Aeros 4, Grizzlies 2
WEST VALLEY CITY — Grizzlies center Mike Barrie signed a 25-game contract Wednesday afternoon. Wednesday night, he was released by the team.
It's not that Barrie was to blame for Utah's 4-2 loss to Houston. It's just that the Grizzlies needed to do something drastic after a sluggish performance at the E Center.
"We'll make a move tonight, right now," said coach Bob Bourne. "And a couple more by Friday. We're going to change the face of our team."
Bourne's frustration is simple. Utah soundly whipped the Aeros on Saturday, 5-2. They've been at home the past few days, able to rest and practice, but they came out Wednesday and played like they had no energy.
Houston scored a goal in the game's first 31 seconds. That set the tone for the rest of the game.
"We were not mentally prepared for the hockey game, pure and simple," he said. "There are not many good comeback teams in this league, and we're among them. Their (Houston's) life increased dramatically after going up 2-0."
The Grizzlies played with enthusiasm at times during the fifth meeting this month between these two teams. Utah's Brad Lauer scored halfway through the first period off a beautiful pass from Pat Neaton to cut the Aeros' lead in half.
But Houston would score again less than five minutes into the second period. Four seconds later, Utah's David Ling began fighting with Houston's Lane Lambert on the face off. As officials were announcing those penalties, Grizzly Gavin Morgan and Aero Bobby Brown began fighting right outside Utah's penalty box. Then two other fights broke out between Utah defenseman John Erskine and Houston's Barry Dreger, and Utah's Jeff MacMillan and Houston's Greg Walters.
MacMillan, Dreger and Walter were assessed game misconduct penalties and forced to leave the game. There was plenty of work for team doctors to do after the fights, and then two other players collided in the third period, breaking Houston's Brown's nose and giving Utah's Chris Wells a concussion.
Wells was taken by ambulance to a local hospital for observation because he was having trouble balancing and his speech was slurred.
As for the fights, well, the crowd momentarily forgot the home team was losing, and it gave Utah a lift that it hadn't had all night.
"It was time for us to get some life," Bourne said. "They had some physical guys out on the ice, so I put some of ours out there."
Utah has lost three players to call-ups by the Dallas Stars in the last couple weeks, but Bourne wouldn't attribute the flat play to that.
"It doesn't make sense to talk about guys that aren't here," he said. "We have enough guys here to win."
Bourne wasn't the only one frustrated by the game's slow pace. Team captain John Purves agreed that being unprepared to start the game finished the Grizzlies Wednesday night. As for a cause, he's just as baffled.
"It's hard to tell," Purves said. "There are days when we've had a terrible warm-up and played a great game. Today it was just the opposite."
He said personnel matters "are not my decision," and he offers no one advice on how to increase the team's intensity.
"I have to be more concerned with myself," the forward said. "I haven't scored a goal in seven or eight games. Until I get myself going, I don't have the right to say anything to anybody else."
Utah had more shots on goal than Houston did, firing the puck 37 times at Jason Elliott. The Aeros only shot 26 times at Mike Bales.
Lauer scored both of Utah's goals, with the second coming late in the fourth period (16:16) off a pass from Purves.
The Grizzlies will get a chance for revenge this Friday when they travel to Houston to play the Aeros again.
E-mail: adonaldson@desnews.com