The Weight of glory: Danny Weight slots overtime winner for Bulls at Evansville Thunderbolts

By Andrew Simonson | Shelby County Reporter

Danny Weight continued his standout week for the Birmingham Bulls with a power-play goal in overtime to give the Bulls a 2-1 win on the road at Evansville.

EVANSVILLE, Ind. – After a memorable Monday against Huntsville where he earned the Gordie Howe hat trick of a goal, assist and a fighting ejection, Danny Weight played the hero for the Birmingham Bulls on the road on Friday, Jan. 23.

With the game tied up at 1-1, Weight fired home the winning goal in overtime to give the Bulls a crucial 2-1 win over the Evansville Thunderbolts on the road at the Ford Center.

Birmingham got into an early hole after Jordan Gagnon committed a holding penalty 4:36 into the game. Evansville’s Scott Kirton punished the mistake with a power play goal, scoring 1:06 into the man-advantage to put the hosts up 1-0.

While the lead held through the first intermission, the Bulls knotted it up at the midway mark in the contest. CJ Walker and Weight dished out passes to Drake Glover, who fired home his 15th goal of the season with 9:16 left in the second period.

Tensions boiled over a few minutes later when Jordan Simoneau got called for roughing alongside two other penalties that got offset, one for Walker for goalie interference and another for roughing on the Thunderbolts’ Joey Berkopec.

However, the real drama came from a rare goalie fight between Birmingham’s Hayden Stewart and Evansville’s Kristian Stead. Both were given fighting penalties and ejected with game misconduct penalties for continuing the fight with 6:32 left in the second.

No suspensions were given as of Monday, Jan. 26, but the ejections forced both teams to go to their next goaltenders in line, the Bulls’ Talor Joseph and the Thunderbolts’ Cody Karpinski.

Birmingham couldn’t capitalize on the ensuing power play, but it killed off a penalty for too many men on the ice to end the second period.

Special teams dominated the third period. Evansville got just 10 seconds of a man advantage for Arkhip Ledizankou’s hooking call before a high-sticking penalty evened it up at 4-on-4. The Thunderbolts also got penalized for slashing with 12:33 left only for the Bulls to not score off it.

However, a delay of game call with 22 seconds left carried over into the first minute-and-a-half of overtime, and Birmingham capitalized on the 4-on-3 advantage.

Matt Wood and Doug Scott found Weight for the game-winning power-play goal just 1:32 into overtime, and the Bulls escaped Evansville with a 2-1 overtime win.

Joseph was the First Star of the game for saving all 26 shots he faced in relief for the ejected Stewart. Kirton earned the Second Star for his opening goal for the Thunderbolts, and Weight’s goal and an assist off four shots gave him the Third Star.

Birmingham won despite getting outshot by at least seven in each of the three regulation periods. Evansville finished with a 47-23 shots-on-goal advantage. The overtime power play helped the Bulls outshoot the Thunderbolts 4-0 in the extra period ahead of the goal.

The win moved Birmingham into eighth place in the SPHL standings with 33 points, although Evansville has three games in hand and sits one point behind and the Fayetteville Marksmen are two points back with two games in hand.

The Bulls will return home on Friday, Jan. 30 and Saturday, Jan. 31 for two more games against the Evansville Thunderbolts. Both games will start at 7 p.m. at the Pelham Civic Complex and Ice Arena, and tickets are available on Ticketmaster and at the arena box office.