Sport

Belfast Giants title hopes ended despite victory over Coventry Blaze

Colin Shields (extreme right) of the Belfast Giants was man-of-the-match against Coventry Blaze on Saturday night at the SSE Arena, Belfast Picture by William Cherry/Presseye
Colin Shields (extreme right) of the Belfast Giants was man-of-the-match against Coventry Blaze on Saturday night at the SSE Arena, Belfast Picture by William Cherry/Presseye Colin Shields (extreme right) of the Belfast Giants was man-of-the-match against Coventry Blaze on Saturday night at the SSE Arena, Belfast Picture by William Cherry/Presseye

THE Belfast Giants' Elite League title hopes were finally extinguished on Saturday night when a 6-2 win for the Cardiff Devils over the Sheffield Steelers enabled the Welsh side to claim the trophy for the first time in 20 years.

The Giants, meanwhile, got back to winning ways with a 5-2 victory over Coventry Blaze at the SSE Arena but it was all in vain after they had lost to the Steelers at the same venue 24 hours earlier.

However, in an ironic twist of fate, Cardiff's win did Derrick Walser's side a favour as it put more distance between the Giants and the Steelers as both sides chase second place in the standings and a potentially easier play-off quarter-final.

The Giants now need just a point from their weekend double-header in Cardiff to make sure of holding down the runners-up spot.

Walser insists that it's important his team maintain their momentum going into the final weekend of the regulation season, after bouncing back from Friday's defeat to beat Coventry.

"It wasn't our best performance and there were a lot of ugly parts to it; we were tired and I think the loss to Sheffield hurt us." said the Canadian.

"We came in playing a fresher team; it wasn't pretty but we found a way to get the job done; our power-play came big and got us a couple of goals when we needed them.

"All in all I'm proud of the guys and we just need to improve on some things before we go to Cardiff and not develop any bad habits before the play-offs."

In Saturday night's game, the Giants got off to a dream start when, in the 12th minute, Chris Higgins fired the puck high into the net after a pin-point cross-ice pass from Blair Riley.

However Brett Robinson equalised fewer than two minutes later when he sent in a powerful shot through traffic and past Giants' netminder Stephen Murphy.

Colin Shields made it 2-1 on a power-play at 23:50 with a slap-shot after being set up by Steve Saviano and David Rutherford.

Shields grabbed his second of the night seven minutes before the end of the second period when his close-range effort beat Blaze goalie Brian Stewart.

Josh Godfrey pulled one back for the visitors when his long-range effort flew past Murphy to reduce the deficit to 3-2.

But that was as good as it got for the visitors as Shields set up Rutherford on another power-play on 51:53 and Mike Forney wrapped up the win when he found the empty net near the end after Coventry had withdrawn their goalie.