That’s a killer

Have spilled a lot of words the last little while on the PK and what it has done. It was utterly brilliant in the first period, three chances killed with a short-handed goal of its own.

Then the IceCaps kept the puck in deep for almost two minutes, kept three of the four penalty killers on the ice for the whole minor.

The silly bounce followed shortly after, sparking St. John’s comeback from 2-0 down to win 4-3.

“You battle hard in the first period, come out of that with a lead,” Pellerin said. “You get one early in the second, and they throw one to the net, it’s a seeing-eye shot, finds its way into the net. They score on the power play later on in the period, and all of a sudden you’ve got a hockey game.”

St. John’s had had some decent chances through the first period and a half, but a combination of shot-blocking and Parker Milner had kept it quiet.

Then two almost-blocks gave the IceCaps one. Andrew Gordon flipped it from the right-wing boards, above the circle. It hit one Sound Tiger out there. It hit another in the slot. It bounced right on in.

Then the power play got hot, given eight chances. And Bridgeport has lost six in a row.

….

Milner wanted to be better (see the gamer), but it wasn’t like he was bad. He looked a bit nervous on some funny caroms (there you go again) behind his net. “The first few minutes of your first game like this, they’re always going to go by really fast,” Milner said. “You follow the puck wherever it goes. Even if the puck wasn’t hitting me the first few minutes, they were buzzing it around. It was good to feel the puck. I was happy to get that breakaway.”

That was Kris Fredheim out of the penalty box, his first actual AHL save, 10 minutes in. Milner said he wanted to take away the angle and liked how he did it, getting Fredheim to shoot it into his shoulder.

The Comeback Boys made an impact: Mouillierat two PP points; Hill drawing the pivotal Ryan Strome tripping minor that turned into four. “We don’t play as many three-in-threes as (teams) around here,” Mouillierat said. “The last one’s always the toughest. Sometimes it’s tough to get up for those games. Down two, we just kept fighting.”

Brett Gallant didn’t return after his fight in the opening seconds of the second period. Something in the hand/wrist area, apparently. (Meanwhile, most awesome part of the night was probably Gallant’s son roughhousing with Blair Riley afterward.)

Calvin de Haan’s last goal, notes Corey, was Nov. 25, 2011. He’d gone 60 AHL games without one (three more if you count the playoffs); good timing, then. Interestingly, he had scored in back-to-back games — the night he got hurt in Springfield, Nov. 12, and then the night he returned. Those had been his only two pro goals.

And all our best to Brendan McCarthy, St. John’s Telegram writer, who Brian Rogers let us know hasn’t been well the past few weeks. Can’t find a better guy.

Michael Fornabaio