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Thunder victimized by Utah's four-goal rally in the final 24 minutes

April 3, 2008 - arenafootball2 (af2)
Stockton Lightning News Release


WEST VALLEY CITY, Utah - Ryan Kinasewich bookended a four-goal rally by the Utah Grizzlies in the final 24 minutes of play with a three-point effort (2g-1a), helping send the Stockton Thunder (26-40-4, 56 points) to a 5-3 loss before a crowd of 2,778 at The E-Center on Friday night.

The loss drops the Thunder to ninth place in the National Conference with two games remaining in the regular season after the Phoenix RoadRunners beat the Bakersfield Condors 4-1 tonight. The top eight teams in the conference advance to the Kelly Cup Playoffs. The Thunder stands one point behind Phoenix for eight place in the Conference and three back of seventh-place Bakersfield.

The Thunder drew first blood on Brian Lee's power-play goal, his ninth of the season with 3:07 left on assists from Brandon Schwartz and Ryan MacMurchy. In the waning seconds of the man-advantage, Lee took Schwartz's deflected blast at the right point and zipped a low wrist shot through traffic that eluded Utah goaltender Nathan Lawson through the five-hole.

With 1:47 left, Justin Bourne answered for Utah with a power-play goal to knot the score at 1-1. Bourne followed up his own shot from the left circle that Thunder goaltender Tim Boron stopped and lifted the loose puck over Boron's outstretched glove with traffic in the slot.

The Thunder shot back on Tom Zanoski's 12th goal of the season for a 2-1 lead just 4:45 into the second period. Joel Stepp, who pounced on a Utah turnover in the high slot, glided to the base of the left circle to draw Lawson out of his net and fed Zanoski at the bottom of the right circle, who finished off the play with a one-timer.

Tim Verbeek's seventh goal of the season, a power-play goal, lifted the Thunder to its biggest lead of the game at 3-1. The goal, coming with 8:58 elapsed into the period, was set-up by Fredrik Johansson's blast at the left circle that Lawson kicked to the right wing. Verbeek pounced on the loose puck and fired a snap shot under the crossbar, past Lawson's glove.

Boron kept Utah at-bay with 9:45 into the period, denying a penalty shot by Olivier Labelle with a nifty glove save on Labelle's forehand bid.

Utah mounted their four-goal comeback with Kinasewich's 22nd goal of the year with 3:25 left in the second period, cutting the Thunder lead to 2-1 on a Jordan Hart assist. Veteran Scott Burt leveled the score at 3-3 on his 26th goal of the year, finishing a second-chance rebound when his initial bid from the low slot was denied by Boron.

Rob Sirianni netted the eventual game-winner on a seeing-eye shot with 4:22 gone in the third period, giving Utah a 4-3 cushion for his 13th goal of the year on a wrist shot from the left circle that glided through traffic and slid through the five-hole of Boron.

After a near-miss by Thunder center Brandon Schwartz's centering pass to MacMurchy, the Thunder pulled Boron for an extra skater. However, Utah put the game away with Kinasewich's second goal of the game and 23rd of the year with an empty-net goal with 27 seconds left.

Boron made 42 saves in spite of taking the loss.

NOTES: The Thunder missed the services of Jacob Micflikier (travel), Sebastien Bisaillon (travel), Luke Lynes (healthy scratch), Les Reaney (injured reserve), Phil Cole (injured reserve), Beau Geisler (injured reserve) and Ryan Geris (injured reserve) ... the Thunder fell to 1-5-1 in the season series against Utah and is now 8-10-1 in the lifetime series.

The Thunder continues the final four-game road trip of the regular season tomorrow against Utah, beginning at 6:05 p.m. from The E-Center. The game can be heard live exclusively online at http://www.stocktonthunder.com/, courtesy of B2 Networks.

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