Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, March 20, 1994 TAG: 9403200161
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By RANDY KING STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: BIRMINGHAM, ALA. LENGTH: Medium
Fighting desperately to make the playoffs, the Express scored the biggest victory in the franchise's short history, beating the Birmingham Bulls 3-2 in a shootout before a crowd of 14,020 at the Birmingham-Jefferson Civic Center.
The victory reduced Roanoke's magic number for making the playoffs to two. If the Express can win tonight in Nashville or Tuesday at home against Huntington, it qualifies for postseason play.
The victory put Roanoke (35-28-3) into a fifth-place tie in the ECHL East Division with South Carolina (32-26-9). Richmond (33-28-5), which won 4-1 at Charlotte on Saturday, is two points behind.
"Let's go to Nashville and get it done, boys," Roanoke coach Frank Anzalone hollered in a happy visitors' locker room.
"If we don't get it done there, at the worst we'll get it done Tuesday at home," he said. "We're that close now. For a couple reasons, I'd like to get it done in Nashville.
"This team showed a lot of character tonight. It was a must-win, and the guys went out and got it done."
After Birmingham tied it at 2 on Tom Neziol's power-play goal with 2 minutes, 52 seconds left in regulation, Roanoke survived a five-minute overtime, then took the shootout 2-0 on goals by Oleg Yashin and Jeff Jestadt.
At the other end, goaltender Paul Cohen shut down the Bulls, stopping all four Birmingham shooters.
"We know we made a big mistake last night [a 7-5 loss at Huntsville], and that really hurt us," Cohen said. "They caught us off-guard, and we knew we'd have to come in here and play a great game. It was pretty much do-or-die tonight."
Playing in a hostile environment, the Express came out undaunted, controlling the flow for the first eight minutes.
Roanoke outshot Birmingham 10-3 during that first period but came up empty against Bulls goalie Brad Mullahy. Birmingham got the game's first break at the 8:46 mark, when the Express' Pat Ferschweiler high-sticked Bulls forward Jay Schiavo. After Birmingham enforcer Jerome Bechard responded by leveling Ferschweiler, referee Terry Koharski gave the Roanoke forward a double-minor for high-sticking and Bechard a roughing minor.
Express defenseman Claude Barthe expressed his displeasure with Koharski's decision, and promptly drew an unsportsmanlike-conduct minor, a costly infraction that set up a two-man Bulls advantage.
Birmingham needed 23 seconds to cash in on the five-on-three power play, with Chris Marshall slapping an ice-hugging 45-foot drive past Cohen. The Roanoke goalie had little chance to make the save as he was screened by the Bulls' Joe Flanagan.
Birmingham nursed a 1-0 lead to the 8:08 mark of the second period, when a brawl broke loose after Barthe started pummeling Schiavo in the Roanoke crease after a stoppage in play. When Bulls defenseman Dave Craievich stepped in to help Schiavo, virtually everybody on the ice joined the fray. Three fights broke out simultaneously, the best bout a heavyweight punch-athon between Roanoke's Gairin Smith and Craievich. After Koharski and both linesmen separated the parties, Smith broke loose from linesman Jim Combs' grasp at center ice and rushed after Craievich, who was skating off with his back to Smith.
Combs chased down Smith and tackled him before he could get to Craievich.
Koharski dished out 68 minutes in penalties and sent eight players to the box - four from each team. Smith and Craievich were ejected from the game.
After that mess was cleaned up, the aroused Express got some breaks in the offensive end. Tony Szabo tied it at 1 at the 10:49 mark with a fluke goal. Szabo, working to the left rear of Mullahy, fired the puck toward the crease, where it caught the stick of the unsuspecting Bulls goalie and caromed into the net.
by CNB