Four unanswered goals gave the Connecticut Whale a 6-3 win over the Springfield Falcons at the XL Center in Hartford on Friday night.
Former Falcon Andre Deveaux opened up the scoring at 3:26 of the first period. The score remained even until Cam Atkinson registered his 28th goal of the season on a power play at 12:51. Atkinson’s tally leaves him one off the pace for most goals in the league (Cory Conacher, 29) and tied for the league lead in PPG (Jacob Micflikier, Hershey) with 13 on the power play. The play started with Martin St. Pierre firing a shot from the right side that was redirected by Tomas Kubalik, and Cam was perfectly placed to tie the game.
Connecticut came roaring back when Mats Zuccarello scored his 11th of the season at 13:43, giving the Whale a 2-1 lead. Connecticut outshot the Falcons 9-8 in the period.
Cameron Talbot took to the Whale net to start the second period. Starter Chad Johnson left the game with an undisclosed injury. Cody Bass welcomed Talbot to the game when he beat him cleanly from the high slot for his third goal of an injury plagued season. Assists on the Bass goal went to Kubalik and Brent Regner.
Captain Dane Byers gave the Falcons their first lead of the game when he broke in on Talbot, converting a nice feed from Kubalik. Greg Amadio picked up the other helper. However, the lead didn’t last very long when Ryan Bourque scored his fourth of the season at 18:21. The clubs went into their locker rooms tied at 3 after 40 minutes of action.
It seems like whenever these two teams meet, Deveaux is always in the middle of the action. Friday night was no exception, as he picked up his 15th goal of the season while Cam Atkinson was in the box for hooking. The PPG at 8:05 energized Connecticut, as they really opened up the play after that goal.
Bourque and recently acquired Casey Wellman closed out the scoring with goals in the last five minutes to ice the victory for the Whale.
The Falcons return to action Saturday night when they host the Providence Bruins at the MassMutual Center in Springfield at 7PM.