The Elite League title isn’t heading back to Belfast just yet.
Adam Keefe’s side entered the weekend with the chance to seal the regular-season crown, but blundered on Saturday [21 March] and saw their hopes fade in a 3-1 loss to the Glasgow Clan.
While the Belfast Giants remain in pole position, the Nottingham Panthers and Cardiff Devils won elsewhere to close the gap to eight and nine points, respectively.
Further down the standings, the Manchester Storm took down the Guildford Flames to consolidate their grip on fifth place, while the Coventry Blaze beat the Fife Flyers to stay in the hunt for a top-six seeding.
Welcome to Around the Rinks, our daily summary of every teams’ post-game media remarks.
Around the Rinks: Saturday, 22 March 2026
Belfast Giants 1-3 Glasgow Clan
Carsen Twarynski, Belfast Giants (Image: William Cherry)
Adam Keefe, Belfast Giants:
I take full responsibility. I thought we would be more ready for the occasion tonight and I was sadly mistaken: we clearly were not. We were humbled in a big way and that was maybe the worst display of hockey we’ve played in a long time.
Coming out of an emotional weekend in Sheffield last time, I hoped we’d put it together in front of a sellout crowd in Belfast. It’s unacceptable that we didn’t and I think we all took our eyes off the ball.
This is not an easy league to win in and you should never expect it to be easy. We have to take a long look in the mirror, forget about it, and respond tomorrow. The good thing is that this group has responded to adversity well all season.
Nobody is going to hand us this trophy: we have to earn it and that’s what we’ll set out to do.
Mike Sirant, Glasgow Clan:
It’s a huge victory for us tonight. This is such a hard rink to play in, and against such a strong team, this is a big moment for us. There were a number of factors: our goalie was excellent, we scored on the powerplay, and our killers stepped us for us in the third period. All of those things contributed to the win, but we just stayed composed and controlled. It was a simple and smart game.
Cardiff Devils 3-0 Dundee Stars
Christian Stoever, Cardiff Devils (Image: James Assinder)
Paul Thompson, Cardiff Devils:
In all fairness to [Christian] Stoever, he is the reason it was a shutout today. I thought he made some great saves and he’s been good of late. I don’t want to sound arrogant, I don’t think we were going to lose the game, but he earned his own shutout tonight.
Marc LeFebvre, Dundee Stars:
I thought we played really hard. I wouldn’t say we played a complete game, but we competed hard for the most part. It’s the story of our season: we just couldn’t find the back of our net. Credit to their goalie, he was great tonight, but we’ve got to capitalise on those chances.
Defensively, we were good for the most part, but it doesn’t matter if you can’t put the puck in the back of the net.
Coventry Blaze 7-3 Fife Flyers
Jordan Power, Coventry Blaze (Image: Scott Wiggins)
Kevin Moore, Coventry Blaze:
In the end, we’re happy with the result. The first period was absolutely horrible from us: one of our worst of the year. It didn’t really get much better going into the second, but our guys took personal accountability once Fife scored their third goal, and they built from there.
It was a good opportunity for the boys to problem solve the emotions of a bad start and credit to Fife for coming off the bus and being ready to play. They played really hard and they absolutely earned the lead they had.
I loved how the guys responded.
Mike Courts, Fife Flyers:
I was very happy with our first period: we had to come out all guns blazing in the first period because we didn’t want to be chasing the game while short on bodies and we did exactly that. I felt that coming into the second period at 2-2 was very deserved.
We started to fall behind from there, but the effort level was there. Tiredness started to kick in and the game got away from us more and more as the third period went on.
I’m proud of the guys: we came down here with such a short line-up and they gave everything. I can’t fault them. The Blaze were very good: what can we do?
Manchester Storm 4-1 Guildford Flames
Cam Critchlow, Manchester Storm:
I thought we had a slow start, Guildford pushed us in the first ten minutes, and Drew [DeRidder] had to be really sharp. Then, we found our game, got in the offensive zone, and really started to hunt pucks. We had some great performances through the line-up, with some huge blocks. It was a playoff-style game and the guys embraced that.
I liked the way we approached that game.
Paul Dixon, Guildford Flames:
I’m disappointed in the result, but I don’t think the scoreline reflected the game at all. For the most part our penalty kill has been really good for us, but we gave up two goals tonight. Overall, I’m happy with our work ethic and how we approached this game.
We’ve just got to move on and get ready for our home game tomorrow.
Sheffield Steelers 2-4 Nottingham Panthers
Sam Tremblay, Sheffield Steelers (Image: Dean Woolley)
Aaron Fox, Sheffield Steelers:
It’s a little bit of groundhog day with our group: we had a great week in practice, the guys worked their tails off, and you could tell they were motivated to start the game.
Again, the lack of execution on our scoring chances is putting us in a tough spot. We outshot Nottingham 24-1 in the first period and we only came in up one-nothing.
I thought we had a much better pushback in the third tonight compared to what we saw last weekend. We had some great looks on the powerplay and were maybe a little bit too unselfish. When you have 47 shots and only score two goals, it’s frustrating but that’s just the way things are going.
We’re finding ways to lose hockey games that we probably shouldn’t and we’ve now got six games to get the team ready for a playoff push.
Danny Stewart, Nottingham Panthers:
They dominated in the first period: Jason Grande kept us in that game and gave us a chance to find our legs. I don’t know if we were still at the bar from Wednesday night or what. We had some harsh words after the first period, I spoke about playing for one another, and the guys responded well.
I loved our composure and how we hung on in the third. With the penalty at the end, I don’t necessarily disagree with the call, but there was too much that went on tonight. I can’t believe that we didn’t have a powerplay.
At the end of the day, it’s a huge win for us and it keeps us ticking. It gives us a chance. I loved our bounce back in the second and third.
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