Thunder shoots its way past Colorado 5-2

When he let the puck fly from the blue line on Friday, Thunder defenseman Brandon Martell couldn’t see the goal. But maybe he could hear coach Kevin McClelland’s voice in the back of his mind.

McClelland has stressed a higher volume of shots to get Wichita out of its scoring slump, and an attempt from more than 60 feet was McClelland’s suggestion taken to its most extreme.

Just as radically, Martell’s shot went in, as did Dalton Reum’s from a similar distance in the second period. The Thunder made the most of its 23 shots, defeating Colorado 5-2 at Intrust Bank Arena.

“You can’t score unless you get the pucks to the front of the net,” Martell said. “The forwards do a good job down low of getting the pucks up to the point, and our job is just to get it past the first forechecker up front. We had a couple sneak in from the defensemen tonight, and it worked out.”

The Thunder scored three total goals during a three-game losing streak, and defensemen scored twice in that stretch. Wichita was happier with two goals from defensemen on Friday because they were supplemented by the second power-play goal in 26 chances and goals from five different skaters.

One came from newcomer Todd Fidler 18 seconds into his Thunder debut. Wichita found it difficult to sustain that early peak, and Colorado tied it 1-1 with about seven minutes to go in the first, but the Thunder was reestablished by its second power-play goal in 26 chances.

Peter Sakaris, who assisted on two of Friday’s goals, found Ian Lowe from behind the net, reenergizing the Thunder and giving its special teams a needed pick-me-up.

“It doesn’t matter who’s running the power play,” McClelland said. “At the end of the day, it’s on my shoulders. But (player-assistant RG Flath) did a great job all week with the guys, and spent a lot of time on it, and it paid off tonight.”

The teams combined for eight fighting penalties over the final 28-plus minutes, but Colorado’s frustration seemed to be setting in before then. Goaltender Jacob DeSerres complained after Reum’s second-period goal from the blue line, possibly looking for an interference call.

A psychological advantage, though, was secondary to Wichita’s aim to take more shots and let the law of averages take over.

“You’ve seen a lot of hockey games where you see a puck thrown on net and you’re going, ‘How did that go in?’” McClelland said. “Every time you put something there, it’s got a good chance of going in. If you’re not shooting, and you’re missing the net, there’s no way it’s going in. Sometimes you’ve got to simplify your game when you’re in a bit of a slide, and that’s what the guys tried to do tonight.”

This story was originally published October 30, 2015 at 10:48 PM with the headline "Thunder shoots its way past Colorado 5-2."