Naas hits hat trick in Stars road win

Spencer Naas scored three of Dundee Stars’ six goals as they took a 6-3 road win in Kirkcaldy over Fife Flyers, the Stars’ second straight away win.#image_title

Fife had just the start they were looking for, going ahead inside three minutes off an excellent Kyler Osterberg one-timer from a Troy Lajeunesse feed. Dundee were level some four minutes later through Spencer Naas at 6:12, who batted a loose puck past Shane Owen from the slot while Jonas Emmerdahl sat a Tripping minor. The opening period’s scoring didn’t stop there, however, and the Flyers were back ahead with just over 12 minutes played – Collin Shirley the scorer with some quick hands to beat a stranded Kevin Carr following Aleksi Makela’s initial shot.

While the hosts had a good start to the first period, Dundee had just the answer in the second. Just 20 seconds were on the clock when Anthony Rinaldi converted a perfect Brent Beaudoin pass at Owen’s fast post to level the game on the rush. A little over eight minutes later, Shirley’s attempt to cut out a Naas pass Ryan Valentini saw the Flyers’ forward put the puck past Owen into his own net and hand Dundee the lead at 29:25. Osterberg looked to have tied the game just before the break with an excellent wrist shot release into Carr’s lower corner, at 39:20, but 27 seconds later Drydn Dow fired home from the point on the powerplay after new Flyers signing Sean Giles’ protests about a non-call saw him assessed a minor penalty for his troubles.

Naas slotted home in close for a xpowerplay goal with 10:28 to put the Stars two ahead. Inside the final five minutes and the looked to take advantage of a Brendan Harms penalty but seemed to be running out of stream – that was until a nice give-and-go between Lucas Chiodo set up Shirley to make it a one-goal game with 4:47 to play. The hosts then had an excellent chance to tie the game on a powerplay with 1:25 to go, pulling Owen for the 6-on-4, but to no avail. Drydn Dow hit the empty net with two seconds remaining to finish off the game.