Frustration builds for Klingberg, McCambridge after IceCaps overtime loss

ST. JOHN'S, N.L. - The first home series of the new year brought familiar problems for the St. John's IceCaps.

Slava Voynov scored in overtime as the Manchester Monarchs, St. John's divisional rival, edge the IceCaps 3-2 on Saturday night in American Hockey League action.

The loss drops St. John's (15-19-2) to near the bottom of the Eastern Conference.

"We're pretty used to getting a goal against right now," said Carl Klingberg, who scored both of the IceCaps goals. "To get that first goal would be nice sometimes."

Jordan Weal and Tanner Pearson also scored for Manchester (16-15-4).

St. John's head coach Keith McCambridge said the team needed to find success against the Monarchs and failed to do so. McCambridge said that coming away from the two games with only one point is not good enough.

"Obviously these were two really big games for us and for ourselves not to be able to have success here against this team, and to drop this one in overtime, we're disappointed," said McCambridge. "These are points that we have to get here. You do have to give credit to Manchester, I thought Manchester played two really strong games."

Consistency was something that both McCambridge and Klingberg spoke about after the loss.

"We had a few good shifts here and there, not consistently," said Klingberg. "Yesterday, we had two solid periods. That's what is lacking in our game right now, we need to find consistency, sixty minutes, every game. That's how we win games, but today we're not and that's why we're not winning."

A lack of scoring is one of the things that frustrates McCambridge, who says the team does not have a single 10-goal player, which is simply not good enough 36 games into the season.

"Other teams are capitalizing on their chances, and we need to capitalize whenever we get them," said McCambridge. "We have to work that much more harder to get those scoring opportunities and we have got to bear down and finish them."

Klingberg thinks the almost week-long break from games will be good for St. John's as they look to re-focus and work on some of their issues before facing off against the hot Toronto Marlies, who have gone 8-0-2 in their last ten games.

"I think we have a lot of work in front of us to do," said the left-winger. "It's going to be nice to work on some stuff and then come back against the Marlies on Friday."

Mannino made 25 saves and Dekanich stopped 29 shots.

St. John's went 0 for 3 on the power play and Manchester was 0 for 2.