Goalie Ryan Massa made 31 saves against Florida Tuesday night (Photo courtesy of F. Medina & G. Basing / Orlando Solar Bears)
ORLANDO, FLA – Entering Tuesday night’s battle with the Florida Everblades, the Orlando Solar Bears knew they were close to the edge of not making the ECHL Kelly Cup playoffs. Even one loss in the final four games would take the Solar Bears fate out of their hands, leaving the team to hope for a lot of help if and only if they did what they needed to do and won out.
As the final buzzer sounded, the Solar Bears found themselves hanging on to the edge of the cliff looking for a rope to grab onto.
Brant Harris’ goal midway through the third period broke a tie and Anthony Peters stopped all but one shot as the Everblades (44-23-0-2, 90 points) defeated the Solar Bears (32-28-4-5, 73 points) 3-1 in front of an announced crowd of 6,698 at the Amway Center. The loss was Orlando’s fifth in its last six games, during which time the Solar Bears have earned just three points.
Orlando now faces a near impossible task of beating its in-state rival three times in three days – with two of the games being on the road – while hoping that both Elmira and Kalamazoo completely fall apart. Elmira took control of the final spot in the Eastern conference playoffs (and pulled even with Wheeling for seventh place) with a come-from-behind win over Adirondack on Tuesday while Kalamazoo faces Brampton on Wednesday. All three teams are in action Friday and Saturday after the Solar Bears host Florida on Thursday.
In simpler terms, both Wheeling and Elmira have 79 points with two games left. Orlando could win its three remaining games to get to 79 points but based on the first tie-breaker – regulation and overtime wins – would need Elmira to lose its last two contests to create a tie which Orlando would break by controlling the tie-breaker. Kalamazoo, which has 77 points, would also have to lose all of its three remaining games to give the Solar Bears a shot by not getting into a tie.
“We know what they (standings points) are. We knew we had to win tonight,” Solar Bears Head Coach Anthony Noreen said after the loss. “We can’t control what Wheeling or Elmira or anybody else does. Obviously we want to win and get into the playoffs. We want to win hockey games. We feel like we’ve been playing some pretty good hockey and we’re due to break out and have a big night scoring-wise.Thursday night we want to win. That’s our goal, that’s all we’re going to look at. We get done with that and we’ll worry about Friday andSaturday and [then] we’ll worry about what the standings look like.”
Earlier in the day, Noreen had set getting off to a good start, dictating the play and being physical as the keys to beating the Everblades. Thanks to goalie Ryan Massa, the Solar Bears were able to keep the game scoreless through the opening period as the rookie netminder made fourteen saves. His best of the frame came in the closing minutes when he turned away Florida best scorer Matt Willows on a break-in.
Peters, who was looking for his sixth victory over Orlando this season, was not as busy, making seven stops in the first. Early in the second, the Solar Bears did find a way to beat Peters when during a delayed penalty, a cross-ice pass by Brady Vail found Brett Findlay who directed it home for his ninth of the season.
The lead lasted just shy of 90 seconds before the Everblades responded. It came Brendan O’Donnell fired an off-balance shot from the face-off circle to Massa’s left that hit the goalie’s pad and went in for O’Donnell’s thirteenth.
Massa (31 saves) and Peters (23 saves) put on a show over the final fifteen minutes of the middle frame and the first half of the third. Midway through the final stanza, Massa made a save on a backhander by Matt Marquardt. The rebound went behind the net where Harris tracked it down and quickly wrapped a shot around the net, barely eluding the Orlando goalie for Harris’ eighteenth of the season and Florida’s first lead of the night.
The Orlando offense, which had mustered twelve shots in the first forty minutes, began pushing harder and harder but the Everblades – in particular Peters – continually frustrated the home team at every turn. The Solar Bears were able to double their in-game shot count in the final twenty minutes but the Everblades netminder was in a zone, making save after save.
Noreen pulled Massa with 1:47 left in regulation in a last gasp attempt to find the game-tying score. The effort went for naught as Kevin Lynch put the game out of reach with his nineteenth goal of the season into the empty Orlando net with one tick over a minute left in the contest.
Massa, who once again played well enough to win, said afterwards that the Solar Bears need to put Tuesday’s loss behind them quickly and get set for Thursday’s game which now will carry even more importance.
“We’re playing for our [playoff] lives right now. Right now things certainly are looking a little difficult. We’re going to need a lot of help the next couple of days,” the rookie goalie said. “Right now we’ve just got to refocus and reshift our focus to our next game.”
Contact the author at Don.money@prohockeynews.com
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