The Calgary Wranglers returned to action on Friday night, visiting the Abbotsford Canucks days ahead of the AHL All-Star Classic. Back by Lucas Ciona’s two goals and Sam Morton’s three points, the Wranglers handed interim head coach Brett Sutter his first victory, 5-1.
Hours before puck drop, Calgary announced that Joe Cirella would miss two weeks after routine eye surgery, allowing Sutter to take over for his first head coaching opportunity.
Related: Wranglers Announce Interim Coach Out For Two Weeks
Ultimately, the game’s outcome was never out of the question as the Wranglers jumped to a 2-0 lead in the first period. Martin Frk opened the scoring at 5:58 with his 15th of the year.
After the Canucks failed to get into the offensive zone, Sam Honzek chipped the puck up to Frk, who sniped one home for a 1-0 lead. Morton had the second helper on the play, his first of three points tonight.
In the dying seconds of the period, the Wranglers passed the puck around the zone before the disc ended up on Morton’s stick in the slot, and he fired a backhand through a screened Arturs Silovs, giving Calgary a commanding 2-0 lead. Assists on the play went to Hunter Brzustewicz and Frk.
Neither team scored in the first ten minutes of the second period, but Devin Cooley stoned Arshdeep Bains on a breakaway during a Wranglers power play, arguably the save of the game.
Then, Ciona netted the first of two at 13:27. During a scramble in the Canucks end, Ciona rang one off the post before the bouncing puck hit off a defenseman and trickled in over a sprawling Silovs.
Surprisingly, David Silye earned an assist on the play despite the mad scramble; none of the Abbotsford players managed to get a touch on the puck.
After being denied previously on a breakaway, Bains tallied the Canucks’ only goal at 16:50 on the power play to cut the game’s deficit to 3-1 heading into the final period.
However, Ciona scored another insurance goal, his second of the night at 9:51. After another Canucks turnover at the Wranglers blueline, Parker Bell carried into the offensive zone and fed a streaking Brzustewicz who got a shot on goal that Silovs deflected out into the slot.
Ciona swooped in untouched and buried a backhand to put the Wranglers up 4-1 with half a period left to play.
Although they were down by three goals, Abbotsford pulled Silovs, and Jonathan Aspirot sealed the victory with an empty net goal at 18:27.
Once again, the Canucks failed to gain the zone, and the puck came out to the neutral zone, and neither Ilya Solovyov nor Morton took a shot at the empty cage, feeding Aspirot for his fourth of the year.
In his second game since returning from injury, Cooley gave up a single goal and finished the night with 30 saves, most likely his last appearance before playing in the All-Star Classic next week.
Meanwhile, Silovs made only 15 saves on 19 shots as the Canucks outshot the Wranglers by a 31-20 margin. Each team tallied a power play goal, with the home team going 1-for-5 on the man advantage, with Calgary finishing 1-for-4.
Interestingly, the Wranglers scored five goals for the second time in three games and the fifth in seven games.
