From the Rampage Desk: Solid Road Trip Keeps San Antonio Rolling

The beloved Rampage closed out a 2-week road trip to the midwest with a couple of victories this weekend after suffering a bad loss Wednesday morning in Grand Rapids. As of today they sit 2nd in the Pacific Division behind Tucson despite having the most points in the Western Conference with 19 (9-3-1 record).

GRG 7 – SAR 4

Julien Nantel scored his second goal of the game 7 minutes into the 2nd period on a beautiful faceoff win and pass from Dominic Toninato to give the Rampage a 4-2 lead. From then on they collapsed and Griffins scored 5 straight goals in a variety of ways for the win. Tragic.

Goals: Nantel (2), Agozzino, Thompson

Shots: SA 26 – GR 37
PP 0/7, PK 4/7

– After going toe-to-toe with the Griffs in the 1st, 12 shots apiece, they were outshot 25-14
– 8 minor infractions, most of the lazy/stick penalty variety
– Special teams were a disaster
– New addition Vladislav Kamenev assisted on Aggz goal in the 1st

Lines/Pairs
Aggz – Kamenev – Petryk
Ranford – Thompson – Musil
Nantel – Toninato – Kostin
Colborne – Girard – Vogelhuber
Geertsen – Warsofsky
Butler – Schmaltz
Siemens – Meloche
Husso

SAR 6 – RFD 0

The Rampage bounced back from the GR disaster with 3 goals on 20 shots in the 1st then turtled the rest of the way to a 6-0 win. In the 2nd/3rd they got smoked 30-13 on the shot chart but Spencer Martin played huge for his 5th win of the season and 6th career AHL shutout.

Goals: Ranford, Agozzino, Butler, Warsofsky, Geertsen, Petryk

Shots: SA 33 – RFD 39
PP 4/9, PK 4/4

– Kamenev went off with 3 assists
– Warsofsky and Ranford with their 1st goals of the year
– Duncan Siemens wore an alternate captain’s letter for the 1st time this year

Lines/Pairs
Kostin – Kamenev – Musil
Ranford – Agozzino – Thompson
Nantel – Toninato – Colborne
Belzile – Girard – Petryk
Geertsen – Warsofsky
Butler – Schmaltz
Siemens – Graham
Martin

SAR 2 – CHI 1

The Wolves dominated the 1st on the shot chart 16-8 but the period ended in a 1-1 tie. The 2nd went much the same 11-4 but still 1-1 on the scoreboard. The Rampage managed to play even in the 3rd and got an early goal from Andrew Agozzino that ended up being the winner. Spencer Martin had another stellar performance coming off his Friday shutout to give San Antonio their 9th win of the season.

Goals: Musil, Agozzino

Shots: SA 20 – CHI 35
PP 0/3, PK 3/3

– Aggz got his team leading 6th goal and 12th point
– Marty let in 1 goal on 74 shots for the weekend (.986)
– Sam Blais returned from UBI and as of the beginning of the game no one on the roster was unavailable due to injury

Lines/Pairs
Blais – Kanenev – Musil
Ranford – Aggz – Thompson
Kostin – Girard – Petryk
Nantel – Toninato – Colborne
Geertsen – Warsofsky
Butler – Schmaltz
Siemens – Meloche
Martin

Week in Review

Goals For: 12
Goals Against: 8
Shots For: 79
Shots Against: 111
Sh%: 15.2
Sv%: .928
PP%: 21.1
PK%: 78.6

Shots For %: 41.6
PDO: 1080
Special Teams %: 997

The Rampage have been riding hot special teams, excellent goaltending (from Martin at least) and unsustainable shooting percentage all year.

Special teams were a wash this week thanks to the PK getting slaughtered in Grand Rapids and the power play going nuts in Rockford evening out the usual tough PK and anemic PP numbers. For the year the PP is at 16.2%, 21st in the AHL and the PK is 7th at 86.2%. For reference, they scored 4 out of their 11 PPGs in the Rockford game and without that the picture is pretty bleak.

Four goals per game is a bit higher than their 3.46 average (6th in AHL), which is good to see. Besides the other issues at least they’re scoring. The defense and goaltending is still stout at just below 2.5 goals allowed per game (4th in AHL) and average a +1 goal differential per game.

Shots for and against is where the real concerns lie. Thanks to a few strong games early on they’re at 48.1% shot share but that’s trending down every week. Of the 9 periods played this week they had 1 period where they outshot the opponent, 2 periods where it was even and 6 where they were short. Coach Veilleux isn’t happy about this obviously but it happens consistently anyway. Whether this is mainly due to strategy or personnel is left to us for speculation but at the end of the day he has to find a way to get the team playing in the opponent’s zone more. Also a concern is the amount of shots that are taken by defensemen. Half the top 10 guys in shots on goal are defensemen and against RFD the defensemen actually outshot the forwards. Defensemen adding offense is great and necessary to boot, but if we’re looking for a reason why the shot totals are down in general then you have to look at the forward corps not doing their job getting pucks to the net. Trent Vogelhuber (6 shots in 10 games) and Joe Colborne (6 shots in 13 games) stand out as particularly egregious offenders here. Vogie was benched for the weekend games and Colborne should follow. Alex Belzile can do anything those two can on the ice and at least he has 6 shots in 5 games. Shawn St-Amant returning from the Eagles gives EV another great reason to say no to unproductive veterans.

Next up

The Rampage have a morning game tomorrow, once again vs Grand Rapids and a Night game Wednesday in Cedar Park. Word on the street is that Kamenev will be called up to the Avs and AJ Greer will return to the Rampage at some point soon. The Avs will need another roster spot in the near future so Grimaldi and/or Gabe Bourque could be on their way back towards the weekend.