BY MICHAEL DAVID

Being home in Sun Valley proved advantageous for the Sun Valley Suns Hockey Club Friday night.

The Suns scored 10 goals at Sun Valley’s Indoor Ice Rink Friday night, defeating Vail 10-7 and avenging their losses earlier in the season in Vail.

 The thrilling game featured scoring runs and comebacks by both teams, delighting hockey fans.

The first period gave no indication it would be such a high scoring contest as both teams went scoreless for the first 18 minutes and 25 seconds.

The Vail goaltender faced a barrage of Suns shots, and he turned back all of them. The local boys made 18 shots during the first period and came away empty handed.

 Vail broke the scoreless tie with a goal at the 18:25 mark of the period and followed it up with another goal 25 seconds later.  Despite the Suns keeping the puck in the Vail end for the majority of the period, they found themselves trailing 2-0 at the first intermission.

The Suns kept the offensive pressure up to start the second period, putting two more shots on goal in the first 20 seconds. Their hard work finally paid dividends as Eric Demment opened the scoring 1:52 into the period, cutting the Vail lead in half.

 Capitalizing on a Vail penalty, Sean O’Grady scored the first of his three goals of the night on a power play at the 3:19 mark to tie the game at two goals apiece. The Suns scored again 41 seconds later to take their first lead of the night, 3-2.

Vail responded with a goal with 13:54 remaining in the second period to tie the game at 3-3, but Mike Curry helped regain the lead, scoring a power play goal off a feed from Demment.  Two straight goals by O’Grady gave the Suns a three-goal lead, but Vail scored again with 3:35 left in the period to narrow the home team’s lead to 6-4 by the second intermission.

Vail scored on a breakaway less than one minute into the third period to get within one goal of the Suns. Then Vail tied the game 6-6 with 16:20 remaining in regulation play. Vail scored again to take the lead with 11 minutes left, but their lead would be short-lived as Matt Puntureri scored just 10 seconds later to tie the score 7-7.  The Suns took the lead 8-7 at the 12:28 mark, and tallied two more goals while goalie Ryan Thomson stopped all remaining Vail shots  for the 10-7 final score.

The two teams meet again at 7 tonight—Saturday, March 5—at the Campion Ice House in Hailey for the finale of this two game series.

A portion of the proceeds from Friday’s gate benefitted Higher Ground, a non-profit organization dedicated to enhancing quality of life through inclusive therapeutic recreation and education for people of all abilities.