Sheffield Steelers v Fife Flyers: Coach Aaron Fox and why he backs Steelers to raise their game yet again

It’s understandable that there would, at some point, be some drop off. But now, with the play-offs swinging into action this weekend, everything is on the line again and the Steelers’ head coach backs his players to step up their game again.

After all, there is another trophy on the line.

Since the league trophy was lifted aloft in front of a packed Utilita Arena on March 24 following a 7-3 win over Guildford Flames – watching and listening for the second time in 10 days having lost to the Steelers in the Challenge Cup Final at the same venue – results have not suffered.

The Steelers won four of the games that followed their title celebrations, ensuring they finished a whopping 14 points clear at the top of the standings once the final buzzer on Game No 54 sounded.

The regular season ended on a losing note – a 4-1 defeat at Belfast Giants – but nothing can sour what a remarkable campaign it has already been for the Steelers.

With Fox having taken the opportunity to rest the battered and bruised bodies of some of his roster over the past two weeks or so, he believes they are primed and ready to lift their game again in the post-season. The kind of game that saw them dominate all before them throughout 2023-24.

Two years ago, the Steelers entered the play-offs on a devastating low note, having seen their hopes of landing the league title disappear on home ice at the hands of Belfast just two weeks earlier.

Drawn against Dundee Stars, they were still fancied to make it to the Play-off Finals Weekend in Nottingham. They didn’t.

This season’s first-round two-legged encounter pits them against Fife Flyers. There is no appetite for a repeat of what happened in Tayside that brought an early conclusion to their 2021-22 campaign.

“We play this game to win trophies, we’re now trying to win a play-off trophy,” said head coach Fox. “The switch has turned from the Challenge Cup, to the regular season and now from there to the play-offs.

“We’ve got a North American group that understands play-off hockey and is a team that, this year, clearly knows what it takes to win. So once that puck drops on Friday night you’ll get a very engaged and desperate hockey team.

“I don’t think we were at our best in the five games we had left (after winning the league title), we found ways to win games and I know there is another level that we have in our game that we haven’t necessarily seen in those last five games.

“And that is absolutely normal after the run we had there where we won the two trophies but I believe we’ve got a group that is built to play their best when everything is on the line and when it matters.

“This is the play-offs and where most of us come from, they are a pretty big deal.”

As was the case with Dundee two years ago, the Steelers will go into their encounter with Fife - the first leg taking place at Ice Sheffield tonight (7pm) - as favourites.

But he and his team have seen enough quality from Tom Coolen’s team during the regular season to be primed to avoid any kind of upset.

“There is plenty to guard against, absolutely,” added Fox, who rates captain Robert Dowd “doubtful” for tonight’s first leg but has seen fellow forward Marc-Olivier Vallerand been given the green light to play. “When you deep dive on the numbers, we’ve given up 15 five-on-five goals against Fife which is more than any other team in the league.

“And 10 of those 15 goals came off a line rush, so we’ve got an idea as to what we need to do to limit them in their opportunities and it’s just about us going out and executing and being ready to play.”