Colorado drops Game 4 to the ‘Bugs in OT

BOSSIER CITY, La. – With two such evenly matched teams battling for the Ray Miron President’s Cup championship, it’s no surprise to see two of the four games played thus far decided in overtime.
It took an extra session to decide the first game of the series resulting in a 3-2 Colorado win and in Game 4, the Bossier-Shreveport Mudbugs prevailed over the Colorado Eagles by a score of 5-4 to even the series at two games each.
Steve Haddon scored his seventh goal of the playoffs at 1:08 into the game assisted by Adam Hogg and Brett Thurston to give the Eagles an early lead.
Bossier-Shreveport followed up with two goals of their own for a 2-1 edge in the first period. Nathan Moon stole the puck in the Eagles defensive zone and beat Andrew Penner to tie the game. 

A mere 15 seconds later, Penner’s attempt to smother a shot leaked past him allowing Sean Limpright the opportunity to shove it into the open net for the go ahead goal.
Colorado out shot Bossier-Shreveport 11-9 with the Mudbugs and Eagles taking three minor penalties apiece.
In the middle frame, Colorado put up three goals in a row to take back the lead. Hogg and Haddon worked together with Kyle Peto to tie the game again at 4:26 with Hogg scoring the goal this time.
At 6:34, Jason Beatty started a short-handed break with a pass up ice to Adam Chorneyko who burst into the Mudbugs zone and put a shot towards John DeCaro that Scott May redirected on goal.
Slightly more than three minutes later at 9:43 Chorneyko assisted on Kevin Ulanski’s 10th goal of the playoffs to give the Eagles a 4-2 lead thereby chasing DeCaro from the Mudbugs net in favor of Ryan Munce.
With less than five minutes left, Simon Mangos scored a four-on-four goal assisted by Andy Contois and David Pszenyczny to bring the Mudbugs to within one to end the second period trailing 4-3.
Penalties in the second period were even again with each team called for two minor penalties while Colorado out shot Bossier-Shreveport 6-5.
The only scoring in the third frame was a goal to tie the game at 4-4 from Limpright of the Mudbugs at 7:47 with assists from Michael Couch and Brett Smith.
Shots in the third period were 9 for Colorado to 7 for Bossier-Shreveport with two penalties called on the Eagles and one minor charged to the Mudbugs.
To start the overtime period, the Eagles had to finish killing a late third period penalty against Daymen Rycroft. After the successful kill, Colorado got a couple good shots off before Rycroft was called again for a penalty at 2:14.
Colorado put forth another strong effort in killing the penalty but the Eagles were unable to get the puck out of the zone after the Mudbugs power play ended.
Jeff Kryzakos scored on a high shot after taking a pass down low from Nick Layton at 4:31 to give Bossier-Shreveport the 5-4 win.
The series now becomes a best two out of three with the next game taking place at the CenturyTel Center on Friday night May 20th at 7:05 P.M. CST.
Contact the writer/photographer at terry.sanford@prohockeynews.com