Antoine Laganiere broke a tie with a power-play goal with two minutes, 12 seconds to play and Jhonas Enroth stopped 22 of 23 shots in his debut with the San Diego Gulls in a 3-1 victory over the Iowa Wild on Monday Night in Des Moines.
Laganiere tipped a rebound of a shot by Corey Tropp into the net, four seconds after Iowa defenseman Dylan Labbe was called for slashing.
Brandon Montour scored an empty-net goal with 54 seconds left as the Gulls (17-12-2-1) won their fourth consecutive game. Montour has scored in five consecutive games.
Montour has four goals and an assist in his three games since being reassigned to the Gulls by their NHL parent team, the Anaheim Ducks.
Laganiere opened the scoring 11:22 into the first period when he put a wrist shot past Wild goaltender Steve Michalek for his seventh goal of the season before a crowd announced at 4,248 at Wells Fargo Arena.
Iowa, the Minnesota Wild’s American Hockey League affiliate, tied the score with 8:12 to play when Kurtis Gabriel took a backhanded pass from Marc Hagel and put a shot past a scrambling Enroth who could not get back to his post.
Enroth was acquired by the Ducks, Jan. 10 from the Toronto Maple Leafs in exchange for a seventh-round choice in the 2018 draft and loaned to the Gulls the same day.
The 28-year-old Enroth has a 50-69-16 record with seven shutouts, a 2.84 goals against average and .909 save percentage over eight NHL seasons. He was 0-3-0-1 in six games with Toronto this season.
Enroth was a member of Sweden’s silver-medal winning team in the 2014 Winter Olympics.
Michalek (6-9-1-0) stopped 29 of 31 shots, including 14 of 15 in the first period.
The Gulls killed all three of the Wild’s power-play opportunities and scored on one of their three.
Tropp assisted on all three Gulls goals.
The Gulls are 12-0-1-0 when leading after two periods.
Gulls left wing Nick Tarnasky and Gabriel drew five-minute major penalties for their fight 4:14 into the game.
The Gulls will resume play Friday against the San Jose Barracuda, the San Jose Sharks AHL affiliate, at Valley View Casino Center.
— City News Service
