Mighty Magwood: 'Blades claim sweep of Stingrays with 5-3 win

NORTH CHARLESTON, S.C. — Zach Magwood scored two goals and finished with three points, and Ken Appleby stopped 31 shots to give the Florida Everblades a series sweep of the South Carolina Stingrays with a 5-3 win on Saturday night at North Charleston Coliseum.

BOX SCORE

In the second game of a two-game series, Florida (21-8-2-2, 46 pts.) overcame a two-goal deficit in the opening period and scored five of the final six goals of the game to hand the Stingrays (23-4-3-1, 50 pts.) their first back-to-back losses of the season.

South Carolina grabbed a 2-0 lead in the opening period with a pair of power-play strikes. Defenseman Dylan Zink punched in a rebound from the top of the crease four minutes, 36 seconds into the opening period, and Max Novak scored from between the circles at 13:08 of the first to push South Carolina’s lead to two.

Florida responded with a power-play goal of its own in the last 90 seconds of the first to pull within one. Levko Koper wrestled the puck free in the left circle and jabbed it back to Nick Schaus in the deep slot. Schaus then hammered a slap shot that Magwood redirected past South Carolina goaltender Parker Milner.

The ‘Blades then tied the score in the first two minutes of the second. Magwood led a zone rush and fed the puck to the right circle for Joe Pendenza. The pass was partially tipped, but Pendenza still recovered the puck and fired it under the glove of Milner.

After South Carolina took a brief lead on Mitch Vanderlaan’s fifth goal of the season at 12:36 of the second, Koper brought Florida even again. Defenseman Patrick McCarron rifled a shot from the slot that Milner stopped, but Koper picked up the rebound in the left circle and snapped it past Milner’s glove with 4:49 left in the second.

With the game tied at four more than halfway through the third, Magwood provided the game-winning goal. Joe Pendenza forced a turnover behind South Carolina’s net and found Magwood between the circles for a one-time shot that beat Milner on his glove side.

John McCarron then scored on an empty net with 1:14 left in the game to seal the sweep.

‘BLADES BITES

• After going without a multi-point game in his first 10 games with Florida, Levko Koper (1g-1a) now has three multi-point outings and eight points (3g-5a) in his last five games.
• Zach Magwood’s picked up his team-leading eighth multi-point game, which was his third multi-goal game of the season.
• The ‘Blades established a new season-high by firing 20 shots on goal in the second period. Florida had put up 19 shots on goal in a period twice this season, with the most recent occurrence coming on Oct. 19 against the Norfolk Admirals.
• McCarron’s empty-net tally was his 100th career ECHL goal.
• Joe Pendenza (1g-1a) and Logan Roe (2a) also posted multi-point games for Florida.
• South Carolina has been outshot in only eight games this season and five of those have come against Florida.   

NEXT UPFlorida still has one game remaining on the docket this weekend, as it travels to Greenville, South Carolina, for a matchup with the Swamp Rabbits on Sunday at 3 p.m. 

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