The Aeros lost 5-2 Tuesday night, which put the final nail in the coffin and gave Oklahoma City the series win. The Aeros were simply outmatched in the series -- the Barons had their number all season long -- but they fought the good fight and will head into the off-season with heads held high.

Nate Prosser scored the first Aeros goal unassisted, while Kris Foucault scored the other, with assists to Joel Broda and Carson McMillan. Mike Brodeur made 22 saves in the effort, and the Barons got one empty netter at the end to punctuate the affair.

Instead of spending any more time on the game, I want to take a little time to sift through the ashes and give you some thoughts on why this season went the way it did... after the jump.

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Staring elimination in the face, the Aeros found their #roadwarrior roots tonight in Oklahoma City and held on to them for dear life in a 1-0 win that keeps the season alive at least until Tuesday.

Brett Bulmer scored the only goal for the Aeros (Cody Almond and Nick Palmieri with the assists), and Mike Brodeur owned the crease earning his first AHL playoff win in a 31-save shutout.

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The Aeros looked marginally better tonight, but were still grossly outmatched and outworked by the Oklahoma City Barons in Game 2 of the first round of the Calder Cup Playoffs.

To make matters worse, they lost Matt Hackett early in the second period when he went into the splits to make a save, and 'kaboom' went the lower body ailment that was plaguing him in last night's game.

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From the drop of the puck to the final horn, the Aeros were no-shows tonight. And when I say Aeros, I mean every Aero except Matt Hackett, who was exceptional before being pulled.

"You know what, we didn't show up. Bottom line. I didn't do a good job," said coach John Torchetti. "Got to do a better job tomorrow prepping the team, bringing our battle level a whole lot higher. They came out hungry. They wanted to prove something to us, and they did in the first game, and we've got to come out and prove it back tomorrow."

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Just when you think the fat lady is done warming her vocal chords and is about to start belting it out, the Aeros send her back to her dressing room.

With a little help elsewhere in the conference (namely, a win in regulation by the Milwaukee Admirals) and the Aeros' own 2-1 win over the Texas Stars tonight.

It really did come down to the last minute of the last game of the AHL regular season to decide whether it would be Charlotte or Houston who would be continuing on later this week. Pretty crazy.

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Nope. We're not. The Aeros took 3 of 6 available points from the weekend and find themselves essentially in 8th place, barely squeaking into the playoffs, but they have not clinched a spot and probably won't, if at all, until game #76 next Sunday.

They have a game or two in hand on some teams, which is good, but they have also lost 8 of the last 9, so they could still find a way to fall out with a couple more losses here or wins for any of the THREE teams that are right on their tail in the standings.

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Remember when the Aeros were a bright spot in a dreary system? Yeah... those were good days.

Now forget about them, because they're gone. The Aeros have lost 6 straight, have dropped from 4th to 7th in the standings (which, as usual, is just 1 point from being out of the playoffs completely and 3 points from having home ice advantage). Granted, they've gotten 3 OT points out of those 6, which is the only thing saving them, but it hasn't been good.

Every year, this conference is just crazy tight and may really take until late in the evening on April 15th to even know if the Aeros are in the playoffs.

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Oh, poor Aeros. What a lousy weekend. Lost all 3 games, only able to score 1 goal in each. Lost Joe Fallon for 6 weeks, if the injury I'm hearing is true, after he was hurt late in Friday's 2-1 loss to Rockford.

The rest of the weekend was on the shoulders of Scott Greenham, a guy fresh out of college with just a handful of pro games in the ECHL under his belt. Apparently, he was also the super-secret back-up plan a few weeks ago when the Wild were running out of options in net.

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Here's what normally happens when I write anything with a shred of definitive excitement about the Aeros: They go out and do the exact opposite and make me look like a huge dope.

So last week, when I gave you a big ol' bullet list of guys who are playing out of their minds along with a few, "still not sure about this thing" (i.e. goaltending), you should not be surprised that the Aeros once again flipped the script on me.

But at least it was flipped in a way I personally enjoy and still resulted in 4 straight wins. Make like Kris Kross and take the Jump...

