09 Feb 2025, 17:30 | Regular season | SkyDome Arena |
Coventry Blaze | 3-2 OT | Sheffield Steelers |
Periods: Shots: | 2-1 (16-11) | 0-1 (7-16) | 0-0 (14-7) | 1-0 (1-0) | Total: 38-34 |
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Referees: #9 Joe Sewell, #23 Andrew Miller  |  Spectators: 2260 |
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Goals and assists
The 2,260-strong crowd at the Skydome in Coventry might just about
have caught their breath after an enthralling game that ended in an
overtime with for the Blaze over Sheffield Steelers on Sunday night.
"I'm
super proud of the guys in our room," began Blaze captain Kim Tallberg,
speaking of a four-point weekend for his team. "We were down two
yesterday and found a way, and that gave us the confidence to come back
onto home ice today, with the amazing crowd, and get another win/"
After
a late win for both sides the night before, it was a strong start at
each end of the ice. The Blaze shaded the opening stages and were
deservedly ahead at 4:13 - Chase Gresock firing the puck high into Matt
Greenfield's net to open the scoring.
A Joona Huttula shot beat
Mat Robson with 4:50 to play in the opening period to tie the game, and
while both sides could have been ahead going into the break it was the
home side who struck next when Nick Seitz took Alessio Luciani's pass
and beat Greenfield high again to put the Blaze ahead with 1:12 left in
the first. The opening period saw 27 shots on target counted.
The
Steelers killed off a penalty carrying over from the first at the
beginning of the second, and gradually started to control the game.
After Robson had pulled off a string of big saves to keep the Blaze in
front, Huttula put home a rebound to tie the scores. An incident
involving Mike Kennedy and Daniel Leavens led to the former and Robert
Dowd dropping the gloves in the immediate aftermath of the goal.
Seitz
rang a shot off Greenfield's post with just under seven minutes to go
in the period, while Greenfield made a flurry of saves to keep the
Steleers out on a latexpowerplay.
Somehow, period three didn't
produce a goal. The Steelers were the ones to hit the iron this time as
the sides traded odd-man rush chances. Only a pair of coincidental
penalties troubled the scorers in the final period of regulation, with
both sides deservedly earning a point.
57 seconds into overtime,
Mikko Juusola took a penalty for the team with a hook to stop a Blaze
attack, On the resulting man advantage, Gresock shot through a screen to
win it for the Blaze and go top of the league's points charts.
"The
whole season is always a process, sometimes it goes up and down, and
you have to find bounce-backs. Right now every game is a playoff game
for us to get more points in the standings, we don’t look too far ahead
and it was a super-good way to start this weekend," added Tallberg.
"We
have excellent coaching staff that give us a lot of video to go through
every game. We’re well prepared and know what to do. This year’s group
is super tight, and I think that’s going to pay off for us in the long
run. I think the best is still to come."