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LOVELAND, Colo. – Much like the previous night the visiting Utah Grizzlies scored first and never looked back in defeating the Eagles on home ice. The 4 to 1 loss followed the 5 to 2 loss suffered Friday night is an unfortunate way to wrap up the home portion of Colorado’s regular season.
Despite out shooting the Grizzlies by a large margin the tenacious goal tending of Utah’s  Ryan Faragher in stopping 41 of the 42 shots proved to be too big a hurdle to overcome.
Through most of the opening period the Eagles and Grizzlies battled to a 0-0 draw until the 15:13Â mark when Mathieu Aubin’s bouncing shot got by Eagles keeper Clark Saunders for the games first score.
Colorado native Luke Salazar, assisted by his fast skating team mate Matt Garbowsky, would combine to even the score very late in the period with a beautifully executed one timer that Farahger was not able get a pad on.
Period two saw the Grizzlies regain the lead plus one as the Eagles were called for three infractions with Utah capitalizing on two of their three power plays .
Eagles Goalie Clark Saunders in the pile in front of his net
With Garbowsky in the box at 3:22 of the middle frame Zac Larraza snapped off a shot that found it’s way into the Colordao net to give the Grizzlies the 2 to 1 lead.
Another late period goal, this one from the Grizzlies on the power play at 17:49, saw Colin Martin score to up the the visitors lead 3 to 1.
Down  two goals to start the third period the Eagles battle hard to get back in the game throwing a total of 18 shots at Farahger but the only puck that got by the Utah netminder was
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batted in with high stick and of course ruled a no goal.
Utah added a fourth goal halfway through the final frame as Larraza again beat Saunders at 9:48 to account for the 4 to 1 final score.
The sold out crowd at the Budweiser Events Center to celebrate Fan Appreciation Night left disappointed. However having already cemented home ice advantage for the first round of the playoffs makes the final home series sweep by the Utah Grizzlies a little less painful.
Colorado will head up to Boise, Idaho next week for three games with the Steelheads on Wed. March 29th, Fri. March 31 and Saturday April 1st. All games are at 7:05 MDT in The Century Link Ice Arena.
Photos copyright  Terry Sanford for ProHockeyNews.com
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