KALAMAZOO – The Florida Everblades battled hard with their season on the line Saturday night, but the Kalamazoo Wings eliminated the Blades 5-3 to advance to the second round of the ECHL playoffs, and bring an end to Florida’s season.

An action-pack first period saw the teams trade offensive punches back-and-fourth throughout the opening 20 minutes. Jumping out to a 7-3 shot advantage over the first seven minutes, the Everblades realized it was not going to be an easy night to get the puck past Wings goaltender Ryan Nie.

The midpoint of the opening frame belonged to Kalamazoo as they stormed back to grab a 9-7 shot lead, with their ninth shot finding the back of the net to open the scoring. Corey Syvret’s shot from the right boards found its way through traffic and past Everblades rookie net-minder Ryan Zapolski at 9:56.

The Everblades responded by closing out the period with strong pressure to finish the frame with a 15-13 shot advantage and the tying goal. With 56.4 seconds remaining, and after a great blocker save by Zapolski, Alex Imbeault led a rush up ice by feeding a pass to Matt Beca at center ice. Beca then raced into the zone on the left side before firing a perfect pass across to Dusty Collins who one-timed home his first goal of the playoffs from the right circle.

Although the Everblades continued to get the better of the chances as the second period moved along, including at one point out-shooting Kalamazoo 9-3 in the period, the Wings pounced on the Blades for a pair of goals separated by 43 seconds midway through the frame.

The Wings secured the lead at 12:01 when Steven Tarasuk kept the puck in at the right point before weaving free in the right circle where he found Justin Taylor at the left post with a perfect pass that was tapped home.

Aaron Clarke slapped home a one-time shot from the bottom of the left circle at 12:44 after he was allowed to slip behind the defense, giving the Wings a 3-1 lead.

As they did a night earlier, the Everblades erased the two-goal deficit to even the score midway through the third period. The Blades got the first of the two goals striking quickly when Alex Hutchings notched his first goal of the postseason at 1:45. The goal was set up by assists from Elgin Reid and Brad Snetsinger.

Midway through the period the Everblades found the equalizer on the power play. A fortuitous bounce helped as Kalamazoo’s clearing attempt hit a glass support and dropped onto the stick of Mathieu Roy who skated to the front of the net where he lifted a backhand over the glove of Nie and into the net at 10:46.

Less than two minutes later the Wings scored the game-winner when Zapolski got a piece of a shot from Mitch Veersteg, but the rebound dropped behind him where Darryl Lloyd poked it home at 12:05.

The Wings sealed the win with an empty-net tally by Kory Karlander that came with 26 seconds remaining.

In his professional debut, Zapolski played well, but suffered the loss allowing four goals on 41 shots, while Nie improved to 3-1 in the postseason with 42 saves.

On the power play, the Everblades closed out the game 1-of-4, while Kalamazoo closed out the night 0-of-3 on the man-advantage.