Ryan Sproul hits the mark to lift Grand Rapids over Chicago in overtime, 2-1. The goal was Sproul’s third of the year. Photo/Grand Rapids Griffins
[dropcap]T[/dropcap]eemu Pulkkinen tallied his 17th goal of the season against division rival Chicago on the road Tuesday night to give him an AHL-leading scoring mark.
Pulkkinen’s goal opened scoring early for the Griffins at the 3:43 mark of the first frame. Grand Rapids led shooting at that point with four shots to none, with the final shot being the Pulkkinen goal. Tomas Nosek attempted a wraparopund shot that was deflected, allowing Pulkkinen to fire a wrister past Wolves netminder Matt Climie.
Grand Rapids would go on to win the game in overtime, 2-1.
After a defensive battle that lasted the remaining of the first period and the entirety of the second, Chicago got on the board to even things up just over five minutes into the third frame.
After Landon Ferraro was sent to the penalty box, Chicago took advantage of the situation and scored on the power play. Matthew Register fired a low shot on the goal through traffic. As Griffins goalie Tom McCollum tried to get into position, Jeremy Welsh tipped the puck home at the 5:22 mark. The goal is Welsh’s ninth of the year.
Both teams had a pair of power plays throughout the game but only Chicago capitalized.
Defense once again dominated and forced the division foes into extra time, where Grand Rapids would eventually win it in under three minutes.
After Chicago tried dumping the puck into the Grand Rapids zone, Ryan Sproul knocked it out of the air to allow Marek Tverdon to collect the puck. Tverdon led a four-on-two rush towards Climie that saw Tverdon swing wide left with Sproul streaking towards the net.
Tverdon dumped the puck to Sproul who tallied his third goal of the season 2:43 into the overtime period for the win.
Grand Rapids led a shooting onslaught against Chicago, tallying 31 shots to the Wolves’ 21. The Griffins improve on the year to 16-11-3-0 while Chicago falls to 17-12-4-0.
Grand Rapids hosts the Rockford IceHogs tonight at 6 p.m. to wrap up the 2014 calendar year. Chicago hosts Hamilton Friday at 7 p.m.
