MILWAUKEE, WI – The Milwaukee Admirals grounded the Houston Aeros with a 4-1 win on home ice Saturday night, tying up the series as play shifts to Houston for the next three games.
Aeros coach Kevin Constantine had called it after Game 1, saying, “I think it will get harder, to be honest with you, from here on out, because now we’re a little tired and they’re not rusty.”
And he was right. The Admirals were rust-free and outplayed the Aeros all night, suffocating the visitors’ attempts at generating quality shots on goalie Drew MacIntyre and capitalizing on their own scoring chances.
Milwaukee limited the Aeros offensive aces while keeping the scoring down. Krys Kolanos was limited to two shots all night and Corey Locke had no recorded shots, with MacIntyre only seeing 19 shots total, and only a handful of quality chances.
The power play that is typically the Aeros bread and butter for generating offense was never allowed to gel by a hard-working Admirals penalty kill.
Milwaukee’s Cody Franson started the scoring during 4-on-4 action nearly three minutes into the first period with a shot from the top of the circle that just beat goalie Anton Khudobin. Helpers went to defenseman Robert Dietrich and Jed Ortmeyer.
Midway through the second frame, Robbie Earl tied it up on a goal from behind the goal line that just squirted between MacIntyre’s skate and the post, but the tie would last only five minutes.
Former Aero Ryan Jones scored his first of two goals of the night on a power play with a blistering one-timer off a feed from Cal O’Reilly and Mike Santorelli. He beat Khudobin, who was out of position for the shot, with a little over three minutes left in the second period.
The Aeros hopes of battling back offensively in the third were sidetracked when Clayton Stoner was hit with a slashing call only 20 seconds into the period. Only seconds after his penalty ended, Mike Santorelli put the Admirals up by two goals when he poked the puck in between Khudobin and the post on a scrambling play beside the Aeros net.
Jones got his second of the night on a wrister from the slot that went through the legs of Khudobin, and ultimately resulted in a goalie change for Houston. Matt Climie played the final nine minutes of the game stopping all six shots he faced.
The series returns to Houston beginning Tuesday night for Games 3, 4 and 5.
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