COMETS CAN'T OVERCOME EARLY DEFICIT
Nov 10, 2017Utica, N.Y. – The Utica Comets fell to the Charlotte Checkers by a score of 5-2 Friday night at the Adirondack Bank Center.
Nicolas Roy netted the game’s first goal with 3:29 to go in the opening frame, intercepting a pass from Evan McEneny and going in on a two-on-none. Aleksi Saarela had the assist on the shorthanded goal.
Clark Bishop extended the lead to 2-0 at the 11:46 mark of the second period, firing a wrist shot past Richard Bachman. Julien Gauthier and Andrew Poturalski were credited with the assist. Jayson Megna cut the lead to 2-1 with a shorthanded goal of his own. Carter Bancks and Evan McEneny tallied the assists.
Poturalski regained the two goal lead 33 seconds into the third period. Trevor Carrick and Phil Di Giuseppe picked up the assists. The Checkers struck again five minutes when Janne Kuokkanen got one behind Bachman with assists from Carrick and Tyler Ganly. The Comets responded two minutes later with a power play goal from Michael Chaput. Nikolay Goldobin and Philip Holm collected the assists. Bishop put the Checkers back up by three with 9:09 to go in the game with a breakaway goal. Andrew Miller assisted on Bishop’s second goal of the night.
Bachman stopped 26 of 31 shots in the loss. His record falls to 1-4-0. Nedeljkovic finished with 22 saves to improve to 7-0-0. The Comets power play went 1-5, while the penalty kill gave up one goal in five attempts.
The Comets are back in action Wednesday night as they hit the road to take on the Laval Rocket. Puck drop is at 7:30 p.m. The game can be heard on 94.9 KROCK and viewed on AHL Live.