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Bucks Battle Back
Laredo avoids elimination and sends the series back home by beating the Mudbugs 4-2 in game five.

04.25.04 -- Bossier City, LA, - The Laredo Bucks looked elimination straight in the eye and responded with a 4-2 win in Game Five of the President's Cup Finals on Sunday night.

With the win the Bucks still trail the best of seven series three games to two, but they force the series back to Laredo, where game six will be played Tuesday night at the Laredo Entertainment Center.

Laredo must have felt their backs against the wall, as they got on the scoreboard first for the only time this series.

Defenseman J.F. David dropped a pass to the right circle for forward Chris Grenville who snapped home a wrist shot just 2:56 into the game for a 1-0 Bucks lead.

It was the first goal of the Finals for Grenville and his sixth of the playoffs. It was also the first time Laredo has led since the third period of Game One.

Bossier-Shreveport tied it when forward Jason Campbell swept in a rebound at 14:57. The goal came one second after a Mudbugs' power play chance had expired.

In the second period the Bucks got the special teams cranked up. At 9:59 forward Patrik Nilson stuffed home a rebound to give the Bucks a 2-1 lead.

Just over a minute later Bucks goalie David Guerrera made a huge save on Mudbugs forward Dan Wildfong to keep Laredo leading by a goal. Late in the second the Mudbugs went on the power play, but the Bucks had the answer.

Forward James Hiebert muscled the puck ahead to streaking forward Steve Simoes who roofed his wrist shot high stick side on Mudbugs goalie Ken Carroll at 16:00 to give the Bucks a 3-1 lead.

In the third period the Mudbugs drew closer when Wildfong tipped in a shot from the point by defenseman Jim Sprott at 13:49.

Late in the game the Bucks put it away when defenseman Dion Hyman fired a shot on a three-on-one that was stopped, but Hiebert swept in the rebound at 16:12 to complete the scoring.

Guerrera stopped 25 of 27 shots to get the win and improve to 7-2. Carroll allowed four goals on 26 shots to fall to 9-4 in the playoffs. The Bucks were 1-5 on the power play, while Bossier-Shreveport was 0-4.