The Worcester Railers took to the ice Saturday night for their second of three games this weekend against the powerhouse Florida Everblades while wearing jerseys inspired by the Worcester IceCats fifth anniversary sweaters, and once again struggled to light the lamp only to explode with two goals in the final five minutes of regulation to steal a point, and then complete the theft with an overtime power play strike from Max Dorrington to win 3-2.
Like Friday night, the teams were scoreless Saturday, but that was due to the play of Worcester goaltender Parker Gahagen and Florida netminder Cam Johnson making great saves as opposed to the squads not having good opportunities. The Railers’ suddenly sputtering power play continued to have issues in the frame, generating just three shots on an extended four-on-three advantage that wrapped around the first intermission.
The Everblades’ style is to pounce on mistakes their opponents make, and that’s exactly what they did in the second period when Tanner Schachle took an absolutely brainless cross-checking minor at 3:41 of the middle period. In the ensuing power play, at 4:52, Craig Needham made it 1-0 to extend his goals streak to six games. It also would have been assists on five consecutive Florida goals for Quinton Burns, but a scoring change on the Everblades’ empty netter Friday breaks that streak.
Schachle’s penalty was one that would have resulted in many coaches gluing that player to the bench. Railers boss Nick Tuzzolino did not do that, and Schachle didn’t miss as much as a shift.
The Worcester penalty killers held firm after that, killing a Lincoln Hatten ill-advised roughing minor and a head-scratching interference minor to Michael Suda as he was continually fighting for a loose puck with Needham. Referee Michael Zyla, showing no feel for the game at all, put his arm up for interference despite the puck being just a stick length away from the pair.
Reid Duke made it 2-0 Everblades at 2:41 of the third on a three-on-three break-in where no one bothered to pick up Duke streaking down the left side. Anthony Hora was the defender on that side and took the wrong path, almost banging into Ross Mitton, who had the center well covered. Duke took the feed to Gianfranco Cassaro and beat Gahagen low glove side.
When a team is struggling offensively and facing a top-tier goaltender, many times it’s someone deep on the bench who will finally break the ice. That was the case Saturday as Finnish defender Jesse Pulkkinen unleashed a slapshot from the high slots that beat the partially screened Johnson clean at 14:36 to make it a 2-1 game. Gleb Veremyev had the lone helper on Pulkkinen’s first career North American goal.
That goal got the 8,025 in attendance back into the game as the DCU Center got very loud. Every rush afterward raised the volume, and every bid was treated like “this is the one”, until finally, it was the one when Michael Suda fired one on net, and Ryan Miotto tipped it home with exactly three minutes to go in regulation. Drew Callin had the secondary helper.
It was heart-in-your-throat hockey after that point, but both defenses clamped down, with Florida having the only shot that made it through to the goaltender, and Gahagen blockered it aside.
In the extra session, Burns was called for tripping Veremyev in the neutral zone, a penalty the Florida fans sitting in front of my perch disagreed with, and at the time, this writer concurred. But a look at the video shows it was a good call by Referee Zyla.
Do you know who else had a good call? Railers broadcaster Tim Foley, whose strained voice rose above the exploding crowd to say all that needs to be said.
The goal was Dorrington’s, from Pulkkinen and Matt DeMelis, and gave the IceCats…errr, Railers two badly needed points.
GAME NOTES
Scratches for the Railers were MacAuley Carson (14-day IR/Unknown), Michael Ferrandino (14-day IR/Unknown), Thomas Gale, Riley Ginnell, Lazarus Kaebel, Case McCarthy (14-day IR/Unknown), and Porter Schachle (14-day IR/Unknown). Tristan Lennox was the backup goaltender.
In what has become sort of a tradition for the Saturday “IceCats Night” festivities, Shawn Heaphy and Terry “Mr. IceCat” Virtue took part in the ceremonial puck drop. With all that was going on, not enough time was spent recognizing Railers captain Anthony Repaci passing Virtue’s career points total, which was seemingly treated as almost an afterthought.
