JACKSONVILLE (Florida Sports Wire) – The Stingrays picked up a 3-2 victory over the Jacksonville Icemen on Saturday night. Garin Bjorklund made 38 saves in the victory.
The Stingrays controlled the opening frame for the second consecutive night, beating Jacksonville netminder Michael Houser just 1:07 in, off of a premium scoring chance for Austin Magera, who continued his hot play, netting his 13th of the year on a top-shelf rocket.
South Carolina would not exit the first period without burying another on a second-chance effort by Kameron Kielly with less than a minute remaining in the opening frame. A one-timer shot from defenseman Connor Moore bounced off of the pads of Houser and to the stick of Kielly, who tallied his third goal in a Stingrays uniform.
Jacksonville would skate a heavy effort in the second period. They were credited with 18 shots in the middle stanza but could not solve Bjorklund. The Stingrays would step back into their element in the closing stages of the period, at 14:11 on a blast from Michael Kimat the top of the blue line, extending the South Carolina lead to three.
Kim’s second tally of the year proved to be enough for the Rays in the third, as a rallying Jacksonville team would claw their way back at the South Carolina lead early in the final 20. Brendan Harris scored his 11th of the season on the man advantage for the Icemen at 4:17 of the third, sneaking a low shot between the legs of Bjorklund to narrow SC’s lead to 2.
An early pull of the Jacksonville goaltender would set up an extra attacker for the Icemen, and Christopher Brown pulled Jacksonville within one at 17:40. Jacksonville once again sent their netminder to the bench, but the last-minute effort would come up short because of a strong South Carolina defensive stand in the final two minutes of play.
FIRST-PLACE RABBITS RALLY IN COMEBACK WIN OVER ATLANTA
DULUTH, G.A. – Luke Richardson made 44 saves in his season debut, as the Greenville Swamp Rabbits overcame a 2-0 deficit to top the Atlanta Gladiators 4-3 on Saturday night at Gas South Arena.
Atlanta wasted little time entertaining the fans with the teddy bear toss goal, as Navrin Mutter scored from a rebound at 3:29, bringing about a lengthy delay for the cleanup of the stuffed animals. After the restart, Atlanta added a second goal, a power-play tally by Jackson Pierson at 7:31. At 12:07, Greenville stopped the Atlanta surge as LA Grissom played the puck to the crease and found Ryan Francis who scored his fifth of the season to cut the Gladiators lead in half. Greenville, despite trailing by only one goal, headed to the intermission being outshot 20-4.
Out of the intermission, Greenville tied the game just 45 seconds in, as Joe Leahy scored his third of the season after his contested shot trickled between the legs of Atlanta’s Gustav Grigals. The Swamp Rabbits used multiple power-plays to generate scoring chances and nearly quadrupled their shot total from the first period, shooting 14 times to the 15 chances for Atlanta.
Before the midway point of the third period, Francis took the puck from teammate Nikita Pavlychev below the goal line and tucked it past Grigals for his second of the game and the first Swamp Rabbits lead of the night. Nearly five minutes later, at 12:03, Ben Freeman scored his fifth of the season, a power-play tally, for the 4-2 Greenville lead. Atlanta answered back at 16:22, as Alex Whelan scored his 14th of the season, cutting the Gladiators’ deficit in half. In the dying moments of the game, Greenville’s goaltender Luke Richardson made a save that went to official review and was upheld to keep the Gladiators off the board for the tying goal.
At the final horn, Richardson, who made his first start of the season and third-ever regular season appearance for the Swamp Rabbits, denied 44 of 47 Atlanta shots to earn the win and Greenville’s 19th victory of the season.
With the win, the Swamp Rabbits improve to an Eastern Conference best 19-5-0-0 and are off to the best start in franchise history, through 24 games, with 38 points. The loss drops Atlanta to 9-14-0-0, as the Gladiators fall for a ninth-straight game and for a sixth-straight time to the Swamp Rabbits.
(SportsDay photo by Nancy DeLander Beecher, Florida Sports Wire)
