Dashers Drop Another One to Thunderbirds

By Nate Williamson

Danville, IL - The Danville Dashers fell, 8-3 at the hands of the Carolina Thunderbirds Saturday night at the David S. Palmer Arena. 

The Thunderbirds took advantage of a Dashers roster that has had a bit of chaos recently after several recent transactions and a coaching change. Danville dropped both games in the home-and-away weekend series against Carolina under Interim Head Coach and Team Captain Dustin Henning. 

Carolina opened the scoring thirteen minutes into the first period on a power play goal by Petr Panacek, assisted by Jiri Pargac and Josh Pietrantonio. They grew their lead to 2-0 after Pietrantonio was able to beat Dashers goalkeeper Blake Scott. 

Petr Cicmanec scored just two minutes into the second period to extend Carolina's lead to 3-0 and Chase Fallis sent it to 4-0 before the Dashers clawed their way to a goal. Stephen Gaul finally got the Dashers onto the board on a goal assisted by Eric Masters and Justin Brausen at 11:30 in the frame. 

Carolina wouldn't be stopped, as Michael Bunn scored at 11:45 of the third, followed by Joe Cangelosi (who played for the Dashers last night as an emergency signing) made it 6-1. Dustin Henning and Stephen Gaul both scored late in the third; Henning on a beautiful snapshot goal and Gaul off of a nice backhanded pass by Daniel Martin to make it 6-3. Unfortunately, any hope for a comeback was extinguished late in the frame. Chase Fallis scored two more times to secure a hat trick, at 19:41 and 19:59 for an 8-3 Carolina victory. 

The Dashers will look to bounce back from the loss on Wednesday in Port Huron, while the Thunderbirds go on the road to face Mentor in their next game.

Photo credit: LMB Studios