CINCINNATI – The Komets had already accomplished their mission. They’d stolen two games on the road and made sure the Western Conference quarterfinals would return to Fort Wayne.

But they doubled down anyway and brought another game to double overtime.

The problem was a rocketing slapshot from the right circle by the Cincinnati Cyclones’ Jonathan Diaby that sailed high on goaltender Pat Nagle and into the net for a 5-4 victory Saturday night at U.S. Bank Arena.

(Video highlights, including the winner, are above.)

"Whenever you lose, it’s tough to swallow for sure. But coming here, we had a game plan and that was to bring it back to Fort Wayne. We accomplished that. But this one, well, it’s just tough to swallow," said Komets forward Garrett Thompson, who forced overtime with his second goal of the night after he had two goals disallowed Friday in the Komets’ 3-2 double-overtime victory cinched by an Alex Belzile goal.

It was the first time in the Komets' 64-year history they'd played back-to-back double-overtime games.

The Komets trail the best-of-seven series 3-2 and Game 6 will be Monday at Memorial Coliseum. Game 7, if necessary, will be there Wednesday.

"We would have liked to have taken this one and gone home with a lead in the series," Fort Wayne’s Kyle Thomas said. "But when we came here, the goal was to bring the series back home and we accomplished that. It wasn’t easy. And it would have been nice to get this one tonight."

This was the first game of the series won by a home team. Coming into the night, road teams in all eight ECHL series had combined to go 20-12.

Though its penalty kill had been tremendous in the series, Fort Wayne was foiled by a Mike Embach penalty for cross-checking Andrew Blazek headfirst into the boards in the second overtime.

While the Komets allowed only two shots on the ensuing power play, Embach had just come out of the penalty box and hadn’t yet joined the play when Diaby gave the 1,319 fans something to celebrate after Fort Wayne had won six of the previous nine games between the teams at U.S. Bank Arena.

Cincinnati was 0 for 5 on power plays, dropping to a league-worst 1 for 24 in the series. Fort Wayne, which got power-play goals from Thompson and Brett Perlini, was 2 for 4 and improved to 7 for 28 in the series.

"Once again, the power play came up huge for us," Komets coach Gary Graham said. "But I didn’t think, overall, offensively, that we did enough 5-on-5 to put ourselves in a better position. It was spotty at times, and it would get a little better at times. We weren’t (working) hard enough in the offensive zone and that hurt us sometimes. But I give the guys a lot of credit. They kept battling back.

"You don’t wonder what’s going to get called in overtime. You never know. But it was a penalty (on Embach) and you’ve got to kill it off. Our kill has been pretty good. … Diaby had a hell of a shot."

The Midwest Division champion Komets, who are the No. 2 seed in the conference, out shot seventh-seeded Cincinnati 33-28 in regulation time.

The winner of this series will face the winner of the Utah/Colorado series, in which Utah has a 3-1 lead.

After Thompson finished off a 2-on-1 rush with a goal 39 seconds into the first period – it was on the game’s first shot – the Cyclones’ Branden Gracel tied it with a 20-foot backhand shot at the end of a 2-on-1 rush at 3:42.

The Cyclones took the lead at 12:53 when a Steve Weinstein shot from the right boards caromed off a batch of players in front of the net, and the puck wobbled over Nagle, who came into the night with a .916 playoff save percentage and finished with 35 saves on 40 shots.

Both goaltenders had great saves in the first period. While lying on his stomach, Nagle stopped an Andrew Yogan shot. Nagle covered a 25-foot Zach Budish shot with a delayed penalty coming, and Cincinnati’s Brad Thiessen, who came into the night with a .920 SP and stopped 41 of 45 shots, thwarted Thomas at the end of a 2-on-1 rush.

Komets forward Shawn Szydlowski tied it 59 seconds into the second period, netting a 25-foot shot just after teammate Jordon Southorn dumped a Cincinnati player right in front of a referee. Shortly after Nagle made a sprawling save on Levko Koper, the Cyclones took a 3-2 lead at 8:28 when Blazek took advantage of a Gracel screen to score from 50 feet.

Perlini tied it at 10:14, getting to the rebound of his own shot during a power play after Cincinnati’s Christiaan Minella was penalized for delay of game because he shot the puck out of play.

After Nagle preserved the 3-all score by stopping Gracel and Yogan from point-blank range, the Cyclones went up on a Blazek slapshot from the left circle that sailed over Troy Bourke’s sliding attempt to block it and slipped inside the far goalpost 7:40 into the third period.

Thompson forced overtime by scoring off a rebound at 17:18 after Brett Wysopal was penalized for tripping Szydlowski behind the Cyclones’ net.

In the first overtime, the Cyclones had 9 of the 14 shots and got two great opportunities to score by Brett Ferguson, while Thomas was stopped on an 8-foot backhander and also sent a shot over an open net.

In the second overtime, the Komets had the first seven shots, and Thiessen had to come up big with saves on Belzile from 30 feet, Jamie Schaafsma from 20 and Embach at the end of a 2-on-1 rush.

Notes: Cincinnati’s Garrett Noonan completed his two-game suspension for high-sticking Bourke, who required about eight stitches in his ear after the Game 3 incident. Bourke scored twice in Game 4. … A pigeon that was circling the ice throughout Game 4 didn’t appear until overtime. … The referees were Andy Howard and Tyler Puddifant. … The Komets have played with the same lineup the last three games, with Schaafsma a roving 10th forward and the scratches being Garrett Meurs, David Friedmann, Taylor Crunk, Randy Cure and Cody Corbett.

jcohn@jg.net