It was another sold out show at the Devils on Friday night as the hometown team cruised to a 5-1 win over their rival Nottingham Panthers.

The Devils fed off the big crowd and were relentlessly forechecking throughout the opening period, out shooting their opponents 18 to 5.  Despite the lopsided shot count, the lone goal of the period came at 10:43 from Jake Coughler who beat Alex Dubeau low glove side with Brodie Reid and Blake Thompson drawing the assists.

The second period was more of the same with the Devils continuing to outshoot the Panthers, this time 19-6.  They doubled the lead midway through the second period when Josh Waller used his speed to break past the Nottingham defence and finished off a perfect pass from Reid to make it 2-0 at 30:15. 

Jeremy Welsh pulled one back for the Panthers at 34:09 to give the visitors some life, but 34 seconds later Joey Martin had re-established the two-goal lead for the Devils when a fumbled pass from Trevor Cox landed on his stick and he beat Dubeau clean to go up 3-1. 

Tanner Sorenson was tossed out of the game for kicking, giving the Devils a 5 minute powerplay to end the second period, which carried over to the start of the third, but they could not convert with the man advantage.  The Panthers had a late powerplay that could have got them back in the game, but the Cardiff penalty killers were perfect on the night, killing off all three powerplays that Nottingham had. 

The Panthers pulled their goalie with over minutes to play but it was the Devils who sealed the win when Blake Thompson scored into the empty net at 56:57 to give the Devils a 4-1 lead.  Things kicked off with 30 seconds left to play when Nottingham netminder Alex Dubeau went after Josh Waller resulting in a handful of penalties on both sides.  The Devils added one final insult, scoring with 1 second left past Dubeau, this time from Marcus Crawford set up by Cox and Justin Crandall to finish the night with a 5-1 win. 

Ben Bowns was solid all night stopping 17 of 18 shots, Thompson and Crawford both had a goal and an assist whilst Cox and Reid both picked up 2 assists. 

Photos courtesy of Rebecca Brain and James Assinder