Shoot your shot — as the kids say these days.
After all, it just might go in.
The Tucson Roadrunners defeated the Stockton Heat 5-2 on Friday night at Tucson Arena, thanks in part to just getting the puck somewhere in the vicinity of the net — even if wasn’t pretty, and even if it wasn’t even intended to happen exactly that way.
While the Roadrunners (17-8-3-1) would pour it on in the latter half of the third period with goals from Laurent Dauphin, Tyler Steenbergen and Robbie Russo, it was Tucson’s first two goals a period earlier that kept the game tight and proved that good things — at least in hockey parlance — might come to those who get the puck into the opposing goaltender’s crease.
It happened, first, when Tucson forward Jens Looke drove into the Stockton zone to the left of Heat goaltender Jon Gillies. Looke held the puck on his stick while spinning in a circle before sliding it toward the outer edge of the Stockton crease. A few seconds later, Tucson led 1-0.
“I saw we had a two-on-one there, and I don’t know what happened. I felt like I just lost the puck, so I just turned around and I tried to find a pass,” Looke said. “I think I hit their guy’s skate and it went in. So it’s really lucky, but I’ll take it.”
After the Heat (13-14-3-1) scored two quick goals in the second period off the sticks of Tyler Graovac and Adam Ollas Mattsson to take a 2-1 lead, Tucson’s Nick Merkley found himself in a similar situation as Looke. Merkley picked the puck at the point, to the right of Gillies, and flung it toward a few bodies jockeying for position around Gillies’ goal crease.
Same drill as before; it went in, and the score was 2-2.
“I think that’s what our mentality has to be with this team,” Merkley, who added an assist on Russo’s goal, said of getting the puck toward the goal. “I got fortunate enough to get (a goal).”
Merkley has five points (two goals, three assists) in six games since returning from knee surgery that had kept him out since March of last season. Looke himself had been on the shelf of late, missing the last five games and not playing since Dec. 12 before returning to the lineup Friday.
Dauphin’s third-period goal was the first shorthanded goal of the year for the Roadrunners. Russo’s power-play strike was his first of the season, to go along with 15 assists.
WATCH: Roadrunners shoot their shot for 5-2 win over Stockton
With an assist on Merkley’s goal, defenseman Kyle Capobianco increased his team-high point total to 23 (four goals, 19 assists). Capobianco is third in points and second in assists among AHL defensemen.
Adam Helewka and Lane Pederson also had an assist each, while Brayden Burke ended the night with two of his own.
Hunter Miska turned away 32 of 34 Stockton shots, earning the win in goal for Tucson.
Friday marked the debut for newly-acquired Roadrunner Giovanni Fiore. The NHL's Arizona Coyotes sent defenseman Trevor Murphy, who had spent all of 2018-19 to date with the Roadrunners, to the Anaheim Ducks in exchange for Fiore earlier Friday.
“He was in tough situation. He took a flight today, had a lot of travel,” Tucson head coach Jay Varady said of Fiore, who didn’t score Friday but comes to the Roadrunners with six goals and five assists to his credit from his time with the Ducks’ AHL affiliate, the San Diego Gulls. “I thought he did a great job for us, right from his first shift.”
The win helped Tucson keep pace in the American Hockey League’s Pacific Division, as the Roadrunners remain two points back of the first-place San Jose Barracuda. The win tied the season series between Tucson and Stockton at two games apiece heading into the teams' matchup Saturday.
The puck will drop at 7:05 p.m., this time on “Star Wars Night” at Tucson Arena.
