The first meeting between these newly-minted division rivals promised to be a high scoring affair and it delivered. Logan Shaw had been announced by the club on game-day as being released from his agreement; catching some by surprise – including myself. His reasons – as per the broadcast – for being absent in the most recent game was due to illness. So to see he had been released seemed odd.
Boyle got the start and scratches for the Gulls included Keaton Thompson, Steve Oleksy, Luke Gaznic and Tyler Soy – as I mentioned in a previous MOTF; Eakins elected to go with the speedier forwards over Gaznic against a more skilled, less heavy opponent in the Eagles.
San Diego came out and dominated play for much of the first period, holding possession for minutes at a time and leading the shot total until a rare breakdown in the San Diego zone resulted in Colorado firing home a hard shot from the point for the 1-0 lead. Colorado took control of momentum for the remainder of the period but Kevin Boyle turned aside the slowly growing onslaught. The period ended with shots 12 to 13 in favour of San Diego.
The Gulls came out charging to start the second, generating several high danger scoring chances and although Colorado attempted to stem momentum by creating traffic in the neutral zone, the Gulls finally broke through on a slaphot from Simon Benoit that was neatly redirected by the passing Ben Thomson. The Thomson, Dostie, Sideroff line had been the best most consistent line thus far and it was only fitting that they got the first Gulls goal.
Colorado appeared to answer right back but the goal was overturned on a high stick. The replay was hard to really tell from the AHL TV camera view I had as the camera was a tad behind the puck speed, but from the broadcast it sounded like San Diego caught a huge, much-needed break.
Two minutes later San Diego earned a powerplay on some strong drive from Jo Blandisi. San Diego spent almost the entire two minutes in the Colorado zone and at one point had a pseudo 5 on 3 as a Colorado player was without a stick, but Troy Terry had a shot blocked and the visitors were able to survive the adversity. San Diego kept the pressure on and were rewarded with a Sam Carrick go-ahead goal on the very next shift, finding himself alone in front with a puck that bounced fortunately his way.
With five minutes left, San Diego received another power play but were unable to get set and as the Eagles fore-checked a sloppy play by Giovannie Fiore in which he turned the puck over- not once but twice- resulting in a short-handed equalizer for the visitors. Fiore did not look good on that shift, at all.
The teams traded power-plays toward the end of the second period – with the Gulls thoroughly embarrassing the Eagles with their “keep-away” heavy possession penalty kill and would start the third with the man advantage for a further minute.
Colorado killed the remaining Gulls power play to start the final period but San Diego kept up their strong play, with all four lines rolling in sync. They broke through again at the 13:23 mark with the Kossila, Terry and Jones line buzzing the net and Terry finding a loose puck by the right hash-marks which he buried with an absolute lazer of a shot to retake the lead.
A few minutes later with San Diego still seemingly in control, the Eagles drew a penalty on a rare foray into the San Diego zone and on the ensuing power play were able to convert to tie things up once again.
With under six minutes left and just as I was verbalizing out loud “come on Gulls, you deserve to win this one, please win this one,” Corey Tropp went Eagle hunting and turned the puck over with an earth shattering open ice hit, the puck squirted free to Sam Carrick who moved it quickly to Chase De Leo in the slot to then fire it home to give the Gulls a 4-3 lead with five minutes left.
Gulls win 4-3
2024-2025 Game 25: San Diego Gulls at Tucson Roadrunners
Tucson, Arizona. After seeing their point streak ended at the hands of a 2-0 shut-out the …