Komm silences Admirals in Stingrays win

NORTH CHARLESTON, SC – Branden Komm stopped 25 shots to earn his professional shutout and lead the South Carolina Stingrays to a 3-0 victory over the Norfolk Admirals Sunday afternoon at the North Charleston Coliseum. Komm improved his record to 5-0-0-0 and the Stingrays earned the weekend sweep over the Admirals. Nick Jones scored the game-winning goal for South Carolina, and the Stingrays penalty kill held the Admirals to 0-for-7 on the power play.

Jones opened the scoring at the 18:33 mark of the first period with his fourth goal of the season. With the Stingrays on the power play, Brett Cameron moved the puck back to Jones at the blue line. The defender let a wrist shot go that beat a screened Norfolk

goaltender Nic Riopel to make it 1-0.

After a pair of fights early, the bad blood boiled over moments after Jones’ goal. At the 19:00 mark, the two teams engaged in a large scrum behind the Norfolk goal. In total, 78 penalty minutes would be assessed in the game’s opening period. The two teams combined for only four penalty minutes in the game’s closing 40 minutes, however.

Holding a 1-0 lead thanks to strong goaltending by Komm, and a penalty kill that killed two lengthy five-on-three power plays for Norfolk, South Carolina was able to add a pair of insurance markers in the third period. Paul Rodrigues scored his fourth goal of the season via a deflection. Defenseman Wade Epp blasted a shot from the point. Rodrigues, positioned directly in front of Riopel, changed the angle of the shot to fool the goaltender to give the Stingrays a 2-0 lead at 7:36.

Marcus Perrier would score his second goal of the weekend into the empty net at the 18:36 mark to make it 3-0. All that was left was to preserve the shutout for Komm, and the Admirals came close to finding the back of the net with 10 seconds left, but Samuel Noreau’s shot rang the right post.

The two teams each fired 25 shots. South Carolina went 1-for-2 on the power play in the victory.

The Stingrays close 2015 with a game at Orlando on Tuesday at 7 pm.