Iowa Wild Weekly Report

Sometimes when a 1 to 0 game is played, it’s miserable, a slog, where neither team even tries to score. That was not the case on last Friday, when the Iowa Wild lost to the San Antonio Rampage 1 to 0 in overtime. There was plenty of good goaltending and defense that prevented these two teams from scoring in regulation. It was a fast skating and fast playing game with few whistles, especially, through the first two periods. Each team had more scoring chances late in the second, with Iowa’s best being an Ian Schultz chance where the puck got behind San Antonio goalie Michael Houser, but he froze it just before it trickled over the goalline. Ultimately, Iowa lost when Michigan Tech alum Brett Olson scored 15 seconds into overtime. New Iowa Wild forward Pavel Jenys led the team in shots on his professional debut with 4. Curry stopped 32 of 33 shots.

When the Rampage met the Wild for a rematch on Saturday afternoon, the game was much less disciplined than the first tilt. Dangerous plays started 7 minutes in when Shane O’Brien took a checking to the head minor, a hit which earned him a three game suspension. At the beginning of the second period, Quinton Howden missed a penalty shot. Over the course of the game Iowa took 30 minutes in penalties, but most of them went to Gabriel who took a double roughing minor and a 10 minute misconduct, and Bulmer who got a game misconduct for slashing. The Bulmer and O’Brien plays earned them suspensions.

A few goals were also scored, most of them by San Antonio. McFarland and Heatley got power play goals in the first period off the Gabriel penalties. Then Butler and Megan added a pair in the third. Iowa finally scored with less than a minute and a half to go in the third, a tally by Archambault from Graovac. Gustafsson took the 4 to 1 loss, his twentieth regulation loss of the season.

Curry played the last game of Iowa’s three in three nights, against the Chicago Wolves, who are a bubble playoff team. Chicago scored on the power play halfway through the first and added another power play goal in the second period. Marc Hagel responded back with a goal assisted by Mitchell and Graovac. But the Wolves’ Ty Rattie added a third power play goal, his third point of the night, to start the third period. Brett Sutter scored, assisted by Jenys and Knight. The assist on this goal was Jenys’s first professional point. But the game ended 3 to 2. With all three Wolves goals coming on the power play, it’s likely that the Wild saw some penalty killing drills during their practices this week.

The two home losses on Friday and Saturday extended Iowa’s home losing streak to fourteen games. Next Friday, the Wild will face the Rochester Americans, the second worst team in the Western Conference. This should give the college players just joining the Wild chance to start of their careers on a winning note.

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