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The Raptors may finally be heading upwards after hitting rock bottom.

The Colorado Raptors got an uncommon win on home ice tonight, defeating their occasional rivals in the St. Louis Scarecrows 4-1. With the win the team has collected 5 points from their past 3 games, which is sadly one of their best stretches in a very trying season for the mile high club. Colorado are now within 3 points of breaking out of the basement past the Detroit Falcons, and for the first time in a while theres a spark of hope amidst the teams fanbase and locker room.

"It feels good to get this win, maybe now we'll finally hit our stride in time for the playoffs." said Raptors power forward Nick Brain.

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Nick Brain was a key contributor throughout, and set the tone early on. Raptors defenseman Jason Kruger got called down for interference two minutes into the first, a penalty that had the Raptors fan howling in frustration, thinking this was going to be another bad night for their home team. However, the Raptors PK stonewalled the Scarecrows, and got a surprise shorthanded goal on an innocuous even man rush, with Nick Brain firing a slapper from near the blueline that got past Billy Sorokin. The surprise shorthanded marker got a roar from the Colorado crowd, which has seen certain sections regularly booing the sophomore power forward from England for subpar play (8 goals and 5 assists in 33 games before today.) this year.

"I can't blame some of them for booing me, to be honest." said Brain in the post-game presser. "I thought and a lot of people thought I was set for a big season, I had a great camp in Winnipeg, had a good preseason, and its just fallen apart a lot this year. I should be playing better, but theres so many days where I can't put the puck past anybody and can't get anything going. I'm doing all I can to fix this, but its just one of those years....... maybe tonight will change it though."

St Louis tried to get back into the game, and got another chance at the man advantage when the aggressive young rookie Duke Nukemstein got penalized for hooking. The Raptors PK came up big again, however, and walled out the threat. Duke Nukemstein celebrated the killed penalty by coming out of the box and landing a highlight-reel quality open-ice hit on Charlie Serpe, his second of the game on the same target.

Nicolas Fleming tried to get the Scarecrows level, but a clever passing play ending with his shot was denied by a stupendous glove save from Yuri Ushakov. the Raptors carried the momentum forward, and got a break when a deflected Julio Tokolosh shot was stopped by Sorokin and gift-wrapped back to him with a rebound. Tokolosh made no mistake with the second chance and the Raptors took a 2-0 lead, as a furious Sorokin slammed his stick against the crossbar.

Less than 30 seconds later it was dreamland for the Raptors, as Michael Scarn deflected a Nick Brain shot past an out-of-position Sorokin to extend the lead to 3-0 with 9 minutes left in the 1st.

Surprsingly, the rest of the 1st period proceeded mostly without incident, sans Slip McScruff going berserk after the 3rd goal and taking out his frustrations on the Raptors with a series of vicious hits. One eventually got him in the box, but the Scarecrows killed the penalty and kept it to 3-0 at the end of the first period.

The second period saw Nick Brain establish the tone once again, this time with a solid hit on Ty Hoover and a open-ice trainwreck of a hit on Slip McSruff that got the Colorado crowd buzzing. The second period saw no goals and was fairly even, with St. Louis firing 9 shots to Colorado's 8 without either team finding the back of the net. Sorokin was looking shaky, almost fumbling a routine stop on Knute Knurtsson late in the period before covering up, but kept the Raptors out until the horn.

The second intermission saw an incident with a fan climbing over the glass and making it onto the ice, holding aloft a sign that said "Hey Calgary, can you give us Chico Smeb back?" before being escorted off the ice by the Raptors legendary Zamboni driver Ray Lahey and a group of armed security guards. The Raptors came out strong to start the third, and got another goal when Jakub Novak calmly faked and worked the puck in the slot until Sorokin committed and Novak could send the puck up top over the flailing goalie to make it 4-0.

The Scarecrows bench bosses had seen enough and pulled Sorokin after the goal, sending out Lee Marshall in his stead. The Scarecrows pushed back to salvage something from the game, and finally managed to break the shutout when Tyler Tougard beat Yuri Ushakov 8 minutes into the 3rd, scooping his own rebound past the Colorado netminder to make it 4-1.

St. Louis made a push through the last half of the third, but found quality opportunities hard to come by. Gordie Boomhover had two decent chances late for St. Louis to claw another one back, but Ushakov alertly made the save both times and the Scarecrow comeback bid was snuffed out.

Nick Brain earned first star honours with his goal and assist. He also set the tone with 3 big hits in the 2nd period and played a defensively responsible game on the 2nd line. Nick credited part of his improved performance to a line shuffle the Raptors have made in recent weeks, with the top line now consisting of Knute Knurtsson, Parker Smeb, and Jakub Novak, while the second line sees Michael Scarn paired with Nick Brain, and rookie Julio Tokolosh replacing Juulius Smonk. All 6 players played solid games.

The Colorado Raptors have also been playing with a bit more fire since Cassius Darrow's tirade against the press in the last week of play. The team captain's rant about his team's fortunes have lit a bit of a fire under the Raptors, and Darrow himself ended his night with 2 assists and played 23 solid minutes for his team on both ends of the ice.

Colorado's next game will see them take on the 6th place Lethbridge Lions on the start of a 3-game road trip. After that, Colorado's next match at home will be against the Anchorage Armada on Day 67 of the season.