Monarchs blank Providence

MANCHESTER – The Manchester Monarchs are proving to be stingy hosts.

Manchester defeated Providence 3-0 in front of 5,715 fans at Verizon Wireless Arena last night, with goalie Jeff Zatkoff making 31 saves to earn his first shutout of the season. The Monarchs were 2-0 winners over Bridgeport on Friday and have outscored opponents 15-1 in four home games with three shutouts.

"We beat some pretty good hockey teams this weekend," said Monarchs head coach Mark Morris. "To shut them out makes us feel pretty good about our goaltending, about our penalty kill and our improvement in defensive awareness."

Manchester is now 7-2-0 for 12 points and first place in the AHL's Atlantic Division. Providence fell to 4-3-1 and will visit Manchester again on Friday night.

The Monarchs broke a scoreless deadlock with 45 seconds remaining in the second period as Marc-Andre Cliche scored his second shorthanded goal of the season.

Cliche stole the puck at center ice and raced in alone on Bruins goalie Dany Sabourin, who tried to poke-check the puck. Cliche avoided the stick and backhanded the puck into the left side of the cage.

Bud Holloway made it 2-0 Monarchs with a goal at 6:06 of the third. Holloway worked the give-and-go with Andrei Loktionov, sending the puck over before getting back in close and sliding it into the net before Sabourin could get across.

Manchester closed the scoring with an empty-net goal from Corey Elkins shot from the neutral zone with eight seconds remaining.

Monarchs goalie Jonathan Bernier, who has two consecutive shutouts, sat out for precautionary reasons with a wrist injury. Manchester's Rick Laurendeau was signed to a pro tryout agreement to serve as backup.

That put the pressure on Zatkoff, who started his third game of the season and played well in picking up the shutout.

"It was a relief to get it. I've been close a couple times this year, but we were able to pull it off," Zatkoff said. "I thought the whole game we were great defensively. I had 30 shots, but you look in terms of quality chances and there weren't many. They did a great job keeping them to the outside and blocking shots. I can't say enough about the guys in front of me." Learning to win tight games will pay dividends later.

"Those are the kind of games that make you better down the stretch and get you prepared for crunch time come playoffs and the playoff push," said defenseman Drew Bagnall, who finished with a plus-2 rating for the game. "This place has always been great to play. We're just happy we can put a quality product on the ice for the fans that have been loyal to us all these years."