Amerks blanked in Iowa, 6-0

DES MOINES, Iowa – The Iowa Wild scored two goals in each period to defeat the Rochester Americans by a 6-0 score at Wells Fargo Arena on Friday night. The Amerks, who were playing the second game of a four-game road trip, saw their record fall to 27-36-5-1 on the season with a visit to Rockford coming up on Saturday.

Goaltender Pat Nagle, signed to a professional tryout by the Amerks on Thursday, got his second start of the season for Rochester and finished with 31 saves in the loss. Allan McPherson led the Amerks with four shots on goal while Jake McCabe returned to the lineup following a nine-game injury absence.   IowaWild

Joel Chouinard led the way for Iowa with two goals, while Tyler Graovac, Stu Bickel, Brady Brassart and Jared Knight each added a goal as well. In all, 14 different Wild players recorded at least one point in the contest. John Curry backstopped the Wild with a 22-save shutout.

Graovac put the Wild on the board early as he corralled a pass in the slot from Jonathon Blum and fired it over Nagle’s glove just 1:23 into the game for the 1-0 lead. Chouinard made it 2-0 when he scored on a breakaway after exiting the penalty box midway through the first. Brady Austin had a shot blocked by Zack Mitchell, and Mitchell found Chouinard with a long pass to the far blue line. Chouinard skated in alone, deked to his backhand and beat Nagle for the goal.

Bickel found the back of the net midway through the second period when he was all alone in the slot. After taking a pass from Brett Bulmer, Bickel took two steps then fired a wrist shot past Nagle for a 3-0 lead. Brassart deposited the Wild’s fourth goal of the night just 24 seconds later as Stephane Veilleux found him streaking up the wing. Brassart went in on a partial breakaway and beat Nagle low on the stick side for a 4-0 Wild lead.

Knight increased the Wild lead to five early in the third period. He took a pass from Pavel Jenys, threw a shot at Nagle, then crashed the net for his own rebound and had it carom off his body and over Nagle for the goal. Chouinard potted his second of the night when he jumped on a rebound in the slot to make it a 6-0 game late in the third.

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