Jayson Megna scored twice, and Aaron Ness tallied a career-high three assists in a 5-3 win for the Hershey Bears over the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins on Saturday afternoon at Mohegan Sun Arena. The victory marked Hershey’s sixth win in nine meetings against the Pens this season, and extended their current winning streak to a season-best four games. 
After going the last three games without a power play goal, the Bears tallied three times on the man-advantage. Mike Sgarbossa opened the scoring with a power play goal at 8:10 after burying a cross-ice feed from Riley Barber to the left wing. Sgarbossa’s goal was his 18th of the season, only one goal short from tying his career-high set in 2012-13 with the Lake Erie Monsters.
In the later stages of the opening frame, the Bears cashed in after beating an icing call in the offensive zone. After a stretch pass into the offensive end, Brian Pinho used his wheels to keep the play alive and fed Jayson Megna behind the net. Shane Gersich teed up a centering pass from Megna past Pens goaltender Anthony Peters to provide Hershey a 2-0 lead at 17:26. Shots after 20 minutes were 11-6 Bears.
Next period, the Penguins took advantage of a full 5-on-3 power play to cut their deficit in half. Ilya Samsonov was finally solved and saw his shutout streak end at 159:51. After Gersich and Liam O’Brien were both handed minor penalties at 11:33, Adam Johnson buried his first of two goals on the rebound following a Jean-Sebastien Dea shot at 12:44. Shots after 40 minutes were 23-15 Hershey with a 2-1 lead in hand.
Into the third, both teams traded three goals within the period’s first 5:51. First, Megna converted on a power play at 2:10 for his second goal of the night and sixth against the Pens this season. Megna sneaked into the low-slot and redirected a pass from Sgarbossa into the cage to extend the Bears lead to 3-1.
Wilkes-Barre answered on a power play goal of their own in similar fashion. At 3:53, Teddy Blueger crept into the slot and fired a quick shot past Samsonov to again bring the Pens within one-goal. The Chocolate and White continued to control the momentum swings and answered at 5:51. Barber sniped a shot on the power play from the right circle which glanced inside the goal post for his ninth power play tally of the season.
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