A win and they were in. Very simple. Yet for the Philadelphia Wings, not so easy to do. In front of their largest crowd (17,340) since February 16, 2002, the Wings turned a lackluster effort into an 11-8 loss to the New York Titans. Both teams are now 9-6 but the Titans won two of the three meetings with Philly this season.
Unlike the first two matches between the teams, this one was a battle between the goalies. And both the Wings Brandon Miller and the Titans Matt Vinc played very well. For Vinc, it was a big weekend for him only giving up 15 goals in the Titans two wins in two days (NY beat Chicago 14-7 Friday night).
As has been happening too much lately, the Wings fell behind early when Casey Powell found the net just over four minutes into the game. Jake Bergey tied it just over a minute later before Brendan Mundorf regained the lead for New York halfway through the quarter. The Wings would again tie on an A.J. Shannon score but that would end up being as close as it would get for the Wings. Three times the Wings got to within a goal but could not put the equalizer past Vinc, who made 36 saves on the night. Miller had the busier night with 43 saves but the Wings offense struggled to support his efforts. Athan Iannucci added to his record goal totals with half of the Wings tallies but Bergey and Shannon were held to a goal each while Merrick Thomson and Jason Crosbie were shut out in the goal department and Jamie Rooney was a scratch.
Now the Wings have to go to their personal house of horrors, aka the Air Canada Centre, and again look for the simple, yet elusive, solution to ending their playoff drought. It could be as simple as just a win and they're in, it could involve some help from others. They'll know next Sunday what they'll need to do, if anything.
