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Entering Friday night's playoff contest against the Fort Wayne Komets down 3-0 in their best-of-seven series, it would have been easy for the Utah Grizzlies to pack up their bags and call it a season. However, the team fought valiantly for 60 minutes and scratched and clawed all the way to the end.
Ultimately, though, the same thing plagued Utah on this night that did in the series: an inability to stop Fort Wayne's high-octane offense. Fort Wayne blasted five goals and in doing so ended Utah's quest for the Kelly Cup, defeating the Grizzlies 5-3. The Komets swept the series and advance to the ECHL Western Conference finals.
"I thought we played a pretty solid game today but we couldn't keep the puck out of our net," Utah coach Tim Branham said. "You're not going to win many games in this league giving up five goals and 30 shots. At the end of the day we have to tip our hat to Fort Wayne, they played a good series."
With a potentially scant 20 minutes remaining in their season and trailing by a goal, Utah refused to call it quits. Marc Cantin rocketed a shot from the blue line at 6:32 to tie the contest at 3. An energized crowd quickly returned to their seats, however, as Komets forward Garrett Thompson scored his second of the night at 8:16 and Fort Wayne's lead was back to 4-3. And finally, with an empty net exposed Fort Wayne ended the scoring as Shawn Szydlowski scored his second of the night.
When a very testy first period concluded that involved several melees, the Komets found themselves up 2-1. Fort Wayne needed only two shots to take its first lead of the contest as Shawn Szydlowski rifled a shot past Mark Owuya at 4:21. Utah was presented with two five on three power plays in the frame but took advantage of only one. Ryan Hayes snuck a shot through Nagle's five hole to tie the score at 7:43. However, Utah couldn't capitalize on their second opportunity and once Fort Wayne returned to full strength, Owuya gave up a juicy rebound to Garrett Thompson, who lobbed the puck into the back of the net for the lead.
Each team scored a power play goal in the second. On the wrong side of a five on three advantage, Utah nonetheless came away unscathed. However, they weren't as fortunate when down five on four as Trevor Cheek scored at 7:39 to take a 3-1 lead. The Grizzlies would battle back as Hayes blazed the net for the second time at 11:14 to cut the deficit to 3-2. —
ECHL playoffs
Best-of-seven
Game 1 • Fort Wayne 6-4
Game 2 • Fort Wayne 5-3
Game 3 • Fort Wayne 3-1
Game 4 • Fort Wayne, 5-3