ESTERO, FLA – Florida Everblades rookie goalie Devin Cooley played in just his seventh professional game on Wednesday night. His new teammate, Alec Marsh, hit the ice for his 14th ECHL game ever. Although both are fairly young as far as experience in the premiere double-A hockey league goes, they played like veterans against the Orlando Solar Bears and led their team to victory.
Cooley stopped all 35 Solar Bears shots he faced for his first professional victory while Marsh notched his first goal in an Everblades uniform in his first game to guide Florida (11-4-0-0) to a 3-0 win over Orlando (6-6-1-0) in front of a COVID-restricted crowd of 2,624 at Hertz Arena in Estero. Veteran Michael Huntebrinker added a goal and an assist as Florida won its third straight game, all of them at the expense of the Solar Bears.
With both teams having been out of game action due to health and safety protocols for ten days, it was hard to figure out what to expect from either side. Add in plenty of roster changes due to callups and other issues and how the contest would play out was certainly in question.
Despite each side playing with shortened benches, the effort on both sides was evident in the opening frame. Cooley and his counterpart, Orlando netminder Garret Sparks, saw plenty of pucks flying their way in the first twenty minutes. Helped in part by three power play chanced, the Everblades targeted the Solar Bears net with eleven shots but failed to beat Sparks. At the other end, Cooley faced eleven Orlando shots but the rookie held his cool and matched his much more experienced opponent save for save.
After seeing Cooley turn away four shots in less than a minute during a carryover power play to start the second, Orlando made a mistake that cost it dearly. Marsh, who had come in from SPHL Pensacola on a callup on Tuesday, forced a turnover at his defensive blueline and sped away on a break. As he got close to Sparks and the crease, Marsh did a quick stop and pulled the puck around the netminder to score his first with the Everblades to make it 1-0 at the 2:30 mark of the period.
Orlando had three more man advantages sent its way in the frame but Florida’s penalty killers never allowed a shot to be registered on Cooley during the Solar Bears opportunities. The Everblades turned one of those kills into a near-fatal dagger for the visitors when after coming out of the penalty box, Huntebrinker was on the receiving end of a slap pass from the point by Michael Downing. Huntebrinker nailed a one-timer past a lunging Sparks for his eighth goal of the season and a solid 2-0 lead for the home team.
Down by two with twenty minutes left in regulation, the Solar Bears tried to amp up their offense, recording six shots on Cooley in the front half of the final stanza. Cooley stopped them all, forcing Sparks, who finished the game with 34 saves, to be letter perfect and denying six Everblades chances in the same time frame.
Cooley, a product of Denver University, faced one last Solar Bears power play with a little over six minutes to go. He turned back shots by Mark Auk, Patrick McNally and Johno May to snuff out Orlando’s last best chance to get back into the contest. Levko Koper put the final nail in the coffin with an empty net goal with 1:31 left to seal the victory. As for Cooley, his teammates stepped up in the closing 91 seconds, holding the visitors shotless to secure the shutout for their young netminder.
Both teams return to action on Friday with Florida hosting South Carolina while Orlando makes its first visit of the season to Greenville, South Carolina to face the Swamp Rabbits.
Notes: Final shots were 37-25 in favor of Florida… The Solar Bears went 0-for-5 on the power play while the Everblades were 0-for-3… With his two point night, Florida’s Huntebrinker took over the league scoring lead with 17 points (8 goals, 9 assists)… Marsh nearly had a second goal in the final minute but it was waived off as the officials ruled it was kicked in… Orlando’s Auk had his five-game point streak snapped. Wednesday’s game was the first time he failed to record a point since joining the Solar Bears… Florida has now won six of the eight meetings with Orlando to date (6-2-0-0) with at least 12 more meetings to come (and possibly more when the final section of the schedule is released in the coming weeks)… The Everblades have now shut out the Solar Bears twice this season – the other coming on January 2nd by a similar 3-0 final with Cam Johnson between the pipes for Florida.
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