Tuesday’s game was full of significant saves by both team’s goaltenders. Vaněček stopped 25 of the 26 shots he faced while Wedgewood stopped all 32 shots he saw. Tourigny shared that Vaněček found out he was playing “maybe an hour before the game;” however, he stood strong in 11th game this season. Utah’s starting goaltender, Karel Vejmelka, was unavailable due to an upper-body injury.
“That’s the advantage to have a veteran as a backup goalie,” Tourigny said of Vaněček. “He was ready. He’s a really good pro. Gave us a chance to win tonight.”
Goaltender Colten McIntyre signed an amateur try-out agreement to serve as a backup to Vaněček and dressed for his first NHL game. McIntyre is a Park City native and is the first player from Utah to be in the Mammoth’s lineup.
“It’s awesome,” Schmidt said of McIntyre’s night. “Boys were super fired up; I was fired up for him. That mustache can be seen from a mile away today and I love it. During the year you find ways to get yourself (fired up) and for me, that’s what got me up tonight. That got you excited about the game for him and you could see him, he was all smiles and I wish we could have gotten the win, but I think it was a pretty cool experience for him.”
Although the Mammoth fell short of two points tonight, the team has played strong hockey in recent games and are proud of their effort.
“That (game) is one and we have others in the last 10 games where we play really solid hockey,” Tourigny shared. “Tonight’s a really good opponent. We could have won that game. We didn’t and there’s no moral victory in that. We just finished as well, 21 games in 37 days. It’ll never be an excuse, it’s not that. But I’m proud of the resilience of our guys. I’m proud of how our group fought. In the last stretch, we had adversity. When you’re tired mentally, it’s easy to let down or to give up. Our group never gave up. They doubled down on their effort. They doubled down on their resilience, their grind in their game. We played good defense. Really proud of the group.”