Game one of week seven action in the SHL saw Siam Mandalay play their second overtime game in as many weeks and this time they came back from a 2-0 deficit to defeat heavily favoured KCG. Missing captain Jordan Ashton – stuck in the Trang airport – things looked grim for Siam Mandalay early and got worse as KCG took a 2-0 lead heading into the third period on goals by Jan Isaksson and Mel Dhiranusonkit.
Patrick Forstner started the Siam Mandalay comeback early in the third period with assists going to Yean Thanakroekkriat and Non Aekkasemnarong. And then Siam Mandalay’s infamous Crash Line (Darius Konotopetz, Mitch Morrison and Turner Johnson) put it into high gear. They just kept banging and plugging away creating havoc and scoring chances. Konotopetz tied the game up from Yean with 1:16 left in regulation time. Then in a thrilling 3-on-3 four minute OT stanza Turner Johnson scored the winner on a spinorama move with 58 seconds left in OT as his teammates jumped the boards and swarmed him, celebrating their second victory of the year. Johnson earned himself the Jerky Monster play-of-the-week award for the second time this year.
Another one of Siam Mandalay’s Bam Bam Brothers, Ernesto Bauer found himself ejected with a game misconduct halfway through the third period frankly for just being Ernesto.
The Rolling Stone Pizza player-of-the-game went to KCG defenseman Mel Dhiranusonkit, who had an outstanding night at both ends of the ice as he scored KCG’s second goal and made a number of key defensive plays. Leo Liao made 27 saves in the KCG net, while Dream Ungkulpattanasuk made 16 saves earning the victory in the Siam Mandalay goal.
The night’s other match wasn’t nearly as close as the Novotel Spitfires won their seventh straight victory 7-3 over Aware. Novotel jumped into a 5-0 after two periods on single goals by Ken Kibdborn, Tomas Stastny, captain Mike Freeson and two markers by Major Ingkharratphithakon.
Aware then staged a comeback reminiscent of their classic OT victory the week before as Masato Kitayama and Brandon Vick scored to narrow the lead to 5-2. But Novotel captain Freeson rallied his troops as he and Major scored within three minutes of each other restoring Novotel’s five-goal lead. Aware’s Peam Jaratwuttipreeda scored the final Aware goal with ten seconds left in the game.
With a five-point night Tomas Stastny continued to impress and easily could have been the Rolling Stone Pizza player-of-the-game but that honour went to Thai left winger Major (2Gs. 1A) who speed was very apparent as he was all the ice like a waterbug.
Lance Parker facing his old teammates for the first time stopped 24 shots in the loss while Ben Kleineschay continued his stellar play stopping 27 of the 30 shots he faced.
The last set of SHL games in 2020 will be played at the Imperial Samrong arena on December 13th with Aware taking on KCG at 9pm and Siam Mandalay facing off against Novotel at 10pm. After that, the league breaks until January 10th.
