Kansas City Halts Gulls’ Win Streak : Hockey: Kvartalnov kept in check by the Blades, the IHL’s top team.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A 4-1 loss to the first-place Kansas City Blades in front of 10,352 at Kemper Arena on Friday ended the Gulls’ five-game winning streak as well as some individual streaks.

Left wing Dmitri Kvartalnov, the International Hockey League leader with 49 goals, failed to get his 50th and snapped a five-game goal-scoring streak.

Len Hachborn, the IHL assist leader with 63, saw a 13-game scoring streak come to an end and drew a game misconduct in the third period--when Coach Don Waddell said the Gulls lost their composure.

Goalie Rick Knickle, 11-0-1 in his previous 12 starts, faced 36 shots on goal while losing and falling to 24-8-3.

“We played OK, but we’ve got to come up with a plan (tonight) to forecheck better and come up with some more scoring opportunities,” said Waddell, after the Gulls (77 points).

Kansas City, which smothered the high-scoring Gulls with its hard-checking defense, improved to 96 points. The Gulls held on to second place in the West Division but saw Peoria (76 points) move to within a point of them with a 5-1 victory over Indianapolis.

“They are an outstanding defensive team,” Waddell said of Kansas City. “They position themselves well and they don’t give you a lot of opportunities. We got frustrated and we lost our composure in the third period trying to create things that weren’t there.”

Trailing, 2-1, heading into the third period, the Gulls saw Ron Handy score on the power play and Jeff Madill later score his 27th goal for the Blades. The Gulls, after getting a goal from Denny Lambert to open the scoring, were blanked the final two periods. They also were outshot, 36-19.

Larry DePalma got the other two goals for Kansas City, his 24th and 25th, in the second period.