NORTH RICHLAND HILLS, TX – The playoffs began on a rough note for the Brahmas as the Atlanta Capitals took game one of the series, 5-1.
Jumping out to a hot start, Alex Johanson opened the scoring four minutes in, cleaning up the rebound off of a shot from Kyle Rimbach. Moments after that connection, Phillip Pugliese scored short-handed for the Caps, his first of two in the frame. Evan Camba set up both of them and on the second, Ryan Dumond contributed a secondary assist as well. When the first period buzzer sounded, the Caps held a commanding 3-0 lead.
Fortunately the Brahmas were able to turn it around in the second, tallying the only goal of the frame thanks to Jacob Elrod. The Tennessee native placed a wrister through a slew of bodies before eventually beating Caps netminder Aleksandr Zendejas.
However, the third period belonged to the visitors again, with Ross Bartlett and Arturas Laukaitis putting the daggers past Brandon Perrone. The goals came in the first and last two minutes of the frame, thus propelling Atlanta to the victory.
Perrone made many terrific saves along the way but suffers the loss in the contest.
Round two is set for 2:15 tomorrow at NYTEX again. Admission is free and if you’re unable to attend, you can catch the action on FastHockey.com.