Race for the title is back on

Blog from Door 8

Well I had been looking forward to Saturday since November, It was time for one of the long awaited perks of being a season ticket holder, the open training session. I had a warm sweater on and I was ready to brave the cold of a very early Saturday start. The last group of season ticket holders all congregated outside Rockies sports bar as we waited to be let into the Arena. The seats behind the benches were filled as we waited for the Giants to hit the ice. It was nice in particular to see Brandon Benedict looking a million times better training with the guys, and its looking like he could be back on the 8th March all being well!

The drills were good to watch, the defence men in Black, the forwards in red, Goaltenders in white and Benny in a rather fetching shade of pink. All in all it was an enjoyable experience watching the team practising their passes and tweaking their offensive moves and also shooting at Murph, Craze and Dickson. Rob Stewart, and Steve Thornton also had their children on the ice getting some skating practice in. We were then shown into the empty locker room to wait for autographs and were warned that the lads would be, well put it this way if you've had a fresh shirt off the back jersey you know that a player can get pretty sweaty!

Shirt completely autographed and meeting players like Szwez and Dickson for the first time out of the way we were then allowed to fire questions at Todd Kelman and Steve Thornton. They confirmed that we had Craig Peacock for next season and that there could very well be more teams in the Elite League in a few seasons. It was highly informative and really enjoyable and a real perk to owning a season ticket.

Hanging round in town then in Rockies for the Rugby I couldn't help but feel that familiar feeling of dread whenever we were playing the Blaze and things could go very wrong. No disrespect but the Giants hadn't beaten the Blaze this season and the other teams had. So after a few Kopparbergs in the bar and the tangible disappointment that hung in the air that Ireland had been beaten by France in the 6 Nations I made my way to the arena for the second time that day.

There was an air of expectation, the league title was dangling in front of the Giants their only obstacles were standing opposite them on the ice. There was however a glimmer of hope that one of the Blaze's top line Calder was injured. Could the Giants do it? Could this be the biggest come back in recent years? The large crowd hoped so and the atmosphere was one of absolute optimism. (well that's how I felt anyway!)

It seemed to be one of those games with incredibly defensive games being played and it looked as if there was going to be a scoreless first, and then there was a hallelujah moment when Jeff Szwez netted a beautiful goal at around the sixteenth minute. The league leaders were visibly shaken, beginning to hit hard and put on a bit of pressure, the period ended however with the Giants only off the mark.

The second period was again evenly matched, both teams were hungry for the win and neither were willing to give up any goals to their opposition. Chambers who had kept the penalty box seat warm for a portion of the match netted a peach of a goal at the thirty minute mark on the power play. The Giants stepped it up a gear with a lot of big checks and some hard shots on Hirsch. Pat Bateman on a power play netted a sneaky goal to put the home side ahead, all to play for in the third.

Grabbing a coffee and dodging mic-happy Kirstie McMurray on the concourse I settled down for what would be a tough period of play. The league leaders tried and tried, there were some dirty hits, Campbell not man enough to take on McMorrow went after one of the more sedate Giants, Evan Cheverie was hit a few times, and even tripped and as a testament to the outstanding refereeing in the elite league the Blaze got away with it! Pulling Hirsch at fifty eight minutes gave the Blaze the man advantage but Belfast held on and kept the lead. The relief was brilliant, the win was in the bag and everyone was delighted. Bring on Sheffield at home on Friday! Sgroi has been called out by McMorrow should be very entertaining!

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