Wranglers look to continue success on home ice

Nick Christensen

Wednesday, Dec. 3, 2003 | 10:09 a.m.

"There's no place like home."

They're not wearing ruby slippers, but the Las Vegas Wranglers still have a bit in common with Dorothy.

"There's no place like home."

The numbers speak strongly. 9-0-1 at the Orleans Arena, 2-5-3 on the road. Only two teams in the ECHL have worse road marks than the Wranglers.

Tonight, the Wranglers' current home stand continues, as they face the Atlantic City Boardwalk Bullies at the Orleans Arena at 7:05. The Boardwalk Bullies are one of the four ECHL Northern Division teams that roughed up the Wranglers, as they went winless on their November jaunt through the East Coast.

And right on cue, with the Wranglers return to Las Vegas, they got back in the winning column, beating Alaska and San Diego over the weekend.

Wranglers coach Glen Gulutzan said the road woes have less to do with the location of the game than with the way the game goes.

"It's kind of misleading," Gulutzan said of the road record. "It's as misleading as the record at home."

On the eastern swing, Las Vegas had a 3.5 goals against average, compared to a 2.1 GAA at home. Gulutzan said it was the excellent goaltending of Marc Magliarditi that kept the Wranglers so hot at home.

"We had some really good goaltending," he said. "(On the road), we had a lot of one-goal games -- we just ran up against some good goaltending, and some good teams."

But now the challenge at the net gets even bigger for the Wranglers. Rookie Brent Krahn, Calgary's first-round draft pick, was sent down from Triple-A Lowell last week, and will share time with Magliarditi minding net. Krahn had a shutout going for Las Vegas Saturday against San Diego, until the Gulls scored a goal with 11 seconds to play in the game.

"It benefits both of them," Gulutzan said of Krahn*s arrival. "(Magliarditi) had a long run with a lot of games. So that give Mags a well-deserved rest. He can help Brent -- he's a good leader."

And with a new face arriving for the Wranglers, a familiar name moved on in November. Center Greg Day, who led the ECHL in assists and was among the league leaders in points, signed with Lowell to a tryout contract last week. In two games with the Loch Monsters, he's compiled no stats.

Gulutzan said that Day's departure, his team is given a new challenge to find a scoring option.

"It actually opens the door for our young guys to step to the plate," Gulutzan said. "We had one line doing 60-70 percent of the scoring. We need some younger guys to step up, and the older guys to elevate their game."

And tonight, that challenge starts with facing the beasts of the east, the Boardwalk Bullies, who the Wranglers played twice at the Boardwalk Hall in November.

"We're preparing for a very well-coached hockey team," Gulutzan said. "We have to score a lot of ugly goals on them, and limit their chances."