For a while, the best New Year’s Eve plans in Portland involved Phyzgig.
However, since vaudeville, mime and magic acts no longer dominate the local social scene on the final day of the year, the Maine Red Claws and Portland Pirates are doing their best to fill the void.
On Thursday, both teams staged comeback victories before appreciative crowds. The Red Claws beat the Texas Legends 119-112 before an audience of 2,446 at the Portland Expo in an afternoon basketball game, and the Pirates rallied past the Providence Bruins 4-3 in hockey before a season-high 5,175 at Cross Insurance Arena, where postgame fireworks set off the building’s alarm system and forced a quick evacuation Thursday night.
“It was a good day for Portland sports,” said Pirates assistant coach Scott Allen, speaking from a Spring Street sidewalk after the game as he awaited the all-clear signal to return inside. “Good way to end the year.”
Both games featured a shot-blocking star. For the Red Claws, that was Celtics rookie Jordan Mickey, who turned aside 10 shots to go with 13 points and 13 rebounds for his first triple-double since high school.
“I had no idea I was even close,” said Mickey, joined by fellow Celtics rookies Terry Rozier at point guard and R.J. Hunter at shooting guard.
Rozier dished out 13 assists and scored 15 points in his fifth game with Maine. Hunter, making his Red Claws debut, scored 13 of his game-high 28 points in the fourth quarter and played nearly 38 minutes, more than triple his average court time with the Celtics.
“I was gassed,” Hunter said. “My first four minutes, I was ready to call a timeout myself. But I knew that was going to happen. That’s why I’m up here. I need to play.”
The D-League victory was Maine’s fourth straight and came with Danny Ainge, president of basketball operations for the Celtics, sitting courtside. Ainge saw 12 lead changes and nine ties. Texas took a two-point lead into the fourth quarter and trailed by a point with just under three minutes remaining.
After a potential game-tying 3-pointer by Texas caught iron with 20 seconds left, Hunter hit Omari Johnson on a fly pattern for a dunk and Johnson immediately turned a stolen inbound pass into another dunk to clinch the game. Johnson finished with 23 points and reserve Coty Clarke scored 24.
Coach Scott Morrison challenged a three-shot foul by Hunter early in the fourth quarter and, for the first time this season, succeeded in getting a call overturned, leading to a jump ball won by the Red Claws.
“It was pretty ugly at times and I don’t think we were as crisp as we were last weekend,” he said, “but we got some big stops and big rebounds when we needed to.”
As an aside, is there another city with a pro basketball team coached by a Canadian (Morrison grew up in Prince Edward Island) and a pro hockey team coached by two Americans (both Allen and head coach Tom Rowe hail from Massachusetts)?
The Pirates weren’t pretty in the early going and relied on their star shot-blocker, goaltender Mike McKenna, to bail them out. McKenna finished with 31 saves and kept the deficit to 2-1 through two periods.
A high-sticking double minor that drew blood from Kyle Rau’s nose gave the Pirates a power play of more than three minutes to open the third. Not only did they cash in with a Rocco Grimaldi goal, they did so on a delayed hooking call, which led to a go-ahead power-play goal by Rob Flick for a 3-2 lead.
Another Providence penalty for delay of game (puck flipped over the glass from the defensive zone) set up a third power-play goal within three minutes, as John McFarland converted a feed from Garrett Wilson to make it 4-2.
“We haven’t had the most success on the power play this year, but now I think we’re getting into the swing of things,” said Shane Harper, who assisted on Flick’s winner and scored Portland’s lone even-strength goal with a wraparound move in the second period. “Once we have the puck on the power play and set it up, we’re always pretty good.”
Grimaldi missed a good chunk of the second period after a deflected puck opened a gash under his left eye.
“Before that happened I was terrible,” Grimaldi said. “Probably the worst game I’ve ever played in my life. Even before all the good stuff happened in the third, I was like, ‘That’s a wake-up call that I needed.’ ”
Providence pulled its goalie for an extra attacker in the final minute and managed to cut the margin to one, but McKenna yielded no more as the Pirates won for the seventh time in eight games and ninth in 11.
At least one fan took in the doubleheader.
“It’s my cabin-fever remedy,” said Jeff Spaulding, 54, of Auburn, who wore a green Red Claws cap and gray Pirates T-shirt.
Because of long concession lines at CIA – not all of the stands were open – the Pirates offered free admission to Sunday’s game against Lehigh Valley for all ticket holders to Thursday’s game.
“It’s worth noting we had a great crowd (Thursday) and we heard ’em,” McKenna said. “We were happy they were here and we hope they come back.”
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