ESTERO, FLA – For just the fifth time in 30 seasons, the ECHL’s championship series came down to a deciding seventh game on Saturday night, pitting the defending Kelly Cup champion Colorado Eagles and the 2017-18 regular season champs, the Florida Everblades. The drama was thick, the hitting was hard and in the end, it came down to a play by special teams that made the difference.
Gabriel Verpaelst’s short-handed tally with 2:29 left in regulation proved to be the difference as the Eagles defeated the Everblades 3-2 in front of an announced crowd of 7.701 at Germain Arena. With the series win, Colorado became just the fourth team in league history to win back-to-back titles but will not have a shot at a three-peat as the franchise will move up to the AHL as the primary affiliate of the NHL’s Colorado Avalanche when the 2018-19 season begins in October.
The Eagles game-winning score was a perfect example of teamwork. With leading scorer and eventual Kelly Cup MVP Michael Joly in the penalty box, the Eagles went on the offensive, pushing out on a three-on-two break. Forward Shawn St-Amant sent a perfect tape-to-tape pass to Verpaelst in the faceoff circle to the left of Florida goalie Martin Ouellette for a wrist shot that found the back of the net, stunning the crowd. Colorado then held off the hard-charging Everblades with netminder Joe Cannata shutting the door to finish off a 30-save victory.
Coming off a loss in game six that evened the series, the Everblades seemed determined to use its home ice advantage in the final contest. Florida came out of the locker room hard, putting Cannata to the test early and often.
Florida opened the scoring at the 8:43 mark thanks to the efforts of a player who was not even in the lineup in the previous contest. Spencer Smallman, who drew in to replace David Dziurzynski who was off getting married, took a pass from Michael Kirkpatrick at center ice and zipped into the Colorado end. Slicing his way past two defenders, Smallman cut to the dot to Cannata’s right and went blocker side for his third post-season tally.
The rest of the opening period belonged to the netminders, especially Cannata who faced twelve shots including one by Brett Bulmer with only two seconds left before the intermission that forced the Eagles goalie to make a huge save. For his part, Ouellette held the visitors off the board by stopping all nine shots he faced.
The teams fought tooth and nail throughout most of the second period, taking turns peppering the other’s net with pucks. The only one that found the back of the net came off the stick of Joly as the Eagles turned defense into instant offense. A blocked shot by St-Amant inside the Colorado blueline hopped into the neutral zone where the speedy Joly scooped it up and headed off on a clean breakaway. Joly drove in and went top corner with a backhander for his league-leading 13th post-season score to knot the score, pumping energy into his teammates.
In the late seconds of the middle frame, the Everblades thought they had gone back in front when Kirkpatrick, who missed three games of the series after a hit by Verpaelst late in game one, beat Cannata to the post on a wraparound. Everyone in the building, including the goal judge who flicked the red light on, thought the puck had gone across the line but the on-ice officials huddled and after consulting with the goal judge, ruled that the disc had not completely crossed into the white and upheld their no goal ruling.
Resolved to get the waived off score back, Florida came out flying in the third but it was its defense that keyed a second go-ahead tally. The Eagles tried to take advantage of a transition by busting into the home team’s end on a three-on-one break. Matt Mackenzie never gave up on the play, digging hard and breaking up a shot attempt by St-Amant. He quickly turned the puck around to Sam Warning, who went the other way on an odd-man rush before feeding sniper John McCarron for a backside goal to give the Everblades a 2-1 lead with 13:45 left to play. For McCarron it was his 10th goal of the post-season.
The lead was short-lived as the hockey gods provided the Eagles with a break four and a half minutes later. As the Everblades tried to ring the puck around the glass in their end, it hit one of the stanchions holding the glass in place. The bounce went to Travis Barron who,from a sharp angle, was able to get the disc past Ouellette for his second of the playoffs to once again pull Colorado even.
Both Ouellette (21 saves) and Cannata looked ready to take the game past regulation as they met save for save down the stretch. The Eagles were given a power play with 5:07 remaining but that was negated by the slashing call on Joly which in turn led to the heroics by Verpaelst, who netted Colorado’s fifth man-down tally of the playoffs and his second goal to give the visitors their only lead of the night.
Notes: Neither team scored with the power play in the game as Colorado went 0-for-2 while Florida was 0-for-3… Colorado joined Allen (2015, 2016), Toledo (1993-94) and Hampton Roads (1991-92) as the only back-to-back champions in ECHL history… Joly finished the post-season with 13 goals and 16 assists for 29 points in 24 games. He tallied four goals and five assists in the final round… Kirkpatrick led Florida in the playoffs with 11 goals and 11 assists for 22 points in 18 games. Teammate Stephen MacAulay led the Everblades in the final with four goals and three assists for seven points… The back-to-back losses for Florida in games six and seven were the first time in 102 days that the Everblades had lost consecutive games.
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