PREVIEW: Gulls, Silver Knights Continue Four-Game Series At Pechanga Arena
Mar 17, 2022By Paige Burnell/SanDiegoGulls.com
The San Diego Gulls are ready for a rematch, hosting the Henderson Silver Knights in the second of a four-game series tonight at Pechanga Arena (7 p.m. PT; TV: AHL TV; RADIO: Gulls Audio Network).
The Gulls tied a season high in goals with a 6-1 victory in the series opener on Wednesday, bringing San Diego’s overall record against Henderson to 5-4-1-0 and its record at home to 3-1-1-0.
"I think everyone is just coming together," Gulls right wing Hunter Drew said. "You know when you lose no one likes it, no one likes the feeling and like you said we won three in a row and now we love that feeling and we are going to keep it going."
The win marked San Diego’s third straight overall and fourth against their Pacific Division foes. During their recent win streak, the Gulls outscored opponents 13-1. This influx of goals put the seventh-place Gulls (46 points) within six points of sixth-place Henderson (52 pts) in the division standings. Maintaining this stream of offense is the key to the Gulls continued success against Henderson tonight.
"The season’s a process," Gulls head coach Joel Bouchard said. "Obviously, we’ve talked about it a lot. It’s the growth I think that we have collectively and all the hardness and the hard moment we have that’s now, we have a style of play that doesn’t come over night that give us a chance. That being said, we’ve got to stay humble, we’ve got to stay hungry. Like I told the guys, you’ve got to take it for what it is. I think our execution as a group, as of the last few weeks, we’ve worked a lot on it. We’ve challenged the guys and they’ve raised to the challenge."
The goals are coming in a variety of ways – and from a plethora of different players. The latter applies to Drew, as he scored a career-high 2-2=4 points in Wednesday’s win. He’s posted consecutive multi-point performances (3-3=6) and enters tonight’s game leading the Gulls in goals (13), second in points (13-17=30) and tied for third in assists.
Additionally, Drew scored the second of two power-play goals in the team’s most recent game after rookie Brayden Tracey earned the first, simultaneously snapping the Gulls’ three-game stretch without a man-advantage goal and his own goal-less streak of 17 games.
"I can count, you know, probably five or six games that as a group we feel like we lost this year because our power play wasn’t clicking," Drew said. "Now to be scoring on the power play is huge for us and huge for the team."
The Gulls continue to receive offensive contributions from their blueline, with a trio of defensemen leading the charge.
Nikolas Brouillard recorded a three-point effort (2-1=3) on Wednesday, extending his point streak to a third game (3-2=5) and bringing his point total to 3-7=10 over his last seven outings. Brouillard is tied for first in goals among American Hockey League defensemen and also leads the Gulls in assists (22) and points (33).
Trevor Carrick has 3-4=7 points over his last eight games, including a goal in Wednesday’s win, while Kodie Curran registered his third multi-assist effort of the season (0-2=2) in the Gulls’ most recent contest.
"It’s a team game and everyone comes together," Drew said. "Like you said the D (defense) are jumping up. D can’t jump up if the forwards aren’t making good plays and if our goalie’s not making saves, we don’t have the puck. So, everyone’s coming together really nice and it’s really good to see."
Despite the offensive outburst, Bouchard continued to stress the need for the team to remain structured to continue its success and help the team’s goaltending duo of Lukas Dostal and Olle Eriksson Ek.
"I think it’s always two things: goalies playing well and the team in front of them playing structure so the goalie knows what’s coming a little bit," Bouchard said. "That being said, our job is to make sure we protect Dos and Olle the best we can."
Dostal continued his recent stellar stretch with a 34-save performance in the series opener. Since Jan. 7, the Czech Republic native posted a 9-4-0 record with two shutouts, a 2.23 goals-against average and .935 save percentage to lead all AHL goaltenders (min. 500 minutes played) in save percentage.
Henderson continued its recent slide on Wednesday, dropping to 2-7-1-0 in its last 10 games. Defenseman Peter DiLiberatore scored the Silver Knights, the second time in the last three games they’ve scored one goal. They’ve allowed 20 goals in their last five games, including two six-goal outputs.