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AHL Grand Rapids Griffins

Griffins Complete Season Sweep over Texas with 4-3 Victory

March 28, 2015 - American Hockey League (AHL)
Grand Rapids Griffins News Release


CEDAR PARK, Texas - The Grand Rapids Griffins completed a season sweep against the defending Calder Cup champions Saturday night, beating the Texas Stars for the second straight night 4-3 at Cedar Park Center.

The win against Texas sets up a Midwest Division home-and-home showdown with Rockford beginning Wednesday at 7 p.m. at Van Andel Arena. The IceHogs trail the Griffins by three points following a 4-2 loss at Utica tonight.

Captain Jeff Hoggan's goal at 8:46 of the third period gave the Griffins a two-goal lead and proved to be enough as they withstood a flurry of shots on Tom McCollum over the final 10 minutes as he finished with a season-high 45 saves.

Unlike last night's game that saw a scoreless first period, tonight's contest saw its first goal at 5:28 of the opening frame when Alexey Marchenko fired a shot from the point on net where Louis-Marc Aubry got through a scrum of Stars defenders and found the back of the net on his third rebound attempt.

McCollum surrendered his first goal when his save on Matej Stransky popped behind the net where Gemel Smith then banked a shot from behind the goal line off McCollum into the net at 14:38.

The Griffins took a 2-1 lead in the second period when Landon Ferraro scored his 26th goal of the season when he was on the receiving end of a tic tac toe play at close range from Marek Tvrdon and Tomas Nosek. His snap at 4:01 on Jack Campbell went over his blocker just below the crossbar.

Texas (32-21-13-1) tied the game for the second time at 10:50 when Kevin Henderson took a pass from Smith and fired a point blank shot from the high slot over McCollum's glove.

Grand Rapids (40-19-6-2) took a 3-2 lead in the third period when Andy Miele screened Campbell and tipped the puck following a Nathan Paetsch blast from the point at 8:46. Miele's 21st goal of the season places him even with Teemu Pulkkinen with a team-high 61 points this term.

After Hoggan gave them a two-goal lead, Texas got one back at 11:27 when Jamie Oleksiak put a shot from the point through traffic inside the right post.

Texas pulled Campbell for an extra attacker with 2:13 remaining. The Stars kept possession in the offensive zone for over a minute and a half, but couldn't get the puck past a winded Griffins' defense.

Campbell finished the contest with 32 saves. Texas didn't score on four power play opportunities. Grand Rapids had two power play opportunities and didn't score.

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