Big games with huge crowds usually mean multiple songs prior to the national anthem being sung, and that was the case Saturday as the 8,025 fans in the house were serenaded by three different school groups. Now this writer fully understands and appreciates that schools or organizations pay for the privilege of singing those songs by purchasing packages that include tickets, and that teams make money selling them, but at some point, teams have to maybe explain that God Bless America is just eleven lines long and that perhaps singing more than a couple verses of America the Beautiful is overkill. I do wish I could recall the names of the two combined school groups that sang the national anthem because they ripped through that song at the correct tempo and deserve some recognition for that. Unofficially, from the moment that Adam Webster introduced the first group until the last note of the anthem was sung, 8:02 had elapsed. The 6:05pm start time ended up being 6:18pm. Now add that to the slow-paced game that went into overtime, and we had a night that ended at 9:10pm.
Here on the 210Sports site, we have a listing of every number worn by every player for all three of Worcester’s professional teams. It’s completely correct for the WorSharks and Railers, but there are questions concerning a couple of IceCats players about specific games. So, imagine my shock when I posted a list of 1998-99 IceCats and their numbers and discovered an error concerning a major player of that era, Marty Reasoner. The game sheets of that time have him listed as wearing #20, which is what I posted, but Booster Club member Nick Eaton replied that Reasoner wore #11. Well, the first picture I see after a search shows Reason in that number #11. What I expected to be a lot of research into what happened lasted about 30 seconds, thanks to former Telegram scribe Bill Ballou, who wrote in his story for the IceCats game against New Haven on December 12, 1998 that Reason had switched from #20 to his Boston College number #11, which he then wore for the rest of his time here in the city. That information will be added in the next site update.
The three stars of the game were
1. WOR – #7 Max Dorrington
2. WOR – #35 Parker Gahagen
3. FLA – #33 Cam Johnson
The 210Sports Player of the Game was Jesse Pulkkinen.
Even Strength Lines
Repaci / Miotto / Piercey
A.Callin / D.Callin / Veremyev
Donhauser / DeMelis / Hatten
T.Schachle / Dorrington / Mitton
Hora / Suda
Pulkkinen / Samuelsson
Blanchard / Federkow
Press Releases
RAILERS: IceCats complete comeback with 3-2 overtime victory
EVERBLADES: Worcester steals 3-2 overtime win from Florida
Our affiliates last night
NY Islanders 4, Minnesota 3 OT
Bridgeport 4, Utica 2
In the ECHL’s North Division last night
Idaho 7, Greensboro 4
Wheeling 5, Trois-Rivières 0
Norfolk 4, Adirondack 3 OT
Maine 2, Reading 0
BOX SCORE
Florida 0 1 1 0 – 2
Worcester 0 0 2 1 – 3
1st Period- No Scoring.Penalties-Donhauser Wor (interference), 11:54; Cooper Fla (roughing), 18:11; Piercey Wor (roughing), 18:11; Allen Fla (cross-checking), 18:37.
2nd Period-1, Florida, Needham 11 (Cassaro, Burns), 4:52 (PP). Penalties-Schachle Wor (cross-checking), 3:41; Hatten Wor (roughing), 14:31; Suda Wor (interference), 18:16.
3rd Period-2, Florida, Duke 7 (Cassaro, Penney), 2:41. 3, Worcester, Pulkkinen 1 (Veremyev), 14:36. 4, Worcester, Miotto 6 (Suda, Callin), 17:00. Penalties-Needham Fla (slashing), 4:10; Berzolla Fla (roughing), 9:16.
1st OT Period-5, Worcester, Dorrington 2 (Pulkkinen, DeMelis), 4:23 (PP). Penalties-Burns Fla (tripping), 2:47.
Shots on Goal-Florida 7-10-11-1-29. Worcester 10-9-10-2-31.
Power Play Opportunities-Florida 1 / 4; Worcester 1 / 4.
Goalies-Florida, Johnson 10-4-3-1 (31 shots-28 saves). Worcester, Gahagen 7-2-1-0 (29 shots-27 saves).
A-8,025
Referees-Michael Zyla (34), -.
Linesmen-Jasmin Boutet (89), Philippe Pilon (68).
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