The Shreveport Mudbugs (27-22-3-6) scored late but could not overcome a slow start out of the gate, dropping the first game of the weekend to the El Paso Rhinos, 3-1, on Friday at George’s Pond.
After a scoreless first period and a replay stoppage, the Rhinos opened the scoring at the 13:02 mark of the middle frame with Jacob Solano notching his 5th of the season, with assists logged by Troy Hunka (56) and Ethan Wolcott (43). Gaige Giblin followed up with 7:42 left on the 2nd period clock, his 13th, to put the Rhinos up 2. Aiden Bergner (17) and Simon Nealy (16) both earned assists on that tally.
After outshooting El Paso 12 shots to 1 early in the period, the Bugs got one back on the powerplay at the 7:09 mark of the 3rd from Willie Tremblay’s 9th goal of the campaign with Grayson Gerhard picking up his 36th helper. Tommy Shore scored an empty net goal from center ice with 1:02 remaining to push the Rhinos to their prevailing lead, 3-1.
Tyler Hodges took the loss, dropping to 16-14-2-5 on the season. Hodges stopped 17 of the 19 shots he faced in the game. The Bugs win streak was also snapped and they drop to 3-4 in the season series with El Paso.
The regular season finale is slated for 7:11pm on Saturday at George’s Pond on the backend of “Appreciate the 318” weekend, also closing out the season series against the Rhinos. Tickets are still available at tickets.georgespond34.com. The game is also available on NATV or by free audio stream on the Mudbugs Audio Network.