Blades win again, beat Admirals 7-2

   The Blenheim Blades, on South Kent Minor Hockey Night Thursday, ran their season-long unbeaten streak to five thanks to a 7-2 victory over the Amherstburg Admirals before 455 fans at the Blenheim Memorial Arena.

   The win moved the Blades into second place alone in the PJHL Stobbs Division with 10 points, two behind the division-leading Essex ’73s, who are now 6-0-0-0 with 12 points thanks to an 8-0 drubbing of the Walpole Island Wild Thursday in Walpole. The Wheatley Sharks sit third at nine points.

    Next action for the Blades will be next Friday when they travel to Dresden to play the Kings at 7:30 p.m., before returning home a week from Sunday to host the Mooretown Flags at 7. There will be no game Sunday night because of the Thanksgiving weekend.

   Once again it was assistant captain Tate Bowden leading the way for Blenheim, as he scored three times to give him seven goals on the season, including back-to-back hat tricks.

    Ryan Sanders helped out in the scoring department with his second goal of the year, with Gavin Merino getting his third, Matt Hayter his second and Matt’s younger brother Joey his first Junior Hockey tally.

   Both Amherstburg goals came on the powerplay in the second period with Jacob Archer and Stefan Jacobs putting the puck behind Blenheim netminder Owen Lemieux.

   Darby Lemieux had four assists for the Blades, with Brad McAlpine setting up two goals, and Breck Rainey, Zach Van Boxtel, Craig Spence, Joey Hayter, Matt Hayter and Justing Ewald helping out on one each.

   The win between the pipes was the third for Lemieux as he stopped 32 of 34 Amherstburg shots, while his teammates fired 40 at Admirals goalie Josh Courtney.

    BLADES BITS: It was the first game for Blenheim rookie forward Beau Moison who was injured in an exhibition tilt…The Blades took six of 10 minor penalties called…Not dressed was forward Andrew Goulet, who was out with a hand injury…In their five wins the Blades have only allowed 10 goals while scoring 30…The three stars were all Blades – first star Bowden, second star Darby Lemieux and third star Joey Hayter…The ice time sponsor was Kent County Bailiffs Services.