ORLANDO, FLA – On a night where hockey celebrated the anniversary of one of the iconic moments of the 20th century, the Orlando Solar Bears drew inspiration from one of their own and conjured up arguably the team’s best performance of the season.
Orlando goalie Ryan Massa recorded his third professional shutout Wednesday night (Photo courtesy of Gary Bassing / Orlando Solar Bears)
Led by a goal and an assist from Eric Faille and a flawless 39-save performance from goalie Ryan Massa, Orlando (27-18-6-3, 63 points) shut out the visiting Atlanta Gladiators (20-25-6-1, 47 points) 4-0 in front of an announced crowd of 4,023 at the Amway Center Wednesday night. With the win, the Solar Bears remained tied for second place in the ECHL’s South division with the Greenville Swamp Rabbits who defeated the Reading Royals.
Wednesday may have been the 37th anniversary of the “Miracle On Ice” victory by the USA men’s Olympic hockey team over the Russians at Lake Placid but that event took a back seat to more pressing matters in the City Beautiful. Two hours before game time, the Solar Bears announced that head coach Drake Berehowsky would not be behind the bench because of a “medical emergency” Tuesday evening that left the 45-year old coach lying in a bed at Florida Hospital according to the release from the team.
No other information was provided on Berehowsky’s condition other than Solar Bears Chairman and CEO Joe Haleski saying in the release that the coach “was in good spirits and eager to get back behind the bench as soon as he receives medical clearance to do so”.
“It’s the nature of professional hockey. You get a key component to your lineup and they go down with an injury or whatever it may be and everyone else has to pick up the slack,” Massa said about the team’s mentality in Berehowsky’s absence. “Everyone else has to buy in together that much harder, play together that much more intensely. Tonight every single guy wearing that jersey did that. There wasn’t a single player that I felt had a bad game tonight. Everyone did their job.”
The job that fell on the shoulders of assistant coach John Snowden Wednesday morning was to let the team know about Berehowsky and get them refocused on a game that had major implications in the division race. Snowden, who filled in for Berehowsky back in January in Alaska when the heach coach was suspended, said that all he tried to do was make sure that the players knew that regardless of the circumstances, it was just another day.
“I just took it as another game day. That’s all we could do,” Snowden said. “We didn’t have to really change anything. Drake and me, we think [about] the game alike and I just followed suit of what he would want. That’s what my job is – to make his job easier. We just stuck to our plan that we always have and we executed well tonight.”
It took a little bit of time for the execution to come fully through but it gave Massa a chance to show just how dialed in he was. The second-year netminder was rock solid early on in the first period, turning away eight Gladiators shots in the opening eight minutes of the game – one coming at the expense of former Solar Bear Tyler Murovich on a semi-breakway.
At the other end of the ice, Atlanta goalie Dan Vladar looked to be just as strong, stopping Faille on a rebound from close in and moments later denying Patrick Watling on a clean break-in.
Orlando finally broke the ice at the 13:36 mark of the first. Faille, who had just been reassigned to the Solar Bears after a month up with the AHL’s Toronto Marlies, cut into the Gladiators end from Vladar’s left. Using a brilliant toe drag move, Faille left a defender in the ice chips before moving the puck to Joe Perry who banged it into the open side of the net. For Perry, it was his 27th goal of the season – a personal best – and tying the ECHL Solar Bears franchise mark set by Mickey Lang during the 2013-14 season.
Late in the opening frame, Solar Bears forward Austin Block took a penalty that gave Atlanta a power play to start the second. Instead of the Gladiators taking advantage, it was the Orlando penalty killers who turned defense into offense. As the visitors attempted to break into the Solar Bears defensive zone, veteran forward Chad LaRose busted up the foray by sweeping the puck away in the direction of defenseman Brenden Miller. Miller, who returned to Orlando after playing a game and scoring his first career AHL goal with the Marlies on Monday, sent a perfect stretch pass to Darik Angeli at center ice. Angeli drove in alone on Vladar, made a couple of stick moves and buried a shot between the goalie’s legs. It was Angeli’s 12th of the year and ninth since donning an Orlando jersey for the first time.
For LaRose, who is trying to revive a career that saw him earn a Stanley Cup ring with the Carolina Hurricanes in 2005-06, it was his second assist in Orlando – the first two ECHL points since his rookie season with the Florida Everblades in 2003-04.
“It’s fun coming to the rink every day. We’ve got a good group of guys,” LaRose, who last played with the Charlotte Checkers in 2014-15, said. “I figured it would take me a bit but I’m feeling back to normal now and getting better every day.”
The lead for the home team jumped to three with just over seven minutes left in the middle stanza. It came when forward Alex Gacek stole a clearing pass just inside the Atlanta blue line and took off with it toward the slot. Using newly signed teammate Michael Turner as a screen, Gacek cut from right to left across the area out in front of Vladar and whistled a shot into the lower right hand corner for his 21st goal of the season and 13th as a Solar Bear. The goal was the final one allowed by Vladar as he was replaced by Matt Ginn between the pipes for the Gladiators.
Faille, whose last Orlando goal came during the team’s road trip to Alaska on January 14th, completed the scoring 6:38 into the final frame. After taking a pass from Daniel Maggio along the right boards, Faille made a power move to the net and tucked a backhander under the goalie’s pads for his 17th goal of the 2016-17 campaign in Orlando. Massa, who had moved the puck to Maggio, earned the secondary assist.
“I felt pretty good tonight. I wanted to come back and help the team win,” Faille said. “I just worked hard. I think everybody starting from our goalie [and] our defense moved the puck to our forwards [who] got the puck down low [and] worked their defense. I think it was all in all a great game.”
From that point on, the only question was whether Massa would get the shutout. The Littleton, Colorado native was bent on doing whatever it took to post the goose egg, making 17 saves in the third as the Gladiators looked to break down the wall the goalie had put up in front of the net.
Massa said afterwards that it was probably the best sixty-minute effort the Solar Bears have put together in several weeks.
“I saw an entire team wearing black jerseys that played a full sixty minutes. Over the last however many weeks, I’d say we struggled as a group to put together a solid sixty, a complete sixty,” Massa said. “Tonight the boys really came committed to a purpose. Not one guy put themselves above the team. Everyone was blocking shots. They were doing their jobs and when everyone does their job [and] communicates, you can see what the results are.”
Snowden agreed with Massa that the effort from start to finish was there and that given all of the adversity that Wednesday brought with it, the Solar Bears were more than ready to meet the challenge.
“We did what we set out to do going into tonight. I think guys competed hard for sixty minutes. I think guys were up on the bench, they were into the game the whole time,” Snowden said. “We work at it every day to make sure we’re prepared for every game no matter what the situation. Tonight was a good example of that.”
Notes: Despite not being behind the bench, Berehowsky earned his 50th coaching victory with the Solar Bears in the game. The first 28 wins came during the 2012-13 season… Massa’s last shutout came on January 16, 2016 – a 2-0 blanking of the Indy Fuel on the road in Indianapolis… Neither team was effective on the power play as Atlanta went 0-for-4 while Orlando finished 0-for-3… In its last eight games at home, Orlando is 6-0-1-1… Angeli’s short-handed score was the Solar Bears’ 12th of the season as a team. That is one off the league-leading mark of 13 co-owned by the Florida and the Colorado Eagles… The Solar Bears and Gladiators will have Thursday off before playing again Friday night at 7 p.m. at the Amway Center. They will finish the three-game set Sunday afternoon.
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