March 16-17

It was rainy and raw on Saturday morning, we did our usual lunch date in Quarryville. In the afternoon we heard reports of snow flurries in Berks County, when the ladies and I arrived for the Royals game the precipitation had ended. This night at the Sovereign Center featured the top two clubs in the Eastern Conference going head-to-head and virtually even. The Cincinnati Cyclones came in with eighty-eight standings points on a 40-17-8 record, the Royals had the same point total but led the conference on the basis of their 41-18-6 mark. This was not a postseason game but the intensity level was playoff caliber. The Cyclones drew first blood but the Royals evened it on a score by Stanislav Galiev. The club took its first lead of the night when newcomer Robbie Bourdon lit the lamp for his first goal as a pro, he recently finished his collegiate career at Colgate University. Yannick Tifu added an insurance marker before the 'Clones struck again to make it 3-2, down the stretch Riley Gill was immense in net as the Royals recorded a huge twenty-sixth home-ice win. The victory gives the club a two-point cushion in the conference standings and a two-win tiebreaker advantage, the twenty-six home wins are a new franchise record. The boys will play their next four on the road before returning to the Sovereign Center on Thursday the 28th. On Sunday Jamie Burkholder joined the ladies and me as we headed to the road one last time for the week, the destination was Hershey for our final AHL game of the season. The Adirondack Phantoms made the last of their two regular-season appearances in Hershey and for a while it looked like a rerun of the game in February as the Bears scored the first three goals. Ex-Royal Philipp Grubauer was in net for Hershey, he would have no shutout on this night but he was the winning goalie as the Bears took it 5-2. In recent years the Phantoms have not been very good and they almost never win in Hershey but they are the Flyers' AHL club and as a Flyers fan I try to see them whenever they visit (the likelihood of me getting to Glens Falls, New York anytime soon is highly doubtful). Take care, thanks for reading.