Giants double up against Blaze

Photo: William Cherry

Belfast Giants secured their second win over Coventry Blaze in as many nights with a 5-3 win on Saturday night in front of 7,286 fans at the SSE Arena.

Four goals in the opening 20 minutes had the teams locked in at 2-2 after the first period. Danny Kristo's pass in front found Kobe Roth to open the scoring at 2:31, putting the Blaze in front. Will Cullen intercepted the puck in the neutral zone to skate clean through on Nolan Kent and finish nicely to tie the game five minutes later, but Kristo and Roth combined again to put the Blaze back ahead at 9:43. Cullen slapped home a David Goodwin pass to tie the game at 19:19.

Blake Speers put the Giants ahead 94 seconds into period two with a shot high over Kent off a nice interchange with Ara Nazarian, but this time the Blaze pegged them back with Ian McNulty tapping home Kristo's feed into the slot.  Coventry turning the puck over in front of their own net allowed Bobby MacIntyre to put the Giants back ahead just under four minutes from the end of the period.

Ben Lake scored shorthanded at 47:40to give the Blaze a very uphill task heading into the closing stages of the game. They pulled Kent for the final 2:02 but without success, and the Giants took another win.