BRIDGEPORT, Conn. – The Connecticut Whale hit the daily double Friday night.
First, All-Star right wing Jeremy Williams had a goal and two assists to back the 21-save effort of Dov Grumet-Morris in a 4-1 victory over the undermanned Bridgeport Sound Tigers before 5,742 at the Webster Bank Arena at Harbor Yard.
The Whale’s second victory after a four-game losing streak assured they would be back in the AHL playoffs after the first miss in their 14-year history as they closed out the win about 20 minutes after the Charlotte Checkers, their former ECHL affiliate, beat the Worcester Sharks, 2-1.
The Whale (40-20-2-6) clinched the third and final guaranteed playoff spot in the Atlantic Division when they moved five points ahead of the Sharks (36-30-4-9), who have only one game left compared to two for the Whale. The Whale will play division-leading Portland or second-place Manchester in a best-of-seven first round series that starts next week.
“It’s a good feeling because you always want to make the playoffs,” said Whale coach Ken Gernander, who was 12-for-12 as a player, assistant coach and coach with the former Hartford Wolf Pack before last season. “Now we want to do something. We’ve given ourselves an opportunity, and now we want to make something of it.”
The Whale’s strong forechecking and cycling caused havoc for the Sound Tigers (28-39-3-3), who have the AHL’s worst record but had won two in a row and were on a 7-2-1-2 run. But they had five players on amateur tryout contracts and one on a professional tryout deal on defense, and the Whale took advantage to amass a 40-22 shot advantage, including 18-3 in the first period.
“Before the season, it’s always a goal to get to the postseason,” said defenseman/alternate captain Jared Nightingale, one of only eight holdovers from the 2009-2010 team. “We’ll enjoy that, but now is when the fun starts and most of the work begins. It’s a whole different season with a whole different bunch of guys, but you can always look back and also find a lot of positives. You don’t want that taste in your mouth again. The guys who came back this year learned from last year’s disappointments and made the most of this year.
“Hopefully we have lots more hockey to play. A lot of teams deal with a lot of injuries and call-ups, which is the nature of minor league hockey. But I think the team that adjusts the best has the most depth most of the time, so it’s a lot of credit to the guys in the dressing room that we stuck with it and found a way.”
Grumet-Morris rightfully called the clincher “a simple game and a very strong road game.”
“It really did result in exactly what we wanted,” said Grumet-Morris, who improved to 13-5-1 with a 2.00 goals-against average, .925 save percentage and one shutout. “We gave up under 25 shots, which is a great start, and did well in the special teams battle, and that’s usually the difference at this level.
“It was the same thing in the last game (a 4-2 win over Portland), but it was a two-goal game in the third period so from now on, you pretty much have to assume every game is going to be that type. Small details are going to be the difference at every level, from the NHL all the way down to the amateur level.”
Despite the lopsided shot advantage in the first period, the Whale didn’t beat Mikko Koskinen (36 saves) until Williams picked off a clearing attempt by Cameron Wind, one of the Sound Tigers’ young defensemen, and passed to Ryan Garlock, who converted his own rebound with 2:38 left. Until then, Koskinen had stopped Evgeny Grachev’s backhander off a steal at 1:03, made a toe save on Williams’ deflection at 4:31 and stopped Kris Newbury’s partial breakaway at 9:14. The Sound Tigers then sustained a tough break when right wing Rhett Rakhshani, presented crystal in a pregame ceremony honoring him for being named to the AHL all-rookie team, didn’t return after he sustained an injury when checked by Brodie Dupont with 7:05 left.
The Whale continued to press on a carryover power play early in the second period and made it 2-0 at 1:11 when Williams’ 40-foot shot deflected off rookie defenseman Blake Parlett’s leg and past Koskinen off a setup by Newbury.
“I was trying to get out of the way, but the puck hit me and went in,” a smiling Parlett said of his second AHL goal and what proved to be his second game-winner in 23 games with the Whale. “But I’ll take it.”
The Sound Tigers then pressured Grumet-Morris for the first time, and he had to be alert to deny good bids from the slot by David Ullstrom and Aaron Ness at 2:28 and 3:06.
The Sound Tigers soon had back-to-back power plays and converted on the second as Matt Donovan intercepted John Mitchell’s clearing attempt and got the puck to Ness, who found Ullstrom in the right circle for a wrist shot that beat Grumet-Morris cleanly at 12:51.
The Whale nearly made it 3-1 on an ensuing power play, but Williams hit the crossbar for the third time in two games with 4:44 left in the period.
But the Whale then got a golden opportunity to break the game open when Sound Tigers veteran center Jeremy Colliton was given a five-minute major for boarding and a game misconduct when he ran Tomas Kundratek into the boards with 3:51 left. Before the puck was dropped, Sound Tigers defenseman Benn Olson was whistled for slashing Newbury, giving the Whale a 5-on-3 for two minutes.
It took only 53 seconds for the Whale to take advantage as Dale Weise got the puck to the left circle to Williams, who put a wrist shot off the crossbar and in for his team-leading 32nd goal and a 3-1 lead. The 32 goals tie his career high last season with the Grand Rapids Griffins.
“My one-timer for some reason isn’t hitting the net, and (assistant coach) J.J. (Daigneault) said I should take more wrist shots, maybe pump-fake and just throw wristers and it worked,” Williams said. “The last game against them didn’t end the way we wanted (a 5-1 loss), and they’re a hard-working team. They had a lot of guys out, but it’s tough to play a team that’s flying around out there. There’s not a lot of room, so if you’re not smart mentally, it’s going to be a long night.
“But fortunately guys got their legs moving, we matched their speed and we were smart with the puck. We wanted to take advantage of any sort of flaw on their side, and that was working down low. Guys filled in and were in the right spots, and it’s always a little easier when you’re not always second-guessing when you’re going to jump because there’s always a guy behind you.”
The Whale played especially smart defensively in the third period but gave the Sound Tigers three power plays, including a 6-on-4 for nearly two minutes after the home team pulled Koskinen for a sixth attacker with 3:33 left. But the Whale allowed only one shot on Grumet-Morris and got the insurance goal when Mitchell scored into an empty net with 54.2 seconds left.
When the final horn sounded, the Whale mobbed Grumet-Morris, who was quite the addition after being called up from Greenville of the ECHL and then signed to an AHL contract after helping the Road Warriors begin a run to the second-best record in the league.
“We played a pretty solid game, but we could have been a little more disciplined, though I can understand some of it because they want to defend their teammates,” Gernander said. “Now we’ll approach it as one game at a time and one step at a time. And it’ll be a little bit of everything from here on out. A lot of the playoffs is discipline in all areas of your game, and obviously there was a little bit of a test tonight.”
Williams, one of the Whale’s newcomers, was just happy to have another chance at the playoffs after being eliminated early last season.
“It’s definitely nice to make the playoffs with a couple of game left,” Williams said. “It’s nerve-wracking when it comes down to the final game. It came down to the wire, but we found a way. The guys’ confidence level going into this weekend was high, and it worked out and is a big deal for everybody.”
Tickets for the Whale’s first two home playoff games go on sale at the XL Center ticket office Saturday night, when the Whale have a rematch with the Sound Tigers. Tickets also will be available at 10 a.m. Sunday at TicketMaster.com and TicketMaster charge-by-phone at 800-745-3000.
Story by Bruce Berlet of the Whale
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