PRESCOTT VALLEY, AZ --- After falling behind in the second period 2-1, the Arizona Sundogs scored six straight times before the Mississippi RiverKings could muster a late comeback in a 7-4 Arizona win in Central Hockey League action on Saturday, March 5th in Prescott Valley.
Box Score
Arizona took a 1-0 lead early in the contest on a power play goal from Joey Sides, who was able to deflect the puck off a RiverKings' defender into the net during a scramble for his 24th goal of the year (8th power play goal) at 3:26 for what became the first intermission score.
The Sundogs rallied in the second period to take a 5-2 lead going into the third period. Mississippi took a 2-1 lead early in the second period on Matt Summers' 24th goal of the year at 2:35 to tie it at one, then Andrew Lackner's unassisted drive resulted in the RiverKings taking the lead at 4:43. The marker was Lackner's fourth goal of the season.
But, Arizona scored the next four goals for the 5-2 second intermission lead. Kyle Hood, Tyler Butler (power play), Corey Laurysen, and Mark Kolanos scored in a span of eight minutes in the period for the three-goal lead.
With Larry Sterling starting the third period in net for the RiverKings in place of Alexander Pechurskiy, Arizona scored twice on goals from Luke Erickson and Samuel Grenache for a 7-2 lead before the RiverKings finished the game with markers from Brennan Sarazin (power play) and Derek Landmesser to complete the scoring.
Mississippi scored twice in seven power play chances and Arizona was 3-for-8 on the power play.
Pechurskiy stopped 16 of 21 shots on goal in falling to 13-11-2 for the season. Sterling stopped 5-of-7 shots on net. Meanwhile, Levente Szuper made 28 saves in posting the victory, moving him to 15-12-6 for the season.