The Playoff Races — ECHL (Feb. 8)

A couple of five goal nights helped the Kalamazoo Wings improve its playoff perspective this past weekend.

The Wings used back-to-back wins at the Wings Event Center against the North Division leading Toledo Walleye to get within seven points of the eighth and final playoff position. That seven point spread doesn’t sound nearly as rough when considering the Wings also have three games in hand on the Greenville Swamp Rapids who currently hold down that eighth spot. Of course, with the Wings currently sitting 11th overall in the Eastern Conference, there are a couple of other hurdles in the way as well.

Walleye 1 at Wings 5

In Friday’s game, the Wings opened up a 2-0 first period lead, thanks to a pair of goals by Curtis Valk — his sixth and seventh of the season. Valk wrapped up the natural hat trick 5:31 into the second before Shane Berschbach scored the lone Walleye goal about seven minutes later.

After setting up a pair of Valk’s goals earlier, Ludwig Blomstrand scored his 13th of the season a little past the halfway mark of the third period for added insurance and Alex Mallet put it away with an empty netter with exactly a minute to play. Dane Fox picked up three assists in the game for the Wings and Joel Martin turned aside 37 of 38 to nail down his 19th win of the season in goal.

Walleye 2 at Wings 5

The following night, Blomstrand had his team in front with a shorthanded effort, the lone goal of the opening period, but Austin Wuthrich tied it just past the halfway mark of the second with his 10th and the Walleye moved in front on Evan Rankin‘s seventh of the season in the second minute of the final period.

The Wings stormed back though, Sacha Guimond tying the game with his second of the season on a Wings’ powerplay and Justin Taylor putting the home team in front to stay with 7:11 to go. Tanner Sorenson‘s 12th of the season added insurance inside of three minutes from the end and Taylor fired his 13th into an empty net with 40 ticks on the clock.

Martin stepped up again with a 40-save effort to get him to the 20-win mark on the season.

The two losses snapped a four-game winning streak for the Walleye who entered the game 8-2 in its past 10 games. The Walleye however are still a comfortable (for now) 13 points up on second place Wheeling in the North Division.

Fuel 3 at Cyclones 4 

A pair of teams on or near the playoff bubble went at it and home/away weekend set at Indianapolis and Cincinnati.

Both teams held on for the wins on home ice, the Cyclones grabbing a 4-3 edge at U.S. Bank Arena Friday and the Fuel doubling up the guests 2-1 at Indiana Farmer’s Coliseum Saturday.

On Friday, two goals in 62 seconds had the home side up 2-0 just past the halfway mark of the first period. Andrew Yogan scored the first and Jack Downing notched his 22nd of the year just over a minute later.

Nick Petrecki collected his first of the year with 36 seconds to go in the period to get the Fuel on the board and Ben Marshall completed the comeback 23 seconds into the middle period with his sixth of the season. The Cyclones moved in front again as Yogan scored his second of the night and 12th of the season with a little less than five minutes to go in the period.

Rhett Bly‘s 12th pulled the Fuel back within one on a powerplay 97 seconds into the third, but the game winner was scored by Peter Quenneville, his sixth, on a feed from Yogan at the 6:03 mark.

Andy Iles made 32 saves to collect his fourth win in four tries for in goal for the Cyclones.

Cyclones 1 at Fuel 2 

Yogan had the Cyclones in front again the following day with his 13th, 7:34 into the game, but that was the only shot of 30 to elude Shane Owen in goal for the Fuel.

Daniel Ciampini scored his seventh, about five minutes later to tie the score and the game winner came from Petrecki just past the halfway mark of the second.

With the split, the Fuel remains sixth in the Western Conference with 50 points, just two points up on seventh place Tulsa and eighth place Colorado. However the Fuel have played 48 games while the Oilers (43) and Eagles (44) have both played less. The Cyclones currently sit one point out of the playoffs with 45 games played.

Rush 2 at Mallards 4 

The Quad City Mallards are another team just outside of that playoff window and looked to make up some ground on the weekend. However, after 4-2  win on home ice against the visiting Rapid City Rush on Friday at the iWireless Center, the Mallards fell 3-1 at Fort Wayne on Saturday night.

At home Friday, Guillaume Gelinas scored the lone goal of the first period and added another, his eighth of the season, 6:41 into the second to put the Mallards up 2-0.

That lead held up into the final period before Benjamin Dieude-Fauvel scored his third of the year in the opening minute to pull the Rush within a goal.

Anthony Collins scored his sixth to restore the two-goal cushion for the Mallards at the 6:01 mark, but Sean Erickson sank his second of the year with 52 seconds to go to make things a lot more interesting. Matt Carey finally clinched it with an empty netter four seconds away from the final buzzer, his 11th.

Brody Hoffman stopped 21 of 23 to nail down the win in goal for the Mallards, Danny Battochio handling 26 of 29 in goal for the Rush.

Mallards 1 at Komets 5

The Mallards had to settle for the weekend split as the Midwest Division leading Fort Wayne Komets extended a two-game winning streak and moved to 8-3 in its last 11 with a 3-1 win Saturday night at the Memorial Coliseum.

Troy Bourke, just moved to Fort Wayne from San Antonio scored the lone first period goal for the Komets and he also picked up an assist on the second, scored in the seventh minute of the middle frame by Alex Belzile. Brady Brassart got the Mallards on the board with his third of the season 2:51 from the end of the second but that was the only shot of 31 that would beat Pat Nagle in goal for the Komets on this night.

