On Saturday night at the Sierra Providence Events Center, the El Paso Rhinos topped the Tulsa Jr. Oilers for the second straight night. The Rhinos opened the scoring at 5:47 of the first period with a blast from the blue line by defenseman Patrick Stancl that was redirected into goal by forward Gavin Abbott. The Rhinos would go on to add four more before the night was over on their way to defeating the Jr. Oilers by a final score of 5-0.
Abbott’s goal would be the only goal allowed by Jr. Oilers’ goaltender Teke Murphy during the first period. Much like Friday night the Rhinos seemed to have figured Murphy out during the second period. At 8:05 of the second period, the Rhinos’ leading goal scorer, forward Jiri Pestuka would score on a top shelf blast from about 10 feet out on a breakaway. Only ten seconds later, Pestuka would send a beautiful pass across the goal crease to streaking forward Bryton Tomko who would notch his 20th goal of the season. Pestuka would end the night with a total of 61 points on the season. The Rhinos were not done — shortly before the second period ended, forward David Barbour would score on a beautiful unassisted wraparound to go into the intermission ahead by four.
In the third period, things would get heated between the two teams as Abbott would bookend his night with a fighting major with only seven minutes left to play. On the night, the Rhinos would wind up with a total of 32 minutes to the Jr. Oilers 19. Another area where the Rhinos would lead by a large margin was in shots on goal – 51 to Tulsa’s 11. Midway through the third period forward Sebastian Borg would tie Pestuka for the team lead in points with a nice deke on the breakaway that would leave the Tulsa goaltender searching.
Tomorrow at 4:30pm the Rhinos will finish up the series with Tulsa — hoping to secure the series sweep in the friendly confines of the Sierra Providence Events Center.
–Jason Green
