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Steelers crush Fife as another hectic spell begins
SHEFFIELD Steelers barely shifted out of second gear as they closed the gap on Elite League leaders Belfast Giants with a 5-1 win over bottom club Fife Flyers.
Ryan Finnerty’s team now lie seven points adrift of the Giants with four games in hand, with three games still to be played between the two.
Playing the first of four games in six days, defending champions Steelers went ahead when captain Jonathan Phillips scored past goaltender Garrett Zemlak.
The home side doubled their advantage at 15.41 when Neil Clark struck and, less than two minutes into the second period, Mike Ramsay forced the puck home.
Before long it was 4-0 as Clark – so often in recent weeks left on the sidelines as the club’s ‘spare’ import – fired in his 15th goal of the season.
Jeff Legue hammered in a rocket shot on the break and a subdued third period brought one more goal, a consolation for Fife through Stephen Gunn.
The Steelers are back in action on Friday at Braehead Clan, at Fife in Kirkcaldy the following night, then back home when they welcome struggling Edinburgh Capitals to the Motorpoint Arena.
Afterwards, player-coach Finnerty admitted he was surprised Fife - who had posed plenty of problems in previous meetings between the two sides - had struggled to put more pressure on the Steelers last night, particularly with time running out for their fading hopes of making the post-season play-offs.
“Sometimes it’s tough (to get going) when your opponent - no disrespect to them - perhaps isn’t coming at you as hard as, say, a Nottingham or a Belfast,” said Finnerty.
“I did think they would come at us a bit harder but, it’s a long trip down here for them and we were able to get the jump on them fairly early which is credit to our guys for maybe taking the wind out of their sails.”
Finnerty said he was satsified with the response he got from his players following their 5-1 defeat at Nottingham Panthers on Saturday night.
“The game was almost like night and day compared to other games we’ve had recently - such as the Nottingham one,” he added. “But the guys responded well and were very professional. They didn’t get too far ahead of themselves, despite there not being too much pressure coming at us.
“It’s unfortunate we gave up the late goal for Housey (stand-in goaltender Geoff Woolhouse) but it was good to get our guys scoring again, who have perhaps been in a bit of a slump.”
phil.harrison@sky.com
Twitter: @philarra
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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