North Stars dig out a 6-3 triumph

FROM STAFF REPORTS

January 01, 2009 12:00 am

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ALPENA -- Kyle Bonis had a three-point night and goalie Brandon Stephenson made 31 saves as the Traverse City North Stars doubled up Alpena 6-3 in a North American Hockey League game on Wednesday night.

Traverse City scored two goals in each of the periods against the Ice Diggers.

The Stars accounted for the first four goals of the game.

Eric McLintock had the first goal 5:32 into the contest on an assist from Eric O'Hearn. Josh Miller's goal, on assists from Dean Pawlaczyk and Phil Wendecker, midway through the first made it 2-0.

Bonis, assisted by David Johnstone and Marc Thompson, scored 4:39 into the second period to make it a 3-0 game. Thompson and Bonis had assists on Nathan Urbaniak's power-play goal to send the North Stars into the second period intermission with a 4-0 lead.

Alpena scored three times in a 10-minute span of the third period to pull within one. Andy Yarber had the first and third goals for the Ice Diggers with Sam Cheraso sandwiching a tally in between.

McLintock's second goal of the night, assisted by Dan Radke and Kyle Jean, gave Traverse City a 5-3 advantage with 3:23 to play. Bonis closed out the scoring with a short-handed, empty-net goal with 57 seconds remaining.

Stephenson stopped 31 of 34 shots on the night, including facing 18 blasts from Alpena in the final 20 minutes.

Nick Graves turned aside just 12 of the 16 shots he saw over the first two periods for the Ice Diggers before being relieved in net by Tyler Stamler.