Coventry Blaze replied immediately to a Flames fast start and added just enough the rest of the evening to remain in front throughout, eventually delivering a 4-3 defeat to Spectrum’s hosts.
At 3:50, while on a powerplay, Jack Jacome set Flames in front, but just 9 seconds later Blaze were level thank to Alessio Luciani’s quick reply, and a goal each is how the period eventually closed.
Less than 5 minutes into the middle set, Blaze went ahead on the strength of a 2nd by Luciani. Grayson Constable in the 37th minute had the visitors enjoying a 2 goal cushion, but a Lewis Hook answer 89 seconds from period close made it a 1 goal game to begin the 3rd.
Brandon Alderson re-stored a 2 goal gap on a powerplay at 48:35. Flames pulled Eamon McAdam in favour of a 6th skater a little over 2 minutes out, then played 6 on 4 thanks to a powerplay for the bulk of that stretch where Sam Jones in his debut made it a single goal game 23 seconds from time, but in the end it was a cosmetic change to the scoring without alteration to the points distribution.
McAdam made 38 saves on 42 shots against Matt Robson who was 37 for 40.
“All in all, the result was probably justified no matter which team ended up winning,” said Paul Dixon. “It was not particularly one sided by either team, and we had a lot of good moments for 2+ periods but Coventry probably did just a bit more to get a few more good opportunities.”
“We had more pressure in the 3rd than we did in the 2nd so it was a good stretch of push back when we were obviously needing to keep it up to recover a goal then 2 goal deficit, but it wasn’t quite enough.”
“We had plenty of shots, as did Blaze, and Eamon made some good saves to keep us in it to the end, but not our night to take points and we will look to Sunday against Cardiff.”