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I'm technically on vacation this week, but I spent the morning working on my real job. So now I'm annoyed and want to go play in the sunshine. Which means your Hotdish this week is gonna be quick and dirty.

And quick and dirty means a hailstorm of bullet points coming your way after the jump, but it's still all good stuff, if you're hankerin' for some good news out of this organization.

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Here's the beauty part of paying attention to the Aeros in addition to the Wild: Sometimes the Aeros give you something to smile about when the Wild seem hell bent on giving you permanent frown lines.

It's not that the Aeros are doing a whole lot better. They've lost 5 of their last 7 games, absolutely decimated, shaken up, and thrown off by the revolving door between here and Minnesota, plus injuries of their own, short benches all too frequently, and ECHLers in and out of the line-up.

Never mind not having played a home game for over a month.

But they keep winning often enough and decisively enough that it keeps us hanging on, believing that the playoffs are not out of reach if we could just get the roster to stabilize.

Let's take a look at the chances for the farm boys to press their way into the post-season:

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I waited until the very last minute to write this because when I woke up this morning, I had notifications in my email that Rob Nolan, an ECHL goalie, had been called up to the Aeros.

Turns out, as you probably know by now, Matt Hackett was called up to the Wild because Harding has a minor injury. Okay, fine. Not nearly as interesting as a trade, but whatever.

Also, this Nolan kid is a stone cold fox, so mama's happy. Tweak away, Hards.

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We stood on the dock early last week and waved our tear-stained hankies at the Aeros as they took off for over a month of away games.

Since then, a lot has changed so let's start this one off after the jump by taking a look at the turmoil in the Aeros' roster lately:

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I'm not gonna lie. I'm still kind of in vapor lock over last night's... whatever that was. But I'll try and choke a few sentences out here, despite the fact that the Aeros weekend will offer zero improvement on our collective moods.

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Remember back when the Wild had a bunch of Aeros players and the team still sucked, and the Aeros weren't doing much better?

I'm not sure what happened in the organization, apart from the renewed faith in management inspired by Marek Zidlicky earning his $4M in the press box, but we're in that same boat again. This time, however, it seems to be working!

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Let's talk about Tyler Cuma for a bit. First of all, if you don't follow him on Twitter (@TCuma61), you should.

I often get asked what happened with him. Remember his first camp after being drafted and folks (including, if I recall correctly, Lemaire) were so impressed with his poise for such a young guy, that there was some fleeting thought given to turning him pro right then and there?

But reason prevailed and they sent him back to junior where he got hurt. Then hurt again. Then hurt again. Then he turned pro with the Aeros and... got hurt again.

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I'm writing this the morning after the Aeros lost 6-0 to the Oklahoma City Barons on New Years Day. So, it's safe to say, I'm feeling a little glum about the boys in the bomber jersey. Please forgive my negativity.

This, after a decisive 5-2 win over San Antonio on Friday night had me feeling like, in fine Blues Brothers fashion, the Aeros had finally put the band back together.

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When I sit down to write about the Aeros, I'm not sure whether to write about the Minnesota Aeros of the NHL or the Houston Aeros of the AHL, but I guess you can read everything else in this space for all the Minnesota Aeros action.

Meanwhile, down south, the Aeros had a Jekyll and Hyde kinda weekend. Friday night was a resounding win over the Texas Stars that made me feel like everything was going to be okay.

But then, while the Aeros were up in OKC getting a point while losing (yet another) shootout, the Wild were busy breaking even more of their/our players resulting in call-ups that threw a wrench in the works. And it showed on the ice Sunday. Boy, did it show.

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I didn't walk away from the weekend with a feeling in the pit of my stomach like, "Uh oh, the Aeros suck." But now that I look back at the 2-1 SO loss to Oklahoma City, the 1-0 win over San Antonio, and the 3-2 SO loss to Peoria, I'm sorta questioning my memory.

Like the Wild, the Aeros are just scraping by right now, in a number of ways, including a problem the Wild don't really even have.

