The Lake Erie Monsters will continue their pursuit for a berth in the 2009 Calder Cup Playoffs this weekend with three games in as many days starting Friday at Quicken Loans Arena. Currently, the Monsters are nine points out of a playoff spot with 17 games remaining in the regular season.

Lake Erie begins the home stand with back-to-back games against the Rochester Americans, a team they’ve struggled against this season. To date, the Monsters are 0-3 in 2008-09 versus the Americans and have only mustered one goal in each of the losses. Rochester comes in for a 7:30 p.m. puck drop on Friday and will stay the night in Cleveland, returning to The Q Saturday afternoon for an early one o’clock start.

After hosting Rochester, the Monsters will face one of the league’s best – the Hershey Bears – on Sunday afternoon for a 5:00puck drop. Hershey, a team that has compiled a 39-17-1-5 record, sits in first place in the Eastern Conference and second in the AHL. The Bears also posses the league’s best offense, averaging 3.8 goals per game. In the only game of the season against the Bears, the Monsters dropped a 3-2 shootout decision on December 21st at the Giant Center in Hershey.

Aside from playing three games in three days, the Monsters will also be wearing all three of their jerseys this weekend, as the team will wear their road red jerseys Friday, their alternate black jerseys Saturday and their home white sweaters on Sunday.