Bad start dooms Roadrunners again in 5-1 loss to Coachella Valley; Game 2 of Calder Cup playoff series Friday

If a penalty for too many men on the ice and subsequent power-play goal against — both coming in the game's first minute — weren't responsible for undoing the Tucson Roadrunners in their 2023 Calder Cup Playoff opener Wednesday, then perhaps it was the stellar play from someone who played his college hockey in Tempe, back then wearing the maroon and gold that so many in Tucson oh-so-love to hate.

Goaltender Joey Daccord, an alumnus of ASU's NCAA Division I hockey program, stopped all but one shot he faced from the Roadrunners, just narrowly missing pitching a shutout Wednesday for the Coachella Valley Firebirds in an 5-1 Firebirds' rout over Tucson in Game 1 of the best-of-three series in Palm Desert, California.

Daccord, who stopped the first 45 shots he saw before Tucson's Vladislav Kolyachonok scored on the final shot on goal of the game for either team just outside a minute to play, wasn't without some extremely early help. The Roadrunners were called for too many men on the ice just 36 seconds into the first period. Twenty-four seconds later, the game was 1-0 on a power-play goal by Max McCormick, Coachella Valley's leading scorer during the regular season.

Despite outshooting the Firebirds 46-27, Tucson would never quite recover after yet another inauspicious start. Counting the stretch run to Tucson's regular season, the Roadrunners have now allowed a goal inside the first minute in four of their last nine games.

Roughly eight minutes after McCormick's goal, Alexander True added one for Coachella Valley against Tucson goaltender Ivan Prosvetov, and less than 90 seconds later, the game was 3-0 off the stick of Kole Lind.

McCormick added his second of the game — another power play marker — eight minutes into the second before Carsen Twarynski capped the Firebirds' scoring in the third; the Firebirds' final goal came with roughly four minutes to play with Tucson leaving its net open in desperation despite being down by four goals at that point.  

McCormick (two goals, one assist), Lind (one goal, two assists) and Ryker Evans (three assists) all had three-point nights for Coachella Valley, playing its first-ever playoff game as an American Hockey League expansion team this season.

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"We have to be clean up some stuff on the defense, be more dangerous on offense," Kolyachonok said postgame in an interview with Roadrunners' play-by-play voice Adrian Denny. "For sure discipline is the most important thing in the playoffs, and that's what's going to give us success."

Game 2 between the Firebirds and Roadrunners is Friday night at 7, also at Coachella Valley's new-this-season Acrisure Arena. If the Roadrunners win Friday, the teams will play a winner-advances, loser-goes-home Game 3 Sunday at 3 p.m., also in Palm Desert.

Prosvetov, who finished with 22 saves on 26 shots against, settled in a bit for the second and third periods, but that came only after the Firebirds scored on three of their first five shots.

"Ivan tried to do everything possible," Kolyachonok added. "Of course we should help him (more). Of course we're all going to be better and we'll give our best effort."  

Wednesday marked Prosvetov's first action for Tucson since March 4. He spent nearly all of March and into last week with the NHL's Arizona Coyotes, posting a 4-3 record with a 3.98 goals against average and .880 save percentage in seven starts. The Coyotes reassigned him to Tucson for the Roadrunners' playoff run once their season concluded last Thursday.

Coachella's win came a day after the club's NHL affiliate, the Seattle Kraken, earned its own first-ever playoff victory in a 3-1 win over the defending Stanley Cup Champion Colorado Avalanche.