WICHITA, KS. – The Idaho Steelheads (32-13-4-0) fell to the Wichita Thunder (21-18-3-4) 4-1 Sunday afternoon at INTRUST Bank Arena. The Steelheads remain on the road moving forward, as they prepare for three games next week against the Tahoe Knight Monsters from Stateline, NV.
For the third straight game, the Thunder opened the scoring, with Matt Crasa finding the game’s first goal after skating around the Steelheads’ defense and tucking the puck by Ben Kraws to give Wichita a 1-0 just over four minutes into the game.
Despite outshooting the Thunder 12-8 over the opening 20 minutes, the Steelheads couldn’t find a response tally before the end of the frame.
In the second period the Thunder extended their lead, getting a power play tally from Spencer Blackwell, who scored from inside the crease on a centering pass from Jay Dickman to double Wichita’s lead with eight minutes remaining in the middle frame.
After stringing together several solid response shifts, the Steelheads finally cashed in with their first goal, as Mitch Wahl notched his ninth goal of the season to get Idaho on the board with just 2:15 remaining in the second period.
In the third period the Thunder pulled away once again, killing off a Steelheads power play and shortly after tallying another insurance marker at 7:38 from Jake Wahlin. The deficit proved to be too much to overcome for the Steelheads, as Nick Nardecchia added an empty net goal for Wichita in an eventual 4-1 win in the series finale.
Idaho’s Ben Kraws stopped 22 of 25 shots in the loss, while Wichita’s Roddy Ross turned aside 25 of 26 shots in the win.
ICCU THREE STARS
1) Roddy Ross (WIC, 25 saves, win)
2) Spencer Blackwell (WIC, 1-1-2, +1, 3 shots)
3) Jake Wahlin (WIC, 1-0-1, +2, 1 shot)
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