Spiders show heart, beat tough Fighting Piranhas 3-2 in playoff opener

April 12, 2012

The Spiders came away with a much-needed and hard-earned 3-2 win over the Fighting Piranhas in the 1st round of the AHA playoffs.

The ice was tilted in the Piranhas favor early as their aggressive forecheck kept the Spiders pinned in their own zone. The Piranhas had several chances early in the 1st but blocked shots, key saves, and cleared loose pucks by the rear guard of the Spiders kept it scoreless.

The Piranha aggressive forecheck cost them early in the 2nd period with the Spiders on a 5-on-3 power play. The Piranhas were able to clear the puck but only to center ice. The forechecking forward got beat by the first pass from the D and the Spiders ended up with an odd-man rush into the zone. Jay Hilden beat the Piranha netminder short side as he seemed to be leaning toward the far post as Cory Vandenberghe was streaking to the net.

The Spider parade to the penalty box started midway through the second period and the result was two Fighting Piranha power play goals. The second period ended 2-1 and strong goaltending and effort to get to loose pucks saved the Spiders from being down more.

The Piranha forecheck slowed down by the 3rd period and the Spiders had more luck controlling the puck out of the zone. Spider goalie Brian Dow stood tall in net, making two point-blank saves and smothering multiple rebounds. Dow showed good positioning and patience on a 2-on-0 breakaway, not leaving much to shoot at as the shot went off the outside of the post. Whew!

Midway through the second period, the Spiders caught a break as a bouncing puck in the neutral zone turned into a 2-on-1. The initial shot came in high on the glove side and the goalie failed to play the puck cleanly as it bounced toward the open net. Cory Vandenberghe pounced and scored a Cory Vandenberghe-like goal — by skating hard and picking up rebounds as he launched himself headfirst at the puck and put it home just before plowing into the net.

After several missed Piranha penalties by the officials for tripping, boarding, interference (which led to a 3-on-1), and high sticking the Spiders seemed to have gotten a makeup call as a Piranha forward was tripped coming into the Spider zone. Or maybe it was karma for the ref allowing a goal after the whistle during a regular season matchup last year. The resulting turnover and rush resulted in Jim Maietta putting home his own rebound to put the Spiders up 3-2.

Several Spiders penalties in the last minutes of the game gave the Piranhas plenty of power play time, including some 5-on-3 time. The Spiders’ kill played smart position and the Piranhas never really controlled the puck, keeping them from pulling their goalie. Final score — 3-2 for the Spiders.

While the game featured a large number of penalties, including more 5-on-3 power plays than the Spiders had seen the entire season combined, the game was intense and competitive rather than chippy and cheap.

The Spiders win over the Fighting Piranhas is a huge win. The Pirnahas are very, very good team and beating a team of their caliber is impressive. The game came down to the Spiders converting more of their scoring chances than the Piranhas, and much of this was due to the strong goaltending of Brian Dow.

Elsewhere in C2 Pool A the Rack Attack played as expected in the 1 vs. 4 matchup, pounding the Beavers 7-3. The Spiders will face off against the Beavers in the 1:15pm matinee at BIG 1 on Friday.

Side note – At one time, the Beavers were in the running for the unofficial AHA Website Of The Year award. While the frequency of updates was far inferior to ahaspiders.com, the ridiculousness and quality of the updates, usually including old timey advertising or embedded youtube videos, at least deserved a nomination. Exhibit 1 – “Beavers Kick A Puppy, Punch A Kitten.” Alas, there have been no updates for the 2011/12 season. Hopefully the author is still on the team as it would be an honor to beat him 6-0.