Early Xtreme goals seals win

Three Adelaide Xtreme goals in the first five minutes of the game proved to be the difference in a 6-4 win over the Noarlunga Stars.

Dean Peterson, Joey MacDougall, Andrew Chen did the damage early while the Xtreme did just enough to hold of pesky comeback effort from Noarlunga.

The hole was just too big for the Stars to climb out of after the Xtreme busted out of the gates.

The first goal came from Dean Peterson who banged home a shot from the point by Jai Sarcich.

A couple shifts later, Joey MacDougall scored a top-shelf back-hand goal to put the Xtreme up 2-0.

As quick as you could blink, smooth skating defenseman Andrew Chen powered up the ice, fed Nathaniel Benson, who dished back to Chen who knocked in the 3-0 goal.

From a neutral perspective – it was a recipe for disaster for the Stars.

Let’s add another ingredient, shall we?

A nightmare start for the Stars got worse when Dave Madsen took a penalty immediately after the Chen goal to send the team to the penalty kill.

But a pending bad dream turned out to be some sort of benefit for the Stars as their feisty comeback effort began with a short-handed goal. WA recruit and French Candian fan favourite Yoann Levesque bounced off an Xtreme turnover and scored a beautiful break-away goal to get the Stars on the scoreboard.

Then the Stars continued their penalty parade. They were short-handed 11 times in Game #1 and piled on to their penalty woes in the opening 20 minutes of this one.

Right after the Levesque goal, Tyson Boyd took a five minute major for roughing – and during that penalty Josh Harding got the gate for cross-checking.

Some nifty saves from Glen Forbes-White and a tenacious effort killed them both off to send the Stars to the locker room in with a fighting chance.

A second period that favoured the Stars was bookmarked by two Xtreme goals, however. Both of them were scored by the killer Xtreme combination of young guns Nathaniel Benson and Xander Wardlaw.

The first of two goals from the pair came 90 seconds into the second, when Wardlaw finished off a Benson effort to restore a three goal Xtreme lead.

The Stars regained momentum – especially in the back half of the period – and at one stage had 9 of 11 shots on goal. They did everything but score.

Jeremy Friederich bailed the Xtreme in a couple crucial situations.

It allowed for another pretty connection between Wardlaw and Benson. Wardlaw got drilled as he was trying to enter the zone, but the puck squirted to Benson, who drove the lane, got a shot off, got rebound and passed the puck to a wide open Wardlaw who was back on his feet able to put the puck in the back of the net.

5-1 game and a life-sucking goal.

Down four and looking for life, a Jake Riley strike put the Stars back down 5-2. An ensuing power play saw them have four glorious opportunities – each turned away from Friederich in net.

The 19-year-old made 34 saves on the evening and none were bigger than those while shorthanded.

Olli Martin all but iced the game with a mid-period power play goal.

The rest was formalities. A late Jake Riley goal followed by a Connor Smith at the buzzer made the game a little closer but the Xtreme grabbed the full points.

They sit 2-0-0 with 4 points and are the only team to beat the rest of the competition.

Next week the Stars and Brewers face-off in a rematch of an epic Week 1 clash.

Shots on Goal

Xtreme - 37
Stars - 38
 

SCORING SUMMARY

1ST PERIOD

2ND PERIOD

3RD PERIOD