Wranglers fizzle in shootout

For the second straight night, the Wranglers rallied to tie Idaho in the third period and had a chance to win in a shootout.

Unlike Thursday's comeback victory fueled by three shootout goals, Las Vegas was blanked in Friday's shootout and lost to the conference-leading Steelheads 3-2 before an announced crowd of 4,387 at the Orleans Arena.

Idaho center Tyler Spurgeon continued to torment the Wranglers, beating goalie Michael Ouzas (24 saves) for the lone goal of the shootout, in the fourth round.

Spurgeon had a hat trick in each of his previous two games against Las Vegas (19-22-5) and put the Steelheads (31-11-3) in front early Friday with a power-play goal 1:09 into the game.

Idaho goalie Rejean Beauchemin stopped 13 of 15 shots in regulation and all five in the shootout, stoning Josh Prudden, Andrew Orpik, Alex Bourret, Jason Krischuk and Ned Lukacevic.

The latter scored both Wranglers goals on power plays.

"He's a good goalie, but we've got to find a way to score at least one or two in the shootout to give ourselves a chance," Lukacevic said. "We've got to score at least one."

The teams play again tonight at the Orleans, where the Wranglers have a 12-game point streak (10-0-2) and haven't lost in regulation since Nov. 13.

The Wranglers trailed 4-0 after two periods Thursday and started slow again. They mustered only three shots on net in the first period despite having three consecutive power plays.

Las Vegas finished 2-for-8 with a man advantage and its 15 shots were a season low.

"We've got to find a way to get to the net," Lukacevic said. "We're shooting the puck, we're just not getting it through."

The Wranglers, outshot for the eighth straight game, also failed to score on three second-period power plays and couldn't muster a shot on net during a 95-second two-man advantage.

Following Thursday's theme, Las Vegas finally showed a pulse in the third period. Lukacevic, who sealed Thursday's win with a shootout goal, buried a rebound at 1:38 to tie it 1-1.

Idaho regained the lead a few minutes later on a power play when Mark Derlago scored from point-blank range. But the Wranglers tied it again when Lukacevic redirected a left point shot by Bourret past Beauchemin.

Idaho made several late scoring bids, getting three power plays, but Las Vegas killed them off, including a 63-second two-man disadvantage.

"It was a heck of an effort, stepping up at the end and killing a 5-on-3," Wranglers coach Ryan Mougenel said. "We got a point and we'll build on it."

Contact reporter Todd Dewey at tdewey@reviewjournal.com or at 702-383-0354.