Kalamazoo splits a pair of home games

KALAMAZOO, Mich – After seeing a 14-game unbeaten streak come to a sudden end last week, the Kalamazoo Wings (35-22-2-5) split a pair of games at home this weekend, losing on holiday-themed green ice to the South Carolina Stingrays (35-26-2-3) but besting the Trenton Devils (24-34-2-6) the next night.
The Stingrays came into Wings Stadium Thursday night on a five-game losing streak. Their 71 points claimed stake to second place in the South Division and fourth in the Eastern Conference, only four points behind Kalamazoo.
South Carolina Head Coach Cail MacLean could sense the pressure on his team tonight.
“We started to feel the heat dropping in the standings. Teams are coming from underneath and all of a sudden we turned into the desperate team,” MacLean said.
Forward Trent Campbell scored two goals and added an assist to lead the Stingrays. Tommy Goebel added a goal of his own to go along with two assists and a plus-three rating.
Campbell scored his first goal early in the second period during one of South Carolina’s many odd-man rushes on the night. The goal gave the Stingrays a 2-0 lead.
K-Wings goaltender Ryan Nie took a share of the blame onto his own shoulders. “They just kind of threw the puck to the net and they crashed the net hard and we didn’t do a real good job of tying them up in front and my rebound control was a little sloppy,” Nie said.
Coach MacLean took credit for his team’s good luck bounces too.
“Let’s call a spade a spade,” he said. “We found a couple lucky pucks in front of the net, but I’ll take it because we’ve been making good plays on the power play and a few lucky bounces is something we’ve worked for.”
South Carolina’s luckiest moment came during the second period with the K-Wings trailing 2-1. Goebel attempted to backhand the puck deep into the zone where it caught a stanchion behind the net and quickly popped back out front. Forward Ryan Del Monte scooped the puck into the open net before Nie could adjust to play.
Goebel and Campbell scored in the last three minutes of the second period to take a 5-1 lead. Despite a strong push from the K-Wings in the third period, South Carolina held off the attack and added the game to the win column.
“We were trying to rally it, but probably trying outside the gameplan and that’s not going to work,” Head Coach Nick Bootland said. “They’re trying to battle and trying to find a way to make it happen, but it’s too much by themselves.”
Stingrays’ goaltender Shane Owen allowed one goal on 26 shots, falling just short of claiming his first shutout of the season.
The K-Wings returned to Wings Stadium on Friday night against the Trenton Devils. Kalamazoo entered the game 1-1-0-0 against Trenton this season, beating the Devils in their last meeting 4-1 on February 10.
Rebounding from their disappointing loss the night before, the K-Wings exploded out of the gate, controlling the game from the first drop of the puck.
Goaltender Riley Gill, making only his 20^th start of the season, made several acrobatic stops throughout the game. Gill finished with 32 saves and claimed his second shutout of the season.
“He played a great game. He made some huge saves when we needed him to and was pretty calm in net tonight,” Bootland said. “We probably owed Riley a good game in front of him and we did that.”
Gill quickly gave credit to his defense. “A couple posts there in the second period and obviously our defense did a great job clearing out the rebounds,” he said. “I can’t say enough about the good performance out of everybody on the team tonight.”
Forwards Kory Karlander and Trent Daavettila each added a goal and an assist for the K-Wings. Twelve different players made their mark on the score sheet and Coach Bootland had nothing but compliments for his team’s bounce-back effort.
“The compete level was high, they stuck to the game plan as a group, we forechecked well, we made good puck management decisions, and we made good decisions as defensemen,” Bootland said.
Bootland expected nothing less with only eight games left on the regular season schedule.
“We want to prepare to play playoff hockey and whatever team we’re playing, whether they’re playing for something or not, my standard and our standard as a hockey team is going to be to how we need to play in the playoffs,” he said.
The K-Wings currently lead the North Division with 77 points. The second-place Cincinnati Cyclones (30-26-6-4) trail Kalamazoo by seven points.
Contact the writer: Ryan.Loren@ProHockeyNews.com Contact the photographer at Larry.Burdick@prohockeynews.com