The Nailers went 1-1-1 last weekend, winning Friday at home against Kalamazoo before losing two to Fort Wayne, once in overtime, on Saturday and Sunday. What happened with Wheeling in these games to keep them from earning more wins?
Normally, if the Nailers can score 13 goals in a three-game stretch, I would expect them to do better than that. But when two of those games are against one of two teams you currently have a sub-.500 record against this season (Fort Wayne, with Worcester being the other), I guess we should be thankful they at least got one point from those two games. Luckily, Wheeling will only have to play the Komets one more time this season on April 1, assuming they don’t find each other at the end of the playoffs.
The Nailers played very well on Friday against the Wings, scoring the first two goals of the game within the first four minutes of action, thanks to Ryan McAllister on the power play and Craig Armstrong. Kalamazoo cut the lead in half just over a minute later, and the score remained such until Daniel Laatsch gave Wheeling their two-goal lead back. Unfortunately, the K-Wings scored once more with about five minutes left in the period, and the game was a one-score affair after the first.
The second period is where Wheeling really turned it on, only allowing one shot to get through on goalie Taylor Gauthier, which he stopped. Meanwhile, Emil Pieniniemi on the power play and Nolan Renwick while shorthanded made it a 5-2 game heading to the third. Kalamazoo doubled their second period shot total in the third, getting two shots on goal (and only 10 total for the game, a Wheeling team record for least shots allowed in a game), which Gauthier turned away again.
Two more goals by the Nailers, the second of the game for Armstrong followed by a third power play tally in the game, this time by Brent Johnson, gave Wheeling the 7-2 victory.
Saturday’s game in Fort Wayne went very well for the home team early, as the Komets got on the board less than four minutes in. However, a Connor Lockhart goal evened the score just past the halfway point. Fort Wayne turned it on from there, getting two more goals before the horn, one of them on the power play, and Wheeling went down the tunnel trailing by two.
The Nailers pushed hard in the second, outshooting the Komets 14-9 in the period, but the only goal in the middle stanza belonged to Fort Wayne with about three minutes left, and the difference was three heading to the third. Wheeling finally got through in the final period, scoring two goals within the first five minutes of the period by Jack Works and Nolan Renwick, and another tally by Ryan McAllister tied the game at four with less than nine minutes to play. Unfortunately, the Komets had an answer with just over six minutes remaining, and an empty net goal late gave Fort Wayne the 6-4 victory.
Both teams then jumped on their buses and made their way back to the Friendly City to end the weekend with a Sunday tilt. The Nailers managed to jump on them early, getting a goal just over five minutes into the game by Zach Urdahl before the game turned chippy and penalties became the name of the game. A Fort Wayne power play from a fight and an elbowing call gave them the chance to tie the game late in the first. Another incident when the goal was scored led to players from each team receiving misconduct penalties for inciting, and another issue between Matthew Quercia and the Komet bench when the horn sounded led to a total of 40 minutes of penalties called in the first 20 minutes of the game.
Things seemed to settle slightly in the second, as only eight minutes of penalties were called (four apiece), and despite the two teams combining for 19 shots on goal, the game remained tied 1-1 heading to the third. In the third, Wheeling managed to establish a lead again with just over eight minutes remaining in the game after a Mike Posma tip on a Daniel Laatsch shot went into the net, and all the Nailers had to do was hold tight to get the win. But Fort Wayne had other ideas, scoring the tying goal with less than a minute remaining in the game, before scoring the game winner with less than two minutes left in overtime to keep the Nailers to just the loser point and souring their weekend.
The Nailers played the first of their three-game set against Rapid City on Wednesday, winning 4-3 in a shootout. How did Wheeling come away with the victory?
While it may not have been all positive, as the Nailers allowed another lead to slip between their fingers to give the Rush a chance to force extra hockey, it’s nice that Wheeling was still able to earn the extra point with the victory. Luckily, giving up the freebie point to Rapid City won’t come back to bite Wheeling in the backside too badly, since the Rush aren’t in the North Division, so all that matters in this one is the Nailers coming away with the two points.
The first period was a bit of a “getting to know you” period, as neither team really controlled play for long stretches. Wheeling did outshoot Rapid City 13-8 in the frame, but the game remained knotted at no score. The Nailers finally managed to get on the board seven minutes into the second after Emil Pieniniemi tipped a Connor Lockhart shot into the net on the power play to break the deadlock. The Rush responded less than five minutes later with a goal of their own while shorthanded, but a Matty De St. Phalle tally with less than five minutes remaining in the period gave Wheeling the lead heading into the third.
