Prowlers Trounced in Carolina

The Port Huron Prowlers saw their nine-game win streak come to an end in a 5-1 loss to the Carolina Thunderbirds on April 4 in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. It was the first time since February 21 that Port Huron did not add a point in the standings.

“It hurts,” said Prowlers assistant coach Chris Paulin. “It was not a good game for us at all. I thought there were a lot of details and structure we put into place this week that we didn’t execute at a very high level. We gave them a lot of space to get their top guys coming through the middle of the ice. We had trouble breaking the puck out. I thought the physicality edge went to them as well.”

An even first period turned the Thunderbirds’ way when the Prowlers turned the puck over in their own end. Zach White fed a pass across the ice to Gus Ford for a one-timer that opened the scoring. 

Early in the second, Petr Panacek doubled the lead when he settled down and ripped home a pass from Jan Salak. Port Huron got on the board later in the period when Bobby Price got credit for the puck crossing the line on a jam play that involved him and both of his linemates.

“The pretty stuff wasn’t going in,” Price said. “We thought we might as well go to the net and dig the goalie in there and see what happens and we got lucky.”

In the dying seconds of period two, Dawson Baker finished off a play in tight to the Prowlers’ net and the back-breaking goal made it 3-1 heading to the third.

There, Jon Buttitta deflected home a power-play marker and Baker hit the empty net to seal the deal. Port Huron went 0-7 on the man advantage including a five-on-three late after the penalty sheet filled up on both sides.

“We had a couple of looks power play wise,” Paulin said. “We had a couple of good looks that we wanted to hit and attack this week that didn’t go in. I think positionally, we were a smidge off in a couple of areas, that will be an easy thing to address tomorrow.”

Reid Cooper made 25 saves but took the loss for the Prowlers.

Panacek and Buttitta had a goal and an assist apiece and Baker finished with a pair of tallies. Boris Babik stopped 32 shots and had four penalty minutes in net.

The teams wrap up their regular season series on April 5 at 6:05 P.M. at Fairgrounds Arena. The game can be seen live on the PHP Network YouTube channel.

Photo courtesy of Logan Allen