Gacek, Kaskisuo lead Solar Bears past Aces

ANCHORAGE, AK – More than 3,000 miles away from home, the Orlando Solar Bears found themselves without their head coach and one of their goalies Wednesday night. Instead of shrinking in the face adversity, the Solar Bears did exactly what their namesake in nature would do: overpower their opposition.

Orlando goalie Kasimir Kaskisuo made 49 saves Wednesday night against Alaska (PHN photo by Phillip Nichols)

Led by two goals and an assist from Alex Gacek and a career-high 49 saves from rookie Kasimir Kaskisuo, Orlando (19-12-4-2, 44 points) won its first ever game in the Land of the Midnight Sun, thumping the Alaska Aces (19-10-1-4, 43 points) 6-2 in front of an announced crowd of 2,498 at Sullivan Arena. The victory was the Solar Bears second on their six-game swing out west.

Eleven different Orlando players had at least one point in the contest with Eric Faille and Joe Perry (one goal and one assist each) and Denver Manderson (three assists) joining Gacek with multiple points. The performance by Kaskisuo was even better as he set a new ECHL Orlando franchise record with 27 saves in the second period, breaking the previous mark of 23 set by Garret Sparks in January of 2015.

Kaskisuo had to be tough as his partner between the pipes, Ryan Massa, was not able to go for the second straight game. In his place, the Solar Bears signed local goalie Wylie Rogers as the emergency backup. Orlando was also minus head coach Drake Berehowsky, who was hit with a one-game suspension by the ECHL after receiving an abuse of officials game misconduct on Sunday in Colorado.

Following two straight losses to the Colorado Eagles, the Solar Bears wanted to get out to a fast start and keep their foot on the pedal. The quick opening came just as Berehowsky and assistant coach John Snowden, who replaced Berehowsky in charge for the night, drew it up. Thanks in part to an early Alaska penalty, Orlando put the heat on Aces starting goalie Michael Garteig.

The early pressure led to the game’s opening score 5:49 into the first period. Defenseman Chris Bradley took a feed from Darik Angeli and drove a shot at the net. Garteig made the initial save but Gacek was in the right spot to shovel a backhander into the net for his twelfth goal of the season and his fourth with Orlando.

The lead doubled in size at the 10:38 mark when on a power play, Perry redirected a feed from the left circle by Faille past Garteig for his his team-leading 19th of the season.

The Aces regrouped and answered back quickly with a pair of goals of their own. At the 12:08 mark, Daniel Moynihan picked up his eleventh of the year when he changed the direction of a shot by Steve Tarasuk and it found the back of the net. Feeling the momentum, Alaska evened the score 2:38 later when Stephen Perfetto carried the puck through center ice into the Solar Bears defensive zone, split the defenders and slid the puck under Kaskisuo’s pads for his 17th of the season.

Orlando’s power play, which has shown some signs of life of late, connected for the second time in the opening frame with just 14.6 seconds left before the intermission. Off an offensive zone face-off, Manderson got the puck to Gacek and he did the rest, zipping below the right circle and scooping a backhander behind Garteig for his second of the night and fifth in seven contests since being acquired by the Solar Bears.

The Aces knew they had to wrest the momentum back from their visitors, coming out in the second period and firing shot after shot at Kaskisuo. The Vantaa, Finland native proved to be too hot for the cold Alaska night, stringing together save after save after save and frustrating the host Aces to no end.

Boosted by the confidence being shown by their netminder, the Solar Bears offense went in for the kill. At the 4:01 mark of the frame, Manderson got control of the puck below the goal line and sent it to the slot where Faille ripped a shot that was past Garteig in the blink of an eye. For Faille, it was his fifteenth of the season and 39th career tally as a member of the Solar Bears, moving him past Brett Findlay into sole possession of first place in the franchise’s ECHL record book.

Following a successful penalty kill, the Solar Bears increased their lead to 5-2 when defenseman Ben Danford made a heads-up play. Seeing Chase Witala along the wing with the puck, he made a beeline for the front of the net. Witala saw his teammate on the move and got the puck to the cage where Danford banged it home for his third goal of the season. It as also the end of the night for Garteig who was replaced by Kevin Carr between the pipes for the Aces.

Not satisfied with five scores, Orlando continued to push and found the back of the net one more time in the middle stanza. It came when Gacek made a perfect pass from the goal line to Chris Crane who beat Carr with a quick shot for his ninth of the season and sixth since coming to Orlando from the Allen Americans. It also broke a drought for Crane, whose last tally had come back on December 3rd.

The rest of the period belonged to Kaskisuo, who was doing everything in his power to not let Alaska back into the contest. He robbed Tim Wallace not too long after Crane’s score and in the closing minutes of the frame denied Ryan Trenz by literally laying his body just inside the net to keep the puck out after it had dropped into the crease with traffic all around. When the buzzer sounded to end the period, Kaskisuo had amassed 27 saves to keep his team comfortably in front.

The final period was more of the same as the Aces tried desperately to find a kink in Kaskisuo’s armor by sending shot after shot in the goalie’s direction. He stood up to the barrage to finish with a confidence-boosting career best in saves at a time when his team needed him the most. The 51 shots he faced were the second most allowed by the Solar Bears in a game this season behind the 59 Massa faced on December 22nd with his 49 saves being only outdone by Massa’s 57 made on that December night.

Notes: With his two points, Faille joined Jake Cepis and Manderson as the only three Solar Bears players to reach 100 points in an Orlando jersey… Crane’s next point will be his 100th ECHL point… Prior to signing Rogers, the Solar Bears had Josh Hooyer as their EBUG on Tuesday… The two teams will resume their three-game series Friday night with puck drop set for 7:15 p.m. Alaska time/11:15 p.m. Eastern time.