeport Sound Tigers, it meant the playoff berth that once looked completely out of reach remains tenuously attainable.  But with the team sitting five points back of the Sound Tigers with four games remaining, and the Norfolk Admirals in between, it still remains an extremely long shot.

And if this year’s edition of the Wolf Pack is to avoid becoming the first squad in the franchise’s 13-year history to fail to earn an invite to the post-season dance, they’re going to have to continue winning without some important pieces.  Last week they did it without leading scorers P.A. Parenteau and Corey Locke, who both spent the week with the Rangers.  They’ll get top point-getter Locke back following his two-game debut in a Rangers uniform, but they’ll be without the services of Dale Weise, who earned his first call-up to the NHL with a four-game goal scoring streak and a career-high seven game points streak.  The sophomore winger has picked up ten points in the span, bringing his season totals up to 28 goals (second on the team behind Locke’s 29) and 50 points, handily eclipsing his 11 goal, 23 point rookie campaign.

Four of Weise’s points came in the past week, beginning with a goal in the Wolf Pack’s 5-3 loss to visiting Worcester on Wednesday.  After Donald Brashear gave the Pack a rare early lead at 8:30 of the first period, the Sharks answered with three goals in the final 8:24 of the frame, sending the Pack to the locker room 3-1 down.  Weise gave his club hope late in the second period when his centering pass went in off a Worcester defenseman and cut the lead to 3-2.

An early man advantage in the third period should have provided the perfect opportunity for the Pack to tie things up, but instead their power play surrendered its eleventh shorthanded goal against, all but sealing the team’s fate.  Captain Dane Byers added his 22nd of the campaign on a deflection on the power play at 8:44, but Worcester shut the door 1:15 later with its fifth and final goal of the night.

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Despite victories in two out of three games, the playoff picture only got bleaker for the Hartford Wolf Pack this week.  After impressive come-from-behind wins over the Adirondack Phantoms and Bridgeport Sound Tigers — the club the Pack is currently chasing for the final playoff berth — Hartford once again found themselves playing from behind on Sunday.  They were unable to rebound from a two goal deficit a third time, however, dropping a 3-2 decision to the Portland Pirates.

To make matters worse, the club now finds itself moving forward without either of its top two scorers, since both P.A. Parenteau and Corey Locke were recalled by the New York Rangers.

They got a taste of what it would be like this weekend, when they were forced to play without Parenteau, who got the call from New York on Friday morning.

Facing the already-eliminated Adirondack Phantoms on Friday night, the Pack spotted their visitors a two goal lead before buckling down and playing the kind of hockey they’ve proven they’re capable only in short bursts throughout the season.  It was a pattern that would be repeated in each game this week: fall behind by a pair of goals before rallying to tie.  That they did it without their most dynamic offensive player in Parenteau makes it especially impressive.

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Like those of their big brothers in New York, the Hartford Wolf Pack’s playoff hopes took a serious blow this week.  In three games, the club managed just one win, and that came in overtime against a team ahead of them in race for the final Eastern Conference playoff berth.  As a result, with just ten games remaining and a nine point gap between them and a playoff invite, its looking more and more likely that this season will mark the first in the franchise’s 13-year history that it does not participate in the postseason.

A common theme in both losses this week — and throughout the second half of the season — was playing from behind.  In Wednesday’s game against the Providence Bruins, defensive breakdowns cost the Wolf Pack two goals in the first 10 minutes of the game, including a goal on the game’s first shot just 2:23 in.

The Pack drew within one on Corey Locke’s league-leading 17th power play goal in the second period and equalized three minutes into the final frame when P.A. Parenteau banged home a convenient carom off the end boards.  But the Bruins re-took the lead at 10:43 after Trent Whitfield slipped Locke’s coverage, stole the puck from Anders Eriksson behind the net, and wrapped it around the post for what would ultimately become the game winner.

A botched change when goaltender Chad Johnson came off the ice for the extra skater allowed Providence to add an empty net goal with a minute and a half left, and Jordan Nightingale took a high-sticking penalty 19 seconds later, ending any hopes his team may have had for a late comeback.

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Okay, so the Hartford Wolf Pack’s two wins this week don’t rank anywhere near a Stanley Cup victory, but for a team that had only won three of its last 21 games and was mired in a seven game winless streak they were pretty important. And not just because of the points gained in the standings.  In those games the Wolf Pack started to show signs of being the team many thought they should have been all season long.  The question now, with only 13 games remaining in the season, is whether it’ll be too little, too late.

