SOUTHAVEN, MS --- Nathan Lutz scored twice and Louis Dumont assisted on three goals, as the Mississippi RiverKings defeated the Bloomington PrairieThunder 4-1 on Tuesday, December 21st at the DeSoto Civic Center in Southaven.  Mississippi won the first-ever Central Hockey League meeting between the teams, who will meet again tomorrow night in Bloomington. 

Box Score

Craig MacDonald opened the scoring with Bloomington's only goal of the night at 12:52 of the first period.  But the RiverKings responded for three second-period goals, one shorthanded, one power play and one full-strength tally to take a 3-1 second intermission lead. 

R.G. Flath tied the game at 1-1 at 4:09 of the middle session with a shorthanded goal, his sixth goal of the season.  That was followed by Lutz, who scored his seventh goal of the year and the eventual game-winner on the power play at 15:16 for a 2-1 lead.  Patrik Levesque made it 3-1 with 28 seconds remaining in the period for a 3-1 lead.  The goal was Levesque's 11th of the year and his tenth since coming to the RiverKings from Quad City. 

Lutz completed the scoring in the final period with an empty-net, shorthanded tally with 12 seconds remaining for the final 4-1 score. 

Mississippi scored once in four power play chances, and shut out the PrairieThunder in their four extra-man opportunities. 

The RiverKings out shot Bloomington 25-22, with winning goaltender Alexander Pechurskiy stopping 21 shots.  Losing goalie Marco Emond also stopped 21 shots in taking the loss for Bloomington. 

With the win, Mississippi moved back above .500 in the CHL standings at 13-12-1, the team's ninth win at home this season.  Bloomington dropped just its third game on the road this year in falling to 13-8-1 overall for the season.