ROSEMONT, Ill. – The Chicago Wolves finished their third straight week of playing four games in five nights by defeating the league-leading Manitoba Moose, 2-1, in front of 9,105 at the Allstate Arena.
“They are a very accomplished team to this point in the season,” said Chicago Wolves Coach Don Granato, “You are not going to completely eliminate them, but you got to be focused to limit them and I thought we did that a group pretty well tonight.”
The win moved the Wolves into second place in a tightly contested West Division, behind the Milwaukee Admirals. Manitoba scored within the first minute on the power play as ex-Wolves Jason Krog and Guillaume Desbeins worked the puck in the attacking zone and passed it out to defenseman Dylan Yeo, whose shot found the corner of the net.
Two minutes later, the Wolves knotted the score on the man advantage, as winger Spencer Machacek found the puck in front of the goal and found an opening past Manitoba’s goaltender Curtis Sanford.
All the remaining scoring occurred in the second period, as right wing Joe Motzko scored the game winning and team leading 25th goal of the season. The goal initially was not called since there was plenty of banging on the boards that set up this play. Motzko’s shot went high just under the crossbar, rolled around just under the net and quickly popped out as if it hit the crossbar. But after further discussion and review the goal was called good.
Granato commented on how the team did on this difficult segment of the schedule.
“You are always looking for the response from your group and the leadership or the competitiveness in such a response,” the coach said. “We lost a tough game Friday night here, 1-0, at home against a great Milwaukee team, we responded last night within our division winning on the road (against Peoria) and today against a great Manitoba team. These games can go either way with the number of scoring chances. You got to make your breaks and I always preach to the guys this, deserve the break, deserve to win. I thought by the end tonight, the way they were focused and competed the way they did, we deserved to get a couple of points here.”
Wolves goaltender Ondrej Pavelec was again spectacular. Chicago’s coaching staff considered sitting the netminder, unsure whether he was getting fatigued from a heavy workload. Pavelec was unfaced, facing 46 shots and improving his record up to 13-12-1. Curtis Sanford faced 29 and missed two to go 3-1-2 since coming down from the parent Vancouver Canucks.
The Wolves get a break and don’t have a game until Friday when they travel to Iowa for another divisional tilt.
Contact the author at matt.chin@prohockeynews.com
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