CLEVELAND, Ohio — The Cleveland Monsters dropped a 5-2 decision to the Hershey Bears on Thursday night at Rocket Arena.

The Monsters are are sixth in the AHL’s North Division standings.

Hershey seized control early, building a 3-0 lead in the opening period. Ivan Miroshnichenko opened the scoring at 4:54, followed by power-play goals from Spencer Smallman at 10:18 and Ilya Protas at 12:07. Justin Pearson cut into the deficit late in the first period, scoring at 18:00 with an assist from James Malatesta to make it 3-1.

After a scoreless second period, Hershey’s Bogdan Trineyev extended the lead to 4-1 at 7:04 of the third. Cleveland’s Luca Pinelli answered less than two minutes later, scoring at 8:53 off feeds from Owen Sillinger and Roman Ahcan. Andrew Cristall sealed the victory with a

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