Offense struggles in Everblades’ 2-0 loss
It was a somber Everblades locker room after Saturday night’s 2-0 loss to the Gwinnett Gladiators at Germain Arena — where the Blades are used to winning.
To be fair, their three-game set against Gwinnett had everything from a four-goal comeback win to an all-out brawl.
Florida came out on the short en, when it was all said and done, dropping two of three games to the Gladiators.
It was a lack of offense which cost Florida a possible win Saturday night. It was a surprise to the team, which scored eight times on Gwinnett in their prior two meetings, but failed to score on 18 shots on goal Saturday.
“They did a good job of shutting us down,” analyzed coach Gerry Flemming, “We couldn’t generate any traffic in front of Craig Kowalski to help us. When we did have a shot K-wall was there to stop it.”
To be fair the Gladiator defense was stifling, cutting off lanes, bringing the extra man down to cut off break away opportunities and sacrificing their bodies to stop shots getting at their netminder.
Gwinnett didn’t look like the team who had been blown out the previous night in what will go down in Everblades’ annals as “the Brawl.”
Some on the team weren’t so worried.
Forward Derek Damon had a different look on the series with Gwinnett.
“We should have won that first (game) and the second game we won handily. (Saturday night’s) game was just one of those nights where we weren’t getting to the net like we normally do and they got a break in the third period, and we just didn’t capitalize when we had the chance.”
The “break” Damon refers too is Gwinnett’s first goal, the important one.
Both teams were playing solid defense in a scoreless game, when Gwinnett forward Mike Hamilton broke free of Florida’s defense. Florida goalie David Shantz (30 saves) was there to make the save, but the puck took a funny bounce off his leg pad into the corner of the net with 5:42 to play in the game.
The goal ended up taking the wind out of the Blades’ sails.
Gwinnett’s second goal was an empty netter with just over a minute left in regulation.
Despite the tough loss, players like Damon believe the Blades are better than Gwinnett, whom they will have to get through if they want to win the South Division this year, and they’re focused on turning it around quickly so they can build some momentum heading into the playoffs.
Fortunately for the Blades (36-25-8) they have a favorable matchup next when they host the Pensacola Ice Pilots (19-41) Tuesday night at Germain arena.