Fresno Monsters 5, San Diego Sabers 6(OT)
The San Diego Sabers expanded on their winning ways from last weekend as they persisted to an exciting overtime victory at home against the Fresno Monsters. It was a true battle of attrition as both teams traded goals and opportunities all night. William Baird’s overtime winner at 3:47 turned him the hero in the Sabers’ first meeting with the Monsters.
Ondrej Vaculik (3G) registered a hat-trick while three more Sabers had multiple point nights. For the Monsters, Petr Philippov (2G-1A), Narek Aleksanyan (1G-3A), and Zackory Turpin (3A) cashed-in several points.
The Monsters started the way they needed to netting the game’s first goal at 10:01 of the first. It didn’t stun the Saber’s who responded in the ensuing action, two minutes later. The trend continued for the length of the game as Fresno had three different leads, although, the Sabers always found a way to beat Max Karlenzig.
The Icoplex faithful was treated to a five goal third period to set up the intense overtime period.
Fresno Monsters 3, San Diego Sabers 6
With a better defensive effort, the following night, and the same offensive punch, San Diego was able to capture their fourth win in a row. The Sabers withstood a higher volume of shots this time around, but Calijah Hunter stopped 46 of 49 shots.
Quinn Patenaude (2G) and Trevor Wittkopf (2G-1A) each had two goals and nine more Sabers tallied points. On the other side, The Monsters received contribution from William Markstedt (1G-2A), Ty Woodard (1G-1A), Tristan Baker (1G-1A), and Mikhail Gavrilenko (2A).
Fresno got on the board first but, again, didn’t have enough defensively to prevent the Sabers from putting together consecutive goals. With the game 2-1 in favor of Fresno, the Sabers scored three straight goals to end the first period 4-2. The second period was deadlocked and the feeling of a comeback lingered going into the third when Fresno’s Markstedt made it 4-3.
San Diego didn’t give up their lead and continued with two goals at 9:39 and 2:34 of the third to end the game 6-3.
Fresno Monsters 4, San Diego Sabers 1
The Fresno Monsters stole one on the road and avenged themselves with a 4-1 win thanks to a late game push.
Four different goal scorers showed up for Fresno including Petr Philippov, Zackory Turpin, Tristan Baker and Ty Woodard (1G-1A). Max Karlenzig made 37 of 38 saves in the backstopping effort.
San Diego’s Ondrej Vaculik scored the lone goal from an assist by Samuel Kapusta.
The Monsters scored first in all three games during the weekend except they were able to outmuscle the Sabers on Sunday. Woodard was able to break the deadlock at 12:24 of the second period before San Diego’s Vaculik tied it at 10:51 just shortly after.
Fresno regained the lead to closeout the second period and then netted two goals in under thirty seconds in the third period to secure the win.