DEVILS DOMINATE IN FINAL TO WIN CONTINENTAL CUP

The Devils became only the second British team ever to win the IIHF Continental Cup, beating Grenoble 6-1 at Vindico Arena to take the prize with an unbeaten record in the final round.

Tyler Busch opened the scoring for the Devils 5:17 into the first period when he finished off a goal mouth pass from Kohen Olischefski.  The Devils had the perfect chance to extend their lead when they had a 5 on 3 powerplay midway through the period but failed to score with the two-man advantage.

Grenoble struck back with less than 4 minutes remaining in the period through Aurelien Dair who made it 1-1 at 16:13 on the powerplay with Andrew MacWilliam in the box for interference.  The period ended all tied up despite the Devils outshooting Grenoble 12-6 after 20 minutes.

The second period belonged to Cardiff as they outskated, out hit and outscored Grenoble, ending the period with a 4-goal lead.  First it was Brett Perlini who was sprung on a breakaway by Olischefski to beat Matija Pintaric in goal for Grenoble at 23:46 to give the Devils the 2-1 lead.  At 30:51, Perlini scored again, banging home a rebound after Bayley Harewood was stopped by Pintaric on a breakaway.

Josh MacDonald took a pass from Zach O’Brien on the powerplay to make it 4-1 at 37:44, then Cole Sanford scored on a breakaway with 1:15 left in the period to give the Devils a 5-1 lead after 40 minutes of play.  The Devils only allowed 4 shots on goal the entire period and peppered Grenoble with 14 shots, scoring 4 times.

The final period saw the Devils control the majority of play and see out the game in style.  Grenoble pulled their netminder early to try and find a way past Carruth, but the last goal of the game came from Perlini for his hat-trick after O’Brien broke up the play and turned up the ice to find Perlini to make it 6-1.

The celebrations began with the final buzzer and lasted for a long time on the ice as the Devils celebrated their first championship under Head Coach Pete Russell.