Photo courtesy of San Jose Barracuda. Cole Cassels screens goalie Drew Commesso (taken on 3/17/24).

By Titus Wilkinson (@TitusWisme)

After losing to the IceHogs on Saturday the Barracuda looked to bounce-back against them on Sunday.

In goal for San Jose was Eetu Makiniemi who heading into this game had a 6-7-0 record with a 3.48 GAA and .887 SV%. On the other side of the ice it was Drew Commesso had a 12-13-4 record with 2.73 GAA and .904 SV%.

The first period was a penalty filled affair as the teams in total combined for five penalties. Unfortunately for San Jose those penalties ended up helping the IceHogs rather than them.

The first goal in this game came on the power play as Mike Hardman scored his 18th of the season only five minutes into the game.

Later in the first Cole Guttman added to their lead with his 11th of the season assisted by Nolan Allan and Rem Pitlick.

Not long before the buzzer San Jose did respond on the power play as Ethan Cardwell one of San Jose’s hottest scorers got his 17th goal.

The middle frame saw the offense slow down considerably as we wouldn’t get a goal until 18:21 into the period. That goal came from the IceHogs as Guttman got his second of the game making it 3-1.

Funnily enough the final frame saw the opposite happen as just 41 seconds in Rockford made it 4-1 as Jackson Cates got his 11th.

That goal ended up being the last one in this game as San Jose only managed to get one past Commesso who had a great game making 34 saves.

A big part of the reason why the Barracuda only put up one goal was their power play as they went 1/5.

With three assists on the night Pitlick improves to an extremely impressive 16 points in just 13 games played for the IceHogs.

The three stars in this game were: 1st: Cole Guttman 2nd: Mike Hardman 3rd: Rem Pitlick

With the loss San Jose falls to 18-29-9 as the IceHogs improve to 28-22-5.

San Jose will look to snap their three game losing streak at home against one of the bottom feeders in the AHL the Gulls on Wednesday at 10:30 a.m.