Grizz hang on, take third straight

WEST VALLEY CITY — With Friday's return of rookie all-star scoring leader Matt Craig from assignment in the AHL (Manitoba), Utah Grizzlies coach Jason Christie has about the best complement of players from which to choose that he's had in 45 days or more.

The result is Utah's first three-game win streak of 2006, thanks to a second straight get-a-lead-and-hang-on victory over the San Diego Gulls.

Utah won 4-3 Friday night in the E Center after holding leads of 2-0, 3-1 and 4-2, and allowing the Gulls to nearly come back several times.

It was similar to Wednesday's game between the same two teams when Utah won 3-2, scoring all three of its goals in the first period and then clinging.

The Grizzlies hadn't given up a power-play goal in more than eight periods of play, but San Diego's Jesse Bennefield finally solved Utah's penalty killing — last in the ECHL for most of the season but up to second-to-last going into Friday's game — with a score at 10:30 of the third period.

That trimmed Utah's lead to 4-3 and left the Grizzlies feeling nervous the last half of the third period.

Christie was even more nervous after the game, knowing that tonight's opponents — the Las Vegas Wranglers, the second-place team in the entire ECHL — were relaxing in the stands Friday night, watching Utah take a lot of penalties it probably shouldn't and likely figuring out ways to goad the Grizzlies into the same sort of thing tonight.

Utah, 25-19-4 and in fourth place in the ECHL West, hosts the 34-8-4 Wranglers at 7 p.m. in the E Center. San Diego fell to 19-20-5 and fourth in the ECHL Pacific Division.

"We'll have to keep our emotions in tact a bit more" tonight, Christie said, despite the recent success with penalty killing.

Las Vegas is seventh in the league in scoring with the man-advantage, far better statistically than Friday's opponent. The Gulls are 20th in the ECHL on the power play.

With players like Ian Forbes and D.J. Jelitto returning recently from injury and Craig just back from Manitoba, Utah has made some headway during this second seven-game homestand of the past month, winning three in a row after losing the opener.

Tonight's game should be an even bigger test as Las Vegas trails only Alaska (75 points) in the league standings and is 7-2-1 in its last 10 games, and beat Alaska 7-1 in Vegas on Tuesday night to end the Aces' nine-game win streak.