After a 2-1 win against the IceHogs in Rockford Sunday night, the Admirals dropped the second half of the home-and-home set in unspectacular fashion, losing to the IceHogs 4-1.
With Linus Klasen and Chris Mueller up with Nashville, others needed to step up their games. And nobody really did.
Early on, Kelsey Wilson tried to light a fire under his team at the 5:36 mark, as he and Kyle Hagel dropped the gloves, shed their helmets and circled the blue line for a good ole fashion fisticuffs. Once they locked up it was a great fight as Wilson got out to the early lead with a good couple jabs. Hagel wouldn’t be out done and had some crosses and jabs of his own. The fight lasted a good while and after it was all done the score card was given to Hagel. They both spent the subsequent five minutes in Johnson’s office to think about what they did.
Half way through the first period, Ryan Thang was called for a questionable slashing offense whilst (yea, I said whilst, what ya gonna do about it?) in the offensive zone. With the IceHogs up a man, they quickly converted at 10:54 when Peter LeBlanc sent the puck around the boards to Brandon Pirri on the near boards near the face of circle. Pirri gathered and sent a pass to Mathis Olimb at the point who put a cannonade on net and beat Ads goaltender Mark Dekanich high side through traffic. The goal was Olimb’s fourth on the year and gave the IceHogs the 1-0 lead.
The Admirals had their chances in the first but were unable to convert. With 2:05 to go in the stanza Roman Josi got through the defense and into the slot where it was just he and IceHogs goaltender Hannu Toivonen. Josi tried to put a quick move on the goaltender but was stonewalled in the process. The Admirals would surrender the first period trailing 0-1.
8:24 in the second period Dylan Hunter evened the score 1-1 with a goal from about 2 feet out. Gabriel Bourque was fed the puck at the point and he fed it to Laakso on the far side blue line. Laakso fired a shot on net that Toivonen initially saved but couldn’t control. The puck spit out to Hunter who was waiting in the slot and put the rebound past the goaltender. The tally was Hunter’s first goal of the season in his 3rd game played with the Admirals this season.
Both teams got into penalty trouble in the second period but it was the IceHogs who capitalized on the opportunity. Matt Halischuck (second game back from injury) was sent to the sin bin for a slash at 17:35 and 1:14 later Ben Smith gave the IceHogs the lead again. Jeff Taffe dished the puck to Smith who skated down the near side and fired a puck on net from the right faceoff circle. The uncontested shot beat Dex short side about glove height. It was most likely a shot that Dex would have stopped 9 times out of 10 but failed on this attempt.
The third period didn’t prove any easier for the Admirals. At 5:45 in the 3rd Ben Smith got behind the defense and put a shot on goal that Dex was able to knock down with his glove but not contain. The Admirals’ Aaron Johnson tried to clear with a backhanded swing. Johnson was able to hit the puck but unfortunately for him, right into the crashing Evan Brophey. Brophey was able to gather the puck from the bottom of the near circle and put on a shot from a sharp angle that found the little daylight that Dekanich gave him. The goal was Brophey’s 3rd of the season giving the IceHogs a 3-1 lead.
(BEGIN RANT)
That goal would be more than enough to beat the stagnant Admirals as the IceHogs went on to win 4-1. From the start of the match the Admirals seemed complacent and lacking on, well, offense (duh statement of the month, and coming from me that says a lot). With the lack of offensive production we could make excuses that the Admirals were still without their production guys in Klasen (15 goals) and Mueller (12 goals). We also could talk about how the vuvuzelas were super distracting and the Admirals couldn’t focus. Or we could even talk about why the NFL would move a game to Tuesday when they know Lane has Vick going at QB in his keeper league and needs 25 points to win it all.
Instead we should focus on some other questions, like why hasn’t Thuresson scored in over 2 months, or who is going to step up on this team and start to score goals.
Oh, and Blake Geoffrion? Your attempt at that fight pretty much summed up the entire game. Outmatched.
(END RANT)
They’ll try again tomorrow against Houston. Feel free to leave a rant of your own in the comments section.
Admirals Roundtable 
Jamie Lundmark summed up the night. When its been 11 minutes into the 3rd and your team has not recorded a shot…its always impressive to fumble the puck on a breakaway.
Thuresson looked impressive for a game or two but has gone back to his invisible game.
Brett Palin is awful. I realize to be an Admirals captain you have to be slow and not have any offensive talent…but this guy takes the cake, and promptly turns it over to the other team.