Sometimes the addition of one player can change the entire dynamic of a team.  That’s what’s happened when Kris Newbury joined the Wolf Pack at the NHL trade deadline two weeks ago.  Newbury’s arrival allowed third-year pro Brodie Dupont to slide back to his natural position on the wing, and with the return of P.A. Parenteau from injury, reunited two-third of last season’s dynamic top line, with Newbury slotting into Artem Anisimov‘s place at pivot.  That allowed the team’s leading scorer, Corey Locke, to center his own line with Dane Byers and Dale Weise, giving the Pack a pair lines that pose an equal and serious threat .  And, in turn, take some of the pressure off rookies like Evgeny Grachev and Paul Crowder and ECHL call-up Ryan Garlock, who have all been asked to do a little more than they’re currently capable of throughout much of the season.

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The Hartford Wolf Pack made a rare foray north of the border this week and came home with a pair of points, though they continued to chase the elusive “W” in the standings.

Both Saturday’s match-up with the Hamilton Bulldogs and Sunday’s tilt against the Toronto Marlies required extra time to decide a winner, and despite being tied for tops in the league in overtime victories, the Wolf Pack came away the loser in both: Saturday in a shootout, and Sunday with just 1.1 seconds remaining in overtime.

A pair of new faces were on hand for the latest round of losses, while some old friends moved on to greener pastures, victims of the NHL Trade Deadline. New York Rangers General Manager Glen Sather made two moves at Wednesday’s deadline, both with the goal of shoring up weak spots in the Wolf Pack line-up.

The first deal brought 27-year old center Kris Newbury to Connecticut’s capital. A veteran of 48 NHL games with the Toronto Maple Leafs and Detroit Red Wings, Newbury was brought in to fill a gap down the middle that’s been an issue for the Pack since Tyler Arneson left for the KHL and Patrick Rissmiller was dispatched to Grand Rapids of the AHL in October. Newbury paid immediate dividends, potting a goal and an assist in his first weekend with the Pack.

Newbury didn’t come cheap, however, and in exchange for the hard-nosed center, the Wolf Pack sent 23-year old heart-and-soul winger Jordan Owens — recipient of last season’s Fan Favorite Award — to the Motor City.

The second addition was Anders Eriksson, a 34-year old veteran defenseman with almost 600 NHL games under his belt. Eriksson helps shore up a defense corps that’s been depleted by injuries all season, and suffered its latest when Michael Sauer went down with season-ending shoulder injury last month. And while the front office didn’t know it when they acquired him in exchange for goaltender Miika Wiikman and a sixth round draft pick, Eriksson’s arrival would prove fortuitous. On Thursday Matheiu Dandenault, who returned to the Pack line-up only a week ago after spending the majority of the season nursing a groin injury, opted to call it quits after learning he would not receive an NHL contract from the Rangers.

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The losses continued to pile up for the Hartford Wolf Pack last week, but there were a few silver linings to be found amidst the black clouds that have hovered over the franchise in recent weeks.

The Pack lost all three of the games it played, each by single goal, to fall below the .500 mark to 26-27-4, but two of the losses came in overtime, earning the Pack two extremely valuable points.  And so as the AHL enters its final full week before Clear Day rosters must be submitted, the Wolf Pack finds itself in the seventh spot in the eight team Atlantic Division, 11 points behind the fourth place Lowell Devils.  Yet thanks to the lopsided division alignment in the AHL’s Eastern Conference this season, and the poor play of the bottom half teams in the East Division, the club remains only two points out of the final cross-over playoff position.

The week started on a high note, with the Wolf Pack welcoming veterans P.A. Parenteau and Mathieu Dandenault back from extended absences.  Parenteau returned from a concussion — his second in less than a year — that had kept him out of the lineup for 16 games over a five week span.  Without its top offensive producer, Hartford’s record was a dismal 4-10-2-0.  Dandenault, meanwhile, had been missing since Thanksgiving weekend with a groin injury, an absence of 36 games.

With Parenteau and Dandenault back in the fold, the Wolf Pack started the week the closest they’ll be to full health for the remainder of the campaign.  Only Michael Sauer (shoulder), Brent Henley (knee) and Mike Hoffman (shoulder) remain sidelined, but all three have undergone surgeries that have brought a premature end to their season.

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Despite showing signs of improvement, the Hartford Wolf Pack continued to struggle this week, winning just once in four tries and finishing the weekend in seventh place in the AHL’s eight team Atlantic Division, with a 26-26-3-4 record.

