Glens Falls, NY – The Adirondack Thunder earned a split of the weekend series against the Norfolk Admirals with a 5-1 win on Saturday evening at the Glens Falls Civic Center.
The Thunder started the scoring just six minutes into the game with a goal from Jeff Silengo. After he took a pass from Dana Fraser, Silengo weaved through traffic and fired top-shelf for the goal. The tally was Silengo’s tenth goal of the season and his second in the back-to-back meetings against the Admirals. Silengo is now riding a five-game point streak at home, dating back to January 22.
Adirondack doubled their advantage with a goal with seven minutes left in the first period. With the Thunder on a two-man advantage, Patch Alber swung the puck around to Michael Kirkpatrick on the left wing, who passed on to Ryan Constant at the point for the power-play goal. Both Alber and Kirkpatrick picked up assists on Constant’s sixth goal of the season.
The Norfolk Admirals tacked on a goal just two minutes away from first intermission after narrowly escaping a storm of Thunder power plays. After Adirondack had two goals disallowed and hit three posts on their power play, Brandon Christoffer went the other way and shuffled the puck over the goal line, sneaking the puck through Thunder netminder Kent Simpson. The goal for Christoffer came in his first game with the Admirals, his first career ECHL goal.
Kirkpatrick widened the lead to two with the fourth goal of the night, just over a minute into the middle stanza. Ryan Lomberg got the assist after he battled along the left hand boards for the puck before he passed to Kirkpatrick, who fired a wrist shot top-shelf from the left face-off dot. Kirkpatrick’s goal came one minute into the second period and marked his seventeenth goal of the season, a Thunder team high.
Building upon the Thunder’s lead, Mitchell Heard got a breakaway goal at the XXX mark of the second period to push the lead to three. Heard zipped through the neutral zone and took a nifty saucer pass from Silengo, before he moved in past the Admirals’ defense, deked around Riopel and buried the puck to make it a 4-1 game. The play gave Silengo his eighth assist for the season and Heard his eleventh goal.
Heard would add an empty net goal with less than four minutes on the clock for the final margin of 5-1. After the win, the Thunder move to 27-12-2-2 on the season and remain in second place in the East Division, trailing the Manchester Monarchs by just three points. The Thunder have a two-day break before they face off against the Elmira Jackals on Tuesday.
Don’t miss out on the speed, skill, strength and sounds of Thunder hockey with a partial season flex or mini ticket plan today. The Adirondack Thunder have several mini-packs on sale now, consisting of two or four tickets, combined with a taste of downtown gift card. Send a jolt into your weekends with the gift of Adirondack Thunder hockey. For more information on all Thunder ticket plans, call 518-480-3355 x1 or visit echlthunder.com.
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