It's never easy to win a game when you give up the first goal, as the Komets did Saturday night to the Dayton Gems.

"Well, roughly 85 percent of the teams that score the first goal win the game," said Fort Wayne coach Al Sims, whose team defeated the Gems 3-1 with three unanswered goals Saturday night, in front of 8,123 fans at Memorial Coliseum.

"Scoring the first goal is very important. When you can come back and win when the other team doesn't, you're in the very small minority and we managed to do it tonight. And when you manage to win with three goals, we're playing the kind of hockey we want to be."

The Komets are 7-11-1 when giving up the first goal.

They got tallies from Bobby Chaumont, Chris Auger and Jesse Bennefield.

The Komets also took over first place in the Turner Conference. However, Evansville, which is two points back, is still playing against Rapid City.

"This week we really worked hard on battling and worked on the defense. That was something that had been slipping a bit," Chaumont said.

I think the best player on the ice was Brent Henley. His defense was superb. He had a fight. And he was contributing on the offense. And goaltender Nick Boucher had 33 saves, one of which was on a breakaway in the waning seconds.

The Komets were 6-7-1 in January but have won two in a row since. They are 27-13-2 overall.

Next up, they play at Evansville on Wednesday. That should be a heck of a game.