There’s an old adage in playoff hockey that a series doesn’t actually begin until the home team loses a game.
After four games between the South Carolina Stingrays and Orlando Solar Bears, the visiting team is still searching for its first win.
Orlando forward Ara Nazarian scored midway through the first overtime period on a wraparound attempt and Jon Gillies made 41 saves to lead Orlando past South Carolina 3-2 in the South Division semifinals before a crowd of 7,107 at the Kia Center in Orlando, Fla., April 23.
The best-of-seven Kelly Cup playoff series is tied at 2. Game 5 of the series will be on April 24 at the Kia Center at 7 p.m.
The Stingrays dominated the action at home in the first two games of the series, building a 2-0 lead, but have struggled to put the puck in the net down in Florida.
“Obviously everyone is very disappointed with this result, but I still feel like we’ve got a great opportunity to come back to Charleston with a 3-2 lead in the series,” said South Carolina coach Jared Nightingale. “There’s a lot we can build on from this game. I thought we had a lot of good chances down the stretch in overtime, and it's unfortunate that we gave up that one on a broken play.”
After a scoreless first period, Orlando opened the scoring on Mark Auk’s goal six minutes into the middle frame.
The Stingrays answered with back-to-back goals from defenseman Andrew Perrott and rookie forward Kelly Kupa.
Aaron Luchuk tied the game for Orlando with his third goal of the playoffs with 62 seconds left in the second period.
“We’re going to bounce back,” Nightingale said. “I thought we were more of ourselves tonight. We need to continue to play to our strengths and bear down and finish around the net. We had a lot of grade-A opportunities tonight. It’s that second and third efforts around their net that usually result in goals during the playoffs.”
Game 6 of the series will be played on April 27 at the North Charleston Coliseum at 6:05 p.m. Tickets are available now for purchase at stingrayshockey.com or at ticketmaster.com.