Steelers respond with trashing of Stars
Photo: Derek Black
Sheffield Steelers responded to a 6-0 defeat on home ice by beating Dundee Stars 10-4 on Tayside on Sunday night.
"I thought we were better, obviously last night wasn't the effort we wanted and just had to look internally," began Steelers' Colton Saucerman. "I thought we started hot, we've been kind of slow coming out of the first period and kind of playing from behind the last few games so it was a good first period, we carried the momentum but I think we still got a few things to clean up in our game if we're going to continue to make a push and catch Belfast."
Sheffield opened the scoring just 38 seconds in, as Mark Simpson found space behind the Stars defence and beat Richard Sabol to make it 1-0 - the puck deflecting off Drydn Dow's skate as he faced his own net. Spencer Naas equalised and made it 1-1 for the home team at 05:04, taking advantage of an odd man rush and sending a tight angle shot from the left circle past Matthew Greenfield.
A turnover in the Stars’ zone led to Marc-Olivier Vallerand picking the puck up in the slot, firing it past Sabol at 05:46 to make it 2-1 and regain the Steelers’ lead. A good forecheck in the offensive zone allowed Mikko Juusola to add a third for the visitors, knocking the puck into the net at 11:31.
A shot from the blue line by Colton Saucerman found its way past Sabol and into the Stars’ net to make it 4-1 at 13:19, while a scrappy play around the Steelers net allowed Brendan Harms to poke the puck past Greenfield for the Stars second of the night at 19:09, making it 4-2 heading into the period break.
"It was a good low play by Ciampini who drew two players to him, made a good play up to Cormier and his elusiveness and deception kind of froze the winger there," explained Saucerman. "He slid it over to me and those ones are easy you just try and hit it as hard as you can and I was fortunate it had eyes."
Dundee began the second period by generating their best chances of the game, forcing Greenfield to make some key saves as they searched for a third goal.
A drop pass by Mikko Juusola in the offensive zone set Brien Diffley up in the slot, who fired the puck past Sabol top shelf at 25:52 for a 5-1 lead. Keanu Yamamoto used his speed to cut past the Steelers defense at 31:04, beating Greenfield with a backhand in close to make it 5-2 and cut the deficit to two.
A cross crease pass from Daniel Ciampini found Brandon Whistle, who fired the puck into an empty net for a sixth Steelers’ goal at 36:57.
Period three was one to forget for the hosts. Mark Simpson made it seven at 44:50, followed by Juusola at 48:56 on a powerplay. Juusola then scored a penalty hot after Keanu Yamamoto's hook with 6:53 to play, before Sam Tremblay rounded off the scoring at 57:14 - that goal also saw Sabol pulled and Jarrett Fiske enter the net.
Speaking about the defeat on Saturday night, Saucerman concluded: "That's just not us, sometimes you're going to lose games and sometimes you're not going to have your best but that was just a lack of effort and unacceptable to be a Sheffield Steeler and play that way, so we had to have a response game and I thought we had that effectively."
