HERSHEY, Pa. — For a kid who stands on the brink of the AHL and the ECHL, Michael Mole played like a veteran Saturday night for the Bridgeport Sound Tigers in a 3-2 shootout victory over Hershey. Mole made 34 saves on a night when the Bears honored their 2006 Calder Cup championship in front of 10,630 fans at Giant Center. That allowed Sergei Ogorodnikov's, Peter Ferraro's and Luch Aquino's shootout scores to secure a victory. "It was definitely a little intimidating," said Mole, who started the night with a brilliant glove save on Chris Bourque and ended overtime with a grab on Alexandre Giroux's stuff attempt. "It's a great feeling. It was my goal coming in, to kind of rain on their parade."

Mole came up from Pensacola (ECHL) last Saturday when Wade Dubielewicz was recalled. "He came all the way up here. Why not see what he can do in an AHL game?" coach Dan Marshall said.

So the Sound Tigers left Dubielewicz home Saturday, apparently avoiding the long bus ride before today's home game, and watched the kid shine behind a team that played much better a night after a disappointing shootout loss to Hartford.

"I felt pretty good in warm-up," Mole said. "We got here, and we kind of rushed on for warm-up right away. Just getting ready, getting into it, got everybody into it right away."

There was talk earlier that Mole could be sent to Pensacola today — the Ice Pilots play at Reading, Pa., about an hour from here — but that hadn't been decided after

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the game. Hershey, beginning overtime on a 66-second power play, buzzed in the Bridgeport zone for most of the five-minute extra session without a shot until 49.5 seconds remained. Giroux took a pass at the side of the net, deked a couple of times, tried to stuff the puck in, and found a combination of Allan Rourke's skate and Mole's glove.

Bridgeport built a 2-0 lead on goals by Ferraro (third goal in three games) and Jeff Tambellini. Hershey came back with two goals at the end of the second, Giroux with 2:18 to play and Tomas Fleischmann on a breakaway with 10.6 seconds left in the period, moments after Hershey's Frederic Cassivi stopped Steve Regier and Rick Berry. Bridgeport captain Mark Wotton, an alternate captain last year for the Bears, was the first to receive his Calder Cup ring. Bridgeport wore its white sweaters, normally worn at home, so the Bears could wear chocolate-brown sweaters commemorating the championship. Petteri Nokelainen, Matt Koalska and Jason Goulet were the Bridgeport healthy scratches along with Dubielewicz. Nokelainen, coming off springtime knee surgery, had been expected to get the odd day off during the season.