Coventry Blaze continued their excellent from in 2026 with a 4-2 win over Dundee Stars on Saturday night.
“It feels good, getting back into the win column is huge,” said Blaze Goalie Mat Robson. “It’s good to get the first win of the weekend, especially after a long bus journey, it makes it easier moving through the rest of the games. We battled a lot of adversity, a lot of penalties called throughout the game, but we were able to pull it out.”
Dundee gained their first of four opening period powerplay opportunities early, with Colton Saucerman called for holding at 02:23.
Despite that, Coventry opened the scoring through Matthew Gleason, who netted the lone goal of the first period with a shorthanded wraparound past Emil Kruse at 03:40.
Spencer Naas levelled the score at 26:41 on the Stars’ sixth powerplay of the night, firing a shot that deflected off a Blaze defender and past Mat Robson.
“We practice for it all the time, we have a really good penalty kill,” added Robson, of his side killing seven penalties in the game. “It almost excites me in a way, it’s like an opportunity to make saves and put a mark on the game. It felt like we were a little short for too long, so we’ve got to work on our discipline a little bit, but once we were able to get those kills it was a momentum builder for us.”
Alessio Luciani quickly responded, pouncing on a rebound at the top of the crease to restore the visitors’ one goal lead at 27:37.
Luciani added his second of the night at 34:16, ripping a shot from the left circle over the glove of the Stars’ netminder.
Jonathan McBean replied less than a minute later, picking up a feed from Otto Nieminen and beating Robson in close to once again make it a one goal game at 35:12.
Neither side could find the back of the net for much of the third period, despite chances at both ends of the ice.
Dundee pulled Kruse late for the extra attacker, but it proved to be too little, too late, as Jordan Power fired into the empty net just before the buzzer to seal a 4-2 Blaze victory.
Robson concluded: “It’s a really tight group we have and I think that plays a really big part in it. Everyone wants to win for each other, block shots and do all the little things that make teams successful. Obviously it’s a game of inches and a game of bounces, you’re not going to be on the winning side every night, but fortunately for us we put a string of them together and it breeds confidence. Everyone’s just having a good time playing hockey games and winning together, and obviously we want to keep that going.”
Photo: Derek Black
