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ECHL Reading Royals

Reading Royals Weekly: Raconteur Royale Number

January 9, 2017 - ECHL (ECHL)
Reading Royals News Release


Week Thirteen (January 9, 2017)

LAST WEEK'S GAMES Friday January 6, 2017 v Adirondack Thunder Loss 2-4 Saturday January 7, 2017 v Adirondack Thunder Win 4-3

TEAM RECORD

GP W L OTL SOL PTS WIN % GF GA STREAK Place in Standings Overall 33 19 12 1 1 40 .606 117 98 1-0-0-0 3rd North Division Home 15 10 5 0 0 20 .667 63 44 1-0-0-0 Road 18 9 7 1 1 20 .556 54 54 1-0-0-0

THIS WEEK'S GAMES FRIDAY, JANUARY 13 @ ELMIRA JACKALS First Arena - Elmira, NY (7:05 pm)

SATURDAY, JANUARY 14 @ ELMIRA JACKALS First Arena - Elmira, NY (7:05 pm)

MONDAY, JANUARY 16 v ELMIRA JACKALS Santander Arena - Reading, PA (1:00 pm)

Martin Luther King, Jr. Holiday Matinee Buy One Ticket - Get One Free Second in a Series of Four Bobblehead Giveaways: Olivier Labelle Courtesy of Reading Health System

Broadcast: Broadcast Begins 30 Minutes Prior to Opening Face-Off With Pre-Game Warm-Up Show

Digital Stream on iHeartRadio Rumba 1340 - Reading

Road Games Only: BCTV Telecast in Berks County, PA (Comcast Reading Cable Channel 15, Service Electric Cable Channel 19, Comcast Southern Berks Channel 965)

Pay-Per-View Streaming Video at ECHL.TV Weekly Notes

This past week, the Royals split a two game set with the Adirondack Thunder at Santander Arena in Reading, losing 4-2 to Adirondack on Friday before bouncing back to beat the Thunder on Saturday, 4-3.

Friday's loss to Adirondack snapped a four game winning streak for Reading-as well as a three game home winning streak.

After Saturday's bounce back win, the Royals have compiled a record of 13-4-0-0 in the team's last seventeen games; and Reading has gone 9-2-0-0 in the team's last eleven games at Santander Arena.

Overall, with the two-game split this past weekend, Reading's record sits at a season-best seven games over .500 for the second time this year (19-12-1-1@) through thirty-three games played, which places the team in third place in the North Division of the ECHL's Eastern Conference.

Four of the Royals' last six games have been played against the Adirondack Thunder, and Reading has gone 3-1-0-0 in those games, despite being outshot 151-117.

Reading still has three more games to go against Adirondack in the month of January, but before the team will see the Thunder again, Reading has three in a row against the Elmira Jackals-two in Elmira on Friday and Saturday and then the Martin Luther King, Jr. Holiday matinee in Reading on Monday.

So far, the Royals have gone 9-7-1-0 against teams from the North Division with twenty-four more games to go against teams within the division, including the next seven in a row.

The Royals have scored first in the team's last six games-and in eight of the last nine games played. Overall, Reading has scored first in eighteen of the team's thirty-three games, compiling a record of 12-5-1-0 in those games (.694 win percentage).

Reading actually scored nineteen seconds into both games played this past weekend. Steven Swavely scored 19 seconds into Friday's loss; and Ryan Penny scored 19 seconds into Saturday's win. Those are the quickest goals scored into any game this season for Reading.

The Royals held two leads in Friday's loss (at 1-0 and 2-1) before Adirondack battled back to tie late in the second period; and then bagged a third period tie-breaking game winner (and empty netter) to pull out the win. That was the eighth blown lead loss of the season for Reading.

Friday's loss marked the eighth time this year that Reading has entered the third period tied with the opposition, and the team has compiled a record of 4-3- 0-1 in those games.

Reading led 4-2 entering the third period in Saturday's win. The Royals are 12-0-0-0 when holding a lead over the opposition as the game enters the final frame.

After Saturday's win, Reading no longer has a negative goal differential in any of the three periods. The team has played even in the first period (29 goals for - 29 goals against), plus-3 in the second period (41 - 38), and plus-18 in the third period (47 - 29).

The team's plus-eighteen goal differential in the third period is third best in the league to the Allen Americans (+23) and Fort Wayne Komets (+20).

Adirondack generated forty-shots in Friday's 4-2 win. That marked the third time this year that Reading has allowed forty or more shots against-and second time that the Thunder has hit that number. Reading has gone 1-1-0-1 in those games.

The nineteen shots taken by Adirondack in the first period of Friday's win over Reading was a season high for shots against the Royals in a single period.

The twenty-three shots taken by Reading on Friday night was a season low; and the four shots generated in the third period of Saturday's win for the Royals tied a season low for the team.

The Royals power play was held off the board in ten total chances with the man advantage in the two games played this past week. That marked only the second time in the last seventeen played that Reading has gone back-to-back games without scoring a power play goal.

Reading's power play has been held off the board in fifteen of the thirty-three games played this season, and the team has gone 7-7-1-0 in those games.

Overall, the Royals' power play is scoring at a 20.2% clip (24 for 119), which is six best in the league.

Although Adirondack's power play did touch up the Royals penalty kill for a power play goal in Saturday's win for Reading, the team's PK did knock off nine of the ten power play chances awarded to the Thunder and have now killed 61 of the last 66 power play chances for the opposition (92.4%) dating back twenty games.

For the first time this season, Reading's penalty kill is killing at above an 80% ratio overall (23 PPGA in 119 chances for the opposition = 80.7%, twenty-first out of the twenty-seven teams in the league).

