NORTH CHARLESTON, SC-The South Carolina Stingrays (12-8-0-1) 25 points lost their second straight game to the Kalamazoo Wings (12-6-0-1) 25 points Saturday night, 2-1. Saturday’s loss came after the Stingrays dropped the opening game of a two-game series with the K-Wings Friday night by a 5-3 score. The two losses cost South Carolina their lead in the South Division of the ECHL Eastern Conference as the Gwinnett Gladiators (10-5-5-2) 27 points now lead the South Division and have the overall lead in the Conference. The Western Division Alaska Aces have the overall league lead with (13-4-1-1) 28 points.
The ‘Rays came into the weekend riding a four game overall win streak and had won six straight games on home ice at the North Charleston Coliseum. Despite rallying to tie Friday night’s game in the third period scoring twice to tie the game at 3-3 the ‘Rays allowed the K-Wings to score twice in the game’s final two minutes to claim the 5-3 win.
Kalamazoo got a first period power play goal from Kory Karlander (Brandon Svendsen, Trent Daavettila) to take a 1-0 lead into the first intermission. Next the K-Wings extended the lead to 2-0 with a second power play goal in the middle period as Steven Anthony registered his fourth goal of the year off an assist by Sam Ftorek.
Pierre-Luc O’Brien answered with a power play goal of his own for the home team at 8:59 of the second period. Danick Paquette and Zack Tarkir combined to set up O’Brien’s team high ninth goal of the season and the teams skated off for the last intermission with Kalamazoo holding a 2-1 edge.
The K-Wings extended their lead to 3-1 within the first five minutes of the third period with their third straight goal from a power play goal this time by forward Dean Strong. His goal at 4:37 drew assists form Svendsen and Eric Kattelus. On the evening the visitors went three of seven on power plays.
A short time later the Ray’s extended their own power play streak as the Rays made the score 3-2 with their second straight power play goal this time from rookie Sean Dolan. His sixth goal of the season and the fifth straight power play goal of the game between the two teams came off assists credited to defensemen Nick Tabisz and Tarkir.
The ‘Rays appeared to grab the momentum as they tied the score at 15:19 at 3-3 when Tabisz got the game’s first even strength goal with helpers going to O’Brien and David de Kastrozza. The tie however to the chagrin of most of the crowd of 2,531 lasted less than two minutes when K-Wings center Karlander deflected a shot at the 18:03 mark past losing goal tender Daren Machesney. The deflection was set up by Joe Charlebois as Svendsen also added this third assist of the night.
An unassisted goal less than a minute later ran the final score to 5-3 as winger Darryl Bootland got the insurance score at 18:53 to seal the win for rookie goal tender Maxime Clemont. The 19 year old rookie goalie who played last season in the Quebec Major Junior League made 22 saves on 25 shots to post his third win in five appearances this season.
Saturday night’s game featured less offense as a crowd of 3,084 saw K-Wings goal tender Riley Gill out duel ‘Rays’ rookie Philipp Grubauer in an evenly matched game. Gill stopped all but one of the 27 shots he faced while Grubauer allowed two goals on an equal number of shots.
Kalamazoo opened the scoring at 7:19 of the opening stanza as Nick Sirota beat Grubauer glove side from the slot. His fourth goal of the season drew assists from forwards Trent Daavettila and defenseman Harry Young.
Brandon Svendsen earned his fourth point of the weekend this time on a power play goal just 30 seconds into the second period to register what would turn out to be the game winner. His 10th goal of the season drew assists from Ellington Taylor and Eric Kattelus. The K-Wings scored four power play goals on 12 opportunities in the two game series this weekend. Meanwhile the ‘Rays squandered six power play opportunities in Saturday’s game after going two for seven with the man advantage on Friday.
The Stingrays managed to get on the new North Charleston Coliseum scoreboard at 5:14 of the third period to cut the lead to 2-1 when de Kastrozza tipped a pass from Anthony Maiani past Gill. Joe Pereira got the secondary helper on the only Stingrays’ goal.
The ‘Rays leave for a three game road trip with games at Greenville next Friday December 9th followed by an important two game set at Gwinnett on Saturday night and Sunday afternoon.
Contact the author at Phil.Brand@prohockeynews.com
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