By Kris Smith
The Clan arrive in Dundee reeling from a shootout loss to Fife Flyers last night, where they had led 5-2 heading into the third period but allowed the Kirkcaldy club back into the game and then came up short on penalties.
On the scoresheet for Glasgow was Nate Kallen, Robert Lachowicz (2), Jake Bolton and Gary Haden, while Brady Porteau, Collin Shirley, Max Humitz, Kyle Osterberg, Sean Giles and Johan Eriksson found the target for the Fife.
Although, that was not Shirley’s and Osterberg’s only goals of the weekend as they netted against the Stars on Friday night at the Fife Ice Arena, however it was not enough as the Stars skated to a 6-4 road victory.
Osterberg had given Fife an early lead but Spencer Naas would swiftly strike back to get Dundee level before Shirley put Tom Coolen’s side back in front before the break.
The Stars tied it up quickly through Anthony Rinaldi, before Naas’ second of the night gave them a 3-2 lead halfway through the game but Troy Lajeunesse would make it a 3-3 game in the final minute of the second period.
However, the Stars struck quickly through Drydn Dow to regain their lead with 13 seconds left on the clock and Naas would complete his hat-trick in the third session to make it a 5-3 game, but Shirley cut the difference back to one in the final minutes.
Dow would then score into an empty net from his own end with only two seconds left in the game to seal the 6-4 victory and move Dundee up to sixth in the league table.
Naas picked up the ‘Man of the Match Award’ in Fife and also the game puck after scoring his first Elite League hat-trick, taking his points tally to 12 for the season (6G, 6A) and also four goals and four assists in his last three games.
The Stars were missing defenseman, Sean Allen on Friday through injury and lost another blueliner in the game as Dundonian, Kris Inglis left the match with an upper body injury.
American forward, Johnny Walker will also serve the first game of his three-match ban for elbowing, tonight against Glasgow.
Speaking after the win in Kirkcaldy, Stars Head Coach, Marc LeFebvre said: “It is a massive win for us, we really wanted those two league points because it is our only league game of the weekend, so we had to maximise the points we can get.
“We treated it as a playoff game, because we knew it was a one-off weekend and you have to come into this building and find a way to win and that is tough.
“Fife do not make that easy, these guys do not stop playing and they do not care what the score is, they just keep playing and we learned that lesson in the cup against them, but I am proud of our guys getting the job done.
“We are not going to be a pretty team to watch and I have said that since day one, there are times where I think guys are maybe trying to be pretty when our bread and butter, and the way we have won games this year is because we got pucks in behind teams and went to work.”
Turning the focus to tonight’s cup game, Marc continued: “It is about finding way to win, I do not care what the score is, as long as we get the two points.
“We have to knuckle down here and find a way to get a win somehow because I do not know what they are going to do with the format of the cup now, with the unfortunate events in Nottingham but first thing first is that we want to win a game, get points on the board and we will go from there.”
Face-off for tonight’s home game is at 5pm and you can buy your tickets HERE!
All images: Derek Black.
