HERSHEY, Pa. – The Springfield Thunderbirds (0-2-0-0) could not generate enough offense and suffered a 5-1 loss to the Hershey Bears (1-1-1-0) on Saturday night inside Giant Center.

Springfield put pressure on the Hershey crease in the opening minutes, but Clay Stevenson came up with a trio of stops in the opening three minutes, buying his offense time to crack into the scoresheet first. 

30-year-old veteran Sheldon Rempal flew up the right wing undetected off the Bears' bench, received a feed from Spencer Smallman, and elevated a perfect shot on the short side of Georgi Romanov to give Hershey the 1-0 jump at 4:07 of the first. 

Both teams struggled to find high-danger chances for much of the next 15 minutes, but an unfortunate miscue from the visitors gave Hershey the chance to balloon their lead heading into the intermission. Rookie Ilya Protas took advantage of a misfired pass off the outside of the Springfield net, and fellow first-year pro Patrick Thomas crashed the net to finish off the set-up from Protas with 43 seconds left in the first. Hershey outshot Springfield 12-5 in the opening 20 minutes.

The T-Birds, to their credit, responded to their sloppy opening period with a purposeful middle frame, culminating in a 13-4 shot advantage in the second. Despite consistent pressure in Stevenson's kitchen, the Bears and their penalty kill appeared to be the stars of the show after surviving three Springfield power plays, including 61 seconds of 5-on-3 time. 

The visitors would not allow the Bears off the hook completely, though, as Nikita Alexandrov deflected a Matt Luff shot through the legs of Stevenson with just 1:32 remaining in the stanza, cutting the lead down to 2-1 and giving both Alexandrov and Luff points in each of the T-Birds' first two games. The goal also snapped Springfield's 0-for-6 power play drought to begin the season. 

Romanov moved back into the spotlight as the Bears pushed back to begin the third period after Springfield had outshot the home side 13-4 in the second. The T-Birds' debutant came up huge with a pair of point-blank saves off of Protas and Thomas to keep the visitors within one heading into the back half of the final period. 

Unfortunately for the newcomer in net, the Bears finally found a way to crack through at 13:06 as Henrik Rybinski finished off a centering pass in front of the goal by Bogdan Trineyev to restore a two-goal lead at 3-1. Empty-netters in the closing minutes from Protas and rookie defenseman Ryan Chesley finished off the Bears' first win of the season following an 0-1-1-0 start.

The T-Birds will look to earn a split of the weekend against the Bears at 5:00 p.m. on Sunday in Chocolatetown for the back half of the two-game series.

Single-game tickets and ticket memberships for all remaining games in the Thunderbirds' 2025-26 season are available now - fans can order now by visiting www.SpringfieldThunderbirds.com or by calling (413) 739-GOAL (4625).