Stingrays Top Icemen in 5-3 Comeback Victory

NORTH CHARLESTON, SC—The South Carolina Stingrays delivered a thrilling come-from-behind 5-3 victory over the Jacksonville Icemen in front of a crowd of 6,639 fans on Saturday evening. Mitchell Gibson made 31 saves in the victory. 

BOX SCORE

Brandon Fortunato opened the scoring for Jacksonville with a power-play goal 10:48 into the first period. The goal was Fortunato’s first of the year and the only goal of the period.

Garrett Van Wyhe made it 2-0 Icemen when he scored on a breakaway 1:08 into the first period.

Kyler Kupka pulled the Stingrays within one with his first professional goal. Kupka centered the puck in front and Jacksonville’s Riley Fiddler-Schultz put it into his own net.

Fiddler-Schultz scored for Jacksonville 11 seconds later to make it a 3-1 game.

The Stingrays stormed back to tie the game thanks to two goals in 1:05 from Austin Magera, who buried his team-leading 28th and 29th goals of the season.

With less than two minutes to go in the second period, Tyson Empey gave the Stingrays a 4-3 lead. Empey crashed the net and buried a feed from Kevin O’Neil for his 19th goal of the season.

Marko Reifenberger added an empty net goal to make it 5-3 with 1:11 remaining in the game. 

The Stingrays are back in action this Friday night when they take on the Florida Everblades at 7:30 pm at Hertz Arena in Estero, Florida.