GLENS FALLS, N.Y. — Tye McGinn yelled a four-letter word in frustration. He was the Adirondack Phantoms’ last shooter and they needed a goal to force the shootout into sudden death.

He made a move, lost control of the puck and didn’t get a shot off.

McGinn wasn’t the only one to miss; he was just the last one to miss as the Phantoms fell to Portland 3-2.

The winger didn’t even want to talk to Ben Holmstrom when the captain physically reached out to him after the game.

The Phantoms are of two minds on this one. On one hand, it’s a loss to a team lower in the standings when they came back and tied it in the third. Then there’s the view that they came back and tied it up and got a point.

“Right now, we gotta take the positives,” said goaltender Yann Danis, who made 42 saves on 44 shots. “We got a point, we came back. We haven’t done that too many times this year.”

Danis did his part to keep the Phantoms in the game; the two goals he gave up were on the power play.

But so did Mark Visentin on the other end. He made 53 saves as the Phantoms put an Adirondack-Phantoms-record 55 shots on net.

“I thought the key for Mark and our team was the first five minutes, Portland head coach Ray Edwards said. “I think he made three pretty good saves to settle the game down for us. If they get an early lead it’s always tough, so that was important.”

Edwards said both teams needed points, and you could tell. It was a physical game with players’ getting in each others’ faces

With 13 total power plays, seven for the Phantoms and six for the Pirates, the bench got short for both teams.

“You only get so many guys going in the game, a lot of guys end up sitting,” Holmstrom said. Especially when there are consecutive power plays and penalty kills. The guys who are in those situations are getting extra minutes and the guys that are on the bench are trying to stay in the game. It was its affects.”

The Phantoms scored one power-play goal and had some good chances. Both of the Pirates’ goals came on the power play.

Portland’s goals didn’t come on set-up plays, one was on the rush and one was on the scramble, but it worked for them.

The third period may have been the Phantoms’ best of the game. They outshot the Pirates 21-6, completely dominating play.

Finally, Jason Akeson tied the game up on the 52nd shot of the game, with 3:39 to play. Kris Newbury won the faceoff and Akeson took a shot from the top of the circle that he said “had eyes.”

Head coach Terry Murray offered that the Phantoms may have finally had their feet under them in the third period.

“Whenever you’re off four four days, maybe you lose your touch a little bit,” he said. “Get pucks in, get your feet moving, get over it and go do it again was kinda the theme of the day. Fifty-five shots is a pretty good total. I think we had some very good shots, we just weren’t able to get it by them.”

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