JACKSONVILLE, FLA – Playing four games in five days with some travel involved can be a taxing event for any team. When you add in an afternoon contest to make it five games in six days, it can be down right agonizing. The Orlando Solar Bears faced such a dilemma on Sunday when they traveled to Jacksonville to complete a five game in six days stretch with a fourth straight matchup with the Jacksonville Icemen.
Tired as they were, the Solar Bears needed extra time and some offense from a blueliner to save the day.
Mark Auk scored 2:14 into overtime to give visiting Orlando (18-13-3-1) a 3-2 victory over Jacksonville (14-14-2-3) in front of a COVID-restricted crowd of 2,835 at the Vystar Veterans Memorial Arena. The win allowed the Solar Bears to split the four-game set with each team winning twice.
Kyle Topping and Anthony Repaci scored the goals for Orlando in regulation before Auk, who is among the league leaders in points thanks to his number of assists, netted the game-winner. It made a winner out of goalie Clint Windsor, who bounced back from being replaced late in Friday’s meeting to record 35 saves two days later.
Auk’s game-winner was a classic three-on-three extra time score. Aaron Luchuk collected a loose puck at center ice and started to curl. He spotted Auk and hit him with a pass that created a two-on-one break with Tristin Langan. Using Langan as a decoy, Auk skated into the faceoff circle to the right of Iceman goalie Charles Williams and when he became level with the faceoff dot, Auk whipped a wrist shot into the top corner of the cage. It came out so quickly that the officials had to go to the video replay to confirm that Auk had scored his fourth goal of the season to end the game.
In what has seemed to be a recurring point of late, the Solar Bears began the contest fighting to find shots on net. It took them nearly seven minutes to record their first shot on Williams amid a struggle to get to just three for the entire opening frame. Meanwhile Windsor was very busy at his end of the ice. Thanks to a pair of power plays and lots of energy, the Icemen were able to put 13 shots on the Orlando net.
The thirteenth shot ended up being a good one for the home team. Following a defensive zone faceoff with ten seconds left in the stanza, Jacksonville captain Wacey Rabbit gained control in the neutral zone and fired a long shot into the Solar Bears end. It was wide of Windsor but whacked the end boards hard and shot out above the goal line. Derek Lodermeier, who had bedeviled Orlando during the pervious games during the week, beat the Solar Bears defenders to the puck and with Windsor off his line, snuck a tough angle shot home with .2 seconds left on the clock. For Lodermeier, it was his eighth of the season and fourth during the four-game mini-series.
The late goal, and likely some words from the coaching staff between periods, seemed to act like a wakeup call for the visitors. Just 1:21 into the middle frame, the line of Kyle Topping, Luchuk and Tad Kozun did some work in the Jacksonville end. Topping ended up with the puck behind the net and tried to send a pass to Kozun in front. Instead of getting to its intended destination, the disc hit the skate of a Jacksonville defenseman and redirected into the net for Topping’s second goal in as many days and his third of the season (second with Orlando).
Seconds later – 19 to be exact – Orlando caught a huge break that led to the Solar Bears first lead. Defenseman Alexander Kuqali took a feed at the point and let go with a shot. Anthony Repaci was trying to set a screen on Williams but instead tangled with a defender who hit him hard enough to start bending the young forward over. Kuqali’s shot was just high enough to hit Repaci’s helmet and redirected into the cage. The referee initally waived the goal off for a high stick but after consulting with his linesmen, signaled that Repaci had his second goal of the year and the visitors had a 2-1 lead.
The score stayed that way thanks to Windsor who made eleven more saves in the second period. He was perfect until Pascal Aquin drove the puck into the Solar Bears end and using a defenseman as a screen, fired a shot from the faceoff circle past Orlando’s netminder for his ninth and a 2-2 tie.
Jacksonville controlled most of the play in the third period but Windsor was back in form, making 12 more stops to keep the hard charging Icemen off the board. Williams (15 saves) was equally as tough, turning away all eight Solar Bears shots to keep the score tied and send the game to overtime where Auk ended it soon after.
Orlando will get some time to rest up before heading north to face the South Carolina Stingrays in a three-game set starting Friday in North Charleston. Jacksonville is off until Wednesday when they head up to North Charleston to take on the Stingrays.
Notes: Final shots were 37-18 in favor of Jacksonville… The Solar Bears were 0-for-1 on the power play while the Icemen went 0-for-4… The victory brought Orlando’s season series record against Jacksonville to 6-3-1-0… Sunday’s contest began a stretch of six games between the two teams in the River City between now and the end of the regular season… With two assists, Luchuk now has 15 goals and 21 assists for 36 points, putting him in a tie for third in scoring in the ECHL… Auk (4 goals, 22 assists) is second in points by a defenseman in the league… The victory was just the seventh for the Solar Bears after giving up the first goal of the game (7-12-1-0).
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