Blaze Looking For A Lift

Last night the Coors Belfast Giants took another step towards ending the hoodoo that the Coventry Blaze had held over them since their first meeting in September 2003. In a feisty game that had it all, the Giants may have been out punched, but they scored where it mattered by putting five goals past former team member Martin Klempa.

The game started brightly for the Giants as Fleury and Courteney combined to give Skiehar his fourth goal in as many games with just over two minutes of the game gone. The lead was doubled by an in-form Steve O'Brien less than two minutes later with Colin Shields picking up his first point as a Belfast Giant.

Credit to the Blaze though as they refused to wilt under the relentless Giants pressure and with Fleury and Belak in the boxes for roughing penalties, they managed to pull a goal back, Tait and Poirier combining to open the Blaze account for the night.

The rest of the first period passed off without much incident, although the Blaze tactic of hooking, holding, clutching, grabbing, and general hugging and piggybacking on Giants players was undoubtedly causing frustration.

That frustration exploded in the second period, when seven minutes in, Jason Ruff tangled with Blaze hard man Graham Belak. Although Belak did get Ruff down, he was not out and managed to get back up to deliver a few jabs before the fight was ended by the stripeys.

On the half hour mark the Giants regained the two goal cushion, as George Awada scored his seventh goal of the season with O'Brien and new boy Shields getting the assists.

Moments later Belak was involved again, this time with Marc Levers. As the pair squared up, it was clear who would be the victor in this bout, and Levers can be thankful to Shawn Skiehar for jumping in to defend his team-mate when he was in danger of being pummelled through the ice. This came at a cost to the Giants as Skiehar received a game penalty for being "Third Man In". However, Skiehar made sure that Belak knew he was not impressed with him before he left the ice, and it remains to be seen whether this will be carried over to todays game in the SkyDome.

This was not the last of the rough stuff however, as Jason Bowen reminded Andreas Moborg that he can be as handy with his fists as he is with his checks. Bowen hammered down on Moborg after the Blaze player put in a dubious hit on Captain George Awada in the corner. The hit clearly angered the team captain as he lost his composure and ended up receiving a two minute penalty of his own moments later.

The final period started with Coventry pressing to try and get back into the game. They managed to do that thanks to an unforced error by player/coach Ed Courtenay as he gifted the puck to Blaze forward Barrie Moore who made no mistake with his finish. Courtenays passes had been going astray for most of the game thus far and it was no surprise when the visitors capitalised.

Belak's only contributions to the game for the Blaze had been his two fighting penalties and with ten minutes left he took yet another penalty, this time for hooking. It took just over a minute for the Giants to get that two goal lead back on the resultant powerplay, this time Shane Johnson setting up Fleury for the clinical finish.

With less than five minutes left on the clock, Colin Shields sealed the win for the home team as he scored his first goal and the Giants fifth of the night. It was a team full of man of the match performances, O'Brien was superb, Stewart was rock solid, and the line of Bowen, Morrison and Levers was oustanding. However, it was Colin Shields, with one goal and two assists in his first game that received the plaudits.

Both teams travel to Coventry today where battle will resume at the Skydome today at 6.00pm.

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