Kingdom Of The Giants :: Belfast Giants Fan Community, News & Views
McGimpsey Lifts Giants To The Top!
14-Jan-2005Belfast Giants' Chris McGimpsey was the star of the show tonight as his shut-out along with goals from Awada, Kelman and Johnson lifted the Giants to the top of the Elite League for the first time this season.
When the news of Klempa's ban spread, many predicted tonights game would have seen a long boring game of defensive play, but the team surprised a lot of people with a mentality that the best form of defence was to be on the offense for most of the night.
George Awada squeezed the first goal in at the near post, against the flow of play as JB sat out a charging penalty, and he rang the pipework in the dying seconds of the period, just to check that the Bison keeper was awake.
Giants kept up the pressure during the second period, but they left it until the final ten minutes to seal the win. Kelly set up Todd Kelman for Giants' second at 50.29 before Bison threw caution to the wind and pulled their netminder with two minutes left. Shane Johnson shook off his marker and rifled a shot into the back of the net from just inside the blueline less than ten seconds later, and put the icing on the cake.
It was a great team effort tonight, but the hero of the hour was McGimpsey, who has given coach Tony Hand some food for thought, and some more reassurance to the fans when it comes to future netminding choices.
Martin Klempa is available once again for tomorrows match-up against the Nottingham Panthers in the Odyssey, but McGimpsey has more than made his mark between the pipes tonight and the Belfast fans hope theres more of that to come.
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- Sat 07 Apr
- vs Devils, OTL 4-3
- Giants Goals: Rebek, Clarke, Hoffman
- Devils Goals: Matzka, Dobben, Piggot
League Standings
| P | TEAM | GP | W(OT) | L(OT) | PTS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Giants | 54 | 46(0) | 5(3) | 95 |
| 2 | Steelers | 54 | 41(0) | 11(2) | 84 |
| 3 | Panthers | 54 | 38(0) | 12(4) | 80 |
| 4 | Devils | 54 | 32(0) | 12(10) | 74 |
| 5 | Blaze | 54 | 32(0) | 20(2) | 66 |
| 6 | Clan | 54 | 31(0) | 19(4) | 66 |
| 7 | Stingrays | 54 | 16(0) | 34(4) | 36 |
| 8 | Stars | 54 | 13(0) | 35(6) | 32 |
| 9 | Capitals | 54 | 13(0) | 37(4) | 30 |
| 10 | Flyers | 54 | 8(0) | 40(6) | 22 |
Giants' Stat Leaders
| Points | Robert Dowd | 78 |
|---|---|---|
| Goals | Robert Dowd | 40 |
| Assists | Craig Peacock | 49 |
| PIM | Adam Keefe | 247 |