ALEXANDRIA, MN — The Bismarck Bobcats saw their latest winning streak snapped at three games Friday night as the Cats fell hard to the Alexandria Blizzard, 5-1, at the Runestone Center.
Alexandria wasted no time in starting their goal parade as Blizzard forward Ryan Doner grabbed a Bobcats defensive zone turnover and quickly snapped a shot past Ryan Faragher to boost the home side to a 1-0 lead just 2:28 into the game.
Paul LaDue followed Doner\’s goal with one of his own on the power play just 2:17 later to push the lead to 2-0 for the Blizzard less than five minutes into the contest.
The Blizzard struck again with 8:24 left in the opening frame when Thomas Williams popped in a transition centering feed from Steve Zierke to extend the Alexandria edge to 3-0 heading into the first intermission.
Adding injury to insult, the Cats lost top assists man Dan Zawacki to a broken arm in the first. Zawacki\’s arm will be evaluated in Bismarck on Sunday to determine the severity of the injury.
The middle frame did not go much better for the Bobcats as Jordan Nelson and Nardo Nagtzaam tacked on goals to push the Blizzard\’s lead to 5-0 after the second.
Following Nagtzaam\’s power play goal, Faragher was lifted for Tommy Burke. Burke performed admirably in relief, stopping all 11 shots sent his way.
In the third the Bobcats finally broke the spell of Alexandria netminder–and former Bobcat–Jake Williams at the 6:27 mark when Nikolaj Rosenthal banged home the loose change from a blocked Sam Dougherty shot to cut the deficit to 5-1, but the visitors would draw no closer.
Faragher took just his sixth loss of the year on 18 saves.
Williams bested his former mates with 21 stops to pick up his fifth victory of the season.
The Bobcats will take a break from regular season action Thursday night when they travel up US Route 83 for an exhibition tilt against the Aberdeen Wings at Minot\’s Maysa Arena.
Friday night, regular season play resumes when the Cats and Wings return to the VFW Sports Center for a 7:15 PM showdown.
Friday\’s contest will be broadcast locally on the radio home of Bobcat Hockey, Super Talk 1270, KLXX-AM, and worldwide at http://nahl.fasthockey.com/. Pre-game coverage will begin at 6:45 PM CT.
Season tickets are now on sale for the 2010-11 season! Call the Bobcat Hockey office at (701) 222-3300 or email gobobcathockey@aol.com for more information on reserving your seats for the entire season as the Bobcats look to defend the Robertson Cup!
BOBCAT HOCKEY
2010 ROBERTSON CUP CHAMPIONS