Another exciting night of games in the ECHL produced some great performances. Here's a look at three.
Six games were on the ECHL slate Wednesday. Here’s a look at three standouts from the day’s action.
Josh Wilkins: South Carolina Stingrays
Wilkins had quite a night Wednesday, scoring four points including a hat trick in South Carolina’s decisive 6-1 victory over the Orlando Solar Bears at North Charleston Coliseum.
With the score tied 1-1 in the opening frame, Wilkins got a deflection in front of Solar Bears netminder Jon Gillies, pushing the Stingrays ahead for good 2-1 with 4:51 remaining.
After Lynden Breen pushed the lead to3-1 in the second period, Wilkins notched his second goal just 57 seconds later off his own rebound.
Wilkins finished off his hat trick with 6:06 left in regulation to put the Stingrays ahead by five, 6-1.
Stingrays netminder Ty Taylor followed up his 40-save performance on Sunday with another strong outing, stopping 20 shots on 21 attempts.
Keith Petruzzelli: Reading Royals
Not many teams have been able to stop the freight train that is the Wheeling Nailers this season. The club came into Wednesday night’s matchup against the Reading Royals boasting a league-leading 18-3-1 record.
Royals goaltender Keith Petruzzelli slowed down the train, at least on this night. He stopped 16 of the 18 shots he faced in a 3-2 Reading victory at Santander Arena.
Connor Lockhart gave Wheeling the early advantage 11:06 into play for the lone goal of the opening frame. The Royals responded with two goals in the second period to flip the score, 2-1, entering the third courtesy of tallies from Kyle Haskins and Connor McMenamin.
Nick Capone extended Reading’s lead with his second goal in two games, 3-1, at 12:29 into the third period. The goal would ultimately be the game-winner after Logan Pietila scored at 13:54 for the Nailers to cut their deficit to one, 3-2, but would stay as the final result.
Carson Golder and Carter Berger each earned multi-point games with assists on two of the three Reading goals in the game, their team-leading sixth and second multi-point games of the season, respectively.
With the win, the Royals improved to 11-9-2 overall and 5-5-0 at home, having a point in 13 of their 22 games overall.
Isak Walther: Atlanta Gladiators
Walther scored two goals and had one assist as Atlanta downed the Utah Grizzlies 6-3 at Mavrik Center in Salt Lake City. The win improved the Gladiators’ record to 15-5 on the season.
Walther didn’t waste much time getting started, scoring his eighth goal of the season 59 seconds into the contest. Louis Boudon picked up the assist.
After Atlanta built a 4-2 lead, Walther scored his second goal of the night and team leading ninth of the season unassisted 1:25 into the third, powering toward the net and slipping the puck past Grizzlies netminder Kyle Keyser to put Atlanta up 5-2.
Utah cut into the lead, but Ryan Francis scored an empty net goal to ice the game and give the Gladiators the 6-3 victory.