Jackals Fall To Wheeling In Weekend Finale, 3-1

WHEELING, WV - Elmira entered WesBanco Arena with a three-game winning streak, but it came to an end in the weekend finale, which was the fourth game in five days for the Jackals.

Josh Archibald, who has spent the majority of his rookie season with Wilkes-Barre/Scranton of the American Hockey League, opened the scoring at 8:00 of the first period. David Gilbert pushed the puck towards the net front and Archibald was waiting for the loose puck in the slot. Late in the first period, tempers began to flair between the two rivals and resulted in Justin Kea bundling Clark Seymour with rights, sending the Nailer down to the ice in a heap with a cut over his eye.

In the second period, the resilient Jackals battled back to tie the game at 15:14 of the frame. Thomas Nesbitt moved the puck to Ryan Rashid, who's shot popped off the pad of Eric Hartzell onto the awaiting stick of Mike Seidel for his team-leading 15th goal of the season. The game appeared to be heading to the third period tied 1-1, but with 1.7 seconds left on the clock Derek Army fired a shot from the goal-line that deflected off of Sam Marotta and in for his team-leading 19th goal of the season.

As the final frame of regulation began, the Nailers looked to build upon their momentum from Army's late second period tally. At 6:20 of the period Archibald picked the puck up in the neutral zone and wheeled from Wheeling's blueline across center ice and snapped a quick wrist shot past Marotta for his second goal of the night. Zack Torquato and Paul Cianfrini added the assist's on Archibald's insurance goal. As the third period progressed the frustration reached a boiling point and Justin Sawyer dropped the mitts with Pat McGrath after crushing Archibald along the wall. Seconds later, Archibald pushed Mike Bergin into Marotta and another scrum ensued, which resulted in a penalty to Archibald and misconducts to Colin Jacobs and Zack Torquato.

Marotta stopped 30 of 33 shots faced but was handed the loss. Hartzell turned aside 19 of 20 shots faced for the win. The Jackals went 0-for-3 on the power-play and Wheeling went 0-for-4 with the man advantage.