After sweeping three games from the Allen Americans in Texas two weekends ago Railers’ fans were excited at the prospects of one of the most successful road trips in Worcester hockey history helping to launch the team toward their first playoff berth since the 2017-2018 season.
Eight days and four games later, things look completely different. The Railers managed just two points on a split in Savannah after a win and a loss against the Ghost Pirates, sandwiched by two shutout losses to the Stingrays in South Carolina.
The Railers’ lead over Reading is now down to four points, with the Royals having two games in hand. To make matters worse, Reading has a far easier schedule for the remainder of the season. If it comes down to the final weekend Worcester and the Royals face off twice at Santander Arena. The Railers are currently 2-4-0-1 against Reading this season and are 6-9-3-1 over the past five seasons away from the DCU Center against the Royals.
Worcester is like just about every team in the ECHL and could use more scoring, but at least for now, that’s not the biggest issue the team faces in its run toward the playoffs. At the moment the primary concern for the Railers is they take far too many dumb penalties.
Their undisciplined play leads to them being shorthanded far too often, and killing penalties is an incredible energy drain on players. Tired players tend to make more mistakes, which results in more penalties, and the circle continues. Coupled with their 26th-ranked penalty kill (77.2%) Worcester needs to do everything they can to stay out of the penalty box.
What they also need to do is stop making bonehead plays that get players suspended. Now that the ECHL’s active roster and game roster are both set at 20 players any suspended player costs them a skater in a game. They found out the hard way that having just 16 skaters in your fourth game in five days is not the best way to do things.
On that note, unfortunately Railers general manager Nick Tuzzolino has to make a hard decision about forward Kolby Johnson. While Johnson is absolutely the kind of player a team needs to have available the fact that ECHL referees have clearly targeted him and even the most borderline offenses result in penalties or game misconducts against him and is causing the team personnel issues.
Having just 17 skaters available because Johnson is suspended is not a winning formula. And in a situation that mirrors Yanick Turcotte’s tenure with the Railers, Johnson toning down his play probably isn’t going to help either. Once referees get used to calling ticky-tack penalties against a player or issuing misconducts to them it continues for a long while.
No matter how you slice it, the undisciplined play has to stop or the Railers have no chance at the postseason. If the Railers can fix the issue that alone will be their biggest boost toward getting into the playoffs.
As was mentioned, could another goal scorer help? Of course. Do they need to pick it up on the defensive side of things? Absolutely, and fewer penalty kills will help there too.
If the Railers can find a way to play smarter hockey they have the ability to consistently beat most of the teams remaining on their schedule. And with so many games remaining against Trois-Rivieres, Worcester going to need to beat everyone else they play and hope to steal a few points against the ECHL’s #2 team.
Anything else and it’s likely another early summer for Railers fans.
—
Do you have something you loved (or hated) about the post? Head on over to the 210Sports Facebook page and leave a comment. You could comment on this post too, but fair warning, the spam filter catches lots of stuff it shouldn’t, and it might be weeks before we see your comment. While you’re there, please give the page a like and a follow.
You can also follow along and comment on the following sites:
Twitter/X (210Darryl), Twitter/X (210Sports), Bluesky, and Mastodon.
-30-
210Sports 