MANCHESTER, NH – At the start of the ECHL Kelly Cup Playoffs, the South Carolina Stingrays lost the first two games of the first round to the Greenville Swamp Rabbits. The Stingrays responded by winning the next four games to claim the series before eliminating the South division and Eastern Conference top seeded Florida Everblades in five games.
Saturday night at SNHU Arena, the latest piece of a second hot streak by the Stingrays fell into place.
A three-goal outburst in the third period turned a deficit into a third consecutive win as the visiting Stingrays beat the host Monarchs 3-1 in front of an announced crowd of 2,661. South Carolina can book a trip to the Kelly Cup championship series with a victory in game six on Monday night.
Had it not been for a fortunate – or in the case of Manchester unfortunate – bounce that became Steven McParland’s goal early in the final frame that started the landslide, Monarchs goalie Sam Brittain was well on his way to out dueling Stingrays netminder Parker Milner as he had in games one and two. Instead, Brittain and his teammates will be fighting for their playoff lives the next time they hit the ice.
Coming off of Friday night’s win that evened the series, South Carolina had a jump in its stride in the first five minutes of the game. The Stingrays hit Brittain with an early salvo of shots that the Florida Panthers prospect turned aside with ease.
The visitors penchant for taking penalties came back to haunt them as the Stingrays were tasked with killing off three Monarchs power plays between the 5:17 and 11:16 marks of the opening frame. The first two Manchester man advantages went by the boards although it took a quick whistle by the referees to negate what appeared to be a score by the Monarchs’ Daniel Ciampini to keep the game scoreless.
With Olivier Archambault in the box at 11:08, it took just eight seconds for Manchester finally open the scoring. South Carolina won the defensive zone face-off but failed to clear the zone. The Monarchs quickly worked the puck to defenseman Colton Saucerman who lined up a low, hard drive that Matt Leitner redirected up and over Milner for his seventh post-season goal and the lead.
The rest of the first period and for that matter the majority of the second belonged to Brittain. He finished the first forty minutes with 22 saves with many coming in key moments. In the opening stanza, he thwarted a chance by McParland among the ten stops he made. In the middle frame, the Monarchs netminder stoned South Carolina’s Rob Flick on back-to-back chances early before turning away both John Parker and Scott Tanski who each had short-handed chances as part of his twelve-save second period.
The Stingrays did appear to beat Brittain with a shot early in the second but once again the referees overruled the tally. Not too long after Flick was denied, defenseman Max Nicastro blasted a drive through traffic that found the back of the net. As quickly as the goal light went on, the score was waived off for contact in the crease that did not allow Brittain an opportunity to make a play.
Through two periods, the Monarchs were 1-for-6 on the power play. It was shortly after killing off the sixth Manchester man advantage early in the third (a penalty to Andrew Cherniwchan had carried over from the middle to the final frame) that the Stingrays pulled even.
With a delayed penalty coming to the Monarchs, South Carolina worked the puck around in the Manchester defensive zone. Eventually Joey Leach fed McParland who fired at Brittain. The puck hit a Monarchs defender and eluded Brittain for McParland’s fourth goal of the playoffs and a tie score.
Just over a minute later, South Carolina found itself on its third actual power play of the game. A little past the midpoint of the advantage, Cody Corbett came off the half boards with the puck and saw Archambault on the back side of the play. Corbett found a lane and made a perfect pass to Archambault who sent the puck into the back of the net for his fourth tally of the post-season and a lead the Stingrays would not relinquish.
Less than a minute after going in front, Joe Devin was called for tripping, putting the Monarchs on the power play yet again. The Stingrays held Manchester without a shot on the advantage as the defense – which allowed just three Monarchs shots to reach Milner in the frame – stiffened at the right time.
Kelly Zajac put the game out of reach with 3:23 left in regulation, taking a feed from Domenic Monardo on an odd-man rush and sliding home his fifth goal of the playoffs to give South Carolina a two-goal cushion. The Monarchs pulled Brittain (26 saves) with just over a minute to go but the Stingrays held the fort to move one step closer to playing in the finals.
Notes: Milner finished the game with 19 saves on 20 shots faced. In 16 games played this playoff season, Milner has held the opponents to one or fewer goals seven times with three shutouts… In two games at home, Manchester’s power play is 1-for-14 after 4-for-17 in the first three games in South Carolina combined… The Stingrays’ Monardo has assists in each of the last three games.
Contact the author at don.money@prohockeynews.com
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