WHEELING, WV – The South Carolina Stingrays were eliminated from the ECHL playoffs tonight dropping a 3-2 decision to the Wheeling Nailers. Peter Delmas swept aside 24 shots while Chris Kushneriuk scored twice to the delight of most of the 1,454 fans at WesBanco Arena.
The Nailers win was their third victory in four contests in the best of five matches. This was the second straight early exit from the playoffs for the ‘Rays as they lost to Cincinnati in round one last year.
Once again as in all of the previous contests in this series the Nailers scored first.
Kushneriuk struck from in close with a wrist shot to beat losing goal tender Todd Ford at 2:30 of the opening period. Mikael Bedard and Paul Crowder provided the setup passes for the first Kushneriuk’ goal.
The Wheeling lead of 1-0 lasted just over two minutes as the Stingrays tied the game 1-1 at the 4:47 mark. ‘Rays’ defenseman Dylan Yeo aided by forwards Pierre-Luc O’Brien and Ryan Del Monte ripped a shot from the point scoring the first ‘Rays’ power play goal of the series.
The lack of power play success was a major contributor to the loss of the series by South Carolina especially since all three Wheeling wins in the match up were by one goal margins. The ‘Rays had been held scoreless on 14 straight extra man advantage situations until Yeo beat goal tender Delmas on this attempt.
The early 1-1 tie stood up over the next 15 minutes of period one and for over nineteen minutes of the second stanza. After a more freewheeling first period both defenses clamped down in period two. The Nailers held South Carolina to just four shots in the middle stanza while managing seven shots of their own.
Just as it looked as though period two would end scoreless a late interference call set up a Wheeling power play. Kushneriuk slammed home his second goal of the game at 19:11 as Wheeling reclaimed the lead 2-1. Forwards Joey Haddad and defenseman Kyle Bushee both of whom had a strong series provided the helpers on the Kushneriuk’ score.
The eventual game winning goal came late in period three when defenseman Jason DeSantis hammered a slap shot past Ford from the point scoring the second power play goal of the game for Wheeling. The Nailers went two of three on power plays in the game while South Carolina was able to convert on just one of four chances. Crowder got his second assist of the night on the goal as Doug Rogers was credited with the primary assist.
The 3-1 one lead off the DeSantis goal at 15:27 gave South Carolina less than five minutes to save their season. They managed to close the gap to the final 3-2 score when Brock McBride scored poked home the puck out of a rugby type scrum in front of the Nailers’ net.
However, McBride’s goal at 18:39 assisted by Yeo and forward Rob Ricci was the last goal and shot of the 2011 playoffs for the ‘Rays. The Nailers were able to prevent any additional shots on Delmas goal in the final 1:21 of the game.
The Nailers move on to face the Grenville Road Warriors in the next round of the playoffs. Grenville sent Elmira home also winning that series in four games. Contact Phil.Brand@prohockeynews.com
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