Bourque and Hallischuk looked mildly impressive at times and I am glad to see Blake going strong to the net…but when we aren’t shooting it doesn’t matter
Blum looked lost out there tonight. Palin was awful.
Plain and simple they need to shoot more and shoot better. The lack of shooting is deplorable. No inside presence, no rebound control.
Power Play needs to be completely redone. They flat out suck! Less than 18%, pathetic! Penalty killing was also dreadful.
The team looked out of sorts. This is something that Lane needs to fix. Last year it was the New Year’s day debacle, this year it is happing again. His preparation and motivation skills are in serious doubt.
They need to get one back tomorrow!!
Can’t really blame Geofrion for fighting…he was getting shoved around all night.
Bourque seemed to play the best tonight, but overall we couldn’t even establish anything in the offensive zone.
Hoping for a better result and more energy tomorrow.
Lets face it, the entire team looked awful. You can say Palin was bad, Blum was bad, etc. but over the scope of the last month or two, our defense, including both Palin and Blum, has played very well. This was just a stinker game. I wouldn’t get worked up over it. Now if this continues on tomorrow, and the next game after that….
Maybe Thuresson needs to be benched a game or two? Maybe he should be demoted to a different line? Or even demoted to Cinci? Something has to change.
My analysis on Palin and Lundmark are cumulative over the last few weeks. Blum looked pretty awful tonight, but has been solid for the most part.
I’m very very impressed with Josi. I love his offensive rushes (since we can’t break out of a zone to save our soul)
Thuresson has bounced around to every line possible…not sure what will fix him. Surprisingly the leash that Lane has him is apparently miles longer than the one that Klasen had.
No offense and poor defense. Bourque plastered several people. The AHL needs to go to a three ref system. The two stooges tonight missed Rockford punching the Admirals in the head after the whistle about 10 times in the first and second periods. Blake was angry in the third period, probably because of that junk. He ran over a guy by 216 in the third period. The refs missed Dex getting taken off his feet behind the goal in the second period. How was that not called? My favorite was when Rockford was short handed. They had 5 skaters on the ice twice on the penalty, the second time for 20 seconds. How did four on-ice officials miss that? Maybe they should be docked some pay. Roger Behling was the only one that didn’t have his head up his butt.
I’m surprised that Geoffrion didn’t get called for something after the empty net goal, after giving the scorer a shot. Expected unsportsmanlike conduct or something. If he’s upset about being pushed around, he needs to start being more physical, but not in a fighting sense. He needs to be physical in the corners. He needs to win battles. He needs to just get back up if he gets hit.
Blum has become VERY inconsistent. Some of it is simply poor decisions. Johnson needs to get that puck out of the zone, but instead it turns into the 3rd goal. Credit the IceHogs — the converted their chances.
Here’s the good news…..very rarely is a Lane Lambert team awful in consecutive games. I expect a much better effort tomorrow against Houston. They may not win, but it’ll be a better effort for sure.
Thuresson? 27ish games in a row now without a goal? That’s what, about a third of the season? Don’t know what the fix is. He’s played on scoring lines…played a bit with Klasen. Lundmark is capable, and Geoffrion is supposed to be offensively capable. Just seems like the killer instinct is gone. We can speculate if he’s snakebitten or if it’s all in his head or if it’s an attitude problem. I’m hopeful he’ll snap out of it, but man…..he looks like a different hockey player than last season.
Come on…vuvuzelas on Sweet Caroline? You have to admit that was kind of fun…
I would just like to point out that the Masterlock treasure chest is rigged, and nobody can win it!!! Sorry, I’m just a bad sport! Anyways, I will never go back to another game where they hand out any sorts of noisemakers. I was tempted to turn a few vuvuzelas into enemas.
Bleh, I’ll be back tomorrow. Hopefully get that bad taste out of my mouth…
Speaking of Rockford, where the hell was Jessiman?
Dexshow was playing some black opps on PS3 yesterday.
It was Déjà vu, he was getting snipped all the time.
Man the D needs to step up and give him some air.
Jessiman took a shot to the foot against Texas the day before we first played them in Rockford. (Mid- December?)
Pretty sad when Mark Santorelli is your leading goal scorer on the active roster… can’t say the outcome was that surprising, not much Dex can do when the D flops around like fish.
It was nice to see the ADS get a big crowd win, that doesn’t happen all that often. It was also nice to see them win without having to go to overtime.