Elite League: Belfast Giants 7-2 Coventry Blaze

John Kurtz goes close for the Giants in Saturday night's league game against Coventry

Darcy Murphy's hat-trick helped the Belfast Giants to a comfortable victory and Elite League double over Coventry Blaze at the SSE Arena.

Brandon Benedict, Spiro Goulakos, Colin Shields and Jim Vandermeer were also on target for the hosts, who earned a 7-4 win over Coventry 24 hours earlier.

Belfast move to within a point of the leaders Cardiff Devils, who lost to Nottingham Panthers on Saturday night.

The Giants will travel to take on Guildford Flames on Sunday.

After a scoreless first period, and rather like Friday night's game between the two sides, the goals flowed in the middle session with six in all.

The Giants took the lead at 24:51 when Murphy scored his first of the game on the powerplay after all the hard work was done by David Rutherford.

Lead doubled

Eleven seconds later it was 2-0 when Benedict tucked away his second goal in two games.

Once again, however, the home side were having difficulty staying out of the penalty box and in doing so allowed the Blaze to stay in the game.

On a 4-on-3 man advantage at 28:39 Adam Courchaine pulled them within one, and with a another four-minute powerplay to come they had the opportunity to tie the game, but Murphy's shorthanded breakaway and neat finish restored the Giants' two-goal advantage.

However, on yet another penalty called on the hosts, Alex Barron blasted the puck past Giants goalie Chris Truehl.

Darcy Murphy raises his arm in celebration after scoring his second goal against the Blaze

But with only 40 seconds remaining in the period, Murphy was the right man in the right place again as he completed his treble, assisted by Goulakos.

Another powerplay goal increased Belfast's lead at 47:13 when Shields pocketed a rebound from in front of the Blaze cage after Brendan Connolly's shot was saved.

It was with the man advantage once again at 48:42 that Goulakos picked his spot and fired home the Giants' sixth goal.

The final marker of the game came with just over a minute remaining when Vandermeer scored as the home side rounded off their eight-game home stand in style with a 7-1 record while chalking up a 14th win from their last 17 games.