{"id":197376,"date":"2026-05-20T02:41:07","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T02:41:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/197376\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T02:41:07","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T02:41:07","slug":"penguins-hold-off-thunderbirds-to-take-2-1-series-lead-theahl-com","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/197376\/","title":{"rendered":"Penguins hold off Thunderbirds to take 2-1 series lead | TheAHL.com"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sergei Murashov<\/a> turned away 27 shots, Bill Zonnon<\/a> made it three goals in three games and Wilkes-Barre\/Scranton defeated Springfield, 2-1, to take a two-games-to-one lead in the Atlantic Division finals on Tuesday at the MassMutual Center.<\/p>\n

Game 4 of the best-of-five series is Thursday night in Springfield.<\/p>\n

The Penguins scored first when Rutger McGroarty<\/a> took a lead pass from Avery Hayes<\/a> and beat Georgii Romanov<\/a> on a shorthanded breakaway with 19.1 seconds left in the opening period.<\/p>\n

After a scoreless second, Zonnon doubled the lead 5:58 into the third period, scoring his third goal in as many games to start his pro career. Boko Imama<\/a> fed Zonnon on a three-on-one rush and the 19-year-old put a wrister past Romanov from 20 feet out to make it 2-0.<\/p>\n

Zonnon, Pittsburgh\u2019s first-round pick (22nd overall) in the 2025 NHL Draft, joined Wilkes-Barre\/Scranton from Blainville-Boisbriand (QMJHL) late in the division semifinal round and made his pro debut in Game 1 against Springfield last week.<\/p>\n

Juraj Pekarcik<\/a> got the Thunderbirds on the board with 3:39 remaining in regulation when he deked around a Penguins defender and snuck a shot under Murashov for his first postseason goal. Springfield, which scored two extra-attacker goals to tie Game 2 late, pressed for the equalizer but could not force OT.<\/p>\n

Murashov (5-2) improved his save percentage to .948 in the series, with five goals allowed on 97 shots.<\/p>\n

Romanov (6-3) finished with 30 saves on the night.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

(W-B\/Scranton leads series, 2-1)
Game 1 \u2013 Tue., May 12 \u2013 W-B\/SCRANTON 2, Springfield 0<\/a>
Game 2 \u2013 Thu., May 14 \u2013 Springfield 4, W-B\/SCRANTON 3 (OT)<\/a>
Game 3 \u2013 Tue., May 19 \u2013 W-B\/Scranton 2, SPRINGFIELD 1<\/a>
Game 4 \u2013 Thu., May 21 \u2013 W-B\/Scranton at Springfield, 7:05
*Game 5 \u2013 Sat., May 23 \u2013 Springfield at W-B\/Scranton, 6:05
*if necessary\u2026 All times Eastern<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sergei Murashov turned away 27 shots, Bill Zonnon made it three goals in three games and Wilkes-Barre\/Scranton defeated…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":197377,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[178,180,179],"class_list":["post-197376","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-scranton","tag-scranton","tag-scranton-headlines","tag-scranton-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197376","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=197376"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197376\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/197377"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=197376"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=197376"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=197376"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}