Nov. 7, 2010 - GRAND RAPIDS GRIFFINS 4 at Lake Erie Monsters 3

CLEVELAND – Grand Rapids slipped past the Lake Erie Monsters 4-3 in a shootout victory Sunday evening at the Quicken Loans Arena to complete a three-in-three weekend and kick off an eight-game season series against the Griffins’ North Division rival.

The Griffins return home on Wednesday, Nov. 10 to welcome the Milwaukee Admirals for a 12:00 p.m. EST match up at Van Andel Arena.

Grand Rapids (7-3-0-2) fell behind Lake Erie (5-5-1-2) in shots early on, but succeeded in killing four Monsters’ power plays to secure a scoreless first period.

Logan Pyett broke the scoreless tie, putting the Griffins on the board first with a power play goal from just inside the blue line at 1:51 in the second period. Curtis Fraser quickly responded with a goal for Lake Erie at 3:12 on a hand off from Zach Cohen.

Grand Rapids pulled ahead 2-1 when Jamie Tardif handed the puck to Francis Pare who fired off a forty-foot shot from the right wing boards past Jason Bacashihua at 18:02 in the second.

Chris Minard furthered the Griffins’ lead less than two minutes into the third period with an unassisted goal. Success was short lived when Fraser tallied his second goal for the Monsters at 10:39 on assists from Patrick Bordeleau and Cohen who claimed his second assist of the night.

The Monsters evened the score 3-3 at 16:28 in the third, as Joel Chouinard launched a quick shot past Jordan Pearce just inside the right goal post to send the game into overtime.

Both teams battled through regulation overtime to finish the game in a shootout. The Griffins were victorious in round 7 with the game winning goal scored by Tomas Tatar to defeat the Monsters 4-3.

Pearce posted 37 saves and went 5 for 7 in the shootout for the Griffins while Bacashihua tallied 18 saves and went 4 for 7 in the shootout .

Three Stars: 1. GR Tatar (GW goal); 2. GR Pearce (37 saves); 3. LE Fraser (2 goals)