The Cincinnati Cyclones used a three power play goal first period barrage in a 3-1 win over South Carolina on Friday night. Jason Deitsch had a pair of goals and Cedrick Desjardins stopped 35 shots in picking up the victory.

The win gives the Cyclones with a three games to one lead over South Carolina in the best of seven American Conference championship. The winner of this series will advance to the Kelly Cup Finals which will begin Memorial Day weekend.

The fifth game will be Saturday night at South Carolina. Face off is at 7:05pm and the game can be heard on 96 Rock.

The Cyclones exploded for three power play goals to open a 3-0 edge. Rookie Ryan Maki opened the scoring 8:32 into the frame, pushing home his first playoff goal past the right leg of goaltender Davis Parley. David Desharnais and Jean-Michel Daoust had the assists. At 17:31, Jason Deitsch scooped up a rebound at the right goal post and shoveled in for a power play goal, as Sean Perkins and Olivier Latendresse added the assists. At 19:07, Deitsch struck again with Perkins and Latendresse handing out the assists on the power play goal. Cincinnati won the shots on goal battle, 17-11, in the frame.

There was no scoring in the second period, but each team had three powerplay chances. South Carolina had the best opportunity—getting a full two minute powerplay while Mathieu Aubin and Olivier Latendresse served penalties. The Stingrays also won the shots on goal battle, 11-5.

South Carolina scored the lone goal of the third period, as Andrew Gordon scored a breakaway goal at 12:11, his fourth of the postseason. That made the final score, 3-1. The shots again favored the Stingrays, 14-4. For the game, South Carolina held the shots lead—36-26.

Cincinnati was three-for-eight on the powerplay, while the Stingrays were one-for-six.

The Cincinnati Cyclones used a three power play goal first period barrage in a 3-1 win over South Carolina on Friday night. Jason Deitsch had a pair of goals and Cedrick Desjardins stopped 35 shots in picking up the victory.

The win gives the Cyclones with a three games to one lead over South Carolina in the best of seven American Conference championship. The winner of this series will advance to the Kelly Cup Finals which will begin Memorial Day weekend.


The Cyclones exploded for three power play goals to open a 3-0 edge. Rookie Ryan Maki opened the scoring 8:32 into the frame, pushing home his first playoff goal past the right leg of goaltender Davis Parley. David Desharnais and Jean-Michel Daoust had the assists. At 17:31, Jason Deitsch scooped up a rebound at the right goal post and shoveled in for a power play goal, as Sean Perkins and Olivier Latendresse added the assists. At 19:07, Deitsch struck again with Perkins and Latendresse handing out the assists on the power play goal. Cincinnati won the shots on goal battle, 17-11, in the frame.

There was no scoring in the second period, but each team had three powerplay chances. South Carolina had the best opportunity—getting a full two minute powerplay while Mathieu Aubin and Olivier Latendresse served penalties. The Stingrays also won the shots on goal battle, 11-5.

South Carolina scored the lone goal of the third period, as Andrew Gordon scored a breakaway goal at 12:11, his fourth of the postseason. That made the final score, 3-1. The shots again favored the Stingrays, 14-4. For the game, South Carolina held the shots lead—36-26.

Cincinnati was three-for-eight on the powerplay, while the Stingrays were one-for-six.

The fifth game will be Saturday night at South Carolina. Face off is at 7:05pm and the game can be heard on 96 Rock.

The Cincinnati Cyclones exploded for four third period goals, to erase a three goal lead and force overtime against South Carolina Saturday night. Thomas Beauregard’s goal 4:52 into the extra session gave the Cyclones a 5-4 win. The triumph was the first three-goal come-from-behind win in the two seasons that Chuck Weber has been Cincinnati’s coach.

Beauregard re-directed a Barret Ehgoetz feed from behind the net for his eighth goal and league-leading fourth game winning goal to end the game.

The win gives the Cyclones a two games to none lead over South Carolina in the best of seven American Conference championship. The winner of this series will advance to the Kelly Cup Finals which will begin Memorial Day weekend. It is the eleventh time in the 2008 Kelly Cup playoffs that a team jumped to a 2-0 edge in a series. The team with the upper hand won the series in nine of the previous ten.

A crowd of 4853 watched the contest at U.S. Bank Arena, the second-largest playoff crowd in Cyclones history, behind last night’s throng. The weekend had 10,063 fans checking out Cincinnati postseason hockey.

The third game will be Wednesday night at South Carolina. Face off is at 7:05pm and the game can be heard on 96 Rock.

South Carolina scored the only goal of the opening period, as Paul McIlveen tipped in a pass off the right half wall from Steve Pinizzotto.

The second period saw another pair of goals from the Stingrays, as McIlveen netted his second of the night and third of the postseason at 3:20. The lead extended to 3-0, when Chris Chaput scored his fourth playoff goal on a breakaway at 15:22. Cyclones netminder Cedrick Desjardins had his night ended then, turning aside 19 of the 22 shots he faced.

