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AHL San Diego Gulls

Gulls Top Canucks, 4-3

January 21, 2024 - American Hockey League (AHL)
San Diego Gulls News Release


The San Diego Gulls took down the Abbotsford Canucks 4-3 Saturday night at Abbotsford Centre. The win gives the Gulls points in four straight contests (3-0-1-0). San Diego is 8-5-2-0 over the last 15 games and its overall record now stands at 12-16-6-0.

Olen Zellweger scored twice to pick up his first professional multi-goal game. He also picked up an assist to match his season-high in points (2-1=3). His 8-17=25 points rank second among all AHL rookie defensemen.

Glenn Gawdin extended his point streak to four games with a power-play goal (2-2=4). He now leads San Diego skaters with 11 goals this season.

Ben King netted his ninth goal of the season, giving him points in back-to-back games (1-1=2).

Chase De Leo tallied an assist, his 93rd in a Gulls uniform, moving him into a tie with Corey Tropp for second-most in Gulls AHL history. He sits two assists away from Sam Carrick's franchise-record 95 assists as a Gull.

Nikita Nesterenko earned an assist, his 11th of the season. He has points in four of his last six games (1-3=4).

Nick Wolff, Brayden Tracey, and Nathan Gaucher also picked up assists.

Tomas Suchanek stopped 24-of-27 shots and improved to 7-2-1 on the season.

The San Diego Gulls will face Abbotsford in the second leg of back-to-back contests tomorrow afternoon (4 p.m. PST; TV: AHLTV; RADIO: Gulls Audio Network).

POSTGAME QUOTES

SAN DIEGO GULLS

Defenseman Olen Zellweger

On his three-point night:

Just trying to play my game. I think as a team, we played really hard. We had certain things that we wanted to execute that we talked about, so, I think those got done pretty well and we stuck around there and got one late.

On keeping composure in the third period:

I think we have a belief that we're not out of any game. We were leading for the majority of that whole game and, to be tied up, we're fine in that position. And then that last minute play there, I called (Gulls forward Brayden Tracey) that I was behind him, and he made a great play to let it kind of go through his legs there, and I had a ton of time there to walk in.

On the team's fast start:

I think that was the goal, surprise them with our speed and our work ethic, and stuff like that. So, yeah, I think that was definitely a factor early on and we're definitely going to look to bring that again tomorrow.

On the team's recent success:

I think just as a team we're playing more mature. Everyone is maybe building a little more chemistry together. So, all those things starting to click, it's a fresh sheet tomorrow so it's going to be a great challenge for us.

On tomorrow's game against Abbotsford:

I think they're probably going to want to move on and just come hard tomorrow, but same for us. We kind of got to take what we did good out of this game and learn a few things that we can work on. It's a brand new game tomorrow. Can't worry about what happened in the past.

Head coach Matt McIlvane

On the team's fast start:

Our start was excellent. I loved their pressure. I thought we were on top of them. We won a lot of pucks back and it led to some zone time. We were very stingy and we were very responsible with the puck at the beginning of the game.

On Glenn Gawdin and Ben King scoring in their home province:

It's fun to see those guys get rewarded. It's nice when they can have family come and be a part of this event. They get to go celebrate with their families a little bit now, which is cool.

On Olen Zellweger:

It's great that he used his chances like he did. First goal, maybe a little bit lucky off of a skate, but I thought he was active the whole game with his skating. He was threatening at the blue line and down the wall. And I thought he was responsible defensively the whole game too.

On the team's response to Abbotsford's late push:

I think started for me when they scored their first one. They had a real push going on and (Gulls forward Ben King) answered with that nice pass from (Gulls forward Brayden Tracey). I thought that was a big goal for us as a group that just kind of calmed everybody down. We know they're threatening. We know they can score. They push but we push back and we just kind of had to stay patient with the game and eventually we got rewarded.

On tomorrow's game against Abbotsford:

We know what their threats are. Obviously, they showed how good they are around our net and how fast they can transition. Same thing happens for them in neutral zone. They're very quick in their transition. And so for us, we need to be a bit smarter in some certain areas, and I think we can suffocate them a little bit more.

Check out the San Diego Gulls Statistics



American Hockey League Stories from January 21, 2024


The opinions expressed in this release are those of the organization issuing it, and do not necessarily reflect the thoughts or opinions of OurSports Central or its staff.

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