Hedley backstops Blaze to road win

Photo: Mark Ferris

Jordan Hedley backstopped the Coventry Blaze to an important 4-1 win in Manchester on Saturday night, making his first start of the season after CJ Motte was placed into COVID-19 protocol.

Hedley was unbeaten through the opening 20 minutes, making seven saves as the sides split 14 shots in the opening period. The deadlock was broken with a scrappy goal at 12:16 on a rebound from Evan Bloodoff's shot which Justin Hamonic did will to lift over the pad at the back post.

Storm had a couple of good chances to get back on level terms at the start of period two but were denied by Hedley - one effort in particular taking the Blaze netminder's stick out of his hands! 3:10 into the period, Luke Ferrara squeezed the puck through a gap on Jason Bacashihua's near post to make it 2-0, while ten minutes later Ross Venus put the visitors three ahead.

Hedley's clean sheet was eventually taken away from him with 57 seconds left in the period through Tyson Fawcett.

Inside the final ten minutes of period three, the puck broke kindly for Alex Forbes to go through and score 1-on-0 and put the Blaze into a comfortable 4-1 lead. Manchester missed a late powerplay as they tried to find a way back into the game, but a bench minot for too many players on the ice with 2:58 left effectively killed off any chance the hosts had of staging a fightback.