By Bill Ballou

WORCESTER – Did anyone in the city see their front door blow open unexpectedly at about 5:30 Sunday afternoon?

If so, it had nothing to do with the weather. It was the entire staff and roster of the Worcester Monkey Wrenches exhaling in unison after veteran Drew Callin scored what up to now is their biggest goal of the season.

It came at 4:27 of overtime to give the home team a 1-0 victory over the Adirondack Thunder, one of the four teams ahead of them in the North Division standings. The goal snapped a four-game losing streak on home ice and allowed Worcester to earn four of a possible six points for the weekend.

The game marked only the second time in team history it was 0-0 after 60 minutes. Worcester won the last one, as well, on March 21, 2018 at Wheeling in a shootout.

The goal was Callin’s 20th goal of the season. Anthony Repaci set it up by stealing the puck in the left circle. Callin was alone on the right side, moved in on Thunder goalie Jeremy Brodeur and beat him with a backhand fake.

“Patch made a great pass over,” Callin said, “that gave me some free space. I just picked my head up, saw (Brodeur) sliding over and I figured I’d go the other way.”

The overtime victory was the home team’s seventh of the season, fifth at the DCU Center.

The goaltending was great, as it often is in this division.

Brodeur stopped 27 shots. Worcester’s Parker Gahagen made 25 saves for his second 1-0 victory in 29 days.

The Monkey Wrenches killed five penalties and had just one power play. They killed them beautifully to keep the game scoreless.

Worcester’s penalty kill featured some excellent work by Cole Donhauser, who played a major role in Sunday’s victory.

“We have a little bit of plan going into it,” Donhauser said, “but the main thought is to deny the seams, don’t let the puck get going east to west, deny the one-timers, try to protect the house and our D-men did a great job blocking shots.”

Gahagen’s presence has made a huge difference in all the close games Worcester has played recently. Throughout the back and forth havoc, especially in the third period and overtime, he looked like the calmest person on skates.

And the home team is playing nothing but close games these days.

“I think everybody deems it important this time of year to play the right way,” Tuzzolino said.

Callin became the 14th player in team history to score 20 goals. He joins brother Anthony who had 24 last season.

MONKEY BUSINESS – Former Sharks forward Corey Quirk was at the game with his family. … Back to being the Railers — Worcester’s next game is Saturday night at Trois-Rivieres. The Railers’ next home game is March 11 versus Norfolk. … AJ Schlepp made his ECHL debut and was assigned Number 17. He is the 15th different Railer with that number. Predecessors include Anthony Callin. At 6-foot-8, Schlepp is the tallest position player in the city’s pro history. Schlepp fought Daniel Amesbury, who had 127 PIM in 16 going into the afternoon. … Attendance was 4,931.

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