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Fort Worth Brahmas rookie goaltender Tyler Nilsson stopped 32 of the 33 Oklahoma City Blazers shots that he faced to backstop the Brahmas to a 5-1 win over the Blazers at the Fort Worth Convention Center on Thursday night. The win was the Brahmas first victory since November 7 at Wichita and snapped a franchise record 13 game losing streak. It was also the Brahmas first win of the season on home ice.
Nilsson's spectacular effort in goal was matched by the Brahmas skaters offensively. Second year forward Justin Williams paced the Fort Worth attack with two goals, defenseman Jay McGee chipped in a goal and an assist, d-man Adam Davis scored a goal, and center Jeremy Vanin netted a goal. Left wing Chad Woollard and center Aaron Davis each had two helpers. The five goals in the game were the most that Fort Worth had scored since their aforementioned win over Wichita.
Fort Worth scored the only goal of the first period when McGee made a nice deflection off a centering pass from right wing Joey Bastien at the 11:39 mark of the period. Bastien, who was playing in his first game with the Brahmas after being acquired in a trade from Amarillo on Wednesday, picked up a headman pass from Chad Woollard on the left wing side and backhanded the puck towards the Oklahoma City goal. Hustling from his defensive position, McGee tipped the puck past Blazers goaltender Sean Connors for his third goal of the season.
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Southlake's Nicole Minder is the
Captain of the Brahmas Dancers. |
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The Blazers tied the game at one early on in the second period when defenseman Peter Robertson scored just 1:24 into the period. Fort Worth however, answered back with two consecutive powerplay goals to take a 3-1 lead after two periods of play. First, it was Williams scoring off of a deflection of a McGee shot at the 7:06 mark of the period. For Williams, it was his first goal of the season. Then, just under seven minutes later, the Brahmas Adam Davis whistled a shot from just inside the Blazers blueline that beat a screened Connors for his second goal of the season. Nilsson made the Brahmas lead stand up with several breathtaking saves in the final four minutes of the period.
In the third, Nilsson made the difference for the Brahmas. He stopped all 14 Blazers shots in the period and prevented Oklahoma City from mounting a comeback. The Brahmas added two insurance goals when center Jeremy Vanin stripped the puck from and Oklahoma City defenseman and scored his first goal in a Fort Worth uniform on a breakaway at the 15:29 mark of the period. Williams then made the final score 5-1 with his second goal of the game when he blasted a slapshot from the top of the right wing faceoff circle past Connors with just 12 seconds remaining in contest.
Nilsson improves his record on the season to 2-7-0 with the win. Connors, who allowed the five Fort Worth goals on 31 shots, falls to 7-4-1. With the win, Fort Worth improves to 3-17-3 on the year. Oklahoma City drops to 13-9-2. The Brahmas will try to win consecutive games for the first time this season on Saturday night, Dec. 13, when they host the Indianapolis Ice at 7:30 p.m at the FWCC. For more information, please contact the Brahmas office at (817) 336-4423.
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