Oh La La, Ollas’ 31 saves lifts Railers over Reading 3-1

Saturday night the Worcester Railers rebranded themselves as the city’s beloved IceCats, and in front of 8,056 loud and rabid fans at the DCU Center, they got goals from Kolby Johnson, Ryan Mahshie, and Anthony Callin along with Hugo Ollas making 31 saves in his Worcester debut to defeat the Reading Royals 3-1.

It would be so easy to make a “big man coming up big” pun, so we won’t do that, even though by typing that all out just now we kind of did, but that’s only because it accurately describes what Ollas did in his first game with Worcester. We will eventually get exact measurements for his height and weight, but there is no real way to completely understand how large Ollas is until you see him standing in front of a net. Or, more correctly, while he’s kneeling in front of it in the butterfly. Because there’s virtually no room to shoot except up high in the corners.

Did we mention he’s quick and can catch? Oh, yeah, he’s got that going for him too. Eventually shooters here in the northeast will figure him out and it will be a little tougher for him, but for now, Railers fans can breathe a sigh of relief that we’ve, at least for now, found a viable replacement for John Muse.

It was scoreless after the opening twenty minutes, and with shots just 7-3 in favor of Worcester one would think it might have been a boring period of hockey. It wasn’t, there just wasn’t a lot of scoring opportunities and those that did happen were stopped by Ollas (#32 Scott Stirling) and Reading netminder Keith Petruzzelli.

The red light did go on once in the frame, with 2:57 remaining in the stanza, when Mason Klee’s (#24 Darren Rumble) shot rang off the iron behind Petruzzelli and hit him in the backside. After Petruzzell had the puck covered a wild goalmouth scramble resulted in the puck crossing the goal line. Referee Chazz Knoche had it all the way, blowing the whistle before he even got to the net and indicating “no goal” right away. There was a video review, which could only have been to determine if the puck had crossed the goal line before Petruzzelli fell on it, which it hadn’t.

It took 21 seconds into the middle period for the red light to go and for it to count, and it was a right-place, right-time goal from Johnson (#12 Trevor Baker). Riley Ginnell (#9 Jame Pollock) and Cam McDonald (#27 Justin Papineau) had the assists on the play.

Mahshie (#4 Ed Campbell) gave his team a little breathing room at 6:29 with the first ECHL power play goal of his career. Jordan Kaplan (#10 Daniel Tkaczuk) and Connor Welsh (#26 Jonathan Fauteux) earned points on the play.

Reading would cut the lead in half on a goal at 13:26 that no goaltender who has ever worn a Worcester jersey would have likely saved. Defender Sam Sedley fired it from the point, where Matt Miller was able to deflect it downward toward the ice from about 20 feet in front of the net. Sedley’s initial bid was so forceful that after Miller touched it the puck hit the ice and bounded perfectly into the top corner just over Ollas’ glove. It was an NHL-quality goal; one where you just nod your head, mark it down, and move on.

It stayed that 2-1 score because both Petruzzelli and Ollas were at the top of their games. There was one highlight save by Ollas posted, but he had a few that were tough to make, and he made a few of those stops look almost effortless.

It was end to end in the third period and referee Knoche, as he did the entire game, let the boys play. But the Railers had one of those brain-cramp automatic penalties called against them when Matthew Kopperud (#18 Lauri Kinos) just wasn’t thinking and played the puck at the bench door after his replacement had already stepped onto the ice. Linesman Jack McQuesten didn’t really have a choice and whistled Worcester for the Roy Sommer line change. Reading managed two shots with the man advantage, and Ollas saved both of them.

The Royals would pull Petruzzelli for an extra attacker, and while this highlight doesn’t clearly show it Callin’s (#44 Marc Bergevin) shot may be the highest lofted shot at the DCU Center to ever score a goal as his lob wedge-style clear found the yawning net 150 feet away. Currently, Welsh has the only assist listed.

The Railers are off to Wheeling next weekend for a pair against the Nailers. They’ll return to the DCU Center a week from Friday for the first of a three-in-three.

GAME NOTES
Scratches for the Railers were Matthew Boudens (IR/upper body), Ryan Dickinson, Dante Giannuzzi (3-day IR), Justin Gill, and Brendan Rons (IR/unknown). Michael Bullion was the backup goaltender.

