Gulls start climb up Pacific Division standings

The San Diego Gulls have languished near the bottom of the American Hockey League’s Pacific Division for the past three seasons, missing the genrous cut for the Calder Cup playoffs.

Seven of the 10 teams in the division advance to post-season play. The Gulls finished in last place by a whopping 20 points in 2022-23 and were ninth in both 2023-24 and last season.

A reversal of fortune could be in the offing in 2025-26 after a recent spurt had launched the San Diego team into sixth place in the division standings, braced by a gritty 5-4 come-from-behind shootout win at the division-leading Colorado Eagles last weekend.

The Gulls scored in the final minute of last Friday’s two-game series opener to send the game into an extra period. After both teams skated to a scoreless tie in the five-minute overtime period, the Southern Californians captured a five-round shootout 1-0.

Justin Bailey scored the equalizer with just 26 seconds remaining in regulation, assisted by Sam Colangelo and Ryan Carpenter.
Judd Caulfield gave the Gulls the comeback win with the only tally in the shootout. He was confident he could score.

“I got a couple of moves, honestly, when I come in like that, I like going five hole,” Caulfield said of his game-winner. “It just kind of depends what the goalie is doing there … That’s kind of my go-to, that same approach. And then there’s usually a few different ways you can branch off of it. But I like kind of going five hole, it’s usually there. So, it worked out for me (in the game), and I was glad to see it go in.”

The Gulls never lost confidence despite being down two goals late in the game.

“We just have resiliency in our group, and we just band together in those tough moments,” Caulfield said.”You can’t get too high or get too low. When we’re up two, I think (we) might have got a little bit of complacency in our game, but we fought back and we were resilient. There’s just no quitting our game, which we love to see as all our players, and we just bond together there.”

The shootout win was the Gulls’ first victory in the Eagles’ nest since March 2022.

The Gulls compiled a 7-2-1-1 record in December (grabbing 16 of a possible 22 points) and took a 3-1-0-1 record (seven out of a possible 10 pingts) from the Christmas break into the game against the division leaders.

“That’s a big focus for us for sure,” said Nathan Gaucher, who picked up two goals in the win, his first multi-goal AHL effort. “We want to challenge ourselves against the best, and that’s the best team in our conference as well. So, I think we were right up there with them, and it’s a good challenge for us, and we answered.”

San Diego head coach Matt McIlvane admitted it went down to the wire to get the result.

“Well, there’s 60 minutes on the clock for a reason, so sometimes you have to use them all,” McIlvane said. “We’ve got a lot of resiliency in our team. We’re very aware that we’re capable of mounting comebacks and pushing games into overtime. We’ve done this multiple times throughout the course of the season. You don’t want to be in that situation. You want to be in control of the game, but the character that the guys showed to get to that point was excellent.

“I don’t think the San Diego Gulls have won in Colorado since 2022 and so it’s a good feat for our group. It’s just a reminder of where our team is this year. We can come into Colorado and win. The thing is, I don’t even think we played our best game like that. There’s so much that can be improved upon in this game that we’ll be excited to look into and get better at, but that was a good team win.”

Epic finishes appear nothing new for the Gulls this season. Matthew Phillips scored with an extra-atacker to knot the score, 2-all, against the visiting San Jose Barracuda on Jan. 7. That game proceeded to a seven-round shootout the Gulls prolonged four times before the Bay Area visitors finally pulled out a gritty 3-2 win of their own.

The Cuda entered the game in third place in the division standings, so playing even with the division’s elite teams has become a habit for McIlvane’s team this season.

The shootout loss awarded the Gulls with a key standings point instead of falling two points further behind the Cuda.

““Yeah, it’s huge,” Phillips said after the team managed to pick up a crucial standings point.

“I mean, obviously a disappointing result tnd pretty flat on the bench after that five-minute power play (in which the visitors out-shot the hosts), but the message was to just kind of regroup and put that behind us. And we battled really hard to push it to overtime and had a couple chances to win the game still, but we’ll take the point.”

The Gulls entered Friday’s game eight points arrears of the Eagles in the standings but didn’t seemed too perturbed by taking an early 2-0 lead. The visitors then battled back from a two-goals deficit after Colorado reeled off four unanswered goals to take a 4-2 lead.

Gaucher netted his second and third goals of the season, the latter pulling the Gulls to within 5-4 on the scoreboard with 7:15 to play. Bailey collected a goal (his team-leading 12th) and an assist (his eighth).

Nico Myatovic scored his fifth goal of the season, his second power play goal. He is the only Gull with with multiple power play goals and shorthanded goals (two), and only one of seven players to do so in the league.

Colangelo registered his eighth assist of the season to extend his point streak to seven games (two goals, six assists).

Carpenter collected his 15th assist of the season to give him points in six of his last eight games (two goals, five assists).

Goaltender Calle Clang stopped a season-high 38 fo 42 shots in regulation and overtime, including all five shootout attempts he faced, to improve his season record to 6-1-3.

The Gulls lost Saturday’s rematch, 6-0, but the message had been delivered.

The Gulls return to Pechanga Arena for a pair of divisional matchups this weekend: Friday against the defending Calder Cup champion Abbotsford Canucks (following a Wednesday matchup) and Saturday against the Coachella Valley Firebirds.

Friday’s game doubles as Hockey Fights Cancer night while Saturday’s game doubles as Native American Heritage Night.

The Gulls faced off the weekend set following Wednesday’s home ice meeting with the defending Calder Cup champion Abbotsford Canucks, who have languished in the division cellar all season but winners in their last two games.

Lowly Canucks play spoiler’s role against Gulls

The Gulls faced off a stretch of seven games in 12 days with Wednesday’s home game against the Abbotsford Canucks.