Brayden Edwards managed to extend the lead for the Nailers with another goal less than two minutes into the third, but Rapid City turned things around from there, getting two goals of their own, including one on the power play, and the game was tied after regulation time. Shots in the overtime period were 3-1 for the Rush, but nothing went in and the game went to a shootout. The Rush chose to shoot first, and neither shooter for either team managed to score, and the second shooter for Rapid City was turned away as well before Matthew Quercia tucked one in the net for Wheeling. A nice save by Taylor Gauthier on the third and final shooter for the Rush ended the game and made Gauthier the all-time winningest goalie in Wheeling hockey history with his 61st career victory in a Nailers jersey.
The Nailers will finish their series with the Rush on Friday and Saturday out in South Dakota. What does Wheeling need to do to continue their winning ways?
With Rapid City currently 12 points out of a playoff spot and less than 20 games remaining on their schedule, it’s going to be quite tough for the Rush to make a push and get into the second season. My hope is, the Nailers can use this to their advantage and put the metaphorical dagger into their playoff hopes with two more victories in the shadow of Mount Rushmore, and quite possibly improve their own standings above Adirondack in the process.
Rapid City has been a positively mediocre team at home this season, going 12-11-2-1 at home after their loss on Thursday to Wheeling (as opposed to 10-15-2 on the road). Their big home issue has been the specialty teams, where their power play is 20th in the league at a 17.1% success rate, but their penalty kill sits in 29th in the 30-team ECHL, with a 71.9% success rate. While Wheeling’s power play away from home hasn’t exactly set the world on fire, they are hitting at a 17.6% success rate, good for 16th in the league, and their shorthanded unit is ninth with an 83.9% success rate. Taking advantage of the battle when the game isn’t at five-on-five may help lead the Nailers to two more victories in South Dakota.
The Nailers will return to action at home next Wednesday, facing Reading for the 12th time this season. What can Wheeling use from their previous matchups in this one to hopefully earn a victory?
Well, when you face a single opponent 37 times in the same season, eventually you figure out something about them. While I’m being a little facetious about that, having over 20% of your regular season games (15 out of 72) against one team can breed familiarity. Also, knowing that, here in a little over a month, you have a good chance of facing one another in a playoff series, the emotions and physical play will probably ramp up in the final four games between these two clubs. And we wouldn’t have it any other way.
Both of these teams sit in the top half of the league in penalty minutes taken per game, with Wheeling in ninth at 13.38 per game, while Reading is 13th in the league at 12.71 per game (Adirondack, the team fighting with the Nailers for first in the North Division, sit in first overall at 16.60 minutes per game). Knowing just how hard these two teams will be pushing in this game to get the advantage, it will be very important that the specialty teams for Wheeling show up in a big way in this game.
Another important stat I noticed is just how good the Royals are when scoring first. Reading has scored first in 24 of their 52 games played to this point, earning a record of 19-2-2-1 in those games for 41 standings points, giving them an 0.854 points percentage. Meanwhile, Wheeling has done quite well themselves when getting the first goal, doing so in 30 of their 53 games played, with a record of 24-5-1 for 49 standings points, good for an 0.817 points percentage in those games. Scoring the first goal of the game is very important for both of these teams and has gone a long way to ensuring they get those all-important points at this spot in the year, so the Nailers need to come out fast to put Reading down early.
The Nailers continue to play a game of leapfrog with Adirondack for first place in the North Division, currently sitting two points ahead of the Thunder heading into the weekend. What can Wheeling do to make sure they stay in the pole position?
The first thing I have to point out is that Adirondack has one game in hand on Wheeling, which means they could be tied in the standings if they had played the same number of games, so keep that in mind. However, the Thunder have gone 0-2-1 since ending their 10-game winning streak on February 27 and they will play two games at Maine this upcoming Sunday and Tuesday before coming down to the Friendly City for their last two contests against the Nailers next weekend, but we’ll talk about those after we see how these games go this weekend.
One thing to note is that, after finishing up their series in Rapid City, Wheeling’s remaining nine games in March will all come against divisional rivals (one with Reading, three against Adirondack, three at Trois-Rivières, and three at home against Worcester). Meanwhile, of their remaining 20 games this season, only three (against Kalamazoo) are against teams outside of the North Division for the Thunder. So, performing well against divisional opponents will be very important for each team coming down the stretch.
Both teams have good divisional records currently, with Adirondack sitting at 27-14-5-1 (60 points in 47 games, 0.638 points percentage) against the North, while Wheeling is 22-13-1-2 (47 points in 38 games, 0.618 points percentage) within the division. By that logic, it would appear to favor the Thunder down the stretch. However, the Nailers also have five games in April against Central Division foes, where Wheeling is 9-2-2-1 (21 points in 14 games, 0.750 points percentage). If the Nailers can continue to take advantage of the teams in their former division while holding strong over the next month against fellow North teams, they have a very good chance of taking home the division crown and playing a lot of hockey at home in the playoffs.
