PENSACOLA, Fla. – Pensacola welcomed back playoff hockey at the Civic Center as the Ice Flyers and 3,202 fans hosted the Huntsville Havoc in game two of their best-of-three game round one playoff series. Unfortunately for Ice Flyers’ fans the Havoc dominated the home team, skating away with a 5-1 win to even the series at one game each. The deciding third game is scheduled for Sunday afternoon in Huntsville. Goalie Dan McWhinney swept aside 36 of 37 Pensacola shots on goal and forward Andrew Schembri scored twice and added an assist to lead the Havoc to the victory. Ryan Scott took the loss in net for Pensacola facing a 44 shot barrage. A late season acquisition by Huntsville, left winger Brett Liscomb, started the scoring at 7:39 of the first period. He got the only goal of the opening stanza off a nice setup pass from Justin Rohr. His first strike of the playoffs and the 1-0 score held up going into the first intermission. The teams traded chances early in period two but failed to score until 15:08 of the second period. Mike MacDonald staked Huntsville to a 2-0 lead with Schembri and Mike Carter drawing assists. The Havoc dominated the later stages of period two getting the last five shots on goal. A first game bugaboo continued to bedevil both teams in the first two periods. In game one, the Havoc managed just one power play goal in nine opportunities while the Ice Flyers were zero-for-five on the man advantage. Both teams continued to struggle with their power plays in Game 2. Through the first two periods, Huntsville had gone zero-for- four and the Ice Flyers had three power play opportunities on which they failed to convert. The lack of power play success didn’t seem to matter to Huntsville. They grabbed a 3-0 lead at 1:46 into period number three with both teams at full strength when Ray Ortiz got his first goal of the playoffs from Adam Lukacovic and B. J. Radovich. Pensacola finally broke into the scoring column when Mark Hinz converted on passes from Lorne Misita and Dan Buccella to bring the Ice Flyers to within 3-1 at the 8:29 mark. However, just over three minutes later, the seventh power play of the evening for the Havoc gave the visitors a chance to regain their three goal advantage. This time they cashed in. During the man advantage with Pensacola winger Kevin Galan off for a high-sticking double minor, Schembri hit the back of the net at 12:41 for a 4-1 Huntsville lead with the assists going to Travis Kauffeldt and Bill McCreary. Schembri iced the game for Huntsville with his second goal of the game at the 19:51 mark while the Havoc were killing off a Travis Kauffeldt penalty and after Pensacola Coach Todd Gordon had pulled his goalie for an extra attacker. Schembri was able to gain possession of the puck and ease home the empty net goal to close the scoring. Game Notes: The Havoc have scored just two power play goals on 16 opportunities while the Ice Flyers are now zero-for-13 with the man advantage…Liscomb, who scored the first Huntsville goal, signed with Havoc on March 12. He added immediate scoring punch to their lineup, scoring six goals and picking up seven assists in his 10 regular season games with the team…The third and deciding game will be played in Huntsville on Easter Sunday with a 5 p.m. CDT scheduled start time. Contact the author at Phil.Brand@prohockeynews.com
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