Gary Gait scored six goals Saturday night, pushing the Colorado Mammoth to an 18-12 victory over the Vancouver Ravens before a crowd of 16,032 at Pepsi Center.

The victory snapped Colorado's two-game losing streak, keeping it atop the Eastern Division by a half-game with a 5-5 record.

Tonight featured the debut of Jamie Batley as the Mammoth's interim head coach. Previously an assistant coach with the team, Batley moved up to the top spot when Rod Jensen was fired Wednesday night.

"I think I changed our team's philosophy," said Batley, the leading candidate to take the job on a permanent basis. "I didn't teach anyone how to score goals, I didn't teach anyone to play defense. What I did is changed the way we thought about ourselves as a unit. We really came together as a family."

However, some things didn't change in the coaching shuffle -- the Mammoth, notorious for its long scoreless streaks, went over eleven minutes without a goal across the first two quarters, then followed that up with eight- and nine-minute droughts in the second half.

Winning cures most ills, though, and the Mammoth can chalk this up as not just a win, but a big win. Not only did Colorado beat a decent team, defeating someone other than New York or New Jersey for the first time since mid-January, but it did so with dramatic flair.

Vancouver took a 2-1 lead after just three and a half minutes, but the Mammoth strung together four in a row -- on goals from Josh Sims, Ben Prepchuk, Brian Langtry and Ted Dowling -- to end the first quarter.

After the Ravens again assembled a threat, tying the game at five, Gait led the Mammoth out of trouble by scoring twice in a three-goal run (once shorthanded) for an 8-5 lead.

However, Matt Dwane and Ryan O'Connor struck in the closing minutes to bring the game to within one, a development which undoubtedly did not sit well for either the Mammoth players or their new skipper.

If anyone doubted what the Mammoth is capable of, the third quarter laid those doubts to rest. Dowling opened the scoring at 2:10, followed 38 seconds later by Del Halladay and 29 second after that by Gait, for the hat trick. Halladay buried a shorthanded, Dowling hit on the power play, and Phair bagged another man-down goal.

Maybe it was fatigue setting in -- after all, the Ravens won a wicked 18-16 duel with New York last night -- but the score was nevertheless 14-7 in favor of the home side with nineteen minutes remaining in the game.

Bruce Alexander scored a short while after Phair's goal, but the Ravens could only muster a pair of Mike Law shots the rest of the period.

Colorado kept up the pressure well into the fourth quarter, hitting three times in the fifth minute for a 17-8 lead. Al Truant scored on a dish from Dowling, then Colorado won the faceoff and came right down for a goal by Gait. Adding insult to injury, Mammoth goaltender Erik Miller scooped up a loose ball and fed Gait for an easy goal just a half-minute later.

Vancouver scored the next three goals -- first Dwane, then two by Stroup -- but by then, the game had long since been decided.

Miller nearly joined a very exclusive club when he banged an end-to-end shot off the Vancouver crossbar in the closing minute. A goal would've made him the fifth goaltender in league history to score, joining Ted Sawicki, Pat O'Toole (who did it twice), Rob Blasdell, and former Mammoth netminder Devin Dalep. As it was, Miller had to settle for four assists.

Dowling led the Mammoth in scoring with seven points (four goals, three assists) against his former teammates, while Gait chipped in six points (all goals). Stroup (three goals, one assist) and Cam Sedgwick (one goal, three assists) had four points each for the Ravens.

BOX SUMMARY
                                      1  2  3  4     TOT
Vancouver Ravens (3-5)                2  5  1  4  --  12
Colorado Mammoth (5-5)                5  3  6  4  --  18

VANCOUVER RAVENS              COLORADO MAMMOTH
               G - A   PTS                   G - A   PTS
Stroup         3 - 1     4    Dowling        4 - 3     7
Sedgwick       1 - 3     4    Gait           6 - 0     6
Alexander      2 - 1     3    Langtry        1 - 4     5
Dwane          2 - 1     3    Halladay       2 - 2     4
Prat           1 - 2     3    Prepchuk       2 - 2     4
Brunsch        0 - 3     3    E Miller       0 - 4     4
Gill           1 - 1     2    Truant         1 - 1     2
Law            1 - 0     1    Phair          1 - 0     1
O'Connor       1 - 0     1    Sims           1 - 0     1
Maetche        0 - 1     1    Hanford        0 - 1     1
AJ Smith       0 - 1     1    Reese          0 - 1     1
                              Rosa           0 - 1     1
                              Stilley        0 - 1     1

Shots on goal           42    Shots on goal           58
Saves made by           40    Saves made by           30
   Maetche           40          E Miller          30
Penalties               11    Penalties                9
Penalty Minutes         22    Penalty Minutes         18
Power Play Chances       8    Power Play Chances       9
Power Play Goals         3    Power Play Goals         2
   Alexander          1          Dowling            2
   Prat               1          
   Stroup             1          
Shorthanded Goals        1    Shorthanded Goals        4
   Stroup             1          Gait               1
                                 Halladay           1
                                 Phair              1
                                 Prepchuk           1
Loose Balls             72    Loose Balls             97
   Maetche           10          E Miller          19
   B Murray           8          Langtry           10
   Hamilton           6          Oglesby            8
   Law                6          
Faceoffs Won            15    Faceoffs Won            21
   Reisig       (13-17)          Hanford      (21-14)
   Stroup       ( 1- 1)          Phair        ( 0- 1)
   Law          ( 1- 3)

 *** STATS OFFICIAL BY VERIFY WITH COLORADO MAMMOTH ***