Wheeling Nailers Frozen On Home Ice, 4-2
Nailers go 0-for-4 on power play Thursday night
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WHEELING -- Hockey is a game of inches and snap decisions.
On Thursday, Wheeling Nailers coach Mark French felt his team was too patient when making those quick decisions to shoot the puck.
The Nailers battled to the end but ultimately came up short with a 4-2 setback to Tulsa inside WesBanco Arena.
"For me, when you are decisive about what you are going to do, generally you find the lane and the angle but when you want to hold for the extra second and look for the perfect play, that's when you skate out of the angle and a guy skates into your shot lane," French said. "I thought we did way too much of that (Thursday)."
The Oilers struck first in the opening stanza as Darby Llewellyn received a pass from Brent Gates and lit the lamp for the 1-0 cushion.
Wheeling fired back.
Matt Foley roped a shot toward Tulsa goalie Roman Durny but was turned away. However, the puck popped loose in the crease and Brady Tomlak blasted it into the back of the net for the equalizer.
Then, with less than a minute to play in the frame, Cody Sylvester raced down the ice and delivered a quick pass to Austin Fyten, who connected on a short-handed, backdoor goal to give Wheeling a 2-1 advantage at the first intermission.
Despite having the lead, the Nailers came up empty on two power play opportunities in the first and finished the game 0-for-4 with the man advantage.
"Intensity shapes your decision making," French said. "In the first I thought it was an area of concern and it was mentioned between the first and second. It caught us in the second. It was a 1-1 game, we had the power play with 4 minutes to go in the first period. We had a chance at that point in time to really gain momentum. We don't even have to score there but to have momentum. Instead we lost momentum. We were still fortunate enough to score but some of the things we saw on that power play occurred in the second."
French was right. The momentum flooded toward the Oilers' bench.
Tulsa evened the score at 2-2 near the midway point of the second as Charlie Sampair picked up a short-handed goal of his own and less than 3 minutes later, Mike McKee put the Oilers ahead for good.
Wheeling had one more power play opportunity with 4 minutes left in the action but were unable to pull even. Danny Moynihan took advantage and supplied an empty-net goal to wrap it up.
Wheeling was coming off a 4-3 overtime win against Indy on Sunday but now falls to 3-7-3 on the season.
"It's funny, after a game where you are successful, often times you forget what made you successful," French said. "I feel like we forgot what made us successful."
Goalie Hayden Hawkey, who picked up his first win of the season in relief on Sunday, got his first start of the year on Thursday. He collected 26 saves.
"I thought he made some big saves," French said. "He gave us a chance to win and that's all you can ask for from a goalie."
ECHL Postseason Format
The ECHL playoffs will consist of the top four teams from each conference this year with the top-seeded team choosing to host the first two or last three games of a best-of-five series. All three rounds will be best-of-five.