San Diego Gulls Report for the week of April 3-9
By Greg Johnson
It’s a good thing the San Diego Gulls’ season is coming to a close this week. They keep losing two of three games. If that was able to continue, they would find themselves outside of the playoffs.
As it is, the Gulls are almost certain to be in the postseason at the same time as their parent club up north, the Anaheim Ducks. This week will tell us exactly where the Gulls will finish.
Playoffs
The Gulls’ first order of business this week is to get a point. They need only that single overtime game or a win to clinch a playoff berth.
The Gulls stand three points behind the Ontario Reign (Los Angeles Kings affiliate) with three games remaining for each club. That may sound like a huge mountain to climb. But just look at what the Anaheim Ducks did this week to squeak by the Kings and Sharks into second place. It’s certainly not impossible.
The problem is this: The San Diego Gulls are virtually neck and neck with the Texas Stars (Dallas Stars). The Gulls will need to win more than one game this week if they want to avoid the first place Tucson Roadrunners (Arizona Coyotes) in the first round. Guess who they play in all three of those season-ending games. That’s right, the Gulls have a home and double-home with Tucson.
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They’d better hope the Roadrunners want to avoid them in the first round. Maybe they do. The Gulls are 5-4-0 against the Roadrunners, while Tucson is 3-1-0 against Texas. If I was Tucson, I’d go a little light on San Diego at the end of the season. However, they also need two points to sew up first place over Ontario.
Standouts
Escondido native Austin Ortega was scratched for San Diego’s Wednesday game against the San Jose Barracuda (San Jose Sharks). The Gulls were shut out that night. So Ortega was reinserted into the lineup Friday in Ontario. All he did was put five shots on goal with two assists in a 3-2 loss. The undersized Californian is earning some respect in the AHL.
The real standout offensively last week was Kalle Kossila. He had two goals and two assists in three games. The Finnish left wing has put together a good season with 51 points in 52 games. Most impressively, only seven of his 19 goals this season are on the power play. You’ll be seeing more of him up in Anaheim in the future.
Top Stopper
Reto Berra has been warming the bench up in Anaheim since Duck starting goalie John Gibson was injured last week. As a result, Kevin Boyle has had to shoulder the entire load for the Gulls. And he’s doing a great job.
Boyle let in nine goals over a three-game span. That’s a 3.02 goals against average. That is reason enough for San Diego to win only one game.
PIMs
Forwards Corey Tropp and Mike Liambas led the Gulls with 11 penalty minutes each last week. But who cares? The standout in this category last week was 32-year-old Steve Oleksy. The American defenseman had 9 penalty minutes last week. But Oleksy’s fight Friday night against Ontario’s Austin Wagner was a beauty! I can’t guarantee you Wagner ever got back up. He wasn’t dressed for Saturday night’s game.
Attendance
San Diego sold out their building Saturday night against Ontario. 12,920 fans saw a great game on Fan Appreciation Night. The Gulls still lead the AHL in attendance with an average of 9,305 fans per game. That’s only 147 per game ahead of the Cleveland Monsters (Columbus Blue Jackets). San Diego has only a Wednesday night home game left, while Cleveland has home games Thursday and Friday to try to make up the difference. This race will be as close as the playoff race.
Next: Anaheim Ducks Three Stars of the Week (April 2 - April 8)
Games This Week
Imagine if the Gulls play Tucson in the first round of the playoffs. That would potentially give the teams eight straight games against each other. The Roadrunners visit San Diego Wednesday, and the Gulls will play in Tucson Friday and Saturday to finish their regular season. In the AHL, the first round of the playoffs is a best-of-five series. We’ll find out this week if these two rivals want to see each other more. That eighth game would be a nasty one.