Bridgeport and Hershey Brawl in AHL

Last night we saw one of the nastiest line brawls you will see in the American Hockey League. The Hershey Bears and Bridegeport Tigers faced off in more ways than one when they met at the Giant Center in Hershey, Pennsylvania on a Saturday night.

The Bears didn’t like a player so close to their goalie in the late second period when Bridegeport’s Brent Gallant and Hershey’s Chris Brown went at it and all hell broke loose.

Yes. Yes, we did have a goalie fight.

There were nine misconducts, 152 penalty minutes, and both goalies were thrown out of the contest.

All in all, Gallant was suspended for one game, but that was because it was his third game misconduct of the year which results in an automatic suspension. Sound Tigers defenseman Scott Mayfield and Bears left winger Liam O’Brien were also suspended for their roles in the brawl. That role being, they left their respective benches to join in on the brawl.

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The two goalies who faced off where Kevin Poulin of the Sound Tigers and Phoenix Copley from the Bears. Poulin has seen plenty of time with the NHL’s New York Islanders, but only played in one game with the big squad this season.

Copley, a Washington Capitals prospect, is yet to see any NHL action.

“When that kind of stuff happens, maybe I’ll step in,” Copley said to PennLive.com. “But we’ve got plenty of guys in there that are doing a great job stepping up.

“It wasn’t really a fight,” said Bears coach Troy Mann. “I’m glad that he went out and did a good job. I think Poulin cut the back of his head because he hit his head, I think, on the way down on the ice. I guess Copley gets the win because he ended up on top.”

There were 192 penalty minutes in the game overall and along with the goalies and suspended players, other ejections included Justin Courtnall, Kris Newbury, and Connor Carrick.

“I thought Gallant was the instigator of the whole thing,” = Mann said. “Lost a little bit of control of that game there, and consequently we were down some men there with the whole situation that was going on.

It’s not surprising with Gallant, who does have three game misconducts on the season now.

Hershey won the game 4-3 in a season for the Sound Tigers they’d like to forget anyways. Hershey was in Providence tonight without O’Brien.