Things started off well for the goal-starved Checkers as Sergey Tolchinsky tapped in a Brody Sutter feed less than five minutes in, giving the home team their first lead in four games. It didn’t last long, however, as the red-hot rookie Mikko Rantanen evened things up minutes later, but Brock McGinn quickly responded to that with a power-play strike to take the advantage back. San Antonio again had an answer, however, with Joey Hishon converting on the Rampage’s first power play of the night to square things once again heading into the second.
The fireworks from the first spilled over into the second, with Marc-Andre Cliche giving his team their first lead of the night on a rush five minutes in. The Rampage went into lockdown mode from that point, and despite their best efforts the Checkers could not find a way to put the puck in the back of the net for the remainder of regulation, stumbling to a 3-2 defeat.
“We’re getting great chances,” said head coach Mark Morris. “Their goalie was stellar. We had some unbelievable chances. I think about the yawning net we had in the second period and he made an unbelievable save. We had a lot of good looks in the third.”
The Checkers’ winless streak continues to pile up, tying the franchise’s worst mark tonight with their seventh straight defeat. Still, tonight’s decision was not due to a lack of effort by the home team. “It’s a tough time,” said Morris. “The energy and the effort is there. We just don’t have any finish right now and we’ve got to find a way to keep the puck out of our net.”
Charlotte again saw their biggest surge come late in regulation, buzzing all around the San Antonio net. But a long stretch of nearly six minutes with no whistle whittled down the clock and it became a too-little-too-late situation.
“Looking at the third period and all the chances we had there, it’s desperation hockey,” said Brendan Woods. “We can’t wait until the third period to bring that pressure. We’re bringing a good 20-40 minutes a night but we’ve got to bring a full 60, and that’s what we’ve kind of been missing.”
Offensive production continues to be a key factor in the Checkers’ current spiral. It looked like they were on their way out of it with the two early tallies, but things dried up quickly once again.
“I think just bearing down and shooting the puck more,” said Woods. “We’re trying to make that extra pass when the shot is there instead. Good things happen when you go to the net and throw pucks to the net, and I think we’ve kind of gotten away from that. It’s keeping it simple and doing the little things we were doing when we had that long stretch with wins there. Stay with our structure and keep moving forward.”
On the other side, Drew MacIntyre manned the pipes for Charlotte after entering Monday’s contest in relief of Daniel Altshuller. The Checkers held the Rampage to just 21 shots on goal, but fell flat for stretches, and San Antonio pounced on them.
“We didn’t give up too many real good chances,” said Morris. “We’ve got to find a way to keep the puck out of our net. They finished on their chances, but I didn’t like many of their goals.”
“We gave up 40 shots in two games and we were all over them,” said Woods. “We’re just missing that little bounce that we’ve been needing and it hasn’t gone our way yet.”
With the Checkers continuing to lose ground in a tight Central Division, this weekend’s matchups with San Diego will be crucial ones. Though tonight’s result was unfortunate, that same effort level will be need in order to shake out of this slump.
“It’s a tough time, and we just need to continue to try to stay positive and battle through it,” said Morris. “You continue to try to encourage guys to do the right things.”
“We’ve got to stay positive and not beat ourselves up,” said Woods. “We’re going through a little adversity right now, but it’s about what you can do. We can all take a look in the mirror, look at each other, dig deep and turn this thing around.”