Wings Suffer 4th Straight Loss in Buffalo

The Philadelphia Wings had few answers for the Buffalo Bandits on Saturday night, dropping their visit to upstate New York by a 17-5 score.

The first quarter went well for the Wings, as they got on the board first with a Matt Rambo goal 8:14 into the contest and kept Buffalo off the board for the first 9:21 of the game before Curt Fraser found the back of the net. Dhane Smith added another tally with 1:39 left in the period, giving Buffalo a 2-1 lead after the first 15 minutes.

But the tone of the game turned away from Philadelphia over the first 4 ½ minutes of the second quarter, and never came back their way again. Three Buffalo goals in the first 4:19 opened the lead to 5-1 before Kevin Crowley quelled the momentum at the 7:29 mark, but the Bandits then scored six of the game’s next seven goals through the end of the third quarter to open up an 11-3 advantage.

Philadelphia started chipping away at the lead with a Kiel Matisz goal 14 seconds into the fourth quarter followed by one from Corey Small just over five minutes later, but Buffalo scored twice in 14 seconds shortly afterwards as part of a 6-0 run to end the game.

Trevor Baptiste was a bright spot for the Wings, going 18-for-26 in the faceoff circle and grabbing 11 loose balls. Small scored twice, while Blaze Riorden assisted on three of the Wings’ five goals.

The Wings are off next week before starting the home stretch of their season on March 26 in Rochester, where they’ll play the first of six games over the final five weeks of the campaign.