GREENVILLE, SC – Carrying a three-game winning streak and the confidence it brings with it, the Orlando Solar Bears headed north on Friday for the first of two games in the Palmetto State. The Solar Bears pulled into Greenville to take on a Swamp Rabbits team that they found themselves in a three-way tie for third place in the ECHL’s South division with. Unfortunately for the visitors, the Swamp Rabbits were quick out of the gate and kept on skating.
Led by balanced scoring in which ten different players picked up a point, Greenville (18-16-2-1, 39 points) rode a three goal first period to a 4-2 win over the Solar Bears (16-17-4-1, 37 points) in front of an announced crowd of 4,181 at the Bon Secours Wellness Arena. Goalie Ty Rimmer backstopped the victory with a solid 32-save effort for Greenville. The win, coupled with Atlanta’s loss to South Carolina, moved the Swamp Rabbits into sole possession of the third playoff spot in the division.
Sporting a lineup that saw the newly returned from Toronto Jean Dupuy along with Kyle Rankin inserted in place of Josh Winquist and newcomer Kale Kerbashian, Orlando hoped to replicate its efforts from the previous weekend’s sweep of Jacksonville. That did not happen as Greenville struck twice in the first 3:23 to take control of the contest.
Just 1:57 into the first period, the Swamp Rabbits opened the scoring. Chad Duchesne started the sequence by chasing down the puck deep in the Solar Bears defensive zone. He sent it to the front of the net where Derek Sutliffe moved it quickly to Jack Nevins who put the disc between the post and the stick side leg pad of Orlando goalie Cal Heeter for his sixth goal of the season.
Less than 90 seconds later, the lead grew to two thanks to a bit of luck. Shane Walsh skated the puck into the offensive zone and dropped a pass to Matt Prapavessis at the blueline. Prapavessis tried to make a pass to Branden Troock in front but it hit the skate of a Solar Bears defender and slipped through Heeter’s legs for the blueliner’s second tally of the year.
Orlando seemed a bit off-kilter during the initial push by the Swamp Rabbits, taking a little more than five minutes to record its first shots of the game on Rimmer. Any momentum the Solar Bears might have built during the middle stages of the opening frame was quickly undone by penalties that helped to dig the hole a bit deeper.
With Chris Crane already in the penalty box, Orlando defenseman Sam Jardine was tagged for delay of game, giving Greenville 40 seconds of five-on-three power play time. The Solar Bears did a good job of killing the two-man disadvantage but just as Crane stepped back on the ice, Joe Houk drove a shot that navigated its way through traffic and past Heeter for Houk’s ninth and a 3-0 lead that the Swamp Rabbits carried into the first intermission.
The Solar Bears were determined to make a comeback and started to find their way early in the second stanza. A mere two minutes in, Martins Dzierkals got control of the puck below the goal line in the Greenville end and saw teammate Joe Perry out front. Dzierkals threaded a pass and Perry did the rest, beating Rimmer for his fifth score of the 2017-18 campaign to trim the margin to 3-1.
It was the lone score of the period as the goalies took over. Heeter recovered nicely from the first and held the fort, making eleven saves on eleven shots that the Swamp Rabbits sent his way, including denying Troock on a breakaway. At the other end, Rimmer was just as busy, turning away 15 of 16 Orlando attempts to keep his team ahead by two after two periods.
Greenville clamped down defensively at the start of the third period, allowing Orlando just one shot in the first seven minutes of play and six over fifteen minutes of action. The Swamp Rabbits very effectively killed off two Solar Bears power plays during that time, giving up a mere three shots to the visitors.
With about three minutes left in regulation, Orlando head coach Drake Berehowsky pulled Heeter (30 saves) for an extra attacker. The Solar Bears failed to put a huge amount of pressure on Rimmer and when a blueline turnover ended with former Solar Bear Joe Basaraba putting his eleventh goal into the empty net with 1:57 remaining, the decision was sealed.
Not willing to go down without a fight, Jardine drove a shot past Rimmer off assists from Todd Skirving and Rankin with less than five seconds left but it was too little, too late to change the outcome.
Notes: Shots for the game ended up even at 34-34… Orlando’s power play failed to score in three attempts while Greenville went 1-for-4… With goalie Mackenzie Skapskinot availavle for the trip north, the Solar Bears brought in netminder Gordon Defiel from SPHL Pensacola as an emergency backup (EBUG) behind Heeter… Orlando was also without veteran forward Darryl Bootland who was placed on injured reserve retroactive to December 31st… With his assist on Perry’s goal, Dzierkals extended his points streak to four games (two goals, four assists)… Orlando will finish its weekend with a Saturday night contest in North Charleston aganst the Stingrays at 7:05 p.m. while Greenville heads to Duluth, Georgia for a meeting with the Atlanta Gladiators with a similar 7:05 p.m. start time.
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