Fargo Rides First Period, Late Goals to Win
Published on October 7, 2016 under United States Hockey League (USHL)
Dubuque Fighting Saints News Release
DUBUQUE, Iowa - The Fargo Force outplayed the Dubuque Fighting Saints in the first period, and recovered from a crumbled advantage to outlast the Saints 4-2 on Friday night at the Mystique Community Ice Center. It snapped a two-game losing streak for the Force, and extended the Saints' streak to two games.
Martin Sundberg snapped a 2-2 tie with a deflection goal of his own with less than seven minutes to go in the third period, and Grant Meyer tucked it away with a goal in the closing minutes. That closed the book on a solid effort by first star Christiano Versich, who ended up with three points in the game.
Down 2-0, the Fighting Saints staged a seemingly characteristic rally. First, it was Colin Theisen who netted his first goal of the season on a late odd-man situation. Zach Solow forced a steal on the penalty kill, and threaded the needle to the charging Theisen to cut the lead to one as the buzzer sounded to end the second period.
David Brumm capped the rally with his first USHL goal, a sharp-angle shot that eluded Force goaltender Matt Murray to tie the score at two early in the third period. It marked the second game in a row in which the Fighting Saints bounced back from a disadvantageous score to tie the game.
However, for the second consecutive game, that force back to even footing fizzled away.
Fargo rode the wave of a tremendous first period performance. They controlled most of the play and outshot the Fighting Saints 12-8. At one point, they outshot them 9-3, and got the first goal of the game in the process.
Jack Adams converted on his fourth goal of the year with a pass from Versich out of the corner at the 7:49 mark to open the scoring on the man advantage. Jaxon Castor kept Dubuque in it by keeping it a one-goal game.
That is, until Versich took things into his own hands. He cleaned up a broken play in front of the Dubuque net by batting a puck to the top shelf over an outstretched Castor just over halfway through regulation time to extend Fargo's lead to 2-0.
Penalties were called in excess on Friday night. Fargo's top-ranked power play netted a power play goal on seven chances. Fargo's top-ranked penalty kill kept the Saints off the scoreboard on all five chances they faced on this night.
This result bumped Fargo up to the .500 mark, and bumped the Fighting Saints down to the .500 mark.
The Fighting Saints are back at it on Saturday, October 8 to finish up the weekend swing with the Fargo Force at 7:05 p.m. Bring the whole family and receive savings with the first Telegraph Herald Family Four Pack Night! Buy four tickets, four sodas, four slices of Papa John's pizza, and two Kwik Stop/Dairy Queen/Fazoli's Kids Zone vouchers starting at just $48.00. This deal will be available until 5:00 p.m. on game night.
United States Hockey League Stories from October 7, 2016
- Kulbakov Closes Door, Shuts out Madison 2-0 - Youngstown Phantoms
- Fargo Rides First Period, Late Goals to Win - Dubuque Fighting Saints
- Stampede Fall to Lancers, 6-3 - Sioux Falls Stampede
- Power Play Leads Way to First Win of the Season - Omaha Lancers
- Stars Bounce Back, Beat Sioux City 1-0 - Lincoln Stars
- PowerPlay Propels Gamblers to Win on Road - Green Bay Gamblers
- Kulbakov Cools Caps - Madison Capitols
- Hot Storm Power Play Falls to Green Bay, 5-3 - Tri-City Storm
- Storm Looks to Rebound against Gamblers - Tri-City Storm
- Scoring Change, Waterloo Black Hawks at Lincoln Stars - Waterloo Black Hawks
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