ANCHORAGE, AK – The Kelly Cup Finals action will move to the low country of South Carolina after Alaska won Game 2 Saturday night at Sullivan Arena 3-1. Alaska’s win evened the best of seven games series at one game apiece. It was a second straight “Sully” sellout, this time with a crowd of 6,396. The crowd watched Aces goaltender Jean-Philippe Lamoureux outduel ‘Rays netminder Jonathan Boutin, in the second outstanding defensive battle between the finalists. Colin Hemingway scored the difference maker getting the game winning goal in the third period.
The ECHL’s Goalie of the Year Lamoureux allowed only one goal on the 27 shots he faced while Boutin, who performed equally as well as Lamoureux, took the loss allowing two goals on 29 shots. The third Aces’ goal was into an empty net.
Photo by Greg Martin
The first two games of the series matchup seem indicative of what fans can look forward to in the remaining games, no blowouts and tight defensive play. After the game, Stingrays’ coach Jared Bednar was content with his team’s play, but not the score.
“This was a really close game, a lot like last night,” said South Carolina coach Jared Bednar. “We could have won tonight’s game, but they could have won last night’s as well.”
Maxime Lacroix, who scored twice in Game 1, gave the Stingrays an early 1-0 lead at 7:24 of the opening period on a power play. Travis Morin, the ECHL’s regular season assist leader provided Lacroix a highlight reel pass at the corner of the net and Lacroix beat Lamoureux scoring his tenth goal of the playoffs. Defenseman Zach Tarkir provided an initial pass to Morin, who in turn fed Lacroix. The Tarkir pass would also be part of any highlight reel. The period ended 1-1, as Alaska answered with a highlight reel power play goal of their own at 16:21 of the period. Luke Erickson got his fifth post season strike with South Carolina down one man. D efenseman T.J. Fast, a St Louis Blues prospect, held the puck several seconds eventually drawing the ‘Rays’ penalty killers out of position before he fed Erickson who was moving into the slot. Erickson’s wrist shot was slowed by Boutin but made it into the net for the first period tie. Cam Keith got the secondary assist on the Erickson goal. B efore, between and after the two first period power play goals, the goalies and excellent team defense gave portent to the tight defensive game both sides would play for the balance of the game.
Period two featured a number of excellent opportunities but both netminders were perfect and both made great saves at their ends of the ice. The period highlight was a dust up at the 18:44 mark. The ‘Rays’ were crowding the net, trying to physically force the puck past Lamoureux and a pretty good skirmish broke out at the stoppage of play. South Carolina’s Spencer Carbery and Nikita Kashirsky were sent off for the visitors while Colin Hemingway and Bryan Miller got matching roughing penalties for the Aces. The Carbery and Hemingway offenses were double minors.
That action, the last penalties of the night, ratcheted up what was already a tense and dramatic struggle and set the stage for period three and Colin Hemingway. He took a pass from Josh Soares at the 7:50 mark of the final period and blasted the puck past Boutin to give Alaska the 2-1 lead and the needed margin of victory. Hemingway’s eighth goal of the playoffs came from the slot and cleanly beat Boutin. Ryan Turek also got a point on the game winner.
South Carolina had a number of good chances to tie the game and the outcome remained in doubt until the 19:51 mark. The ‘Rays, had emptied the net and with the extra attacker had just missed tying the game on a great Lamoureux save off a Tarkir shot. Then, Aces captain Scott Burt blocked a Brad Farynuk shot from the other point, got past the Stingrays point man, gained possession of the puck and hit the empty net.
Games 3, 4 and 5 are scheduled for next Wednesday, Friday and Saturday with 7:05 EDT start times at the North Charleston Coliseum.
Contact the author at Phil.Brand@prohockeynews.com
Catch all the playoffs at Intotheboards.net
You must be logged in to post a comment.