Mike Embach added some insurance, scoring his 21st of the campaign for the Komets near the halfway mark of the final period.

Hoffman stopped 23 of 26 in goal for the Mallards.

Rush 1 at Icemen 2 (SO)

Meanwhile, the Rush moved on to play at Evansville and wrapped up a rough one-point weekend with a 2-1 Shootout loss to the Icemen to see light at the end of the playoff tunnel shrink a little further.

Battochio turned in a solid effort with 39 saves in the contest and Christoffer Bengtsberg handled 33 of 34 through 65 minutes to force the shootout.

Andrew Himelson scored his second of the season 6:389 into the first period for the Icemen and Spencer Pommells fired his 11th in the third minute of the second period to draw the Rush even, wrapping up the regulation scoring in this one.

Alex Wideman and Daulton Leveille buried shootout goals for the Icemen and Bengtsberg stopped the only two shots he faced to clinch the extra point for the home side.

Eagles 6 at Thunder 0

The post season is a distant memory for the Thunder and things didn’t get any better on the weekend as the team dropped a 6-0 shutout against Colorado on home ice Friday before hitting the road to Allen where it dropped a 5-3 decision to the defending league champion Americans.

On home ice, the game might not have been as lopsided as the score indicates, the Eagles holding an edge in shots, but only by four in a wide open contest 40-36.

Eric Levine stopped all of them for the Eagles to grab the shutout while David Shantz and Grant Rollheiser both took a turn between the pipes for the Thunder.

Colorado blew the game open with a four-goal first period markers and added single tallies in the second and final frames. Six different shooters hit the game sheet for the Colorado: Kyle Ostrow; Kyle Kraemer; Derek Rodwell; Johnny Lazo; Peter MacIntyre and Jake Marto each collecting one.

Thunder 3 at Americans 5

The following night in Texas, the Thunder again stayed right with its opponent on the shot clock, Allen holding a slim 27-26 edge. The host team scored the lone first period goal and padded its lead with another early in the second before Kale Kerbashian scored the first goal of the weekend for the Thunder, his seventh of the season 6:36 into the second period.

The next two belonged to the Americans but Martin Nemcik buried a Kerbashian feed with 7:17 to go in the second for his second of the season and both Nemcik and Kerbashian collected assists on Ian Lowe‘s 10th of the season just past the halfway mark of the third to get the Thunder within one.

Chris Crane ended comeback hopes with an empty netter for the Americans 1:49 from the end and other Allen goals came from: Gary Steffes; Jonathan Parker; Greger Hanson and Mike Gunn.

Joel Rumpel made 23 saves to pick up the win in goal for the Americans and Rollheiser stopped 22 for the Thunder.

Eagles 1 at Mavericks 2 

While the Thunder was slipping a little further away from the pack, the league leading Missouri Mavericks padded its margin atop the heap with a 2-1 win on home ice against the Colorado Eagles on Saturday night.

The win denied the Komets a chance to make up any ground keeping the West Division’s second place team a full 17-points in the rearview mirror of the Mavs.

The Eagles actually hit the board first in this one, Kyle Ostrow scoring his second of the weekend and seventh of the season for the visitors with 6:24 to play in the opening period.

However, the lead didn’t last long as Rocco Carzo ripped a powerplay goal home about four minutes later and teams were even at 1-1 after the opening period.

Jesse Root and Jesse Graham picked up assists on Carzo’s tally and the same trio combined on the other goal, Root pulling the trigger on his 21st of the campaign 4:28 into the second period.

Josh Robinson stopped 26 of 27 to pick up the win in goal for the Mavericks and Clarke Saunders made 19 saves for the Eagles.

THREE STARS OF THE WEEK 

1. Joel Martin –The Kalamazoo goaltender handled 77 of 80 shots in back to back games helping the Wings to a pair of wins against the Toledo Walleye and halting a four-game winning streak for the Walleye while helping improve the playoff prospects for the Wings.
2. Curtis Valk – Another for Kalamazoo as Valk scored the first three goals of the game in a 5-1 on home ice against Toledo Friday night.
3. Andrew Yogan – The Cincinnati Cyclones split a weekend pair with the Indy Fuel, but Yogan did his part, chipping in two goals in a 4-3 win on home ice Friday night and scoring his team’s only goal in a 2-1 defeat at Indianapolis the following night.

The Week Ahead

The Komets and Icemen will kick off a busy week at Evansville Tuesday night while the Missouri Mavericks will host the South Carolina Stingray.

Wednesday night will see Kalamazoo Wings trying to build on last weekend’s success with a game at Cincinnati against the Cyclones while the Rush tries to shrug off a rough weekend with a trip to Colorado.

A busy Friday will see the Walleye crossing the border to play at Brampton, the Komets in Cincy to play the Cyclones; Wichita hosting South Carolina; the Mallards traveling to Tulsa to play the Oilers, Indy Fuel in Missouri for a pair against the Mavs, Wings in Evansville to meet the Icemen and the Rush will return home to host the Eagles.

Saturday night the Komets will move on to Kalamazoo while Brampton plays a return match at Toledo, the Icemen will be in Cincinnati to play the Cyclones, The Thunder entertains the Stingray for a second night, Quad City finishes off a two game set in Tulsa and the Fuel will faceoff in Missouri again as well the Rush in Colorado.

Brampton will move on to Kalamazoo on Sunday, the Fuel finishing off a three game set in Missouri, the Thunder will be in Tulsa, the Komets at Toledo and the Cyclones will hit the road to Evansville.