MANCHESTER, N.H – Sunday was not a good day when it came to Jacksonville sports teams in New England.
At almost the same time the Patriots concluded their victory against the Jaguars, the Manchester Monarchs finished a convincing 10-4 victory against the Jacksonville Icemen.
Early on, it seemed like a repeat of the Monarchs’ disappointing Saturday might be coming, as Bobby MacIntyre grabbed his second early first-period goal in as many days.
However, that would be the last lead of the night for the Icemen, as Spencer Watson and Jordan LaVallee-Smotherman found the back of the net to give Manchester the lead heading into the first intermission.
In the second period, Manchester jumped out to an 8-2 lead, as a power play goal from MacIntyre was Jacksonville’s only response to Monarchs goals from Francois Beauchemin, Keegan Iverson, Justin Agosta, Alexx Privitera, Matt Schmalz, and Justin Agosta’s first two goals of the year.
Schmalz and Matt Marcinew would add more goals in the third period, followed by garbage time goals for Jacksonville from Dajon Mingo and Tanner Eberle.
Manchester’s 10 goals tied a franchise record and also was the most by any team in the ECHL so far this season, surpassing Reading’s nine on Oct. 29.
The second period scoring explosion was accompanied by 15 combined penalties for both sides, including three fights.
Two of those fights involved Jacksonville’s Garrett Klotz, who earned a game misconduct along with Manchester’s Keegan Iverson in that third melee.
Jacksonville’s Tyson Fawcett instigated a fourth fight with Alexx Privitera in the third period, with both teams combining for 99 total penalty minutes before all was said and done.
For Manchester head coach Rich Seeley, the aggression was a welcome sight after Saturday’s anemic effort from his squad
“I think (the penalties) tell you there’s two teams playing some intense hockey,” he said. “When both teams come to battle and compete, there’s some intensity there that happens to boil over at times and I think that happened tonight.”
Those penalties helped both teams’ poor power play statistics as well, as both teams scored two power play goals each. Manchester currently has the fourth worst home-ice power play in the ECHL (12.7 percent) while Jacksonville has the worst in the league overall (10.5 percent).
The Monarchs return to the ice when they visit the Wheeling Nailers on Jan. 27 (7:05 p.m.) at the WesBanco Arena.
