SteelHounds blanked by Thunder's Volp

Goalie Jon Volp made 32 saves in Wichita's win.
By JOHN KOVACH
VINDICATOR SPORTS STAFF
YOUNGSTOWN -- When an ice hockey team has a good goalie, it doesn't make too much difference how good the shooters are on the opposing offense.
And if that goalie is reinforced by a scrapping back-line defense that doesn't allow too much penetration by the opposing offense to set up quality plays and shots, that defense will be all the more effective and difficult to solve.
Such was the case Friday night at the Chevrolet Centre as Wichita Thunder goalie Jon Volp turned away 32 shots and shut out the Youngstown SteelHounds, 2-0, in a Central Hockey League game before an announced attendance of 4,964 fans.
While Volp and his defense were thwarting the SteelHounds at every turn, the Thunder managed to get goals from Tab Lardner in the first period and Kris Wiebe in the second period to bounce back from Wednesday's 3-1 loss to Youngstown.
The two teams return to the Chevrolet Centre tonight at 7:05, with the Thunder leading the series, 2-1.
Volp too tough
"Volp smothered the rebounds when he needed to. We didn't get to many second chances," SteelHounds (14-19-1) coach J.F. Laforest said. "He made a great save on Jeff Christian in the second period. He played a great game. That's a good hockey team."
Coach Mark French of Wichita (19-10-5) said Volp was the difference in the game.
"Any shots that they got, he was able to stop them," said French, noting that Volp covered the net very efficiently. "Volp made every shot look like [it was just average]. He is a big goalie. He made hard saves fairly easy."
French also said his team turned in a strong overall defensive effort, especially Darren McMillan and David Lizotte.
"Our "D" stepped up," French said. "McMillan played the back end [well]."
Laforest admitted that the Thunder's back-line defense did a good job, but said it was Volp that made it so hard to score.
"Their 'D' did a nice job of controlling across the board, but there was no difference in their defense than from our previous game with them," said Laforest, even though his offense couldn't penetrate and was forced to take long, low-quality shots.
Laforest also blamed the shutout on power-play failure.
"We didn't capitalize on our power plays," Laforest said. "They were 1-for-9 [on power plays] while we were 0-for-7. You have to score on your power play."
Penalties also hurt Youngstown --it had 10 to Wichita's eight.
"We were much more physical than they were" Laforest said.
Clever play nets goal
The Thunder scored early in the game with only 2:43 elapsed on a clever play that caught SteelHounds' goalie David St. Germain off guard.
Lardner, who was positioned in front of the net, took a pass from a teammate who was starting to circle behind the net, and then slammed in the puck in on the side of the net before St. Germain could react.
St. Germain finished with 26 saves.
"We had creativity up front [on offense]," French said. " Our offense is pretty gifted. We tried to get St. Germain to start moving laterally."
Tyler Liebel and Daniel Tetrault were credited with assists.
In the second period at 4:47, Wiebe managed to knock in a goal from close range during a multi-player scuffle for the puck. Assists went to Joe Blaznek and Tetrault.
Youngstown enjoyed a 34-28 shot advantage, including 17-4 in the final period. Despite the avalanche of shots, the SteelHounds could not get the puck past Volp.