PEORIA, IL – The Peoria Rivermen used a relentless forecheck to dominate the Louisiana Ice Gators to even their best-of-three SPHL playoff series at 1-all with a 4-0 victory Friday night in front of 2492 delighted fans. The Rivermen rode a 3-point night by Mike Gurtler and shut-out goaltending of Kyle Rank to move the series to a deciding Game Three in Peoria on Saturday night.
“We were much more physical tonight,” Head Coach Jean-Guy Trudel told Pro Hockey News. “We had sixty-minutes of effort. We spoke about that when they called a time-out (after the third goal in the first period.) We didn’t want to let down.”
Mike Gurtler, a healthy scratch in game one, tipped in a Jason Cohen shot at 7:49 of the first period. The power play goal was the first of either team in the series and gave Peoria their first lead of the series. Alex Hudson was credited with the other assist.
“It was tough being the only guy sitting,” Gurtler said, speaking of Game One on Wednesday night. “I knew I had fresh legs, though. We wanted to generate traffic in front of the net and we did that.”
They created plenty of traffic and it led to two more goals in the first period.
From behind the net, Gurtler found Alex Hagaman all along on the far face off dot. Hagaman one-timed a shot that sailed past Ice Gator goaltender Scott Diebold, untouched. Nick Schneider was given a helper on the play that gave the RIvermen a 2-0 lead at 9:30 of the first, as well.
Louisiana left Jake Trask open in front of the net, too. This time is was on a power play. Gurtler, again, found the open man and Trask buried it for a 3-0 lead 12:55 minutes into the first period.
There would be no scoring in the second period, but the Rivermen held the visitors to just two shots on goal.
Peoria tacked on another power play goal late in the third period when Matt Summer poked one in with 41 seconds left to play.
Rank stopped all 21 shots he faced, but gave away most of the credit.
“It was definitely a team effort,” Rank said. “My teammates took it to a new level and made my job a lot easier.”
Diebold stopped 31 of 35 shots in the loss. The Ice Gators, tops in the league with a man-advantage during the season, were held scoreless on the power play for the second straight game. Peoria capitalized on three of their seven chances.
The Decider: Game Three is at 7:05PM tonight at Peoria’s Carver Arena.
Contact the author at Shaun.Bill@ProHockeyNews.com or follow him on Twitter @SLBatPHN .
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