Allen Americans fans got to witness a rarity at the CUTX Event Center last night in Allen's 8-4 win over Tulsa. The last time the Americans scored eight goals at home was over five years ago. You would think an 8-4 game would be a one-sided affair, but quite the contrary. It looked like rust winning out over rest (Allen hadn't played a game in 10 days), when Tulsa took a 3-1 lead early in the second period.
The game changed when Chase Maxwell left the ice in pain in the second period after being checked on a play where there was no call by the referee. This happened shortly after Tulsa took a 3-1 lead. From that point to the end of the second period, the Americans outshot Tulsa 13-2 and scored four goals. (9:46, 15:33, 16:51, 18.40). Allen took a 5-3 lead into the third period, and a win was pretty much assured. The Americans haven't lost a game all season when leading after the second period (10-0-0-0), and Tulsa hasn't won a game all season when trailing after the second period (0-14-0-0).
Here are what the stats say about the game:
- 12 Allen players had points in the game, 7 had goals, and 10 had assists.
- Colton Hargrove, Hank Crone, and Colby McAuley each had a goal and two assists.
- Allen scored the 1st goal and improved its record when scoring 1st to 9-1-2-0 (.833).
- Allen was 2-2 on the power play and has power-play goals in the last five games. The Americans have improved their power play percentage to 18.9% (ranked #13).
- Allen was 2-4 on the penalty kill and has given up five power play goals (5-12) in the last three games. Allen has had the top penalty kill percentage for weeks, once averaging over 90%. After last night, the penalty kill has lost its #1 spot. The power play percentage is down to 85.8%, and is ranked #5.
- Sam Sedley had two assists in the game to extend his assist streak to six games and point streak to nine games. Both are the longest streaks in the league this season.
- Brayden Watts had an assist to extend his points streak to eight games, the second-longest streak in the league.
- With the win, Allen has now won 6 of the last 7 games, 8 of the previous 11, and 10 of the previous 14 games. The Americans' points percentage has improved from .423 to .574 in the last five weeks.
- Goals scorers for Allen were Hargrove (5), Katic (10), Blaisdell (9, 10), McAuley (6), Prefontaine (1), Crone (7), Warmuth (4). Here are the video highlights: https://echl.com/videos/tulsa-oilers-vs-allen-americans-dec-31-2025
- Here is the game recap from the Allen Americans: https://allenamericans.com/news/2025/12/game-recap-americans-blast-oilers-8-4
- Next up for the Americans is a three-game series against the Tahoe Knight Monsters on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. The team didn't have much time to celebrate the win or New Year's Eve, as the bus was leaving for the airport around 9:30 am this morning. It will be a challenging three games for the Americans against a team ahead of them in the standings. Allen has won every series they have been in since Thanksgiving. If the Americans can take two of three games in Tahoe, they will pass the Knight Monsters in points percentage.
- Coach Martinson's post-game chat with season ticket holders was one of those you had to be there type chats. He covered several topics, both serious and light-hearted, not meant for the blog. Here is some of what Martinson had to say about the win:
"It was nice to have a little fun on the bench tonight after all that has gone on the past week."
"When we were down 3-1 and getting outshot almost 2 to 1, I was thinking, how can this week get any worse. It was a nice comeback and great to see a bunch of guys contributing and all the lines involved."
"It was fun seeing all those guys score tonight, and we had some good hits as well. Anania and LaDonne both had some nice checks."
"Murray has a nagging injury that has been bothering him, so he will stay home. Otherwise, everyone will go on the trip to Tahoe."
OTHER COMMENTS
- I haven't heard or seen any information about the ECHL rescheduling the 41 games that were postponed during the strike. From what I can tell, no teams have announced rescheduled games. It makes you wonder if the season might need to be extended to fit in all of these games.
- Since Allen's turnaround started 14 games ago, one of the reasons is more balanced scoring. Here are the leading goal scorers over the last 14 games. Goals scored in the last four games are in parentheses:
- 7 goals - Katic (5)
- 7 goals - Blaisdell (3)
- 6 goals - Asuchak (2)
- 6 goals - Watts (2)
- 6 goals - McAuley (1)
- 5 goals - Crone (1)
- 4 goals - Hargrove (2)
- Allen's team plus/minus is +20, but that hides how good the plus/minus has been recently. Last night, the plus/minus was +19. In the 6-0 win in Tulsa just before the Christmas break, the team's plus/minus was +25. A month ago, it was -63.
- Allen's goal scoring has improved recently. The Americans have averaged 5.00 goals per game over the last seven games. Some Allen players are among the league leaders in points:
- Brayden Watts is #13 in the league in points (26 points)
- Sam Sedley is #6 among defensemen in points (20 points)
- Andre Anania is #15 among defensemen in points (15 points)
- There are 36 ECHL players with 10 or more goals, led by Brendan Hoffman (Idaho) with 16. Allen has three: Brayden Watts (11), Danny Katic (10), and Harrison Blaisdell (10). Only three teams have more 10+ goal scorers than Allen. Atlanta, Idaho, and Tahoe have four players with 10 or more goals. FYI, there are 11 ECHL teams with no 10-goal scorers.
- Here is the odd stat of the day. Allen scored eight goals at home last night for the first time in over five years, but the Americans have scored eight goals on the road many times. Here are all of the eight-goal games since Allen scored eight goals at home. Plus, the dates of back-to-back eight-goal games against Kansas City.
- 12/31/2025: 8-4 win over Tulsa at home
- 03/02/2024: 8-4 win at Wichita
- 02/24/2023: 8-5 win at Utah
- 02/04.2023: 8-1 win at Utah
- 03/18/2022: 8-5 win in Wichita
- 01/16/2022: 8-0 win in Tulsa
- 01/20/2020: 8-0 win over Kansas City at home
- 01/18/2020: 8-2 win in Kansas City
DID YOU KNOW: The ECHL Stats page today is about penalty minutes. FYI, in 2014-15, when Allen won its first Kelly Cup, the Americans led the ECHL with 1644 penalty minutes, averaging 22.83 minutes per game.
Great win. Let's hope the boys can continue the momentum in Tahoe.
ReplyDeleteGo Red!
Yep….definitely a great comeback last night. Keep the momentum and continue to build upon this.
ReplyDelete