The Eagles arrived in San Diego for the last two games of their eight-game road trip. Colorado started the weekend sitting in second place in the Pacific Division, three points behind Ontario (LAK). The San Diego Gulls (ANA) were in seventh place in the division with a record of 25–19–8–4. They’re 3–4–2–1 in their last ten games but have the second-ranked penalty kill in the league. In the Pacific Division, the top seven teams make the playoffs. With the Tucson Roadrunners (UTA) only three points behind them, the Gulls are desperately clinging to their playoff spot.

Friday night: 6–3 victory

Jacob MacDonald, still playing limited games after rehabbing from surgery, was back in the lineup. Keaton Middleton was a healthy scratch. Tye Felhaber, Taylor Makar, Jason Polin, and Nikita Prishchepov remained out of the lineup because of injuries. Trent Miner started in net despite having started on Wednesday night against Ontario.

The Eagles had an early chance on the power play, but couldn’t convert. Danil Gushchin received a penalty for hooking midway through the period. The Gulls’ Ryan Carpenter scored on the ensuing power play. This continued a recent trend of giving up power-play goals. However, the more critical incident happened a few minutes later when Wyatt Aamodt took a puck to the face in front of the net. He immediately fell on the ice. He jumped up after a few seconds and headed straight down the tunnel, leaving an alarming amount of blood behind. The Eagles went to first intermission down 1–0, having been outshot 10–8.

At 6:21 of the second, Valtteri Puustinen picked up a big rebound to score the Eagles’ first goal of the night.

Unfortunately, the Eagles would give up yet another power-play goal a few minutes later after Jack Ahcan was called for high-sticking. Play became extremely chippy in the second with the refs seeming to call everything against the Eagles, yet ignoring when Jayson Megna was thrown to the ice, as well as a blatant elbow to the head thrown by a Gulls player. But despite showing obvious signs of frustration and being down 2–1, the Eagles didn’t give up. Late in the second,  Tristen Nielsen went to the box for cross-checking. This time, the Eagles not only killed the penalty, they also scored a short-handed goal to tie the game.

The third period began with 1:48 of four-on-four play. MacDonald was quick to take advantage of the extra ice, hitting a slapshot from the high slot, giving the Eagles their first lead of the night.

Approximately six minutes later, Gushchin extended the lead from the low slot, tipping in a pass from Megna. At 8:16 of the third, Nico Myatovic went to the box for tripping. Nielsen scored just as the power play expired, putting the Eagles up 5–2. At 15:48, Sasha Pastujov scored to close the gap to 5–3. With three minutes left, the Gulls pulled their goalie. Sean Behrens then scored an empty-net goal to make the score 6–3.

Saturday night: 2–1 loss

Despite having more than a dozen stitches and losing several teeth the night before, Aamodt was back in the lineup, as were MacDonald and Middleton. Alex Gagne was out because of injury and Megna was a healthy scratch to meet the AHL’s veteran rule.  Kyle Keyser started in net. Both teams wore special throwback jerseys as part of the AHL’s 90th anniversary celebration.

The Eagles once again gave up the first goal of the night. At 9:33 of the first, Nikita Nesterenko got a lucky bounce that trickled past Keyser and into the net. Both teams traded power-play opportunities, but neither scored. The Eagles went to the first intermission down 1–0. The score remained the same through most of the second period as well. But with approximately three minutes left in the period, Puustinen scored a power-play goal to tie the game.

The score remained 1–1 through the first half of the third period. Then, a turnover in the neutral zone gave the Gulls an odd-man rush down the ice. Keyser made the initial stop, but Jake Wise unfortunately fell on top of him in the crease, allowing a rebound shot to find the net.

The Eagles had some great high-danger opportunities through the last few minutes of the game, but couldn’t get another one past Tomas Suchanek and lost the game 2–1.

Takeaways:

After having several games get away from them because of sloppy penalties and a floundering penalty kill, the Eagles seemed to get back on track as this series wore on. They allowed two power play goals in the first half of Friday’s match, but locked things down after that. The Gulls had three more power plays that night, but they could not score, and Colorado came away with the win. On Saturday, the Eagles committed fewer penalties, despite a rather chippy game, and they didn’t allow any power play goals. As an added bonus, the Eagles scored a power play goal — their first since March 6 — against the third-ranked penalty kill in the league.

The list of injuries to Eagles players keeps getting longer. Players who missed games this series due to injury included:

      • Jason Polin
      • Taylor Makar
      • Ronnie Attard
      • Tye Felhaber
      • Hank Kempf
      • Alex Gagne
      • Wyatt Aamodt (although he started Saturday’s game, he only played one period before leaving again)
      • Matt Stienburg
      • Connor Kelley

Regardless, the Eagles powered through this eight-game road trip, bringing home nine of a possible sixteen points. Hopefully, some of those players will be ready to play again soon. The Eagles will also get some late-season help from newly signed defenseman Gustav Stjenberg. There’s also the possibility that Logan O’Connor will be ready for a conditioning stint with the Eagles this week.

Thanks to an Ontario loss on Saturday, the Eagles finished the weekend in exactly the same place where they began — in second place in the Pacific Division, three points behind the Reign.

Up Next

Both the Eagles and the Gulls head to Loveland. They’ll play back-to-back games on Tuesday and Wednesday at Blue Arena. AHLTV on FloHockey.com will stream the game.