Vets revive Everblades in 4-3 win
The veterans stepped in and got the job done Saturday night.
Jon DiSalvatore and Matt Marquardt revived the Florida Everblades’ offense, leading the way to 4-3 victory over the Toledo Walleye at Germain Arena.
The Blades let most of a 4-1 third-period lead evaporate, but held on for a much-needed win.
“That was a tight one,” Florida coach Greg Poss said. “As long as we won, that’s all that counts. That was a big win for us. Real big. Now we’ve got to move forward.”
DiSalvatore, with more than 900 professional hockey games under his belt, scored two goals. Team captain Marquardt assisted on both DiSalvatore tallies, and notched one of his own with an assist by DiSalvatore.
“Marquardt and DiSalvatore had big goals,” Poss said. “That was huge from our leadership group to chip in offensively like that.”
DiSalvatore has six goals in 28 games since joining the Blades from Springfield of the AHL.
“I think you always want to have the responsibility, you want to be the example,” DiSalvatore said. “Go out there and show by example, do the right thing. When you get older and you find yourself in a leadership role, you want to set the example for others to follow.”
Rookie Brendan O’Donnell scored the first Florida goal.
The Walleye had 14 of their 23 shots on goal in the third period to battle back within a goal. Toledo goalie Jeff Lerg was pulled for a sixth attacker in the final 1:50, and the Walleye had several solid chances to tie the game before the clock finally ran out with the puck right in front of Blades goalie Anthony Peters.
“They had two nice shots” at the end, Poss said. “We have to continue to work on being more stable in those situations. Everyone was diving around and blocking shots. The most important thing is that we won.”
The Everblades ended the Walleyes’ seven-game winning streak while avoiding their first three-game losing streak. Another result of Saturday’s win is Florida remains in first place in the ECHL South Division, a spot the team has held all season. South Carolina lost to Adirondack in overtime to fall an additional point behind the Blades in the division.
Florida closed within five points of Toledo for most points in the Eastern Conference to five (79-74). Manchester is second with 78 points and South Carolina is fourth with 73.
Lerg, spectacular in a win over Florida on Wednesday, was ripped for four goals on 29 shots Saturday. Peters had 21 saves to earn his 22nd victory in the Everblades’ net.
Florida took the game to Toledo early, and fell behind anyway. The Everblades did most of the shooting and most of the hitting, led by Marquardt, but still paid dearly for a turnover.
Evan Rankin took the puck away from Kevin Montgomery in the Walleyes zone, raced down the ice on a breakaway and beat Peters for the game’s first goal 8:29 into the contest unassisted. It was only Toledo’s second shot on goal.
The Everblades kept up the pressure, and finally were rewarded. O’Donnell drew the Blades even with 5:48 left in the first, beating Lerg thanks to some crisp passing by Gabriel Desjardins and Montgomery. O’Donnell’s goal is his fourth this season.
Florida pushed ahead late in the first period when Marquardt kept a puck from sliding out of the Toledo zone and fired it on Lerg. The rebound went right to DiSalvatore, and the veteran beat Lerg high for the 2-1 lead.
DiSalvatore’s goal was scored the way the Everblades had wanted to attack the 5-foot-6 Lerg all along – up high.
“I just slapped at it and it hopped over (Lerg). You’ve got to give him a lot of credit. He’s focused, he’s ready to go, so it takes a lot to beat him,” DiSalvatore said. “He’s a very good goalie. You’ve just got to keep throwing pucks at him and find ways to beat him. That (shooting high) was the plan, and he doesn’t give those up easily either. He knows that he’s a small goalie and he knows how to cover high shots. It’s a numbers game. You’ve just got to keep throwing pucks at the net.”
It was Florida’s first lead in the three-game series.
Logan Roe and Marquardt set up Florida’s third goal, passing from the point to DiSalvatore, who fired the puck from a sharp angle near the boards over Lerg’s right shoulder early in the second period.
“I’ve been able to do that a little bit in the past,” DiSalvatore said. “You can catch a goalie sleeping a little bit. Catch him by surprise. You throw pucks at the net, you never know what can happen. You wait for the perfect angle and it doesn’t go in, and sometimes you get a weird angle and it goes in.”
Florida upped the margin to 4-1 late in the second, with Marquardt taking a long pass from DiSalvatore and blasting a high slap shot from the left faceoff circle.
Toledo picked up a power-play goal by former Everblade Kyle Bonis with 16:59 to play in the game. Zach Nastasiuk brought the Walleyes with a goal with just over seven minutes to go.
With Saturday’s game in the books, the stretch run begins in earnest for the Everblades. From here on out, the final 15 games on the schedule are against ECHL South Division teams.
That run begins next week with a six-game, two-week road trip to Atlanta, Greenville, and South Carolina.
The next home game isn’t until March 25 against Greenville. In fact, only six of the Blades’ final 15 regular-season games will be played at Germain Arena.
“We’ve got a lot of real tough games coming up here,” Poss said. “It’s going to be a big challenge for us to make the playoffs. If you look at the teams in our division, every night’s a hard night. We’ve got to be ready every night.”