Devils too hot for Steelers, extend lead at top
Photo: James Assinder
Cardiff Devils raced into a six-goal lead against Sheffield Steelers at a sold-out Vindico Arena on Wednesday night, eventually running out 6-3 winners to extend their lead at the top of the Elite League standings.
New Steelers goalie Jere Huhtamaa had a baptism of fire on his debut for the Yorkshire side, finding himself picking the puck out of the back of his net three times in the opening 20 minutes.
Cardiff controlled the play from the opening faceoff and deservedly took the lead with just over four minutes played - Josh MacDonald firing a shot through the five-hole after Ryan Barrow's initial attempt had been blocked. Not long after, Patrick Walting raced through on the Devils net but saw Ben Bows come up with a clutch double save to keep the hosts ahead. Ben Davies doubled the Devils' lead at 16:02 when he followed up his own shot that Huhtamaa spilled out of his glove.
90 seconds later, Gleason Fournier skated from his own zone and shot through a screen to beat Huhtamaa for a third time in under 18 minutes and put the hosts in control.
The second period started just as exciting as the first from a Devils perspective. Reid Duke's perfect pass set up Brett Perlini at the back post on a 2-on-1 rush 2:31 into period two to make it 4-0. Under two minutes later, an Andrew MacWilliam slapshot found the back of the Steelers' net to put the hosts five ahead.
Sheffield had the better of the latter half of the second period, with Ivan Bjorkly Nordstrom impressive in the offensive zone but to no avail as the Devils led by five through 40 minutes.
The final period saw Cole Sanford find the sixth for the Devils after taking advantage of an out-of-position Huhtamaa. However, Sheffield's continued thread did pay dividends at 48:37 on a broken play where the puck fell to Daniel Ciampini in front to neatly lift the puck over Ben Bowns. Mitchell Balmas and Mark Simpson both netted inside the final two minutes to bring the score back to 6-3, but the result had not been in doubt for some time before the final buzzer.
