A four-point weekend, with an aggregate score of 12-2 in favour of the home team, and a move up to first place in the league table. A good weekend by any standard and one that Belfast Giants fans are rightly celebrating.
From the heady heights of the press box on Friday evening, it felt like it might be a tough weekend for the Giants, the general opinion was that winning one of the two games against Sheffield Steelers could be considered a decent weekend of work for the team. Just six minutes into Friday’s game Mitchell Balmas swooped in, received a neat pass from Evan Jasper and slotted it past Jackson Whistle to put Steelers ahead, suggesting a challenging night ahead for the hosts.
Three minutes later Karl Boudrias was called for interference on a hit on Joona Huttala that looked clean from our vantage point. Huttala was clearly aggrieved though, skating up and jumping on Boudrias. A brief scuffle ensued before both players were sent to their respective penalty boxes for two minutes, Huttala having been penalised for roughing.
It was a move that seemed to backfire for Sheffield as it lit a fire under the team in teal. On the fourteen-minute mark Boudrias was in the spotlight again. Known best as a physical defenceman, he decided to become a sniper for the night, capitalising on a neat play from Ciaran Long and Ben Lake to rifle a shot past Steelers goalie Matthew Greenfield.
From there the game opened up, Mike Lee and Bo Hanson both sat for minor penalties (high sticking and tripping respectively) but the Giants penalty kill stood strong and saw them through to the end of the first period.
Period two featured Long with a savvy goal from his own rebounding shot and Boudrias’ second of the night, while the third period saw David Goodwin slot his team’s fourth of the night. 57 minutes in Greenfield took a rarely seen penalty for playing the puck outside the trapezoid and Marcus Eriksson added a goal on the powerplay that followed.
In a game full of scoring opportunities, it was Lake in particular who caught my eye, throwing hit after hit, seemingly obsessed with driving every white shirt he saw into the boards. That he did so on every shift and never got so much as a warning from the referees is testament to his ability to play the game on the edge.
Speaking to head coach Adam Keefe after the game and he was clearly happy with his team’s performance. “If you look at the overall game and you’re a spectator, it probably wasn’t a 5-1 game in the sense that it flew back and forth, but we had some timely scoring there and built on our lead. We talked about going into the third period there, that we’ve given up some leads in the past and making sure that those counted, that we’re learning from those experiences and we’re not continuing to do it, to let it (maintaining a lead) be a reason why we become a better hockey team. I thought that the guys proved that last weekend and they proved it again tonight.”
A positive response, though with a note of caution too. “You have to humble yourselves and reset. That’s a very good Sheffield team, we have to be aware of that.”
“You can’t get ahead of yourselves. There’s a lot of hockey left to be played, and you’ve got to be focused every night. If you’re not, in this league, it’s going to cost you. We’ll get some rest tonight, but then we talk about the game and look for little areas that we can improve on or continue to do things that we’re doing well. Get in tomorrow and get focused right from the off. Two points is nice; four points is better.”
It’s an approach that paid off. Accompanied by a roaring crowd, Belfast looked dominant from the moment their skates touched the ice and with seven and a half minutes on the clock Scott Conway finished a flowing team attack to put his team a goal ahead. Jordan Kawaguchi doubled the lead after 13 minutes then, with Sheffield’s Reece Kelly firing a puck out of play with five minutes left on the clock, the Giants found themselves on their first powerplay of the evening and Mike Lee made sure it counted, receiving the puck from a face-off and slotting it home. Belfast would go into the first break three goals in the clear.
A Ryan Smith brace in the second period put the team in a very healthy lead, though Jasper made the most of a counter-attacking opportunity to ensure that, no matter how the rest of the game went, Steelers would not be nilled.
The third period saw further goals with Kawaguchi scoring his second and Carsen Twarynski putting away the Ginats seventh of the night, a scoreline that highlighted how thoroughly he and his teammates had routed their opposition.
It was a subdued post-game press conference though, as news had broken earlier in the afternoon that well known and much loved Giants fan Blake McCaughey, whose bravery in dealing with a rare genetic disorder served as constant inspiration for Keefe and his charges, had sadly passed away.
“We knew the importance of this weekend. We wanted to follow up and prove to ourselves that we can put two really good performances in, like we did have last weekend. I thought it was maybe a bit more complete performance last weekend; however I think the performance this weekend was equally as impressive because I thought Sheffield were very good, specifically the first period yesterday and the second period today. I thought they were really pushing, and our guys bent a little bit but Jackson was solid and then when we got our opportunities we were putting the puck in the net and obviously that helps.”
One positive, among the many in an impressive Saturday night showing, was Belfast not conceding any penalties, a subject Keefe was keen to comment on. “The discipline was great, I thought, the whole weekend. We had a couple yesterday, we had some big kills, put a pretty big focus on our penalty kill and making sure that we take pride in it. I thought the guys – you look at that first period yesterday, we don’t get those two big kills at the end, it’s a different hockey game – so I thought our penalty kill was great and Jackson stood tall and obviously our special team, our power play went two for two this weekend against the number one PK in the league.
“The guys are taking pride in the details and the numbers, and I think that if you do take care of the details and the numbers then you’re going to be sitting in a pretty good spot come the end of the year.”
So where now for the Giants? Chasing top spot and defending it are very different activities, and with the spectre of Challenge Cup semi-finals looming too, Belfast need to keep their focus. They continue to play short-benched as Josh Roach, Brandon Whistle and Sam Jones nurse injuries. The return of one (or more) of this group will be a great relief as matches come thick and fast. On the flip side, the emergence of Carter Hamill as an EIHL ready forward gives Keefe an extra consideration for his line-up, at least when Hamill isn’t skating for Solway Sharks in the SNL.
The Giants have been in this spot before, more importantly, they’ve achieved great success after finding themselves at the top of the table in January. They’ll be keen to continue in that vein, and based on this weekend’s performances they will have every opportunity to continue their success.
