The Gulls are in the midst of their roughest stretch since October and Wednesday night, it was a rare visit from the Iowa Wild that added to their woes, this time in the form of a 3-2 defeat.
The Gulls (12-15-2-2) are winless in their last five games and the recent skid is the team’s worst since opening the season with six straight losses. Iowa (21-12-2-2) has won four straight.
Anthony Stolarz started in net for San Diego and finished with 40 saves, including several impressive stops during a key stretch of the third period.
Blake Pietila and Sam Carrick scored for the Gulls, who were outshot 42-30.
“Too many turnovers, too many defensive breakdowns,” said Pietila. “(Stolarz) kept us in it, but we made just one mistake too many and it cost us.”
After a sluggish start for both teams, Pietila gave San Diego a 1-0 lead early in the second period with a rebound and putback goal for his seventh tally of the season.
Iowa’s Sam Anas answered at 4:16 when he gathered a loose puck in front of the Gulls net and snapped a shot past Stolarz.
After Anas scored again to push Iowa ahead at 13:16 of the second, Carrick tied it up at 2-2 with a power play goal on a blast from near the blue line for his team-high 13th goal of the season.
Mitch McClain gave Iowa a 3-2 lead when he pinged a shot in off the post and past Stolarz at 8:46 of the third period.
The Gulls face Iowa again Friday night at Pechanga and keeping good defensive structure while keeping possession of the puck and ing better in the offensive zone will be key to getting a win.
One bright spot: the Gulls have killed off 13 straight opposing power plays. That precision needs to carry over to other aspects of their game.
“I think sometimes teams come into San Diego and it’s sunny out, it’s nice and we have to make it not a nice place to be here on the ice,” coach Kevin Dineen said.
“We have not done a good enough job of doing that. That is the overall feeling, that we need to be tougher to play against.”
Notable
The San Diego State men’s hockey team will host the University of Iowa for a game at Pechanga on Saturday at 12:30 p.m. Fans can purchase a ticket good for that game and Saturday night’s Gulls-Ontario contest at 7 p.m. at www.SanDiegoGulls.com/SDSUhockey.
Carter is a freelance writer.