The Gulls turn around and host the Canucks on Friday, then host the Coachella Valley Firebirds on Saturday for three games in four days. The Gulls and Canucks rematch twice more in Canada on Jan. 24 and Jan. 25 for four games in 11 days between the Pacific Division teams.

The race to the Calder Cup playoffs could be greatly affected by the upcoming four games against Abbortsford, which entered the stretch dead last in the division standings but played more like the defending Calder Cup champions in Wednesday’s 5-3 win over the host Gulls in front of 5,039 fans.

The Gulls entered Wednesday’s game against the Canucks with a 4-0 record over the Canadian team this season, including shutouts of 7-0 and 3-0.

While Abbotsford may not qualify for this year’s playoff tournament, the Canucks could play a role as a spoiler, as the Gulls discovered on Wednesday.

After the Gulls killed off an early Abbotsford power play, the hosts took a 1-0 lead on a power play goal by Sam Colangelo at 18:47. Colangelo shot the puck like a rifle into the net, assisted by Tristan Luneau and Sasha Pastujov. The goal was Colangelo’s seventh of the season while Pastujov picked up his 17^th assist of the season.

The teams exchanged goals in the second period. The Canucks tied the game, 1-1, at 6:08 courtesy of Jujhar Khaira, his first of the season, unassisted.

The Gulls regained the lead at 2-1 on Yegor Sidorov’s eighth goal of the season at 8:06, assisted by Tristan Luneau and Nikolas Brouillard.

The Gulls out-shot the Canucks 12-3 in the opening period and 20-8 in the second period for a two-period total of 32-11.

But the third period had a decidedly different look for both teams.

Abbotsford tied the game, 2-2, on a power play goal by Ben Berard, at 3:32, assisted by Lukas Reichel and Nils Aman. At that point, the Canucks had been out-shot 36-13.The goal was Berard’s ninth on the season; the assist was Aman’s 18^th on the season.

Abbotsford took a 3-2 lead at 4:35 on a goal by Wouters, his eight on the season, assisted by Damila Klimovich and Jett Woo.

The goals came 1:03 apart and seemed to stun everyone in the building and uplift the visitors.

The Canucks went on the power play at 8:14,Noah Warren for tripping, with each team already down a skater. Nothing happened until the hosts tied the game at 11:28. Roland McKeown got the even-strength goal, his third tally of the season, assisted by Colangelo and Pastujov. Colangelo picked up his ninth assist while Pastujov logged his 18^th of the season.

3-3.

Abbotsfored starter Jiri Patera left the game at that point, replaced by Aku Koskenvuo. But Patera returned at the next play stoppage after just18 seconds. He would stay in the net the rest of the game to an eventful result.

Abbotsford went back in front, 4-3, with 5:32 to play in regulation as Khaira scored his second goal of the game, with assists to Woo and Jimmy Schuldt.

Mired in last place all season long, the defending Calder Cup champions had shown renewed life of yet with back-to-back wins coming into Wednesday’ s game. They made if three wins in a row with a strong ending.

The Canucks out-shot the Gulls 13-7 in the third period with four goals to show for it, including an empty netter by Reichel at 19:11, to spirit away a 5-3 come-from-behind victory.

Final shots for the game were 39-24 in favor of the Gulls, who clearly missed an opportunity to collect two points against the division’s last place team.

“There was a lot of good in the first bit,” San Diego head coach Matt McIlvane said. “We also gave up two breakaways in the first period, which isn’t something we’re looking to do, but the majority of the game we’re playing the way that we want to play. Then into the third period, had a neutral zone turnover that ended up in a penalty, and then they strike off their power play. It doesn’t take very long. It gets a bounce and I think it’s the very next shift, or soon after we’re giving up a rush and they put another one in. Good on us for battling back and evening the score but then unfortunately, we had a defenseman alone at the net front without a stick. It’s just kind of that kind of game. First goal goes in off of a skate, and then the next one goes in off a stick, and now we have a defenseman alone the net front. I think there’s a lot of good in this game, certainly a lot closer to the way we want to play than the Colorado game (6-0 loss on Saturday). But in the end, we’re empty handed. 

There wasn’t much to apologize for: the Canucks out-played the Gulls in the third period.

“I think instead of coming out and kind of playing on our toes and keep playing the same way, we kind of got on our heels a little bit, playing with the lead, we just didn’t execute to our game plan and we kind of gave them some chances,” Colangelo said. “They made the most of their chances there, so unfortunate way to end the game (for us). 

“I think we play the way we play the first 40 minutes, there’s no doubt we would have won that game. They’re a good team. Obviously, they have a lot of guys that won the Calder Cup last year, so they know how to win and obviously we didn’t want to see that tonight. But we kind of saw tonight that if we let them stay in the game, then they’ll make you pay for it.”

Friday’s rematch shoud be interesting for both teams.

“I don’t think stylistically or style of play there’s massive adjustments that are needed,” McIlvane said. “I think there’s some small things and details that we should certainly explore, but there’s a lot of good in this game. Unfortunately, at the end, we end up on the wrong side, but there’s easily correctable things to be able to fix.”

The loss kept the Gulls in seventh place in the division standings – eight points ahead of the Canucks and one point ahead of both the Henderson Silver Knights and Tucson Roadrunners. It’s a tight fit with the Gulls one point behind sixth place Calgary and four points behind fifth place Coachella Valley. The San Diegans are five points behind fourth place San Jose and six points behind third place Bakersfield.

Ontario now leads Colorado by two points for first place — 12 points ahead of the Gulls as some separation starts to develop near the top of the standings. Overall, six points separates seven teams from third through ninth place. Four teams are separated by two points, sixth through ninth.