Charlotte Checkers vs. Milwaukee Admirals
A late surge helped the Checkers steal a point, but they couldn’t find a way to secure the victory, falling to Milwaukee 4-3 in overtime.

After an early icebreaker from Phil Di Giuseppe, the game belonged firmly to the Admirals, who pumped in three straight goals to build up a substantial lead a minute into the third period. The Checkers continued to push for any sort of spark, out-shooting the visitors 16-5 in the frame, but couldn’t solve Admirals’ netminder Marek Mazanec. Finally, with Michael Leighton pulled for an extra attacker, Patrick Dwyer caught a pass behind the defense and roofed the puck to pull the Checkers within striking distance with three minutes to go.

Then, with 20 ticks remaining in regulation, the Checkers drew themselves even as Lucas Wallmark redirected a point blast from Haydn Fleury into the back of the net, again with an extra attacker. With one point secured, Charlotte moved on to overtime. Despite several big chances, including a Poturalski breakaway stoned by a sprawling Mazanec, it was the Admirals who pulled out the win, with Kevin Fiala dangling his way to the crease before firing the puck in.

Despite the end result, forcing the game to overtime late showed a step in the right direction for Charlotte.

“I thought there were some positive signs for sure, particularly in our five-on-five play and we got a little lucky with that push at the end,” said head coach Ulf Samuelsson. “It showed a lot of character to be able to tie it up and come back.”

“I think we responded really well,” said Fleury, referencing last night’s 3-0 loss to these same Admirals. “We played hard and we played for 60 minutes. It took a while but we got rewarded at the end and got a point out of it.”

The turning point for the Checkers was the pulling of the goalie for an extra attacker, which Samuelsson opted to do with nearly five minutes left in regulation with his team down by two goals.

“It seemed like we weren’t generating anything – it wasn’t like we had a massive amount of pressure in their zone,” said Samuelsson. “The momentum wasn’t going our way, so I felt like maybe this would give them a spark. You could feel it for sure on the bench.”

Once Dwyer pulled the team within a goal, Samuelsson’s plan seemed to take action.

“It just gave a little extra belief that we could make a game out of this,” said Fleury of Dwyer’s goal. “Especially with the time we had left.”

Facing a high-powered Admirals attack, keeping the puck out of their own empty net was a victory in itself for Charlotte, but their focus remained on tying the game.

“I don’t think you can play conservative there because you’re trying to score,” said Fleury. “But it’s always in the back of your mind that the net’s empty so you’ve got to be aggressive.”

Earlier in the third the physical nature of the game came to a head when Adam Payerl hit Patrick Brown from behind into the boards, leading to a handful of altercations and misconducts that landed three players from each squad into the cramped penalty boxes.

Those incidents seemed to spark the Checkers in a different way.

“A couple of hits there both ways were unfortunate and we’ll try to get rid of it, but you’ve got to stand up for each other,” said Samuelsson. “I thought we did a good job of that.”

“Lots of guys were standing up for each other,” said Fleury. “I’m sure Sergey [Tolchinsky, who earned a game misconduct for a secondary altercation] doesn’t use his hands for that very often. Standing up for each other was huge for the team.”

While the two tilts with Milwaukee slowed the Checkers’ previous momentum a bit, the team found something in their late comeback to build off of.

“I think it instills a belief in the team that we’re never out of a game,” said Fleury. “We were down 3-1 and we could have folded the tent, but we chose otherwise and made a game out of it. That was a positive.”

The Checkers’ jam-packed home stand continues this weekend as they welcome the Pacific Division power Tucson Roadrunners to town for the first time ever. As they move into the second half of the AHL schedule, every game is now key to the Checkers pulling themselves back into the playoff hunt.

“We’ve got a good team coming in again here, so we’ve got to get over this one even though we got a point out of it,” said Samuelsson. “We played a lot better than in the first game. Milwaukee is a good team and Tucson is probably an even better team. It’s a couple of challenging, good, hard games in front of us.”

NOTES

The teams’ 73 combined penalty minutes were the most of any Checkers game this season. The previous record was 52 … The Checkers fell to 1-1-2 against Milwaukee this season, with the Admirals responsible for two of their three overtime losses … The Checkers are 3-3 in games decided during the five-minute, three-on-three period … Charlotte went 0-for-5 on the power play during the two-game series with Milwaukee … Charlotte gave up multiple power-play goals (2) for the seventh time this season … Di Giuseppe and Andrew Poturalski each had a game-high seven shots on goal … The Checkers hit the 40-shot mark for the fifth time this season (46). Their season high is 47 … Frederick Gaudreau had the primary assist on Milwaukee’s first three goals … Forwards Andrew Miller and Brendan Woods and defenseman Roland McKeown missed the game due to injury … Forwards Kyle Hagel and Kris Newbury were healthy extras.