Spirit roll to second straight in 'home and home' with Niagara, kicking off road trip with a 5-4 victory over the Ice Dogs

Ethan Cardwell paced the Spirit offense with 2 goals and 1 assist while captain Damien Giroux added 1 goal and 2 assists...

    icon Oct 04, 2019
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St. Catharines, ON:
 
The Saginaw Spirit (3-2-1-0) rolled to its second consecutive win over Niagara, kicking off  the first road trip of the season with a 5-4 victory over the Ice Dogs in the second game of a home-and-home at the Meridian Centre in St. Catharines, ON last night. 
 
After falling behind early when Niagara forward Jake Uberti (2) gave the Ice Dogs a 1-0 lead at 3:23 of the opening frame, Spirit captain Damien Giroux (5) answered with his fifth tally of the season with assists from Cole Coskey and Ilya Solovyov to knot the game at 1-goal apiece at 5:41 of the first period. 
 
Spirit rookie defenseman Mitchell Smith (2) followed with his second goal of the season with assists coming from Giroux and Cole Perfetti at the 10:35 mark, sending the Spirit into the first intermission with a 2-1 lead. 
 
Niagara opened the middle frame with a pair of goals from Akil Thomas (1) and Kyen Sopa (4) to take a 3-2 lead midway through the second, but Saginaw would respond with a pair of goals in the final 25-seconds of the period, just 21-seconds apart when Ethan Cardwell (1) scored his first of the season from Blade Jenkins at 19:35 of the second, before Nicholas Porco (2) followed with his second of the season from DJ Busdeker and Cardwell at the 19:56 mark for a 4-3 Spirit lead going into the final 20-minutes. 
 
Cardwell (2) added his second of the night, which would turn out to be the game-winning goal, midway through the last frame with an assist from Giroux for a 5-3 lead at 9:11 of the third period, while the Ice Dogs managed to cut the Spirit lead to 5-4 with a goal from Oliver Castleman (4) at 11:59 of the third to round out the scoring. 
 
The Spirit played another defensive gem, holding Niagara to just 19-shots, as Saginaw goal tender Marshall Frappier earned his second straight victory in a Spirit sweater, stopping 15 of the 19 shots he saw in net, while his counterpart Tucker Tynan did an amazing job just keeping his team in the game with an impressive 46-save performance between the pipes for Niagara after the Spirit peppered the Chicago native with a barrage of 51 shots tonight. 
 
Saginaw will stay in the eastern conference for the second game of this 3-game road trip, heading back across the border for a 7 pm face off against the Erie Otters at the Erie Insurance Arena in Erie, PA tonight. 

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