Nailers Drop Game 3 at Home
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WHEELING -- Hockey fans in Wheeling will have to wait until Friday for a chance to see a Nailers' home playoff victory.
Wheeling fell in Game 3 of the Central Division Semifinal in the Kelly Cup Playoffs to Fort Wayne, 4-1, inside WesBanco Arena on Wednesday.
Despite the loss, Wheeling still carries a 2-1 series upper hand heading into Friday's Game 4 at home starting at 7:10 p.m.
The Nailers took an early lead in Game 3 and were looking to build off that momentum when penalties started to build for the home team.
The Nailers were called for 11 penalties, including two 10-minute misconducts for a total of 46 penalty minutes.
The back-breaker was that team-leader in goals and points, Patrick Watling, suffered one of those 10-minute misconducts and the Nailers struggled to recover.
"You can definitely see where officiating can change a game," Nailers' coach Derek Army said. "I thought in the first (Fort Wayne) pressed really hard. They came out like we expected them to and LP (goalie Louis-Philip Guindon) was great. We weathered the storm and we went up 1-0 and all of a sudden we started getting some momentum ourselves. That's where you take a penalty and it snowballs from there. I disagree -- especially giving out two 10s -- especially the Watling one. I don't even know if he was talking to the ref. Then, we get a 5-on-3 in the second period and our top scorer is not available. That was frustrating and we definitely felt like we were fighting an uphill battle."
Sam Houde and Watling set up the first goal and Cam Hausinger buried a rebound into the back of the net to give Wheeling a 1-0 edge in the first.
However, Fort Wayne outshot the Nailers 28-6 in the opening stanza and netted three goals over the remainder of the period, two of which were power play goals.
Just as Wheeling fought off a penalty, Anthony Petruzzelli delivered the equalizer from in front of the net.
Just over 3 minutes later, Willie Corrin sent a one-timer near the blue line that rattled the cage with 39 seconds remaining on the power play to give Fort Wayne a 2-1 cushion.
Less than 2 minutes after the first power play goal, the Komets pocketed another, this one coming off the stick of Oliver Cooper from the top of the right circle with 50 seconds remaining in the frame.
"We certainly don't want to give up 28 shots in the first period alone," Army said. "Shots were about 11-6 at the 10-minute mark and we were starting to come into our own. They shoot a lot of pucks. That is part of their identity. That's where we got bogged down and they took the momentum heavily away from us."
Mark Rassell provided the final touch for the short-handed Komets with a breakaway, back-handed goal in the second period to wrap up the scoring.
Fort Wayne goalie Samuel Harvey only needed 22 saves to capture the victory, while Guindon collected 46 saves and took the loss.
"I thought they were hungry," Army said. "They were a team that was desperate. They are a veteran team and they are a well-coached hockey team. They were down 0-2 and we didn't expect them to hand us these games. They were throwing everything at the net and they were living around the net.
"I also thought we got away from our game plan and tried to be a little bit cute on some of our plays but we still had chances on the power play in the second that could have changed the game in our favor and we missed those opportunities."