April 25, 2005
By BRUCE BERLET, Courant Staff Writer
LOWELL, Mass. -- Steve Valiquette acknowledged he isn't any Einstein when it comes to numbers.
But the Wolf Pack goalie's assessment of himself and his teammates proved right on after they secured a 4-1 victory over Lowell Sunday for a 2-1 lead in the Atlantic Division semifinals.
"At this time of year we've learned about all we can learn, so it's basically a game of focus," Valiquette said. "If we can bring that every game, we're going to have the instincts working for us and the results are going to be there.
"It's kind of like being a student who has prepared well for a math test. When you go to that test and know you studied hard, you're going to do really well. You're not going to ace it every time, but tonight we feel like we really aced our game."
The Pack will take an edge into Game 4 of the best-of-seven series Tuesday in Lowell thanks to playing a nearly perfect road game. They slowed the high-octane Lock Monsters with tenacious checking and stout defense, got an early goal from Chad Wiseman off the first of Jeff Hamilton's two assists, then rode Valiquette's 32 saves to victory.
"We really limited their chances compared to what I saw [Jason] LaBarbera face the first two games," Valiquette said. "I'm not going to say it was easy because there were a few times they gave it to us in the first period, but for the most part our defense really stepped up, played a great game and made my job a lot easier."
While Valiquette may not be big into numbers, his stats against his former team are ridiculous. He's 6-0-0-1 with a 0.75 goals-against average and .976 save percentage. That doesn't count stopping the first 12 shots in a 1-0 shootout loss.
The Pack again shut down one of the AHL's top lines - All-Stars Eric Staal and Chuck Kobasew, and Colin Forbes. They had only six shots while going mostly against Jamie Lundmark, Ken Gernander and Jed Ortmeyer. Lundmark took the place of Garth Murray, whose right eye swelled shut after needing 10 stitches to close a cut caused by a deflected puck in a 2-1 loss Saturday.
Staal, Kobasew and Forbes each were minus-3; the Pack trio a combined plus-5.
Gernander, who tied Willie Marshall's AHL record by playing in his 120th Calder Cup game, scored the winner on a 35-footer at 5:18 of the second after Lundmark won a faceoff from Staal. Lundmark iced it with a steal and empty-net goal with 41.5 seconds left.
"I didn't try to change my game too much," Lundmark said. "You just have to realize you're out against their top line and make a few more defensive decisions to stay back a little. I tried to make our line be the line to cover instead of covering their line. That's what G, Orts and I talked about before the game, and I think our line outplayed them. It looked like they got pretty frustrated."
Lowell coach Tom Rowe agreed.
"They did a great job on us," he said. "They really stayed on top of us all over the ice."
Pack coach Ryan McGill credited both teams with playing hard in a high-intensity game. He said Hamilton, known for scoring, had more body checks in the first three games than he had all season, "and that's a compliment."
"Our team has responded all year when we haven't had to think too much about things and just get back the next day," McGill said. "What's helped is that we've tried to play physical all year, so it's not like we're getting out of our element. [But] for us to win 4-1, everyone has to be sharp because Lowell is such an explosive team. The guys did a good job of understanding we had to put the puck in the right areas and weren't overzealous."
The Pack had a 1-0 lead after a raucous first period that included three misconducts for each team and yapping between the coaches. Chad Wiseman scored when he took a cross-ice pass from Hamilton, raced around defenseman Mark Giordano and slid a backhander past Cam Ward (25 saves) at 5:02.
"[Wiseman] is like every other player that has assets with his legs," McGill said. "He has to use them all the time."
Valiquette made strong saves on Chad Larose, Ryan Bayda and Staal before Gernander scored. But Lowell got to 2-1 when Joel Bouchard and Jeff MacMillan lost control of the puck, enabling Mike Zigomanis and Bayda to break in, the latter beating Valiquette to the glove side at 17:54.
"It was a brain burp on all of our parts," Valiquette said. "It's a goal I'd like to have back."
But Valiquette made another big save on Staal late in the second, and Alexandre Giroux made it 3-1 at 6:00 of the third as he took a pass from Hamilton and made a deft move around Richie Regehr.
"We've talked all year about being physical and smart," MacMillan said. "We took the body and made good decisions. We played smart and hard."
