Philadelphia Wings beat Buffalo Bandits, 14-13

The Philadelphia Wings beat the Buffalo Bandits, 14-13, Sunday at the Wells Fargo Center.

In addition to the victory, the Wings celebrated a day on which the team became the first major North American pro sports organization to put Twitter handles on the backs of their players' jerseys.

Rookie Kevin Crowley led the Wings (3-2) in scoring with four goals against the Bandits (2-3). Dan Dawson nabbed one goal and led the team in assists with 11. Drew Westervelt scored two of his three goals in the final five minutes of the fourth quarter to help push the Wings to the win.

"We spent a lot of time this week talking about being aggressive," Wings head coach Johnny Mouradian said.  "Our desire to win, our aggressiveness was there. This was a character win for us tonight."

Sunday's game marked a departure for the Wings from a season-long trend. They have struggled in third quarters of games so far this season. During their first four games, they scored a total of four goals combined in third quarters. By contrast, they totaled more than 10 goals in each of the first, second and fourth quarters. 

Against Buffalo, the Wings scored four goals in just one third quarter, outscoring the Bandits by a 4–3 margin in that span. Mouradian said afterward that the team focused on getting prepared coming out of the halftime break.

"Our guys were out there ready to play while they were getting out on the turf this week," Mouradian said.  

Throughout the agme, the Wings sported jerseys with their Twitter handles on the back instead of their last names. The jerseys were auctioned after the game for the American Cancer Society. The team raised $13,100, Wings spokesman Zack Lloyd said.

"It's good to be a part of giving back," Westervelt said. Of the Twitter handle promotion, Westervelt said, "I think it’s cool we pioneered [that]."

Westervelt said the win was a step in the right direction, as the Wings played all four quarters with the same level of intensity.

"We want to have consistency through all four quarters," Westervelt said. "We were all on the same page tonight."

The Wings will travel across the border next week when they take on the Toronto Rock. Toronto crushed the Wings at home last week, 15-6, holding the Wings scoreless in the second half.

With a win at Toronto, the Wings would overtake the Rock to reclaim first place in the Eastern Conference.

Westervelt said that during the last meeting with Toronto, "hte second half got away from us."

"The biggest thing for us is to keep it simple and battle," he said. "They’re all going to be tight games. We just need to battle and stick to what’s working."