Recap: Late goal robs Wranglers of a point in 4-3 loss to the Firebirds
1 year ago
The Calgary Wranglers concluded their mid-week series against the Coachella Valley Firebirds on Thursday night. It was the only hockey game taking place in both the NHL and AHL on American Thanksgiving night. Dustin Wolf got his fourth straight start and stopped 23 of 27 Firebirds shots. A late goal robbed the Wranglers of a point and they fell 4-3 in regulation.
Lineup notes
Martin Pospisil was back in the lineup after missing the last game on Tuesday for an undisclosed reason. He appeared to have taken the place of Ben Jones, who was out of the lineup in this game. Mitch Love confirmed in his post-game interview, that Jones is day-to-day at this point and they are leveraging their forward depth to give some guys some rest.
Game at a glance
Emilio Pettersen hit a huge milestone on Thursday of 100 games played in the AHL. His 100th AHL game, unfortunately, will not be remembered as a team win but it will be remembered as a multi-goal individual performance. First off, his opening goal came on the power play. This is Pettersen’s third on the season and was assisted by Jeremie Poirier and Radim Zohorna.
Not long after, Coachella Valley also found themselves on the power play and top-rated Seattle Kraken prospect, Shane Wright beat Wolf on the man advantage. That concluded scoring through the first 20 minutes with the Wranglers outshooting the Firebirds 12-6 but evened up on the scoreboard.
Late in the first period, Nick DeSimone blocked a shot off the ankle and headed down the tunnel to be evaluated with just under two minutes to go in the first. He made his return in the second period and was the first pairing on the ice for puck drop.
9:57 into the second period, Jakob Pelletier thought it was about time he extended his point streak to eight straight games with an even-strength goal right on the doorstep. His linemates, Matthew Phillips and Radim Zohorna picked up assists.
Next up was Emilio Pettersen again at 13:18 into the period. He had the perfect positioning to tip in a shot from the blue line off the stick of Jeremie Poirier and snuck it past Joey Daccord five-hole.
This was Pettersen’s first multi-goal night of the season and just his second multi-point night of the year.
Unfortunately, the Wranglers were unable to bask in the two-goal lead for long when John Hayden of the Firebirds scored 16:06 into the second period. After two full periods, the Wranglers still lead the Firebirds, this time 3-2. They still held the advantage in shots as well 21-17.
The Wranglers went nine minutes without a shot in the third and got burned for their lethargic play when Shane Wright got ahead of the play on a partial break and scored the equalizer for the Firebirds. He’s taking full advantage of his conditioning assignment with three goals in the two games played in the AHL already.
These teams both still looked pretty gassed after the goal with neither side having the energy they brought into the first period. With just over three minutes to go in the third, Coachella Valley only had five shots to Calgary’s four in the whole frame. This was also the point Brett Sutter took a high sticking penalty at an awful time.
The Wranglers were able to kill the penalty but their bad luck arose once again. With 6.3 seconds to go in regulation, Cameron Hughes of the Firebirds scored his first goal of the season and it would go on to be the game-winner for the visiting team.
The Firebirds took this game 4-3 and split this week’s series against the Wranglers. Their season series record is up to 4-2 in favour of Coachella Valley.
Highlights
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Next up
The Wranglers don’t have to wait long for their next game as it is literally the next one on the AHL schedule. Calgary hosts another hockey hooky afternoon game on Friday at 1:00 p.m. MT. They’ll get a change of opponent with the Abbotsford Canucks in town to play the Wranglers for the first time this season.
You can catch this game at the Scotiabank Saddledome or stream it on AHL.TV. Mike Gould and I will have FlamesNation coverage on Twitter.
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