The Colorado Eagles defeated the Las Vegas Wranglers, 4-2, in their last game before the 2013 ECHL All-Star Week, presented by CCM. Colorado will return home to the Budweiser Events Center where they'll take on the ECHL All-Stars Tuesday night in a Skills Competition, presented by CCM & OtterBox, one night before the squads face-off again in the All-Star Game, presented by University of Colorado Health. Things could not have started much better for the Wranglers, who were awarded consecutive power plays in the first five minutes of action, however, true to form, their league-worst power play unit -- playing without much of its top talent -- failed to convert on either. At the other end of the ice, Joe Fallon was stopping just about everything the Eagles threw his way; Colorado out-shot Las Vegas 14-9 in the first frame. But 17 minutes in, following a couple big saves from Adam Brown at the opposite end of the ice, Trent Daavettila found Isaac Smeltzer sneaking down from the point and the rookie blueliner laced his first professional goal into the net from the high slot to give the Eagles a 1-0 lead heading into the first intermission. The Wranglers were awarded another four minutes worth of power play early in the second period thanks to a double-minor called against Norm Ezekiel, but it once again appeared that they would be unable to capitalize as Brown was big again in Colorado's net. But with just three seconds left in the extended advantage, referee Andrew Wilk allowed Geoff Paukovich to whack away at what appeared to be a frozen puck underneath the goaltender's pads until the disc freed up and found its way across the goal line to tie the game at 1. Colorado got that goal back midway through the period, however, after Michael Forney won a battle for the puck deep in Las Vegas' zone, carried it behind the net and found Joey Sides for a sharp-angled shot from below the left circle to put the Eagles back on top, 2-1. Daavettila pushed Colorado's lead to 3-1 five minutes into the final frame following a faceoff win in the left circle of the offensive zone. The forward drifted back to the top of the circle and received a pass from Kevin Ulanski before one-timing a rocket past Fallon. Following a familiar theme all game, the Eagles were once again tasked with killing a penalty late in the period, and Las Vegas was able to cut Colorado's lead to 3-2 with 59 seconds to play when Andrew Sarauer put home the puck from the right side of the net on the Wranglers' seventh power play of the night. But Sides scored his second goal of the game into an empty net just moments later to ice the contest.
