Season-Best Crowd Sees Ice Flyers Take Tough Loss On Military Appreciation Night
By Bill Vilona, Ice Flyers Correspondent
The Ice Flyers had the season’s largest crowd, got amid-game hat trick from captain Garrett Milan, and created a special arena atmosphere the entire third period.
Unfortunately for this team, the night lacked completeness of a celebratory win.
In seizing upon their own opportunities, the Birmingham Bulls got a go-ahead goal with less than eight minutes left and scored an empty-netter with one second left to exit Friday night at the Bay Center with a 6-4 win, disappointing a crowd of 5,608 on Military Appreciation Night.
“It was on fire, it was like a playoff atmosphere where it’s one shot could be the difference,” said Ice Flyers owner Greg Harris. “I think the fans got their money’s worth, but unfortunately we couldn’t send them home with a win.”
Milan nearly willed the team himself.
He scored his third goal of the game just past midway through the second period, causing a brief stoppage when fans adhered to the customary tradition of throwing hats on the ice. It was his 12thgoal of the year to go along with 23 assists to now put him atop the league lead in points.
Milan also had several chances at a fourth goal as he continued to fly around the ice and work in position for good shots. Milan scored the game’s first goal with 8:15 left in the first period, set up on a perfect pass by Malik Johnson. The Bulls then responded with three consecutive goals including a pair only 21 seconds apart, to take a 2-1 intermission lead.
They had a 3-1 lead less than three minutes into second period before Milan notched his next two goals, including a tying power-play goal as the Ice Flyers specialty teams play continued to shine.
“Garrett is a guy that comes every day ready to play great and he’s a great player, but you can’t do it with one guy,” said Ice Flyers coach Rod Aldoff.
The Bulls took a 4-3 lead into the third period after scoring with two seconds left before second period intermission on a breakdown that typified the kind of game it became for the Ice Flyers.
“Absolutely stupid,” Aldoff said. “It is game management and it can’t happen.”
The Ice Flyers, however, answered only 90 seconds into the third period when Tommy Stang rifled home a shot created from work by Ivan Bondarenko and Joey Sofo to find him in good position for a tying goal.
From this point, there was an energy that remained the rest of the way as both teams went end to end at time and exchanged hard checks. Stang was again in position with 13:39 left to take a one-time shot that Birmingham goaltender Austin Lotz save. The goal judge mistakenly flipped on the lamp, but the puck stayed in front of the crease.
Six minutes later, the Bulls Troy MacTavish, one of six different scorers for Birmingham, whisked a wrist shot from the behind the faceoff circles past Ice Flyers goaltender Christian Pavlas for the go-ahead goal.
The next pivotal moment arrived at with 5:03 left when the Ice Flyers got a power play and then appeared to have a chance at a 5-on-3 situation when Birmingham’s Nick Minerva was called for interference. But the Ice Flyers Weiland Parrish retaliated with a roughing penalty an moment later, keeping it a one-man advantage for those final 1:03.
“Weiland is a great guy, he’s a leader, he’s played well,” said Aldoff, shaking his head. “I can’t figure this stuff out. But it’s about managing the game and we had a 5 on 3 (potentially) there.”
The Ice Flyers pulled Pavlas for an extra attacker with 1:16 left, but never got a good chance to tie the game before Minerva got a puck at center ice and flicked into the net before the final buzzer.
It left an empty feeling in the building that was so raucous the third period. The Ice Flyers will now try and salvage the weekend on the road with a New Year’s Eve game at the Macon Mayhem with puck drop at 5:30 p.m. (CST). But it will be a long bus trip to Macon, Georgia after a game the Ice Flyers knew they let get away.
“It’s everybody. It just a breakdown all game,” said Aldoff, who had a lengthy team meeting after the game where he let players know his displeasure with inconsistent performance. “We did a lot of good things, then one breakdown and it’s in our net. It’s a frustrating team, this one, because the guys are working hard, but we manage to shoot ourselves in the foot and it’s in the back of the net. We just continue to make bad decisions.
“Winning can be really easy, but you have to players who understand what it takes to win. They don’t have to be the best players… just the smart players.”
GAME NOTABLES
— What made Saturday night’s crowd even more impressive was how bad Pensacola’s weather looked in mid-afternoon as thunderstorms roared through and rain continued until game time outside the arena.
“I really like playing at this time around the holidays,” Harris said. “It’s kind of a pocket that we have discovered and we can get some good crowds. But when I heard rain, coming, I was actually worried and thought, oh great, because we were on pace to clear 5,000.
“It was a lot of rain. But our military appreciation nights are always big and a lot of people are off and available. It turned out to be really good.”
— Three women from the Blue Anchor Belles, a military spouse singing group that dates all the way back to the World War II era in Pensacola, performed the National Anthem to loud applause.
— The game sponsor was Navy Federal Credit Union. Bill Daniel, a 28-year employee in the company in business development, was honored with the ceremonial puck drop and had his daughter, Madison, handle the drop.
— During the first intermission, there was a tug of war among representatives of the various military branches in Pensacola. The Army group, however, dominated both rounds of the contest, beating the Marines group in the last one.
WHAT’S NEXT?
WHO: Ice Flyers vs. Macon Mayhem
WHEN: Saturday, 5:30 p.m. (CST)
WHERE: Macon Centreplex, Macon, Georgia
FOLLOW: www.thesphl.com
NEXT HOME GAME: Jan. 6 vs. Birmingham Bulls (Promotion is Youth Jersey Night, with the first 1,000 children ages 12-under receiving a hockey style youth jersey).
