Coachella Valley partially flipped the script on the Tucson Roadrunners, scoring three unanswered goals on Wednesday night to get a series split.
The Firebirds (13-5-3-0) beat Tucson 4-3, one night after giving up seven unanswered goals.
"It’s an unfortunate way to lose the game," said Tucson coach Steve Potvin. "Honestly I don’t think we had our best night, but I think there was some heavy influence tonight that we couldn’t control."
Tucson opened the scoring, 2:19 in, when left wing Travis Barron got a goal, assisted by forwards Ryan McGregor and Miloš Kelemen.
"He’s a warrior, he’s a warrior," Potvin said about Barron. "He’s a kid that wants to play the game, he’s an old school type hockey player that honestly brings his ‘A’ game every night and we’re lucky to have him.
"His leadership, his demeanor on the bench, his demeanor of the ice is capacity to play in defensive situations and offensive stations are starting to come through."
Coachella Valley outshot Tucson 29-25; both teams were 1-for-5 on the power play.
The Roadrunners (11-8-4-0) are 13 for 14 in penalty killing the last three games.
"Honestly, it’s been a focal point the last couple of weeks here," Potvin said.
At 7:55 in the first, Coachella Valley tied it up with a power play goal from right wing Kole Lind. A couple minutes before the first intermission, Tucson regained the lead when McGregor scored a power play goal. Defenseman Victor Soderstrom and forward Jan Jenik got assists.
There were 21 penalties in the game.
"I thought we did some good stuff, started off pretty well there," McGregor said. "Obviously we want to close it out, third period wasn’t our best but lots of power plays, penalty kills, so it was a bit of a weird game and I thought for the most part 5-on-5 we played pretty well."
Tucson forward Ben McCartney scored 17:22 into the second, with centers Jean-Sebastien Dea and Curtis Douglas credited with assists.
Coachella Valley left wing Carsen Twarynski scored 13 seconds into the third. At 6:03 in the third, Firebirds center Luke Henman scored to tie it up.
Firebirds defenseman Ryker Evans scored at 15:19 in the third to give Coachella Valley the win.
The Roadrunners’ next game is Saturday at San Diego (6-18-0-0) Their next home game is Dec. 22 against the Gulls.
Slap shots
- Wednesday marked the second time Tucson has lost 4-3 to Coachella Valley; they also did so on Nov. 12.
