Oklahoma City, OK – The Amarillo Wranglers defeated the Oklahoma Warriors 3-2 in a shootout on Sunday night at Blazers Ice Centre. Amarillo is now 4-1 against Oklahoma this season and improved to 9-5-1 on the season with the win.
This game was the third game of three straight games at Blazers Ice Centre and the fifth of five straight between Amarillo and Oklahoma. The Wranglers won the first three meetings before falling in Saturday’s matchup. Connor McDonough, who started all four previous matchups between the two clubs, got the start in goal again for the Wranglers. McDonough came into the game with a record of 6-3-1 with a 2.6 GAA and a .903 save percentage. For the second straight night, Dylan Johnson was the starting goaltender for Oklahoma, carrying a record of 3-1-1 and a 2.25 GAA.
For the third straight game, Oklahoma opened the scoring. 7:15 into the first period, Bryce Howard scored for the Warriors to make it 1-0, with assists coming from Drew Sutton and Riley Brueck. The Howard goal would be the only goal of the first period. Amarillo went 2/2 on the penalty kill and was unsuccessful on its one power play opportunity in the first.
Oklahoma jumped out to a 2-0 lead early in the second period, when Landon Fleming scored his second goal of the year from Kaden Nelson and Carter Sproule. The Wranglers PK unit came up with three more big stops before the Wranglers got another power play opportunity of their own with 3:35 to go in the period. Amarillo would cash in on the power play with a goal from Roman Zap to make it 2-1 with 3:13 remaining in the second frame. McNaughton and McDonald picked up assists on the goal where Zap was able to pick up a loose rebound in front of the net for the score. Amarillo has now scored a power play goal in each of its last seven games. Shots were 24-10 in favor of the Warriors, but the Wranglers found themselves down by only one heading into the third period.
Amarillo got another power play chance with 11 minutes to go in regulation, and once again they were able to make the most of the opportunity. Silimlar to the Zap goal, Alex Papaspyropoulos was able to pick up a loose puck outside of the blue paint for the score to tie the game up 2-2. Connor McNaughton and Trey Williams picked up the assists on Papaspyropoulos’ fifth goal of the year. In a critical moment of the game with the score tied in the third period, Connor McDonough made a highlight reel save to keep the game tied. McDonough laid it all on the line with a fantastic windmill save to deny the Warriors on the breakaway. Sixty minutes wasn’t enough, as the game was tied after regulation.
Neither team scored in overtime, so the game went to a three man shootout. Amarillo shot first, with Nolan Gagnon beating Johnson for the early edge in the shootout. McDonough then denied Sutton on Oklahoma’s first attempt. Topi Puikkonen then scored on Amarillo’s second shot to give the Wranglers a 2-0 edge. Kaden Nelson hit the post on the Warriors second shot to help the Wranglers complete the comeback and send Amarillo to victory in the shootout.
Connor McDonough stopped 29 of 31 shots faced in the win. Connor McNaughton recorded his third mulit-point game of the year with two assists. Zap and Papaspyropoulos both had one goal. Amarillo’s power play went 2/3 and the penalty kill was a perfect 6/6.
It’ll be a quick turnaround for the Wranglers as they will host the Shreveport Mudbugs on Thursday and Friday at the Budweiser Bull Pen. Thursday’s game will have an 11 AM start time for the Kids Day Game. It will be the first of four meetings between the Mudbugs and Wranglers this season. You can get your tickets at panhandletickets.com or watch live on NATV.