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The Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins suffered their first overtime loss of the season, falling to the Lehigh Valley Phantoms 4-3, on Friday night.
A Penguins power-play goal from Tom Kostopoulos gave the Penguins the game’s first goal of the night at 14:39 into the first period.
Tic-tac-toe passing in the neutral zone sprung Josh Archibald on a breakaway. Archibald sent one past Jason LaBarbera, lifting Wilkes-Barre/Scranton to a 2-0 lead at 8:34 of the second period and gave Archibald his eighth goal of the season and eighth this month.
Lehigh Valley got on the board when Davis Drewiske blasted a shot through traffic, making it 2-1 with 14:05 still to play in the third.
Cole Bardreau tied the game, 2-2 at 9:10, after taking a pass from Chris Conner from behind the net after Conner was able to corral a shot that had missed the Penguins net wide.
The Phantoms found some puck luck in the form of a cross-crease pass that ricocheted twice off of Penguins defenseman Steve Oleksy and goalie Tristan Jarry before it trickled inside the post, giving Lehigh Valley its first power-play goal of the game and a 3-2 lead with 3:44 left to play.
Twenty six seconds later, Kael Mouillierat tied the score, 3-3, after picking up a rebound and placing it right under the crossbar for a quick answer to Lehigh Valley’s go-ahead goal.
“That was a nice response,” Penguins head coach Clark Donatelli said of Mouillierat’s goal, “They go down, get a bounce, and take the lead. Then we come right back and score. That was one of the positives to come out of the third period.”
Mouillierat’s tying goal not only forced overtime, but earned one point in the standings. Lehigh Valley nab the victory on Bardreau’s second goal of the game come with 44 seconds remaining in the extra frame.
Jarry recorded his second loss of the season and made 30 saves in the outing. LaBarbera made 27 stops between the pipes for the Phantoms.