Gresock wins it in OT for Blaze
Photo: Scott Wiggins
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."
