Aeros win a sqeaker to take series lead (updated)

Close your eyes and imagine the oldest, grittiest, loudest, most intimate hockey arena you can think of. Beer and blood and taunting and fights in the hallways and more beer.

That's where the Aeros played tonight. And like the honey badger, who suffers a hundred stings to reach in there and get what he wants from the beehive, the Aeros just carried on playing their game to get the 2-1 win and take the series lead.

An early goal by the Aeros, where DiSalvatore jammed a rebound over Lehner's leg pad (bad goal) took a little of the air out of the building, but not much. Still early and these BSens can score like crazy, right?

The first period was fairly even, but in the second, the Aeros found their stride and took it to Binghamton pretty hard, putting 11 shots to Bingo's 5. Prosser scored the second goal, punching the puck in during a wild scramble in Lehner's crease about midway through the period.

Things got crazy in the third, as Bingo scored early in the period on a power play. Hackett argued that it was tipped in with a high stick. It was most certainly tipped in but I didn't see tip itself, but I heard it and it was obvious Hackett was expecting it to go somewhere else entirely.

The irony, at least to me, is that the Aeros worked a ton on executing tip-ins today (not defending them) at morning skate. Oh well. The hockey gods are funny like that.

Hackett was VERY good in this game though and had terrific visual attachment to the puck and didn't worry about saves looking pretty. He just got whatever he could in front of everything. Really big game for that kid and one to be proud of.

Later in the third, with the game 2-1, the BSens had their own mad scramble on the net and the puck hit the crossbar and down to the goal line, bouncing around a bit. Hackett covered it and I guess it looked like it crossed the line as he covered it, or maybe he knocked it across or something.

Anyway, Koho was pretty much standing on the back of the net watching this play transpire and emphatically waved no goal. I don't think anyone had a better view, so it's sort of hard to argue. Everyone I've talked to said, "Ehhhhh, it LOOKED over... but I didn't have a great view."  So *shrug* who knows without replay in this league.

The final minute was absolutely bananas. They pulled Lehner with a minute left, at one point he had to go back in net, but mostly he was out and that was the longest minute ever. Lots of crazy scrambles around the Aeros net, but somehow they were keeping it out. At one point, one of the Aeros was laying across the goal line to keep it out. Didn't think that was legal but they got away with it.

It was seriously insane and exciting. Just glad it worked out like it did. It was a phenomenal effort by the Aeros for the entire 60 minutes. I'm exhausted just thinking about how hard they worked out there.

I've been a little concerned about O'Sullivan lately, but he was back tonight and maybe better than ever. He was fantastic with the puck, but even more so, he made some seriously unbelievable defensive plays that saved a lot of bacon.

All the guys do that stuff, but when you have a guy with hands and ability like Sully, sometimes those guys get a pass. But he's not taking it.

The games are getting chippier for sure. They're developing quite a little dislike for each other out there. And props to the Aeros for not reacting to it and getting into penalty trouble.

Because there's a ton of media up here, the press conferences go quite long and, at least for one night, I'm opting for sleep instead of the bar. So, once I figure out how to upload audio to this darn page, I'll just leave it at that for you to enjoy.

Meanwhile, let's just get this posted so you have someplace to comment for now....

Okay, here's the audio. Only way I could figure out to get it going was to make it a YouTube movie. Had to pick a picture. Didn't have any of Kleinendorst, sooooo.... Brusty it is.