Prowlers Swept At Home by Danbury

The Port Huron Prowlers lost control of third place in the Empire Division as they fell to the Danbury Hat Tricks 5-2 on Nov. 30 at McMorran Place. Danbury has now won back-to-back games for the first time this season.

“Everything they were getting, we were giving to them,” said Prowlers captain Austin Fetterly. 
“We didn’t play in our structure and we didn’t play with intensity. They’re not that good of a team, we just gave them everything they needed to beat us both nights.”

The Hat Tricks wasted no time scoring as seven seconds into the contest, Cory Anderson found Noah Robinson to make it 1-0 before all of the fans had found their seats. Danbury doubled the advantage when Jonny Ruiz shot the puck off of Valtteri Nousiainen’s pad on a two-on-one chance. The rebound came right to Connor Woolley who put home his third goal of the weekend.

The Prowlers power play responded as Ludwig Thellström skated coast-to-coast and fed a pass to Joel Frazee in the slot. He deposited his third man-advantage goal in as many games.

Three minutes later, on a four-on-three Hat Tricks power play, Ruiz found Aleksandr Vasilyev all alone in front of the net. He put home his first with Danbury to make it 3-1 heading into the break.

Tucker Scantlebury pulled Port Huron within one again as he fired a shot from the right-wing circle off a rush to the top corner past Connor McCollum’s glove, but two minutes later, Kyle Gonzalez snuck past the Prowlers’ defense and put in his first of the season.

In the final minute of the second, Ruiz won a faceoff forward in the Port Huron zone and slid the puck to the middle of the ice where it banked in off of a Prowler skate. Neither team found the back of the net in the third.

Nousiainen took the loss after making 32 saves. Port Huron has given up five goals in back-to-back games for the first time this season.

Ruiz led the way with a four-point night while Vasilyev added an assist to his goal and Josh Labelle dished out a pair of helpers. McCollum made 30 stops in the win.

The Prowlers head to Binghamton on December 7 and 8 with puck drop for both nights coming at 7 P.M. Both games can be found on the PHP Network YouTube channel. Port Huron has not won a game outside of the state of Michigan this season.

“You have to win games on the road, especially in the playoffs,” Fetterly said. “You have to win games on the road to get to the playoffs too and there’s no more waiting around to start doing that. We have to start right now.”

Photo courtesy of Delta Imaging