The Komets may have mounted a good comeback Monday night, scoring three unanswered goals in the third period, but they still lost 4-3 to the Brampton Beast in front of a near-sellout crowd of 10,233 fans at Memorial Coliseum.

Komets president Michael Franke made it clear after the game that he has grown tired of “the consistent pattern of it not playing well at the start of games or for periods at a time.”

The Komets (16-14-1) have a 9-6-1 record at the Coliseum. They led the ECHL in average attendance heading in to Monday at 7,801 per game.

“At the end of the day, as president of the team, I ultimately am responsible. That’s been my perspective for 29 years,” Franke said. “I really believe that somewhere along the line, we have a disconnect here and it’s time that the leadership on the ice and the leadership behind the bench get together and get everybody on the same page because I think there’s a lot of talent in that locker room. We need to harness that talent and move forward. That’s the thing that bothers me most is I think this could be a very, very good hockey club.”

New Year’s Eve is a night fans can usually count on a good performance – the Komets have a 41-16-5 all-time record – but Brampton scored the first four goals and things didn’t start happening for Fort Wayne until a controversial Anthony Petruzzelli goal on a shot from the right circle 7:17 into the third period. The Beast argued unsuccessfully it had not slipped underneath the crossbar and the ECHL doesn’t utilize video replay at the Coliseum.

Petruzzelli scored again at 9:11, taking advantage of a Jamie Schaafsma pass from the right corner to send a 15-foot shot into the top of the net.

Justin Hodgman, who returned from his two-game suspension for swinging his stick at Kalamazoo’s Tanner Sorenson, got Fort Wayne within a goal by sending a shot from the right corner that caromed off netminder Austin Lotz and crept into the net at 15:13.

“I think all three lines were going and we started to buzz a little bit more (in the third period),” Petruzzelli said. “We were getting in on the forecheck. Once we started getting up on their (defensemen) and turning pucks over, getting to the net, good things started happening.”

The Komets played the final 3:18 of the game on a power play, including a 1:52-long two-man advantage and a major penalty on Jordan Henry for slew-footing Brady Shaw, but Fort Wayne couldn’t convert.

“The amount of scoring chances we had, we’re going to be thinking about a lot of those. We had enough scoring chances to win that game, that’s for sure,” Komets coach Gary Graham said. “Obviously, it was a tough four games in five nights and I thought our legs were definitely not up to par there early in the game.

“In the third period, when we finally started playing, I thought we were the better team. But you’ve got to tip your hat to them, they did what they needed to down the stretch. You’ve got to score on your 5-on-3s.”

Lukas Hafner stopped 23 of 27 shots for Fort Wayne. Lotz stopped 26 of 29.

“I’m very disappointed for our fans tonight,” Franke said. “We had a big crowd and it took two and a half periods for the guys to get energized in the game tonight. That’s disappointing. I feel bad for our fans. We’ve got 10,000 people in the building. I realize that we’ve played a lot of games recently, but you can’t play that way in front of your own fans.

"This is our building. And you have to put forth a more consistent effort. I get the whole, ‘It’s been a lot of games in a short period of time,’ but we’ve got to remember, too, that we had several days off at the Christmas break.”

Brampton (14-16-3) had been off Sunday, while the Komets were winning 3-2 in overtime at Toledo, Ohio.

“We condition all season long for these type of games,” Petruzzelli said. “Whether it’s the third in three or one every other night, we’ve got to be conditioned and ready to go. I think we were eager to go for the third period and definitely wanted to turn it around for all the fans here.”

Earlier in the day, Fort Wayne’s No. 1 goaltender, Zach Fucale, a prospect of the NHL’s Vegas Golden Knights, was in net as Canada lost to Finnish club KalPa Kuopio 2-1 in an overtime shootout in the final of the Spengler Cup. At Davos, Switzerland, where Canada was trying to win its fourth straight championship, Fucale stopped 21 shots and 5 of 8 shootout attempts.

Fucale should be back for Thursday’s game against the Indy Fuel in Indianapolis.

The Komets reached overtime of Game 7 of the Western Conference finals last season. They endured much roster upheaval over the summer, and got off to a 1-5-0 start this season that had them pulling the trigger on myriad trades.

But Franke said he’s losing patience with the inconsistency; Fort Wayne has been battling with Indy, Wheeling and Kalamazoo for third place in the Central Division.

“We have not played well at home on a relatively consistent basis for most of the season and that’s not Fort Wayne Komet hockey,” Franke said. “I know we have a lot of new guys here and it takes time to realize that, but this is when you’ve got to allow the fans to energize you. The only way that’s going to happen is if you put forth the proper effort and we haven’t been doing that on consistent basis. I don’t think that’s a secret. I don’t think that’s a surprise to anyone.”

Hafner came up with a sprawling stop on Francois Beauchemin, who had sped in from the right wing, in the first period. While the crowd called for the play to be blown dead because the puck was underneath Hafner, referee Jarred Mitrano allowed it to go on long enough for the Beast to dig it out and Erik Bradford to unleash a shot that was stopped by Fort Wayne forward J.C. Campagna, who was kneeling in the net, though Henry scored off the rebound at 3:28.

Brampton’s Chase Golightly netted a 35-foot shot – on Brampton’s seventh shot of the game – to make it 2-0 at 8:21, quieting what had been an exuberant Coliseum crowd. And the lead became 3-0 when Nathan Todd got to the rebound of a Daniel Ciampini shot and lifted it past Hafner at 19:16, during a Brampton power play.

The Komets’ woes didn’t end there; a Kevin Gibson misfire on a shot in the offensive zone was quickly converted by the Beast into a breakaway goal at the other end by Artur Tianulin, who played last season for Fort Wayne, and the lead was 4-0 at 2:48 of the second period.

“We had to recollect our thoughts and challenge one another," Graham said. "You’re facing a very hungry team that’s sitting around last night in Fort Wayne and not playing. They were definitely fresher. We knew that. And they did a great job of pushing the pace early on, pushing us back and making us defend. We just said, ‘Enough is enough.’ … It’s difficult because you feel like you deserved a better outcome but you didn’t get it."

Notes: An infant sitting in the lower level of the Coliseum, who was hit by the puck during the second period, was a relative of Hodgman and taken to a local hospital for precautionary reasons. … Eric Levine, who had been called up from Quad City of the Southern Professional Hockey League to back up Hafner, had told the Quad City Times he expected to play for the Komets while he was here but that didn’t happen. … Brampton’s Jackson Leef is a native of Fort Wayne.

jcohn@jg.net