A late Blaze goal tied it, and then they took the extra table point when they bagged the overtime winner on the powerplay for a 3-2 win over the Flames on Spectrum ice.
James Shearer opened the evening’s scoring when he set Blaze to a lead about halfway into the 1st, but Matt Tugnutt at 13:08 and Matt Alvaro 80 seconds later had Flames with a 2-1 advantage when the period closed and the score never changed across the period that followed.
Inside the last 9 minutes, Blaze brought it level through Mitch Cook. A Flames penalty with under 5 minutes to go made it a nervous regulation finish but the penalty kill stepped up to secure a table point.
Unfortunately for the home team, another penalty at the close of the final set put them down a man to start over time and with the 4 on 3 powerplay Blaze sealed the win with a Brady Norrish strike less than 90 seconds into the 4th period.
Eamon McAdam made 24 saves on 27 shots in the Flames net and Tarun Kozun for Blaze was good on 32 of 34.
“It is always tough to lose in overtime, especially when you feel like you did enough to possibly be the winner,” said Paul Dixon.
“We did not capitalize on some chances we had to maybe put Coventry away earlier and they stayed a goal off the pace for a very long time before taking advantage and turning it to a win.”
“Full credit to them for stealing the extra point, and we just have to go away and re-focus now for the weekend that starts with the Cup semi final Saturday.”
