Hull Seahawks: Coventry play-off spot now the top priority for Matty Davies
AFTER a frantic few days on and off the ice, Hull Seahawks’ head coach Matty Davies is hoping the remainder of the 2025-26 NIHL National season will prove more settled.
The Seahawks headed into last weekend’s double-header with Solway Sharks in some turmoil given the announcement late on Friday night that popular import forward Owen Sobchak would be joining Yorkshire rivals Leeds Knights.
Not surprisingly, there was widespread criticism of the development from fans on social media but there was also some support given Sobchak had – for whatever reason – failed to reach the heights of his performances in 2024-25 when he finished the campaign as the league’s top points scorer.
A little under 24 hours later, Hull were again making waves through Davies’ post-match blast at the referees that oversaw his team’s game at Solway, the Sharks winning 5-2.
The 35-year-old labelled the refereeing as “atrocious” and the worst he’d ever seen in his entire career, an assertion he stands by.
The departure of Sobchak – while not universally popular with the team’s fanbase – means, however, that the Seahawks should have a more settled roster, with second-guessing over which import Davies was going to leave out on any given night no longer a factor to consider.
For Davies, it is all about the play-offs from this point on, starting with this weekend’s double-header against a Milton Keynes Lightning team who have endured a similarly stop-start campaign.
A four-point weekend would lift Hull above sixth-placed Lightning in the standings, but Davies is already focussing most of his attention on the post-season.
“They are pretty similar to us this year in that they have been massively inconsistent and I’m sure as a club they are not happy with what they have produced this year up to now,” said Davies.
“From this point forwards the aim is to make sure that when we reach the post-season, this is a team that knows it is going to be very hard to beat and a team that believes – this time – it is going to get to the Final Four Weekend in Coventry.
“That is the sole aim for this team now, to get to Coventry. It doesn’t matter where we finish to make the play-offs, it’s all about Coventry.”