Komets Vanquish Icehawks 4-0, Advance to Turner Cup Finals

On Monday night the Fort Wayne Komets completed yet another playoff hat-trick, rattling off their third straight victory over the Port Huron Icehawks to bounce back from a 3-1 series deficit and advance to the IHL's Turner Cup finals for the third consecutive year -- only the second time in franchise history that the Komets have made it to the finals that many times in a row. And they did it in commanding fashion, not allowing the Icehawks to record a single point. In fact the only moment of the game that gave Fort Wayne fans pause for concern came at 2:18 of the opening period. Port Huron defenseman Mike Gershon was sent to the box by referee T.J. Luxmore for kneeing Komets forward Justin Chwedoruk. Chwedoruk, one of Fort Wayne's key rookies, was assisted off the ice and hobbled to the locker room following the hit, but would later return to the game. Meanwhile, Fort Wayne went on the first power play of the night, and it paid off almost immediately. The Komets won the face-off, and forward Justin Hodgman picked up the puck, passing it back to forward P.C. Drouin on the left point. Drouin then passed to defenseman Guy Dupuis on the right point, who put a slap shot from above the inside edge of the right circle past screened Port Huron goalie Raffaele D'Orso for a 1-0 lead at 2:25. At 4:55, Fort Wayne forward Sean O'Connor sent a 60 foot pass up the ice to forward Leo Thomas, who took off on a breakaway up the middle of the Icehawks zone. Thomas then beat D'Orso with a quick wrist shot glove-side that made the count 2-0. Komets goalie Nick Boucher also picked up an assist on the play. Just 16 seconds later, Fort Wayne did it again. This time, forward David Hukalo had the puck at the Port Huron blue line but lost it after colliding with an Icehawks player. Komets forward Lincoln Kaleigh Schrock was there to pick it up, taking off up the slot on another breakaway before flipping the puck up high with a backhand shot that made it past D'Orso at 5:11. With the scoreboard suddenly reading 3-0, Port Huron Coach Stan Drulia wisely called a timeout to settle down his rattled troops. The break apparently helped, because Port Huron tightened up defensively afterwards and did not allow another goal for the remainder of the opening frame, nor throughout the second period. The Komets did take a couple of penalties late in the second -- defensemen Frankie DeAngelis for hooking at 15:55 and defenseman Kevin Bertram for holding at 18:39 -- but the Icehawks once lethal power play was toothless all night long. There was one close call about halfway through the final frame just as another hooking call on DeAngelis was expiring. A Port Huron player managed to jam the puck free and across the line through a pile of players in front of the net, but Luxmore immediately waved the goal off because the play was already considered dead. Some pushing and shoving amongst the players ensued but the hostilities did not escalate. At 11:36, the Komets put the game out of reach once and for all when Hukalo cleared the puck from the Fort Wayne zone, ricocheting it off the left boards. Chwedoruk picked it up at the red line and skated in towards D'Orso before leaving a drop pass for the trailing Schrock. Schrock completed the play, breaking in on D'Orso and hitting the twine glove-side with a quick wrist-shot from the left face-off circle for his second goal of the evening, capping the scoring at 4-0. If the Icehawks had any hope left of at least making a show of it, it died at 18:09 when forward Mike Kinnie was whistled for tripping. And so yet another once promising Port Huron playoff run came to an end, not in the honor and glory of a triple overtime, but with a whimper. The Komets now await the winner of the Muskegon Lumberjacks/Flint Generals semifinal series, which will be decided on either Tuesday or Wednesday night. Boucher stopped all 33 shots he faced in claiming the win. D'Orso made 20 saves on 24 shots.

Notes: Announced attendance was 7454, the largest Fort Wayne crowd for a first round playoff game since 1995. The Komets went 1 for 3 on the power play. The Icehawks were 0 for 4. Port Huron outshot Fort Wayne in every period and 33-24 overall. The only other time the Komets advanced to the finals 3 times in a row was 1963-1965. When playing a game 7 in a playoff series, Fort Wayne has now won 7 of 10. Not playing for the Komets was forward Brad MacMillan, who had surgery to repair a broken nose a week earlier. Missing the game for Port Huron was defenseman Brian Deeth and goalie Larry Sterling, out with an apparent concussion suffered during game 4 of the series in Port Huron, MI. Sterling made the bus trip to Fort Wayne, but did not bring his gear.