Highlights:
AT&T Center – The San Antonio Rampage have not had much luck inside the friendly confines in the last few months, but Saturday might have been the worst home performance to date. And it showed.
The Rampage trailed early and would fall 6-3 to the Milwaukee Admirals in front of a season-high crowd of 8,379 fans at the AT&T Center for their 12th straight home loss.
Milwaukee got the scoring started early with a goal from Matt White at 1:51 of the opening frame. The would quickly take a three-goal lead after tallies from Pontus Aberg and Vladislav Kamenev. After Milwaukee’s third goal, Rampage Head Coach Dean Chynoweth pulled starting net minder Spencer Martin for backup Roman Will.
Aberg scored his second of the night to give Milwaukee a 4-0 lead going into the second period.
The Admirals extended their lead with a power play goal from Cody Hodgson at 5:16 of the middle frame. Maxim Noreau finally got the Rampage on the scoreboard 19 seconds later with a power play goal of his own, cutting the Admirals lead to 5-1 going into the final period.
“It was more relief than happiness to finally get one (a goal),” Noreau said of his tally. “You could feel it on the bench, the guys were like ‘okay, we’ve got one. We can move on’ but it wasn’t easy tonight.”
Milwaukee responded in the third period as Aberg completed the hat-trick at the 6:31 mark. Michael Schumacher scored midway through the final stanza and Colin Smith capped the scoring with his 12th goal of the season at 16:38 to make it 6-3.
“We were embarrassed. Plain and simple,” Chynoweth said following the game. “Out-competed, not ready to play. We were embarrassed out there.”
Martin stopped three of six shots he faced in 12 minutes before being benched. Will made 20 saves on 23 Milwaukee shots in 47 minutes of action. Juuse Saros stopped 22 of 25 San Antonio shots for the win.
San Antonio finished the game 1-for-3 on the power play, while Milwaukee was 2-for-6 with the man advantage.
The Rampage are now 16-17-7-0 (39 points) on the season and will return to the ice on Tuesday night when they welcome the San Diego Gulls to the AT&T Center to continue their nine-game home stand.