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As injuries have dented the Wild lineup, so have the resulting call-ups dented the Aeros lineup. And on top of that, regulars Jed Ortmeyer, David McIntyre, and Carson McMillan are injured.

Looking at the Aeros roster before the season started, you could predict a pretty strong team due to a lot of returning guys from the big Calder Cup run. But right now, this team has few of those players left, so it's up to the younger guys to hold the reigns and get things done.

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The Aeros headed north yesterday for a 3 game road swing in Cleveland, Rochester, and Toronto.

I don't know about you guys but I miss my team when they're on the road. However, when their road win record is significantly better than it is at home? Well, I miss them a little less.

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It was all Aeros, all the time this weekend, with three games in three days, all in easy driving distance.

So, it was a good time to get T3I's Midwestern Photograher, Chris Jerina, down to Houston to get us all set for photos for a while. 

For as much fun as we had wallowing in hockey goodness all weekend, the Aeros were a bit of an up and down affair. But the visit to Austin for Saturday's game was an eye opener. More on that after the break...

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The Aeros are in the same spot the Wild are right now. They know what they should be doing but it's not happening consistently. And I fear that for both teams, it's only going to get worse because Wild players keep getting themselves broken, and Aeros players keep leaving to fill those spots.

Here's to Lundin getting healthy by the next game, BTW. *clink* (Though I just saw they reassigned Wellman back to Houston, so that's good news for everybody. Hopefully he'll still be with us this weekend.)

After the jump, I'll give you a quick look at the Aeros 2 games since my last post and then, for a change of pace, give you a some quotes from coach John Torchetti and defenseman Drew Bagnall. They were great talking Sunday and sometimes the best way to get a feel for a team is to hear straight from the horse's mouth.

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You know how when a team is surprisingly good, or at least surprisingly successful, and then they start to believe wins will just come to them, so they let up?

Yeah, the Aeros ran headlong into that one Sunday, getting lit up 6-2 just two days after playing, according to coach John Torchetti, their best game of the season in Hamilton.

I 100% chalk it up to a good team having a lousy night. Even surprise rockstar goal scorer David McIntyre tweeted after the game, "Gross game in Houston tonight. No worries, we'll bounce back."

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Here are the things we know unequivocally about the Houston Aeros after this weekend:

Need shorter pre-game naps

That or they need to find a way to sneak a fake 0th period in before the 1st period to get the boys going in time for the actual game. Because bad Aeros starts are like hot days in Houston: There are too many of them.

In 10 games, the Aeros have scored only 4 goals in the first period, where opponents have scored 8.

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Another weekend, another 3-in-3 for the Aeros. Welcome to the minors, kid. At least they got rid of 4-in-5s this season thanks a 4-game schedule reduction.

This weekend's matches all had a common theme that Coach John Torchetti isn't thrilled about: Bad starts. Anemic first periods, sloppy first periods, oh, those damned first periods.

Luckily, the Aeros have exceptional goaltenders who were able to hold the fort until the rest of the team could find their groove. And man, lemme tell ya, once they find their groove, just sit back and enjoy your popcorn. Everything is under control.

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Much like Wild fans, Aeros fans are in that painful early-season process of looking at the product on the ice and trying to find the balance between "OH GOD, THEY'RE NOT GETTING IT!" and "Hey, it's been 4 games. Chill the hell out."

It seems like only yesterday, we were watching the Aeros operate with machine-like efficiency and a complete understanding of Mike Yeo's system as they battled for the Calder Cup. And with that memory fresh on our minds, what really sticks out are the new guys who don't have the system burned into their brains.

So, I spend a lot of time during Aeros games going, "Bahhh, what's that guy doing? Terrible decision-making!" and then realizing, "Oh right, he's a new guy."

The smooth operation we're used to is there in fits and starts, but the success of last season has me (and I'm sure many others) wondering when it's going to click for THIS group. And hoping it's not in January like it was last year.

Now that I've laid the groundwork for my perspective on the season thus far, let's look at what's happened in the first four games to get the Aeros to this 2-1-0-1 record they're currently sporting.

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