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By ANDREW SIMONSON | Sports Editor

The Birmingham Bulls had a bit of a delayed start to their weekend due to the winter weather threatening to turn the Pelham area into an outdoor hockey rink, but they finished it out strong with a victory.

The Bulls defeated the Knoxville Ice Bears 5-4 in overtime on Sunday, Jan. 12 at the Knoxville Civic Coliseum to regain traction in the SPHL standings.

Before that though, Birmingham fell to the Evansville Thunderbolts in a 3-2 game on Saturday, Jan. 11 at the Pelham Civic Complex and Ice Arena.

The Thunderbolts were initially set to visit for a two-game set beginning on Friday, Jan. 10, but due to the snowy weather, the league postponed the game and cut the weekend series to one game on Saturday.

The Bulls found themselves in a 3-0 hole after Evansville’s Logan vande Meerakker and Matthew Hobbs scored in the opening eight minutes of the game and Brendan Harrogate found the back of the net with 9:19 remaining in the second.

Birmingham missed out on a pair of power play opportunities in the first period, but when one rolled around in the third period, it didn’t let that chance go to waste.

After a Thunderbolts high-sticking call just 1:15 into the third period, Drake Glover notched his 12th goal of the season off assists from Taylor Brierley and Nikita Kozyrev, scoring 33 seconds into the power play to cut the deficit to 3-1.

The Evansville defense held the Bulls at an arm’s length for the rest of the way, and by the time Carson Rose scored with nine seconds remaining, it was too little, too late as the Thunderbolts took a 3-2 win.

The next day, Birmingham went north of the border to Knoxville and got a hot start of its own.

After going the first 11 minutes without a goal, the Bulls went up 2-0 in a matter of 21 seconds as Glover and Brierly each scored goals for the visitors.

Troy MacTavish made the lead 3-0 with 1:16 left in the first after taking an assist from Arkhip Ledziankou to score his third goal of the season.

However, the Ice Bears’ Dalton Skelly scored with just nine seconds left in the period to cut the deficit to 3-1 entering the first intermission.

That goal proved to be a sign of things to come as Knoxville surged into the lead during the second half of the second period. Dawson McKinney scored with 9:12 remaining in the second, and Carson Vance followed it up with the game-tying goal with 7:56 left in the period.

Cam Tobey then gave the Ice Bears a 4-3 lead with 3:29 remaining in the second period, leaving Birmingham in need of a response going into the second intermission.

Luckily for the Bulls, they didn’t need long to equalize as Kozyrev scored just 1:08 into the third. He took advantage of assists from Rose and Glover to tie the game at 4-4.

Birmingham had two power play chances in the final 5:13 of the game but couldn’t convert on either of them. MacTavish also ended regulation on an explosive note as he and Knoxville’s Brendan Dowler fought with just 32 seconds remaining, sending both to the box for five-minute majors.

As the pressure built for a game-winning goal during overtime, the Bulls had an unlikely hero come through with the winner. Defenseman Trevor Thurston scored his first goal since Nov. 16 off assists from Ledziankou and Rose to send Birmingham home with a 5-4 win.

Thurston secured the First Star for his game-winning goal while Glover and MacTavish’s two-point days gave them the Second and Third Stars, respectively, after each had a goal and an assist in the win. Goaltender Austin Lotz finished with 23 saves against four goals allowed.

The Bulls dropped to seventh place in the SPHL standings with 29 points from 27 games, just one point off of the Roanoke Rail Yard Dawgs in fifth place but only one point ahead of Evansville in eighth place.

Birmingham will hit the road to Roanoke to face the Rail Yard Dawgs on Friday, Jan. 17 and Saturday, Jan. 18. Both games will start at 6:05 p.m. central.

After that, the Bulls will return home for their annual Martin Luther King, Jr. Day game against the Huntsville Havoc on Monday, Jan. 20 at 1 p.m. at the Pelham Civic Complex and Ice Arena.

The SPHL later announced multiple schedule changes due to the Birmingham vs. Evansville postponement on Friday and a postponed series between the Huntsville Havoc and Peoria Rivermen which was set for Jan. 10 and 11.

The Bulls will no longer travel to Fayetteville to face the Marksmen on Thursday, Feb. 20. In addition, Birmingham will host the Havoc on Thursday, March 13 and Friday, March 14, replacing the Pensacola Ice Flyers on the 13th and Evansville on the 14th, the latter of which will technically serve as the rescheduled game from Jan. 10. The Bulls will also replace Peoria for a Thursday, March 27 road game at the Propst Arena in Huntsville.

In all, 11 games were affected by the three postponed matchups from this past weekend.

“While we hoped to maintain the same matchups from the postponed games, limited arena dates this late in the season, combined with the original schedules of this weekend’s visiting teams around those replacement dates, required changes to multiple teams’ travel schedules,” SPHL Commissioner Doug Price said in a statement.

All tickets from the Friday, Jan. 10 game against Evansville will be honored at the Birmingham vs. Huntsville game on Friday, March 14 at the Pelham Civic Complex and Ice Arena.