PHN’s Best Shots of the Game: Demonz take shootout win over Dashers

DANVILLE, IL – On Sunday, February 22nd, the Dayton Demonz traveled to Danville to face off against the Dashers in what has become arguably the hottest rivalry in the Federal Hockey League. The latest meeting lived up to all the expectations as Ahmed Mahfouz’ goal in the third round of the shootout allowed the Demonz to come away with a 4-3 victory.

The host Dashers opened the scoring just ten seconds into the contest when Justin Brausen beat Dayton goalie Dan McWhinney off of assists from Daniel Turgeon and Joe Pace. Right off the ensuing faceoff, Danville’s Aleh Shypitsyn and Dayton’s David Segal dropped the gloves in a heavyweight battle.

Segal was also a combatant in the game’s second fight of the period, taking on the Dashers’ Alex Milley late in the period. The fight seemed to spur the Demonz on as they found the back of the net twice before the intermission. The first came off the stick of Mark Rivera at the 18:57 mark with assists being credited to Lester Brown and Peter Cintala. 34 seconds later, Mahfouz and Roger Tagoona combined to set up Jared Hicks who beat Danville goalie Matt Anthony to give Dayton the lead.

The Dashers evened the score early in the second period. During a power play opportunity, Justin Levac fed the puck to Gehrrtt Sargis who scored at the 4:51 mark to tie the score at two. Later in the frame, the Demonz answered with a man advantage tally of the own when Rivera notched his own goal to put Dayton back in front again. Mahfouz and Brian Marks picke up the assists.

Midway through the final frame, the Dashers pulled even on a score by John Scully on yet another power play. Levac and Zachary Zamora both made plays to put Scully in position to light the goal light.

It stayed tied through the rest of regulation and overtime, setting up a shootout to decide the winner. McWhinney held the fort against five Dashers attempts, making the Mahfouz score – the only goal in the skills competition – to stand as the winner.

McWhinney made 54 saves to earn the victory while Anthony stopped 42 shots in suffering the loss.