On Saturday, the penalty killers also came up with the team's sixth short- handed goal of the season (tied for fifth most in the league)-which proved to be the game winner at the 11:15 mark of the second period-just 1:13 after Adirondack had touched the team up for that PPGA.

Ian Watters scored the SHG for Reading on Saturday. He is the sixth different player to score a short-handed goal for the Royals this season. The others are: Steven Swavely, Todd Perry, Nick Luukko, Ryan Penny and Justin Crandall.

Chris McCarthy extended his point streak to five games (4g-3a) and his goal scoring streak to three games when he scored Reading's second goal in Friday's loss.

Although those streaks were snapped on Saturday, McCarthy still leads the Royals with fifteen goals and thirty-one points in thirty games played.

Olivier Labelle picked up six total penalty minutes in the two games played this week, giving him 36 PIMs in thirty-three games this season. Labelle has now amassed 539 total penalty minutes with the Royals in 261 career games with the team, tying Malcolm MacMillan, who picked up 539 PIMs in 162 games with the Royals, for the all-time lead in penalty minutes with Reading.

Justin Crandall pushed his personal point streak to five games (5g- 8a=13pts), when he picked up the primary assist on Chris McCarthy's goal on Friday.

Although Crandall was held off the score sheet in Saturday's win, that marked only the third time in the last seventeen games in which he has not picked up at least one point, registering twenty- four points in that time span (9g-15a).

Although Ryan Penny had his four game point streak (1g-4a=5pts) snapped in Friday's loss, he bounced back to score the team's first goal nineteen seconds into Saturday's win, marking the first time this season that he has scored the game's first goal.

Penny also picked up the primary assist on Reading's second goal (by Matt Wilkins) on Saturday to register his sixth multi- point performance of the season-second only to Chris McCarthy who has seven multi-point games this year.

Penny has thirteen points (4g-9a) in his last fourteen games.

Defenseman Florian Iberer, who leads defensemen on the Royals with seven goals and twenty-one points (tied eleventh amongst d-men in the league), played plus-one in both games this past week and has played even or better in six straight, collectively playing plus-4 (+4) in that time span.

Matt Willows, who registered the primary assist on the Royals' first goal (by Steven Swavely) nineteen seconds into Friday's loss, has eight points (3g-5a) (and played to a plus-4) in eleven games with Reading.

Willows also engaged in his first fight as a Royal (against Adirondack's Dennis Kravchenko) 15:58 into the first period of Saturday's win over the Thunder.

After missing seven games with the Royals while on recall to the Lehigh Valley Phantoms of the AHL, Steven Swavely scored nineteen seconds into his return to Reading on Friday.

On Saturday, Swavely registered his third multi-point performance of the season (0g-2a), which included picking up the only assist on the short-handed game winner by Ian Watters 11:15 into the second period.

Swavely, who is riding a four game point streak (2g-3a=5pts), has eighteen points (7g-11a) in eighteen games with Reading.

Defenseman Michael Boivin led the Royals with five shots-which tied his personal season high-in Saturday's win over Adirondack.

Returning to action after a three-game absence, Matt Wilkins recorded the primary assist on the first goal of the game (by Ryan Penny) in Saturday's win. He followed that up by scoring the team's second goal of the game to notch his second multi-point performance of the season.

Ian Watters broke a six game goal scoring drought when he scored the Royals' fourth goal while the team was playing short-handed 11:15 into the second period of Saturday's win. That goal proved to be Watter's second game winner in three goals this season.

Watters' also picked up an assist on Reading's first goal in Saturday's win to register his second multi-point goal of the year.

The short-handed goal scored by Watters on Saturday was his second SHG as a Royal. He also scored one while the team was playing a man short last year-in a 3-2 overtime loss to the Elmira Jackals on March 29, 2016.

Watters played in his 162nd game as a Royal (14g-45a=59pts, 188 pims) on Saturday, tying him with Malcolm MacMillan for seventh most in team history. (Next on the list is Rob Lalonde at 168.)

Derik Johnson played to a minus-1 (-1) in Friday's loss marking the first time in a span of sixteen games that he played to a minus.

Johnson, who bounced back to play to a plus-one (+1) in Saturday's win, leads the Royals in plus-minus at plus-13 (+13) in thirty-three games played.

Goaltender Martin Ouellette, who played his first game for Reading since November 27 (a span of twelve games while on recall to the Lehigh Valley Phantoms of the AHL), made a personal high thirty- six saves in Friday's 4-2 loss. Ouellette is 4-3-0-0 with a 3.27 goals against average and a .889 save percentage in eight games with Reading this year.

Goaltender Austin Lotz won his second game in two starts with Reading this season when he made thirty-one saves in Saturday's 4-3 victory over Adirondack. Lotz, who is 2-0-0-0 with the Royals (2.50 gaa / .919 save percentage) was recalled to the Tucson Roadrunners of the AHL on Monday.

LAST WEEK'S TRANSACTIONS 01/02/17 Add Steven Swavely (f) Loaned from Lehigh Valley Phantoms (AHL) Add Maxim Lamarche (d) Loaned from Lehigh Valley Phantoms (AHL) 01/03/17 Add Martin Ouellette (g) Loaned from Lehigh Valley Phantoms (AHL) 01/03/17 Delete Robbie Czarnik (f) Placed on ECHL Reserve List 01/02/17 Delete Tyrell Goulbourne (f) Placed on ECHL Reserve List Add Matt Wilkins (f) Activated from ECHL Reserve List 01/09/17 Delete Austin Lotz (g) Recalled to Tucson Roadrunners (AHL) End. 17 01-09

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