The third period saw Cincinnati score the first three goals to knot the game at 3-3. Olivier Latendresse scored 3:01 into the frame on the power play from Bryan Schmidt and Jason Deitsch. Latendresse scored another power play goal more than six minutes later, at 9:41, from Matt Macdonald and Deitsch. Scott Reynold’s fourth goal a minute later, at 10:50, from Thomas Beauregard tied the game.

With the Cyclones shorthanded by t****layers at 15:23, Andrew Gordon re-established a South Carolina lead with his second goal from Sean Collins and Travis Morin. The Cyclones completed the comeback with David Desharnais’ seventh goal from Schmidt and Latendresse.

Beauregard’s heroics ended the game and gave the win to goaltender Maxime Daigneault, who entered the game in relief and stopped 14 of the 15 shots he faced.

The series is the first time that a professional sporting conference final has been played in Cincinnati since the Cyclones played in the 2002-03 ECHL’s Kelly Cup playoffs. In that series, Cincinnati dropped the first three games of that session—before bouncing back to win three in a row. Atlantic City then won the seventh game and kept the Cyclones one win away from a championship series berth.

The Cincinnati Cyclones advanced to the American Conference Finals with a 6-1 win over Reading Monday night in the seventh game of the best of seven series. Jason Deitsch and Mathieu Aubin each scored a goal and had tow assists to pace the offense. Cedrick Desjardins stopped 30 shots in taking the win.

The five goal margin was the most lopsided victory in a seventh game in the 20 year history of the ECHL.

There was no scoring in the first period, as the teams each ended with 15 shots on goal in the frame.

For the first time in the Kelly Cup playoffs the Cyclones exploded for four goals in a period in opening a 4-0 edge.

Jason Deitsch picked up the first score, his second of the postseason from Mathieu Aubin and T.J. McElroy. At 6:49, Cincinnati ended a zero-for-28 power play draught that lasted twelve periods—when David Desharnais snapped off his third playoff goal from Bryan Schmidt and Matt Macdonald. The lead extended to 3-0, when Aubin buried his third goal in two games from Deitsch at 11:18. The scoring flurry ended at 12:54 when rookie Ryan Russell netted his first pro playoff goal from Aubin and Deitsch. The Cyclones dominated the period, outshooting the Royals, 19-4.

Reading got a third period goal from Kevin Saurette to cut the lead to 4-1. Scott Reynolds re-established the four goal lead at 8:23 with his third goal from Barret Ehgoetz.. The final goal came from Desharnais from Jean-Michel Daoust.

It was the first time that a professional sporting event had gone to a seventh game and been played in the city of Cincinnati since the 1996 IHL Eastern Conference Finals. The IHL Cyclones lost a 1-0 heartbreaker to Orlando in that decisive game. Since that game, there had been four seventh games played by local pro teams—all hockey and on the road—with only one winning (2005 AHL West Semifinals at Milwaukee).

This was the third time in club history that the Cyclones have played a seventh game in a playoff series, most in ECHL history. This was the 13th time in league history that seventh game has been played, with the home team winning ten of them (77 percent). It was only the third time in ECHL history that a team never led a best of seven series until the end of the seventh game.

As winners of this series, the Cyclones will host South Carolina in a games one and two of a best of seven series to determine the American Conference champion and one half of the Kelly Cup Finals. Game one of the series will be on Friday (May 9) and game two will be Saturday (May 10) at 7:30pm. South Carolina advanced tonight by winning the fifth, and decisive game, in the best of five series—2-0 over Columbia. A full press release detailing game dates and times in the series will be coming later tonight.

The last time a seventh game of a playoff series was won in the city of Cincinnati was the 1996 IHL Eastern Conference semifinals—when the Cyclones knocked off Michigan in a 3-2 decision in the final game on May 15, 1996. The IHL Cyclones advanced, but then lost in a seventh game to Orlando.

There are two other times since 1920 that a seventh game triumph has occurred in the Queen City by a local club. In the 1955 IHL Turner Cup championship series—the Mohawks claimed a 7-0 win over the Troy Bruins to capture the third of their five straight championships on April 3, 1955. The other was the 1940 World Series, when the Reds defeated the Detroit Tigers, 2-1, in the final game of the series on October 8, 1940.

This was the seventh game of the best-of-seven North Division Finals. It is the third time in team history that the squad has reached this stage of the Kelly Cup playoffs and second straight year that is has occurred. The Cyclones (55-12-5) were the North Division, American Conference and Brabham Cup (best overall ECHL regular season record) champions. Reading (38-26-6), which was seeded third, upended second-seeded Elmira in a six game series that ended more than a week ago to advance to this round.