Gulls Hold Off Admirals For 5-2 Victory
Dec 6, 2023By Nick Aguilera/SanDiegoGulls.com
It got a little too close for comfort late, but the San Diego Gulls held off a late push by the Milwaukee Admirals to earn a 5-2 victory Wednesday night at UW-Milwaukee Panther Arena.
San Diego has earned standings points in three of its last four games (2-1-1-0) and is 2-1-0-0 through the first three games of their five-game road trip.
Tomas Suchanek stood tall in net, stopping 32-of-34 shots in the contest. Suchanek has helped San Diego earn standings points in each of his first three AHL starts (2-0-1).
"I thought Tomas was outstanding tonight," assistant coach Kris Sparre said. "They score a couple goals bang, bang, and it's like we responded well. Our bench was calm, it was composed, and we were able to ride into that victory with really no hesitation."
Just about everything that could go right went right for San Diego from the jump. Andrew Agozzino sniped one past Yaroslav Askarov to put the Gulls in the driver’s seat early in the first. The goal marked Agozzino’s fourth of the season, all coming on the road.
"Kind of the way it's ended up so far, but, yeah, I'll be happy to get the first [goal] at Pechanga Arena for sure," Agozzino said.
He ended the night with a season-high tying 1-2=3 points. He is now tied for the team lead in points (4-13=17) alongside Trevor Carrick, who picked up his team-leading 14th assist in the contest.
A little over two minutes later, Olen Zellweger beat Askarov from the point on the power play for his fourth goal of the season. He now leads all AHL blueliners with three power-play goals.
Glenn Gawdin capped the three-goal opening frame with his second goal in as many games. San Diego’s three goals in the first marked a new season high.
Everything kept coming up Gulls in the second, as Ben King joined the fun and netted a power-play goal to stretch the lead to four. King’s goal chased Askarov, who entered the game ranking in the top 10 among qualified AHL goaltenders in goals against average.
"It was nice to get rewarded," Sparre said. "You know, we were bringing a lot of volume to that. I thought our traffic at the net front was really good tonight. We knew that they had a great goaltender, and the challenge was we wanted to get in front of them and make it really hard on him. And we did that, and we were awarded early with some goals."
Suchanek was terrific through the first two periods, turning away all 25 shots faced.
"Every game he's played, he's not just giving us a chance to win but he's won two of them with some big saves at big moments for us," Agozzino said. "I think in the first period he made a couple of big saves that if he's not there for us, it might be a different game. So, yeah, he's been great for us."
Denis Gurianov and Adam Wilsby got two quick goals for the Admirals in the third to cut the lead in half, but it was as close as they would come. Nikita Nesterenko sealed the deal for the Gulls with 1:40 left to play, depositing his fourth goal of the season into the empty net.
Josh Lopina tallied his fourth assist of the season, setting a new AHL single-season career high in helpers.
Drew Helleson recorded two assists (0-2=2), his second multi-assist effort in four games.
Gawdin and Chase De Leo picked up assists as well.
The San Diego Gulls continue their five-game road trip on Friday, Dec. 8 against the Rockford IceHogs at BMO Center (5 p.m. PST; TV: AHLTV; RADIO: Gulls Audio Network).