ADIRONDACK COMES UP EMPTY IN 5-2 LOSS TO MARINERS

PORTLAND, ME  – The Adirondack Thunder turned a 3-0 deficit into a 3-2 game, but that’s as close as they would get as they dropped Friday night’s tilt to the Maine Mariners 5-2 at Cross Insurance Arena. 

Maine jumped out to a 3-0 lead just 5:34 into the game with goals from Ryan Gropp, Alex Kile and Drew Melanson. Gropp scored 81 seconds into the game when he fired a bad-angle shot from the bottom of the left circle up and over Alex Sakellaropoulos’ right shoulder for a 1-0 Mariners lead. 

Kile doubled the Maine advantage 75 seconds later when he collected a loose puck to the left of the Thunder cage and centered a puck that went off a skate and into the net. Melanson ended the quick trio of goals as he cleaned up a rebound opportunity off an original shot from Ryan Culkin for the early 3-0 lead.

That score stayed until the Thunder added their own quick flurry of goals early in the middle frame. Dennis Kravchenko got Adirondack on the board less than a minute into the second period on a tremendous individual effort. Kravchenko created a defensive zone turnover, put a deke on Brandon Halverson who stopped the original shot and the third-year pro collected his own rebound and fired past the Maine netminder for his fifth score of the season, an unassisted goal.

Mike Sdao pulled Adirondack within a goal when he potted his first goal for the Thunder at 4:00 of the second. After an extended offensive-zone possession for Adirondack, the play ended with John Edwardh feeding Sdao in the slot from behind the net where the 6-foot-4 defenseman one-timed his shot past Halverson to make it a 3-2 affair. 

Though Adirondack would control the pace of play for the remainder of the period, the Thunder couldn’t find that game-tying goal. Maine added two more to the scoreboard in the final five minutes courtesy of Alex Kile’s second of the game and John Furgele’s third goal of the season.

Adirondack is back in action on home ice tomorrow night when the Manchester Monarchs come to town. It is MARVEL Super Hero Night at Cool Insuring as well as the annual Teddy Bear Toss, presented by Aviation Mall. The Thunder will be rocking Black Panther-themed jerseys while the Monarchs will don those of Star-Lord. Puck drop is set for 7:00 p.m. in Glens Falls. 

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