A quick note about the game columns for Friday and Saturday’s games, the names and numbers in parenthesis are the players from the 2001-02 IceCats team, which is the season the jerseys are based off of. While I did figure some wouldn’t get the connection, I was humored by the ones that didn’t get it and should have.

Being NY Rangers property and playing in Bloomington it isn’t a shock that Hugo Ollas’ goalie gear, including his pants, is red. Unfortunately, red hockey pants have a somewhat notorious history with the Railers as Mitch Gillam was forced to wear his red pants from Cornell University for a very long time because his new Railers blue pants first somehow got lost in transit to the NHL, which is the organization responsible for determining if they pants are legal to wear in games, and then when they were found the inspection team took their sweet time getting around to determining if they were indeed legal to use. By the time Gillam got his new pants his old ones were so worn there was literally nothing left to them. In somewhat of an oddity, Gillam first wore the new blue pants on the bench as the backup to Eamon McAdam. The date? January 4, 2018, or exactly seven years to the date from when Ollas made his Railers debut.

With all the goings on in Friday’s game post a milestone was edited out, so we’ll toss it in now. Early on in Friday night’s game goaltender Michael Bullion passed Nolan Schaefer to become the leader in career minutes played for a right-catching goaltender in Worcester pro hockey history. Bullion is now at 984 minutes played. Bullion’s five Worcester wins are tied for second on the city’s all-time list with Schaefer, one behind J.P. Anderson’s six. The only other right-catching goaltender in Worcester pro hockey history was the first to do it, Alex Westlund, who played just 7:38 in relief of IceCats goaltender Curtis Sanford on March 23, 2001.

Just like last season’s IceCats Night, many were on the concourse clamoring for the Railers to rebrand themselves as the IceCats. This topic alone could fill a dozen blog posts, so forgive this writer if he boils it down to just a handful of words. Legally the Railers can’t change their name to IceCats because a trademark squatter has attempted to claim the name and intellectual property included and is currently selling IceCats jerseys online. Undoubtedly fans have seen the Facebook ads for them, and there were many being worn last night. Yes, the Railers are attempting to intervene, but it’s going to be an uphill battle. There is legal justification for the Railers to continue using IceCats in relation to throwback nights, so no matter what happens those should be safe. Business-wise, it’s simply not going to have the impact people think it will. While the team may see an initial bump in ticket sales and merchandise revenue, it will shortly thereafter drop to their current levels. It makes much more business sense to have nostalgia nights like this past weekend. And, in the long run, it’s better for the fans too. Yes, that’s the Reader’s Digest version of things and there’s far more to it. So, for right now, enjoy what we have.

The three stars of the game were
1. WOR – Hugo Ollas
2. WOR – Ryan Mahshie
3. WOR – Kolby Johnson

The 210Sports Player of the Game was Connor Welsh.

Even Strength Lines
Repaci / Kaplan / Loughran
Kopperud / Callin / Hatten
Donhauser / DeMelis / Mahshie
Ginnell / Dudek / Johnson

Welsh / Luce
Rajaniemi / Klee
Krygier / McDonald

Our affiliates last night
Rochester 6, Bridgeport 3

In the ECHL’s North Division last night
Norfolk 9, Wheeling 3
Trois-Rivieres 5, Adirondack 2
Maine 3, Tahoe 0

BOX SCORE
Reading 0 1 0 – 1
Worcester 0 2 1 – 3

1st Period- No Scoring.Penalties-No Penalties

2nd Period-1, Worcester, Johnson 2 (Ginnell, McDonald), 0:21. 2, Worcester, Mahshie 2 (Kaplan, Welsh), 6:29 (PP). 3, Reading, Miller 5 (Sedley, Smith), 13:26 (PP). Penalties-Leibold Rea (interference), 2:26; Stucker Rea (high-sticking), 5:04; Leibold Rea (roughing), 7:16; Loughran Wor (slashing), 12:52.

3rd Period-4, Worcester, Callin 8 (Welsh), 18:12 (EN). Penalties-served by Hatten Wor (bench – too many men), 12:27.

Shots on Goal-Reading 3-15-14-32. Worcester 7-20-4-31.
Power Play Opportunities-Reading 1 / 2; Worcester 1 / 3.
Goalies-Reading, Petruzzelli 4-11-3-0 (30 shots-28 saves). Worcester, Ollas 3-7-0-1 (32 shots-31 saves).
A-8,056
Referees-Chazz Knoche (33).
Linesmen-Jack McQuesten (53), Matthew Heinen (93).

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