STARS WIN THIRD STRAIGHT, TOP BLAST 8-6

KENT, WA. The Tacoma Stars (5-8-3) made it three straight wins Friday night by dispatching the visiting Baltimore Blast (10-3-1) with an 8-6 final at the accesso ShoWare Center Friday night. With the win, Tacoma moves into the 8th seed for the Ron Newman Cup playoffs with eight games to go in the regular season. 

The Blast looked to jump on the Stars early, scoring back-to-back goals in the first five minutes of the game. Oumar Sylla netted the first of his three goals in the game followed by Patrick Thompson and Baltimore led 2-0 with 10:08 to play in the opening frame. Sylla went on to record a hat-trick in the game.

Nani Mendoza became the first player this season to score a power play goal against the stingy Blast penalty kill team to cut Baltimore's lead to 2-1 with yet another assist from the MASL's all-time assist leader Nick Perera. Perera eventually scored the game-winning goal on a penalty kick in the third quarter. He finished with three points on a pair of goals and his assist.

Now down by just one, Tacoma scored the next four goals with two by Tyler John, one by Fellipe Souza, and a shootout goal by Perera. The Stars held a 5-2 lead at halftime following their five-goal run.

Baltimore outscored the Stars by a 4-3 margin in the second half but it wasn't enough to close the gap. Eber Ospina and Ricardo Diegues each picked up a second half goal for Baltimore with Sylla tallying a pair of sixth-attacker goals in the final minute for the Blast.

Eddie Na and Kyle Rivers scored for Tacoma to go with the game-winner by Perera. 

Tacoma and Baltimore will square off again on Sunday at the accesso ShoWare Center with kickoff scheduled for 5:05 pm PST.