Three Third Period Goals Sends Carolina Back Into Win Column

Mentor, OH - The Carolina Thunderbirds faced off against a couple of familiar opponents Friday night in the Mentor Civic Ice Arena but kept their perfect record on Fridays in tact with a 4-1 win over the Mentor Ice Breakers.

Former Thunderbirds Tommy Mahoney and Ryan Koresky were making their Ice Breakers debut in the game.

Mahoney was looking to prove himself to his old team immediately playing very physically and even getting into a fight with Thunderbirds defenseman Dominik Fejt. Mahoney would end the night leading the Ice Breakers in penalty minutes with 11. Unless you count Iain Duncan's two bench minors for abuse of officials and eventual game misconduct, then that would be 14.

Moving on to the scoring summary the ice was broken first by Mentor with a goal coming from Mark Essery the team's leading goal scorer. Essery's tally was the only to speak of in the first period.

In the second period fireworks erupted early, first with the Fejt vs. Mahoney fight and then about three minutes in to the period Joe Cangelosi scored his 8th of the year to tie the game at one.

The third period started with the teams about as even as you could get, 1-1 score and 14-14 in shots. However, Carolina would quickly break both of those deadlocks when Jan Salak fired on home after a Karel Drahorad shot to make it 2-1 Thunderbirds.

Sometime between Salak's goal and Pestuka's insurance marker to make it 3-1 Mentor head coach Iain Duncan was ejected from the game.

Finishing off the scoring was Carolina's Petr Panacek who got his 10th goal of the year.

Henry Dill made 18 saves on 19 shots for the win, Derek Moser stopped 21 of 25 shots in the loss.

The same two teams go at it again tonight at the Mentor Civic Ice Arena, puck drop scheduled for 7:35.

Three Stars of the Game

Joe Cangelosi
Chase Fallis
Henry Dill