The Hershey Bears know a winning standard when they see it.

They have seen that standard. After Calder Cup championship runs in back-to-back years, they have lived it as well. What that standard feels like, they know it.

Twenty players on this season’s roster have their names on the Calder Cup from last June’s championship. That number would be higher if the Bears had not graduated captain Dylan McIlrath and postseason most valuable player Hendrix Lapierre to the Washington Capitals this season. And of that group of 20, eight were around for the 2023 title chase as well. The team’s coaching staff headed by five-time champion Todd Nelson remains in place as well.

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So, pulling out a game on a Tuesday morning in November is one thing. Bringing the collective standard to something capable of putting away games come April, May, and June, that is something altogether different, and the Bears understand that. For any player who may forget, one of Nelson’s core tenets is that the entire regular season is a step-by-step climb toward refining and perfecting – or coming as closely as possible – a team game that can hold up through two months of Calder Cup Playoff demands.

To be clear, the Bears have plenty to be happy about even if they don’t necessarily always sound pleased with their play. At

10-3-1-0, they rank second in the AHL in wins. Their .750 point percentage places them in a fifth-place tie with the Charlotte Checkers, a team that could be a potential season-long nemesis. They have themselves a four-game winning streak. It was around this time last year that the Bears rolled off nine consecutive wins, a pace that allowed them to eventually construct the second-best regular season in AHL history with a .771 point percentage to go with 53 wins. It was second only to the 1992-93 Binghamton Rangers, who finished at .775. But considering that Binghamton team fizzled in the second round of the postseason while the Bears went on to win a second consecutive Calder Cup, a strong argument could be made that last season’s Hershey club fashioned the best regular-season and playoff performance in AHL history.

With a standard like that, the Bears have been quick to pick apart their own game. They split a two-game home series with the Checkers to open the month. Most teams would be reasonably pleased with that result against a well-built opponent like Charlotte. Not Hershey.

“Right now it feels like we don’t have our swagger yet,” Nelson said after the opener of the two-game set with the Checkers. “That’ll take time. We’ve just got to find that swagger. It’ll happen.”

Maybe that swagger is starting to show a bit. Last Saturday at home they had 17 first-period shots but needed a two-goal rally to take another 3-2 win. The following afternoon they outshot Springfield by a 29-11 margin in the first two periods at home before managing to scratch out a 3-2 overtime decision.

And a 5-4 win at Bridgeport on Tuesday morning provided the latest such piece of evidence. The Islanders, who visit Giant Center on Friday night to complete the home-and-home series, have given Hershey trouble so far. In the third game of the season back on Oct. 16 in Bridgeport, the Bears trailed by a goal into the third period before a pair of strikes in a 1:05 span gave them a 3-2 victory. On this return trip to Total Mortgage Arena, Fredrik Karlström put the Bears into a 1-0 hole after just 64 seconds. By the time the Bears returned to their dressing room after 20 minutes, they had a 2-0 Bridgeport lead to handle.

Sometimes, though, sheer talent can win games at this point in the season, and that is something the Bears possess in abundance. Hershey undid that Islanders lead, though the home team went back ahead by a goal. But then one of last spring's playoff aces, 36-year-old forward Garrett Roe, came through with a pair of goals spaced 47 seconds apart. Bridgeport made it a 4-4 game in the third period only to see Hershey’s Spencer Smallman put away the game with 7.3 seconds to go in regulation.

Winning games on talent is something that the Bears are particularly wary of making a habit, however. Even this early. Doing so can be an easy balm, something that can make it easy to overlook far more concerning issues.

So while the Bears will take Tuesday’s win and the rest of their haul through the first month of this season, they know that they are not yet up to last spring’s standard. Even if they are winning those November morning contests, they know quite well that the season’s midpoint will test them. Then comes the stretch drive, something that will come complete with a 10-game road trip spanning most of March.

Even when it seems safe, it isn’t. After all, Hershey nearly saw its postseason fall apart in the Eastern Conference Finals last June against Cleveland. With the Bears having taken a 3-0 series lead, the Monsters proceeded to grab the following three games and then push Game 7 at Giant Center to overtime before the Bears finally put an end to that series on Roe’s winner.

This is also a team that has had to handle a heavy workload so far. After playing to June 24, their regular season opened with five games in eight nights. A period of six games in 10 nights followed. They just finished a three-in-four chunk of their schedule with Tuesday’s win.

Now there is another wrinkle. The team announced Nov. 4 that Nelson will be away to tend to a family matter, and any return date remains unclear for now. With assistant coaches Nick Bootland and Patrick Wellar running the bench in his absence, the Bears have made sure to do right by their head coach. The Bootland-Wellar tandem provides familiarity and commands respect while a deep leadership core helps to ease the effects of playing without their head coach.

Forward Pierrick Dubé broke out with 28 goals last season, more than justifying the faith that Washington management had shown by signing him to a two-year contract in July 2023. The 23-year-old chipped in a pair of assists in Tuesday’s win and is 2-7-9 through 14 games. He wants a lot more from himself, however.

“We want to be better,” Dubé said after the Bears’ 4-3 shootout win against Charlotte on Nov. 3. “And especially after these two years, I think the expectations are pretty high.

“I mean, I'm going to take myself as an example. I think I'm really not happy right now how I play, how I work. I think that was a really short summer, and I don't want to put this as an excuse because we're professionals. It's me, myself, and I that have to get ready for the season. I can work way harder, and I can do things better, especially the little details, and the rest is going to come.”

Going into last season, Nelson raised concerns about a potential championship hangover. That worry never came to be. This campaign has been a bit different. The points are there even if the style points are not. Nelson put it this way after that shootout win against Charlotte. He is not one to panic, though he is also not a coach who lets standards slip. Three more wins later, this is still a team taking shape.

The rest of the AHL will not ease up on the Bears, either. Not after back-to-back Calder Cups and with a roster that gives Hershey a shot to become the first three-peat Calder Cup champion since 1962. The word “target” has quickly become a common word in Hershey.

“They all want to beat us,” Dubé said of the opponents dotting the schedule. “The whole league knows that we have a target on our back, and that's reality. We’ve just got to play through that pressure, and we’re capable of it.”

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