By Aberdeen goalie Damon Cunningham stopped all 27 shots he faced as the Wings completed a weekend sweep of Watertown with a 3-0 victory on Saturday, Oct. 5 at Prairie Lakes Ice Arena in Watertown.
The Wings are 5-0 to start the North American Hockey League season.
Aberdeen head coach Scott Langer credited Cunningham with keeping the team in the game during an inconsistent first period.
Langer
“Damon made some big saves for us, especially in that first period,” Langer said. “We didn’t come out of the gate really well and had a very so-so period. Killing off nearly 70 minutes of penalties (Friday, Oct. 4) may have had something to do with it.”
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Gavin Reed broke a scoreless tie at the 15:31 mark of the second period to give Aberdeen a 1-0 lead.
“Since he’s come back, Gavin has been a different man. He’s so dialed in right now, and he wants to be one of our go-to guys and play heavy minutes, and we’ve given them to him and he’s accepted it. He scored a strong side one-timer, which is extremely difficult for any goalie to stop,” Langer said.
Leonid Bulgakov continued his strong start to the season by scoring his sixth goal to put the Wings up 2-0. Ishan Mittoo’s empty-netter with about 10 seconds left in the game accounted for the final.
Wings win rough and tumble home opener against Watertown
Aberdeen built a 4-0 lead en route to a 4-2 win over the Shamrocks in it home opener Friday at the Odde Ice Center.
By the end of a game, it was clear the Wings and Watertown will have an intense rivalry. There were 103 penalty minutes in the game, 68 logged by the Wings.
“That’s just how the game was called,” Langer said. “Look, our identity is a big, heavy, skilled team, and we’re gonna push some teams around. Sometimes we’ll be on the good side of that, and tonight we ended up on the bad side.”
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Bulgakov scored two goals, including the first of the game when he picked off a pass, skated into the Watertown zone on a breakaway and beat goalie River Leslie-Toogood cleanly.
Bulgakov
Ishan Mittoo scored on a nice play in front of the net about 90 seconds later to make it 2-0. Bulgakov and Jibber Kuhl added second-period goals as the Wings built their lead before the game turned chippy.
“Leo had another big night,” Langer said. “He got us going early and just seems to be the first guy around the puck. That line with Leo, Jibber, they scored three of our goals tonight, so they’re playing at a high level early, which is good for us.”
While Aberdeen is undefeated, it’s in second place in the NAHL Central Division as Bismarck has won all seven if its games on the season.