It didn’t look good for the Hershey Bears on Friday night in Charlotte. In the first of two games against the Checkers, Hershey trailed 3-0 when the second period ended. Charlotte, hot on Hershey’s heels in the standings, looked to draw two points closer to overtaking them. Instead of fading quietly into the snowy night in Charlotte, the Bears rallied to force overtime in the third. Alex Limoges scored in the extra session to lift the Bears to an improbable win.
Excellent Ness
The catalyst behind Hershey’s win was captain Aaron Ness. As the first two periods wore on, Ness played with a noticeable edge to his game. At the end of the middle stanza, he spoke with media specialist Jesse Liebman and had some choice words for his club.
“Not good enough, not enough compete,” Ness said. “There’s a lot of things, honestly. It’s not our best, we have to figure it out and turn this tide now. We have a period to do so, we play them again tomorrow. Send a message, at worst. We need to find it in ourselves and bring more in the third period.”
Ness is a vocal leader in the locker room for this team. Despite suffering from injury, he notably took warmups in the Calder Cup Finals and delivered pregame speeches to his team. Healthy and with the captain’s crest on his jersey in the absence of Dylan McIlrath, he had a hand in getting the comeback started. Ness got Hershey on the board with a slap shot through a screen early in the third for his second goal of the season.
Bears Rally to Force OT
Hershey followed that goal up less than one minute later to pull to within one. Hardy Haman Aktell took a pass from Ethan Bear and let a shot fly from the left point. Pierrick Dubé paid the price in front to deflect it past Chris Driedger for his eighth goal of the season. Dubé, who tallied 28 goals a season ago, is heating up with a point in each of his last four games. He scored a hat trick on Driedger in Game Six of the Calder Cup Finals and solved him again on Friday.
The Bears knotted the game up at three on another big goal from their fourth line. Matt Strome skated into the zone off a feed from Vincent Iorio. He spotted Brennan Saulnier with a lot of space, and his shot was off the stick and in the net quick as lightning. All of a sudden, the Bears had improbably tied the game at three. Saulnier had a goal and an assist in the win.
Although the Bears earned a point, they weren’t done just yet. Overtime opened up a bit with the teams trading chances on the rush. One lead pass was ahead of its target, and Clay Stevenson flung it ahead to Alex Limoges. The Penn State alumni went the other way and buried the winner to give Hershey the second point by a 4-3 final.
Essential Points
Hershey took the extra point to extend their lead over Charlotte to five. The two teams will meet again at Bojangles Coliseum for a rematch on Saturday evening. It’s an early playoff preview of two elite Atlantic Division clubs. Charlotte has five games in-hand over Hershey, meaning they can close the gap while the Bears are idle.
The standings race, combined with Hershey’s inconsistency in recent time, makes this win a potential turning point for the Bears. Their stock appeared to be fading as the clock wound down, but the team rose to the occasion in a major way. Hershey still has work to do to play a full, sixty-minute game, but this is a step in the right direction.
Hershey took just their second win over Charlotte in five tries so far this season. The Bears will be back at Bojangles Coliseum in late February for another playoff-style set against the Checkers. The Atlantic Division race is wide-open, as are the two playoff byes for the best two teams.
Frank’s in the Show
Hershey had a lineup swap ahead of Friday’s game from their NHL affiliate in Washington. The Capitals swapped Ivan Miroshnichenko to the Bears in exchange for Ethen Frank. It’s Frank’s first call-up to the NHL hot on the heels of being named to the 2025 AHL All-Star Game. Frank is second in the AHL in goals with 20 and was named to the All-Star Game for the third straight year.
Not only did Frank earn the call, but he jumped straight into the lineup for the Capitals against the Montreal Canadiens. He earned his first NHL point, an assist, by setting up the tying goal with his speed. Frank has won the AHL’s Fastest Skater Competition in back-to-back seasons and used his speed to beat an icing call. He made a slick move to beat a defender and set up Lars Eller for the goal.
Frank’s long journey to the NHL included signing an AHL contract with Hershey out of Western Michigan University. He scored ten goals and 17 points in 18 playoff games last spring. Frank earned a contract with the Capitals and made his long-awaited debut.
