Seals Take Down Halifax at Home 12-8

In a penalty-filled game, the San Diego Seals defeated the Halifax Thunderbirds, 12-8, on Saturday night at Pechanga Arena.

The Seals fell behind early, 3-1, and trailed 4-3 after one quarter but they caught up to the Thunderbirds and tied the game 2:25 into the second on a Tre Leclaire power play goal off a pass from Dane Dobbie. They then took their first lead of the game just 1:09 later on another power play goal, this one from Austin Staats off a pass from Wes Berg and added another a short time later to go up 6-4 on a Jacob Dunbar goal off a feed from Staats. Halifax scored to narrow the deficit to 6-5 before Staats added another at the 5:14 mark of the second and the Seals took a 7-5 lead into the locker room at the break.

Fifty-two seconds into the third quarter, the Seals extended their lead to 8-5 on another power play goal, this one from Dunbar off a pass from Dobbie. Late in the third, a slew of Halifax penalties gave the Seals a two-man advantage and San Diego capitalized with a power play goal from Staats, his third of the night and 49 seconds later, Berg scored on a feed from Leclaire and the Seals led 10-6 after three periods.

The Seals added two more goals in the final period, Staats’ fourth of the night and an empty-netter from Dobbie for the final points of the night.

The teams combined for 18 penalties, 14 of which were committed by the Thunderbirds. With the win, the Seals improve to 9-4 on the season.