Hershey Bears head coach Todd Nelson does not need to yell.

One, it’s not really his style. Two, he know the real pressure points for a player. He can, has, and will publicly indict his top players for any lack of effort or focus. With three-plus decades as a player and coach at the pro level, no one is going to fool him.

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If anyone does decide to question Nelson’s evaluations, he is someone who has his name on the Calder Cup five times, including twice with the Bears. Hershey has had a long succession of top head coaches come through in the 20 years that the team has been affiliated with the Washington Capitals. A lot of coaching personalities, too, and considerable evidence that there are many methods of reaching players. Everyone from Bruce Boudreau to Spencer Carbery to Nelson and several others have guided the Bears to five Calder Cup titles since the Washington-Hershey affiliation’s beginning in 2005.

And with a chance to become the first team to win three consecutive Calder Cup titles since 1962, Nelson is fighting to avoid that opportunity being tossed away.

But the Bears are in trouble right now, big trouble, and Nelson is not hesitant to point it out. The Lehigh Valley Phantoms have controlled the back-to-back defending Calder Cup champion Bears in the past two games of the teams’ best-of-five Atlantic Division Semifinal match-up.

Hershey will attempt to avoid elimination Friday when the series continues at Lehigh Valley. A deciding Game 5 would be next Sunday on Hershey ice.

But if the Bears are to extend their season past Friday, let alone win this round, another divisional round, the Eastern Conference Finals, and the Calder Cup Finals, they will need to show a lot more than they have these past two games. In Game 2 last Friday night, the Phantoms handled Hershey, 3-1. By that point, Nelson had already sounded an alarm that he needed to see much more effort from his team. Sunday’s 4-2 loss at Lehigh Valley led to Nelson punctuating that criticism.

It’s one thing if a power play does not produce offensively. But it had better not break down and allow shorthanded goals. Hershey did that twice in the third period of Game 2 and again in the first 11 minutes of Game 3. Four Hershey forwards found themselves on the ice for all three of those Lehigh Valley shorthanded goals. Phantoms forward Zayde Wisdom had those two goals in Game 2, one on a bad Hershey pinch and the other off a lost puck battle. Sunday’s goal came on a Hershey puck misplay at the far blue line.

Expect a different look for the Hershey power play come Friday.

“Our power play is going to be shaken up a bit,” Nelson told the Hershey media after Game 3. “It's going to be a different look on Friday, for sure.”

Perhaps most irksome to Nelson is that the Phantoms have been outclassing the Bears with the attention to deal, diligence, and work ethic that took his team to those two Calder Cup titles. The Bears have put Nelson, the coaching staff, and their fans through postseason stress before. Last June they nearly squandered a 3-0 lead in the Eastern Conference Finals against Cleveland before finally ousting the Monsters in overtime of Game 7. In the 2023 Calder Cup Finals, the Coachella Valley Firebirds picked apart the Bears in the first two games before Hershey rallied to take that series in seven games. 

Even this year, there have been some really bad nights at the rink for Hershey, starting with a 6-1 home loss in November to the Bridgeport Islanders. Nelson has been critical of his team after some of those poor performances. Along with that Bridgeport loss, Toronto (7-3 on Dec. 21), Syracuse (5-0 on Feb. 8), and Utica (7-4 on March 30) all thumped the Bears at Giant Center this season. Wilkes-Barre/Scranton blew them out on the road in January, 9-0. It took a late-season run for the Bears to raise their home record to 12th in the AHL. Maybe it’s the fatigue, physical and mental, that comes with a pair of Calder Cup Playoff runs the past two springs. Certainly a workmanlike Phantoms team is not helping Hershey’s cause. And Hershey’s two championships has meant that opponents bring a top effort regularly.

If there is one consolation for Hershey, it’s that there is this lengthy break between games. That means time to rest. It also means time to reorient themselves while Nelson makes the adjustments that he sees fit.

“I'm not panicking by any stretch of the means,” Nelson stressed. “I've got to give Lehigh credit. They're playing smart. They're playing strong. You know, their top guys are getting it done. Our guys aren't, and so for us, we've got to dig deep.

“I don't think everybody in the locker room has given us 110 percent, and we'll address that. There'll be changes made for the next game.”

D'Astous To Tampa Bay

A top SHL defenseman is on his way to the Tampa Bay Lightning organization.

Tampa Bay signed 27-year-old Charle-Edouard D’Astous to a one-year, two-way contract Monday. In 49 games with Brynäs, D’Astous had 12-27-39, tying him for second in the SHL among defensemen in both points and goals. He then played 17 playoff games, finishing with 4-4-8 as Brynäs reached the SHL finals.

D’Astous has spent the past three seasons in Europe, playing two seasons with Liiga club KooKoo Kouvola before moving to Brynäs. He also has three seasons of North American pro experience that included 23 AHL games with the Grand Rapids Griffins and Colorado Eagles. In 2021-22 with the ECHL’s Utah Grizzlies, he was named defenseman of the year after producing 26-31-57 in 52 regular-season games. He also has been a QMJHL defenseman of the year, winning that honor in 2018-19 with the Rimouski Oceanic.

If D’Astous does not stick with Tampa Bay, he could be a helpful addition for the Syracuse Crunch, who were swept by the Rochester Americans last week. The Syracuse blue line will need to be rebuilt for next season, and veterans Tobie Bisson, Derrick Pouliot, and Steven Santini are all unsigned for next season.

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