The week started off the same way last week ended, with another blowout loss, this time to the Norfolk Admirals, 7-3.  Another slow start put the Pack behind the eight ball early, but despite being outshot 17-9, the Pack escaped to the locker room at the end of twenty minutes down by a single goal, thanks to a Brodie Dupont tally late in the period that made it 2-1.  Norfolk blew the game open in the second with three unanswered goals, however, the second of which sent rookie puck-stopper Chad Johnson to the bench for the second time in as many starts, after giving up four goals on 21 shots.  Paul Crowder and Jared Nightingale each added goals in the third period, after the game was already well out of hand.

Nightingale’s tally, with only 15 seconds remaining, is noteworthy only because it earned Donald Brashear his first point in the AHL since his demotion, a secondary assist.  It was a weekend of firsts for the exiled enforcer, who also fought his first AHL bout this weekend, against Bridgeport’s Joel Rechlicz.

While Johnson wasn’t good in net by any stretch of the imagination, the defense has continued to be the real issue.  The injury-battered blueline surrendered a season-high 45 shots in Wednesday’s match-up, but received a lift on Friday, when Bobby Sanguinetti returned to the line-up after an eleven game absence due to a high ankle sprain.  The improvement was immediately palpable.  Though the result, a 4-2 loss to the Bridgeport Sound Tigers, was no different, Sanguinetti’s presence proved a settling force.  The Pack kept their opponent under 32 shots for the first time since January 27th, allowing only 22 attempts on Johnson’s goal.  The Calgary native stopped 18 of them, but an empty net goal at 19:45 of the third sealed the Sound Tigers’ victory.

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My mother always told me “if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.”  But if I were to follow her advice in regards to the Hartford Wolf Pack’s week gone by, I’d have to stop typing now. For not only did the Wolf Pack lose all three games they played this week, they did so by a combined score of 20-8.

The week began at the Dunkin Donuts Center in Providence on Friday, where the seventh place Bruins entered the week having won four of their last five games to move withing four points of the fifth place Wolf Pack.  By the time the smoke had cleared, the Baby Bs had scored a 7-1 decision, handing the Wolf Pack one of their worst defeats of the season.

Most worryingly, Chad Johnson, back in the AHL for his first start since January 23, showed signs that the yo-yo treatment he’s been given by the Rangers organization may be hurting his development.  The rookie pro stopped just 28 of the 35 shots he faced and looked nothing like the calm, confident netminder who took over the backup job in New York in early December.

Not that the drubbing the Wolf Pack took was all Johnson’s fault, of course.  Quite the contrary: The skaters in front of him failed to show up in the first period, allowing their hosts 16-5 shot advantage while they fell behind by the score of 2-0.  Rookie Evgeny Grachev ended an eight game scoreless streak early in the second to make it 2-1, but the home side answered just over a minute later and never looked back.  Providence added another goal in the second, and three unanswered in the third period en route to the lopsided victory.

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With apologies for quoting bad seventies pop, two out of three truly ain’t bad, especially when a team is faced by the rash of injuries that continued to plague the Hartford Wolf Pack this week.  And that’s how the Pack finished its trio of games this week: two wins, one loss.  What’s more, their lone loss came in overtime, meaning Hartford’s Heroes came away with five of the six points that were on the table.

Nope, not bad at all for a team that was missing nine players, including five defensemen, to injury.  There was some good news, but also some more bad news on that front this week, but we’ll get to that in a minute.

The week got underway at the Prudential Center in Newark, where the Wolf Pack faced the Lowell Devils on Wednesday.  It was the second of two games played between the two clubs in Newark this season, with the first one going the Devils way by the score of 3-2 on January 6th.

Wednesday’s game brought the same score, but with the Wolf Pack on the winning side.  And it would take some overtime dramatics to achieve.

Since moving out of his natural position at left wing to fill a gap at center earlier in the season, Brodie Dupont hasn’t had the chance to play hero very often.  He seized the opportunity on Wednesday, scoring first in the third period to give the Pack a 2-1 lead and then again with only 19.9 seconds remaining in the extra frame.  The overtime winner — the first in Dupont’s career — gave the Pack their league-leading eigth overtime victory on the season.  Derek Couture had the other Wolf Pack goal early in the second period — the first of three goals he’d score over the week.

Dupont’s overtime dramatics became necessary after Hartford’s battered and bruised defense corps surrendered the tying tally to the Devils with only 1:07 remaining in regulation time.  This week started the same way last week ended: with the Pack short five defensemen, as Corey Potter, Bobby Sanguinetti, Michael Sauer, Matheiu Dandenault and Brent Henley were each sidelined.  Good news came on Friday, however, as Potter returned to the lineup after missing nine games with a concussion.

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