After a rough third period on Tuesday night, the Tucson Roadrunners reversed the result on Wednesday night.
The Roadrunners (7-4-1-0) scored four goals in the first frame on Wednesday night on the way to a 6-2 win over the Henderson Silver Knights. The win came one night after the club surrendered five third-period goals in a 7-1 loss.
“Obviously it was an important one, a big bounce back after last night and the way we show up today, we have to do it all the time,” said Tucson goalie Ivan Prosvetov. “They obviously came hot too and we were able to calm them down and get to our structure, so it was a good one.”
The Roadrunners return to action on Saturday night when they host the San Jose Barracuda (7-5-0-1).
Every line scored in the first period for the Roadrunners and they put up a season high six goals.
Tucson forward Michael Carcone opened up the scoring 4:22 into the game. Forward Milos Kelemen and defenseman Devante Stephens picked up assists.
Then at 11:15 in the first, Roadrunners forward Ryan McGregor scored his first goal of the year with forward Nathan Smith getting an assist.
"We wanted to be a completely different team,” said Tucson defenseman Ronald Knot, “and just show to the fans that we still can play hockey, we still can play good hockey and I’m pretty sure we showed that tonight and I’m happy for those two parts.”
At 13:51 in the first, center Jean-Sebastien Dea scored a power play goal. Forward Laurent Dauphin and defenseman Conor Timmins were credited with assists.
A couple minutes late, left wing Travis Barron scored, assisted by forward Tyson Empey.
Roadrunners head coach Steve Potvin said they wore a “completely different hat” than Tuesday night.
“I won’t even say I liked the end result, I liked the process of our game,” Potvin said. “We came out pretty well, I thought Ivan made a real tremendous save at the start of the game, just to show us that he was gonna be there all night for us and then our guys just took off from there.”
Tucson was 1-for-5 on the power play, while Henderson (4-11-0-0) was 0-for-2.
At 6:26 in the second, forward Ben McCartney scored, with an assist from Dauphin.
With a couple minutes left in the second, Henderson got on the board with a goal from defenseman Lukas Cormier.
For the second time during this home stand Potvin like the Roadrunners’ response after a lackluster first game in a series but he wants to eliminate the need for that.
“It’s great that we’re able to respond, I’m never gonna be disappointed after our boys respond like that,” Potvin said. “I just don’t want to make it a habit.”
At 11:29 in the third, Silver Knights defenseman Daniil Miromanov scored.
Then with about seven minutes left, Knot got a goal, assisted by defenseman Victor Soderstrom and Carcone.
Prosvetov had 29 saves. Potvin said it wasn’t really a bounce back game for Prosvetov because he didn’t have a bad night in the series opener despite giving up seven goals.
“Ivan’s been very consistent, he’s been a real pillar for us back there and after a disappointing loss that was not a fault of his own,” Potvin said. “Our staff thought that it would be the best to give him the opportunity to bounce back.”
