Gems Extinguish Blaze at Hara Thursday Night

November 17, 2011 - Central Hockey League (CHL)
Dayton Gems News Release


Dayton, OH - The Dayton Gems would snap their winless streak at home with a hard nosed 3-1 victory over visiting Bloomington Blaze on Cassano's Italian Ice inside Hara Arena for Twilight Night on Thursday. Scoring for the Gems were Kyle Bochek, Tim Hartung and Damian Surma.

With the action heating up throughout a scoreless first twenty minutes, the Gems would draw first blood 16:56 into the second period when Kyle Bochek cashed in a Charlie Townsend pass to light the lamp past Blaze starting netminder Marco Emond. Sending a barrage of shots towards the Bloomington net, the Gems would outshoot the Blaze by a whopping 27-14 after forty minutes of play when the Gems carried their 1-0 lead into the intermission.

An action packed third period would begin with Brandon Naurato taking a controversial hit just seconds off the opening draw, but was fortunately able to leave the game under his own power. While Naurato wouldn't return to the game, his Gems took full advantage of the ensuing powerplay, extending their lead to 2-0 with a Tim Hartung goal just :37 into the period with the extra attacker. As regulation wound down, physicality would continue to escalate, before boiling over with Bochek dropping the mitts with less than three minutes remaining to engage in a round of fisticuffs with Travis Granbois. Bloomington would make it interesting with a quick powerplay goal to cut the lead back to one, but after missing a penalty shot attempt, Dayton's Damian Surma would make up for it with an empty net goal with 35 seconds left on the scoreboard to seal the 3-1 win for the Gems. Shots on goal in the third once again handily favored the hometown Gems 13-8, with Dayton coming away with 40 shots on goal to Bloomington's 22 after sixty minutes of regulation. Gems starting netminder Bryan Hogan earned his third win of the season between the pipes with the decision. Both teams would earn a powerplay goal, with the Gems faring 1-3 on the man advantage while the Blaze went 1-5.

With the win, the Gems improve their record to 3-4-3 and snap their four game winless streak. Dayton now travels to Fort Wayne to take on the Komets in an 8pm matchup on Friday from the Memorial Coliseum before ending their weekend trip with a Saturday rematch with the Blaze in Bloomington at 8pm from the US Cellular Coliseum.

Fans can tune into Friday and Saturday's game live on wave96.net and CHL TV, with Gems broadcaster JT Szabo handling the call beginning ten minutes prior to faceoff for the Dayton Gems pregame show.



Central Hockey League Stories from November 17, 2011


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