Hockey
Heat Thump Wild
The Abbotsford Heat beat the Iowa Wild 6-2 on Wednesday night at the Abbotsford Entertainment and Sports Centre.
The Heat remain in first place in the AHL with a record of 20-6-1-1 and 42 points.
Six players enjoyed a multi-point game for the Heat including Ben Street who had two goals (2-0-0) and extended his goal scoring streak to four games, while Brett Olson recorded his second straight three point game (1-2-3).
Markus Granlund finished the night with two points (1-1-2) and extended his league leading point streak to 10 games.
The Wild got off to a fast start as Erik Haula scored at 1:04 in the first period from Brett Bulmer.
At 7:52, Michael Ferland tied the game scoring his sixth goal of the season assisted by Brett Olson and Markus Granlund.
Less than one minute later, Bulmer scored a power play goal to give the Wild their lead back at 2-1.
Ben Street tied the game at 14:40 scoring his team leading 15th goal of the season from Josh Jooris and Brendan Connolly. 15 seconds later, Greg Nemisz gave the Heat their first lead of the game at 3-2 with the assists going to Corban Knight and Ben Hanowski.
The Heat outshot the Wild 11-8 in the opening period.
In the second period, Markus Granlund scored his 11th goal of the season at 5:10 assisted by Kane Lafranchise and Brett Olson.
At 14:55 on an Abbotsford power play, Ben Street made it 5-2 Heat scoring his second of the game with the assists going to Corban Knight and Chad Billins. With that goal, the Heat made it nine straight games with at least a power play marker.
Brett Olson was the lone goal scorer in the third period as he scored at 8:50 assisted by Lafranchise and Ferland.
The Heat went two out of three on the power play and killed off three of four power plays against.
Joni Ortio picked up his league leading 12th win of the season stopping 22 of 24 shots, while Johan Gustafsson was charged with the loss turning away 20 of 26 shots.
The Heat and Wild will finish off the season series on Thursday night at the Abbotsford Entertainment and Sports Centre at 7:00PM.
For tickets please call 1-877-452-HEAT (4328) or visit us online at www.abbotsfordheat.com.
Thanks to the Heat for the photo and the press release.