Thursday’s loss to the Adirondack Thunder was not acceptable for the Orlando Solar Bears. With games running out and the Playoffs still in view, but fading quickly, every game matters. Coming out slow from the first shift and unable to capture energy was not acceptable.
There were not talks of Xs and Os or system or structure as has often been the case for this young Solar Bears team in between Thursday’s game and Saturday’s game at the Amway Center. There were some hard words said from the coaching staff to a few individuals and a closed-door, players-only meeting to prep for this final stretch.
The result?
Orlando had to pin its ears back the first 90 seconds and then dominated the game the rest of the way, taking a 4-0 lead in the second period and overwhelming Andirondack with its energy, tenacity and physicality. For an Amway Center-record crowd, this was a very different Orlando Solar Bears team.
This was the Solar Bears team Anthony Noreen always wanted. The kind of team that played the way his junior hockey teams in Canada played before he was brought south to Orlando.
Everyone got the show they wanted in the Solar Bears’ 6-3 win over the Thunder with goals, hustle, energy, chippiness (goalie fights!) and confidence. This Orlando team found its claws.
“We finished every hit, blocked every shot, scored a lot of goals, defended,” Noreen said. “That’s what we wanted. That’s what Solar Bears hockey is going to be. . . . From here on out, that’s what’s expected. We’re going to bring it. Those are the type of guys we want. That was the first time I have seen exactly what I want our team to play like and look like. And we did it for 60 minutes.”
Forging that fire was certainly a hard task for Noreen and the Solar Bears as a whole. It has been a season-long slog. It finally hit a head after Thursday’s loss.
The coaching staff had some personal talks with players and the players got into each other in the meeting and that reinforced what was going to be expected the rest of the season.
Noreen said the staff talked to the players about some personal things and challenged them. It was like a parent scolding their kid. “If they didn’t get it this time, they might not have gotten it,” Noreen said of the talks the team had.
The effect was almost immediately noticeable too.
Orlando got caught struggling to clear the puck and had to endure a 90-second first shift as Adirondack put the pressure on. Fairly quickly though, the Solar Bears were able to strike back.
On Orlando’s first shot of the game, rookie Brian Christie stuck his stick out and redirected a shot from Jack Rodewald into the back of the net. The rout was quickly on there as the Solar Bears got all the best chances and scored four before the final minute of the second period.
The way those goals were scored though said as much as anything. The second was a Rylan Schwartz wrap around, scored after Schwartz missed a shot, grabbed the rebound and then darted around the net to score before Drew Fielding could reset himself. The third goal saw Eric Baier have to fight off two defenders to settle the puck before he could turn and fire. The fourth saw Austin Block win a scrum along the endboards before he first a pass to Erik Bradford for a shot and goal.
Each had their own element of hustle and grit to them that the Solar Bears have not always had against quality teams and certainly not consistently throughout the year. These were both beautiful goals but also extremely gritty.
“Everyone’s a proud guy in there,” T.J. Foster said. “They want to rebound. We came out with a strong start and that translated to our play throughout the game. We were more physical and put the pucks on the net and it worked out for us.”
Orlando was perfectly willing to fight. There were more than a few throughout the 60 minutes of this game, giving the fans their money’s worth on that front.
The Thunder were trying to push and pull their way back into the game — at one point getting it to 4-2 with a goal late in the second period and then another early in the third. But the Solar Bears had an answer there too.
T.J. Foster scored less than a minute after the Thunder pulled within two goals, finishing off a 2-on-1 rush with Denver Manderson. He added one more later in the period for his second goal and team-leading 23rd goal of the season.
It gave Orlando that sigh of relief and relieved some of the pressure as Adirondack tried to knock the team off physically with brawls and barking.
“I thought we stayed even keel, but our even keel was at a much higher of a level than what it normally is,” Noreen said. “And especially from what it was the other night when we played here.
“I thought Ryan [Massa] was tremendous tonight, especially early. We killed a minute, 30 second 5-on-3. That was probably the big turning point of the gam.e He was a big part of that. I know he is a quiet kid, pretty laid back. But there is a lot of fight in that kid.”
Massa was locked in early and stayed that way throughout. The Solar Bears killed nearly 90 seconds on a 5-on-3 power play late in the first period with the team still up just 2-0. From there it seemed like the Solar Bears’ confidence was rolling and the avalanche was coming.
Massa recorded 36 saves and took no guff. On one particular incident, Ryan Lomberg crashed into Massa at the net when a scrum ensued as the Solar Bears acted to protect their goalie. Massa came out of the pile without his helmet and seemed to go after Lomberg himself before he skated off toward the Solar Bears bench. He was involved in another incident with Lomberg as the Thunder went off to the locker room.
It may not be the most positive way to direct energy, but the Solar Bears were certainly not backing down from the Thunder in any way throughout the evening.
With the record crowd of 11,075 at the Amway Center, there was a supercharged feeling to the game. Noreen said it felt like Game Seven of a Playoff series in the locker room beforehand.
That may be the kind of approach the Solar Bears will need to take the rest of the way to make the Playoffs. Noreen said his players were ready to go to war in this game. They held each other accountable in that meeting they had earlier in the day and came through for each other with the result.
Now they have to make it consistent and do it again in Sunday’s series finale with Adirondack.
“It’s easy to do things once,” Noreen said. “It’s hard to repeat it. Especially when it hurts. It’s not easy to play the way we played tonight. We walked in there after the game, you would think there would be hooting and hollering. There was nobody celebrating in our locker room. Guys were laying back in their chairs, they had ice bags on, they were getting hydrated. It’s not easy to play that way. But it’s fun. If you do it every game, it becomes contagious and that becomes your identity.”
