ELMIRA, NY-The South Carolina Stingrays’ have a streak going but not one low country hockey fans are excited about. Last night’s 1-0 shutout loss at Elmira pushed their current losing streak to three straight games.
On Friday night Elmira got just one goal past losing net minder Ryan Zapolski who made 20 saves but received no offensive help despite his own almost shutout performance. He was out dueled by Marc Cheverie who made 31 saves in net for the Jackals.
What may have been doubly disappointing about the loss is the fact that South Carolina which is almost dead last in shots on goal in the ECHL and near the bottom in shots allowed turned this statistic around in this game but positive results did not follow.
Elmira’ Forward Andrew Rowe used a second period power play to beat Zalposki. Long time Stingrays’ nemesis defensemen Kyle Bushee and his blue line partner Danny New were credited with setups on the only goal needed by the home team. It came at 6:39 of the second period.
The ‘Rays’ power outage on the power play continued as they failed to score on seven opportunities. They have gone 0-15 in their last three games with the man advantage. The power play which faltered most of last season is again an issue as the ‘Rays are scoring just 14 percent of the time with the advantage on the season.
After a rematch Saturday night in Elmira the Rays (7-12-0-2) 16 points return home hopefully on a winning note. They are currently in last place in the ECHL South Division and in 11th place in the overall conference standings.
They would miss the playoffs for only the second time in their 20-year history if the season ended today.
Contact the author at Phil.Brand@prohockeynews.com Follow us on Twitter @prohockeynews
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