The first period belonged to the Blues as they won the majority of face-offs and scored five times without a Chicago score. Mitch Rogge got things started with his goal at 2:31 into the stanza on an assist by Kevin Walters. The onslaught continued when Stew Bell scored just 35 seconds later with help from Brett Skibba and Cody Kohn to make it 2 – 0. It was up and down the ice, fast and furious until Chris Sitler took a pass from Ben Kramer at 13:08 and scored to make it 3 – 0. The Blues weren’t finished yet when Josef Pontasch scored on assists from Kyle Cook and Ruslan Pedan at 17:26 to push the score to 4 – 0. Ethan Nauman took a pass from Radim Matus just before the end of the period and scored to make it 5 – 0 at the 18:37 mark. With just seconds left in the first period Stew Bell grabbed Tommy Dowell and both dropped the gloves and went at it. When the period ended Bell was given 2 minutes for instigating a fight, five minutes for fighting, a 10 minute misconduct and ejected from the game.
The early part of the second period belonged to Chicago and they scored twice against Tyler Parks. The first goal went past Parks at 8:17 and the next was scored at 9:49. Everything evened out until Ethan Nauman scored an unassisted goal at 18:17. After two periods the score was 6 – 2, and the Blue and Gold went into the second intermission with the big lead.
Period three was more of the same race horse up and down the ice. Chicago scored at 2:18, but the Blues answered at 8:05 on a goal by Radim Matus with assists from Gavin Tufte and Ethan Nauman. From there on out it was back to up and down the ice by both teams until the final horn sounded to end the game.
Next week it’s off to Kalamazoo, Michigan before we head into a three game series with Janesville the week after. The Blues now are three games over the .500 mark with a 26 – 23 – 2 record.
