Giants burn Blaze to take win in Coventry

The Giants travelled to Coventry to face the Blaze in Saturday's Elite League game. Credit: UTV

  • Coventry Blaze 1 – 4 Belfast Giants

The Belfast Giants came out firing on all cylinders in their first of two weekend road games, taking an early three-goal lead on their way to beating the Coventry Blaze 4-1 on Saturday.

The Giants were without the services of key players in David Rutherford, Chris Higgins and Alex Foster.

And things got feisty only minutes into their encounter with the Blaze, when Jonathan Boxill once again stepped up to drop the gloves after taking exception to an elbow on fellow Giant Michael Quesnele by Coventry's Darcy Zajac.

Player-coach Derrick Walser then led the way in opening the Giants' goal account, firing a slapshot past Blaze netminder Brian Stewart to claim the visitors’ first of the night.

And, inside the last five minutes of that period, Blair Riley extended the Belfast side’s lead with not one but two goals.

The Giants took that commanding 3-0 lead into the second period, but despite creating chance after chance, that was how the score stayed locked after another 20 minutes of action.

The visitors got back to their goal-scoring ways in the third though.

Steve Saviano scored from a Walser assist just three minutes into the final period to make it 4-0 to the Giants and leave the Blaze facing a huge deficit.

Despite Stephen Murphy looking on course for a shut-out in the Giants’ net, the Blaze finally managed a consolation goal via Bjorn Bombis with less than two minutes left on the clock.

But it was the travelling Belfast side who skated away with the 4-1 win.

The Belfast Giants are next in action when they face the Nottingham Panthers in an Elite League clash at 4pm on Sunday.