San Diego Blanked at Coachella Valley
February 4, 2023 - American Hockey League (AHL) - San Diego Gulls News Release
POSTGAME NOTES
San Diego - 0 at Coachella Valley - 4
Feb. 4, 2023
Acrisure Arena
Box Score: San Diego - 0 at Coachella Valley - 4
Postgame Interview Link:
Assistant Coach Kris Sparre
The San Diego Gulls were held scoreless by the Coachella Valley Firebirds tonight at Acrisure Arena, falling 4-0 and bringing their overall record to 12-34-0-0 and 7-17-0-0 on the road.
Michael Del Zotto, Pavol Regenda and Hunter Drew each posted three shots in the effort, tying for the most among San Diego skaters.
Lukas Dostal stopped 27-of-31 shots in the loss.
The Gulls stopped 6-of-8 of Coachella Valley's chances on the man advantage tonight, killing 11-of-13 (84.6%) of the Firebirds' power-play opportunities during their weekend series. San Diego's penalty kill on the road is operating at 82.7 % success rate, second in the AHL's Pacific Division, sixth in the Western Conference and 11th in the league. Overall, the Gulls rank fourth in the Pacific Division, seventh in the Western Conference and tied for 12th in the AHL with an 81.2% kill rate.
The Gulls return home to face the Firebirds for the third consecutive time on the team's annual Pink in the Rink Night on Friday, Feb. 10 at Pechanga Arena San Diego (7 p.m. PST).
POSTGAME QUOTES
SAN DIEGO GULLS
Assistant coach Kris Sparre
On the loss to Coachella Valley
A lot of penalties. You know, a lot of our top players played a lot of minutes tonight. Back-to-back nights. I think we ran out of gas.
On shuffling the lines during the game
We've had a hard time scoring goals 5-on-5 in the past few games. I think when that happens, you're just looking to solve some problems and start putting the puck in the net. Line shuffling sometimes will do that for you. In this case tonight, it didn't, but like I said, we had some really big efforts in the last two games from guys like Rocco (Grimaldi) and Bo (Groulx) and (Michael) Del Zotto logging a lot of minutes on the penalty kill. And then that stuff catches up to you. If you take penalties, it's going to catch up to you.
On the team's penalties
That team skates really well over there and they hunt pucks, and they play a really fast game with a lot of pace, and if you're not moving your feet, you're chasing, and we took a lot of stick penalties tonight in result of that. It's unfortunate, but we'll be looking to solve that moving forward.
On the benefits of the All-Star break
I think it's good. You know, we haven't had the success that we wanted to have in the first part of this year. To get these guys a mental break, away from the rink, come back with a lot of fire because at the end of the day, we're still chasing a playoff spot. We believe we can do it. We gotta get on a bit of a run here though.
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