"HEY BARRY, IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT!"

*Please note while Barry's name remains at the bottom of this blog, he is on vacation and the information/views posted in his absence do not reflect Barry's views or the views of the Allen Americans organization.

The title above is written in jest. Many of us believe if we stick to our rituals, the team will win and all will be right with the world. Maybe if I would have wore my red socks, or maybe I should have had that Vegas Bomb before the game, maybe if wore my red jersey instead of the white jersey....maybe, maybe, maybe!  We know the rituals hard core fans perform.  If that were the case, no team would ever win, no child would win the spelling bee, there would be no winner at the Indy 500, no horse would ever win the Triple Crown, and that certainly would not have changed the result of the game last night.  The reality is the team has to play their best in order to win.  That was not the case last night.

Here are our observations of what did occur, please feel free to comment if you saw things differently:

• Allen only had 22 shots on goal, the only other time we had that few SOG was in game 1  of this series (where they won 8-2) but most were "quality" shots. The difference being traffic in front of the goalie to allow for rebounds and screens. All of our playoff games this season had 30+ SOG with 2 exceptions at 29
• Two potential Allen goals were thwarted on a Jamie Schaafsma break-away and a one-on-one opportunity by Chad Costello
• The lone goal scored by Justin Baker was from a screen by Patrik Valcak
• Gary Steffes, Chris Crane, and Spencer Asuchak combined for only 1 SOG in the entire game
• Since game 1 Ontario continues to give us problems in our offensive zone
• Power Play issues continue to plague Allen as we were 0-5 last night and 0-4 in game 2

For this series,as respects former Allen Americans, Judd Blackwater is a +3 with 1 goal and 1 assist and Matt Register is a -3 thus far with 1 goal, no assists. Register leads all defensemen in the  ECHL playoffs with 7 goals and 15 points.

Scoring the 1st goal continues to benefit the scoring team. In the playoffs for these 2 teams, the team scoring 1st has won 12 of 13 games.

Attendance last night at the Citizen's Business Bank Arena was 3522, bringing their playoff average to 2932.  Average playoff attendance at the AEC is  3221.

To sum it up, this scenario of losing 2 consecutive games, is not as dire as it may seem to some. In each of the last two years under Steve Martinson, Allen has lost 2 consecutive playoff games and went on to win the championship.


Did you know:  In the 2014-2015 season ECHL teams donated over $5.6 million to charity and have donated over $37 million in the last 10 seasons.