Allen’s late-game goal deals another tough loss to Thunder

First-place teams can often skip the character-building defeats like those endured by the Thunder in its last three hockey games, including a 4-3 loss on Wednesday night at Intrust Bank Arena.

Wichita seemingly can’t escape them, with more than a week full of near-misses that didn’t seal the last-place fate but forced the Thunder to wallow in it.

Three of the Thunder’s previous four losses came after regulation, including home defeats against Tulsa and Allen this week. In each loss, Wichita (7-19-1-3) increased the time in which it outplayed the opponent, only to leave the ice in mystifying distress.

“We keep having this talk after games like that,” Thunder captain Ian Lowe said. “I’m kind of lost for words now. We got lots of shots (39), we played well, but it comes down to crunch time and not making the right plays at the right time, and that’s all there is to it.

“We can think we outplayed them all game, but at the end nobody sees whether we outplayed them or not, it’s whether we won or lost.”

For the third straight game, the Thunder took at least 34 shots – Wichita hasn’t been outshot in any of those games. Wichita had a 1-0 lead in the first period but was often playing from underneath, as Allen never trailed after taking a 2-1 lead early in the second period.

The Thunder wasn’t playing defensively, though. Wichita was often looking to turn any situation, even an Allen power play, into a scoring opportunity, displaying an aggressiveness that was absent for the first two months this season.

Defensively, the Thunder created plenty of traffic in front of its own net and hounded the forwards trying to navigate it, but was undone by a pair of power-play goals and the game-winner, with 1:03 to go, was preceded by negligence in that area.

“I don’t know what happened on that one, I just know that we weren’t tight on guys,” Thunder coach Kevin McClelland said. “To lose that with a minute-three left was a heartbreaker.… It seems like we’re always making a mistake at the wrong time.”

Allen’s power-play goals weren’t a result of the Thunder’s carelessness, and they created a swing that essentially decided the outcome. Wichita’s penalty kill was on-point for most of the night, but on Allen’s second power-play opportunity, a beneficial deflection created an easy chance for Chad Costello.

In the third period, Gary Steffes scored on a redirection that was virtually unstoppable, as he guided the puck in one backhanded motion into the corner of the net.

“Every face-off starts out, in the penalty kill, in your own zone, and we can’t win them,” McClelland said. “It doesn’t matter who you put out there, we lose it, they set up and they get opportunities. Win some draws. Battle. Compete.”

The Thunder was 0 for 3 on power plays, a dramatic departure from its assertiveness under most other circumstances.

“If we score a power-play goal tonight, the game is tied,” McClelland said. “But the power play stinks, the power play stinks. It absolutely stinks. Every night we’re going oh-for, oh-for, oh-for, and it’s killing us and it’s costing us in the standings.”

This story was originally published December 30, 2015 at 10:49 PM with the headline "Allen’s late-game goal deals another tough loss to Thunder."