AT&T Center – The San Antonio Rampage are in their first slump of the season and it has all but deflated the excitement the fans felt from the team’s hot start.
Mark Mancari scored the lone goal for the Rampage as they suffered a 5-1 loss to the Rockford IceHogs (7-2-0-1, 15 points) in front of 5,019 fans at the AT&T Center on Saturday night.
Much like Friday night, Rockford lit the lamp first. Brandon Mashinter put the visitors on the scoreboard when he put home a power play goal past San Antonio goaltender Michael Houser midway through the opening period.
The IceHogs extended their lead four minutes later when Mark McNeill slipped the puck past Houser to give Rockford a 2-0 advantage going into the second period.
T.J. Brennan continued the scoring for the IceHogs in the middle frame when he sent a slap shot past Houser at 2:59. Ville Pokka added another power play tally at 13:26 of the second period to put Rockford up 4-0 going into the final period of play.
The IceHogs got their final goal just 35 seconds into the third period off Dennis Rasmussen’s stick. The Rampage finally lit the lamp when Mancari put home a shot past Rockford netminder Scott Darling 15:25 into the final stanza to complete the scoring in a 5-1 IceHogs win.
Houser stopped 20 of the 25 shots he faced, while Darling made 30 saves on 31 San Antonio shots. The Silver and Black finished the game 0-for-2 on the power play, while Rockford was 2-for-4 with the man advantage.
“It’s just a bad stretch, that’s all,” Rampage head coach Tom Rowe said of the losing streak. “We’re not in synch. We’ll get it fixed. I’m not too concerned about it. It’s only the 10th game of the season.”
San Antonio’s goaltending has proved to be a weakness in the past two games. Ellis has 3.00 GAA, while Houser is at 4.00. Add the special times into the mix and it is no mystery why the Silver and Black are on a three game skid. Although Rowe appeared not too worried.
“I told the guys after the game I’m not going to be dragging this through the mud for a week,” Rowe said. “It’s over and done with. We move on. I told them to go watch football on Sunday and come to work on Monday.”
The Rampage are now 5-5-0-0 (10 points) on the season and will return to the ice on Friday when they welcome the Toronto Marlies to the AT&T Center at 7:30 p.m.
