Leeds Knights 6 Hull Seahawks 3: Ryan Aldridge hails NIHL National leaders after holding off derby rivals

It was a deserved win for the Knights in front of a sellout crowd at Elland Road Ice Arena with goals coming from less-likely areas at times, defenceman Noah McMullin leading the way with two, with fellow blue liner Krisjanis Fugalis grabbing his first of the season, with further strikes coming from Innes Gallacher, Matt Barron and Matt Bissonnette.

Ahead of Sunday night’s rematch between the two in Hull, it left the Knights two points clear of second-placed Milton Keynes Lightning, joint second with Romford Raiders, with Hull a point further back alongside Swindon Wildcats.

“It was a massive win for us tonight,” beamed head coach Aldridge.

“The boys played really hard in key areas and it was a proper team performance - everybody had to turn up and play in order for us to win that hockey game.

“It was good for us mentality-wise, confidence-wise, everything – a big win.”

But they didn’t have it all their own way.

The Seahawks - missing GB defenceman Dave Phillips and teenager back-liner Kohan Taylor through suspension - went ahead after riding out the anticipated early wave of attacks from the Knights, Owen Sobchak benefiting from good approach work by Emil Svec to fire home on the power play at 6.23.

But just over four minutes later the Knights were level when Fugalis fired through traffic from the blue line and past an unsighted Jordan McLoughlin.

It was Leeds who struck next at 24.45, Bow Neely, Matt Haywood and Matt Bissonnette working the puck around the boards well before the latter teed up McMullin who side-stepped his man before back-handing past McLoughlin.

Only 24 seconds had elapsed, though, before Hull were level through Jason Hewitt’s close-range effort.

It looked like staying that way until the second break, but Gallacher had other ideas, Ethan Hehir chasing a lost cause before setting up the 20-year-old Scot to fire past McLoughlin from the left circle at 38.12.

It got worse for the Seahawks 77 seconds later when Bissonnette teed up Barron to make it 4-2 on the power play with a piledriver from the right circle.

Johnny Corneil made it a one-goal game just 63 seconds into the third with a strike on the man advantage for Hull, but their hopes of drawing level were dashed when McMullin – in a carbon copy of Fugalis’ earlier strike – restored the two-goal lead at 43.52.

Haywood and Finley Bradon both went close when skilfully working one-on-one situations for themselves, while Sam Gospel was kept busy enough at the other end.

But the killer blow came when Bissonnette skilfully worked space for himself inside the right circle and picked his spot to make it 6-3 at 54.39, a position the Seahawks could not find a way back from.

“The D-side of the game has been our little soft point this season and we saw that again,” added Aldridge. “We made a couple of little mistakes and they scored.

“We’ve just got to get a little bit better in certain areas, but it’s coming. We’re certainly still in a good spot despite not playing our best, so that’s a positive.”

Elsewhere, Sheffield Steeldogs saw their three-game winning streak snapped after going down 4-3 at home to Romford.

Ben Morgan’s team never recovered from going into the first intermission 3-0 down, the visitors going ahead inside two minutes through Jacob Ranson with further strikes coming from Brandon Ayliffe and Tyler Nixon.

Morgan Clarke-Pizzo got the hosts back in the game just before the halfway mark, their cause enhanced further when Jonathan Phillips made it a one-goal game with a power play strike at 47.13.

But Aiden Wilson restored the two-goal lead just 64 seconds later and although Phillips reduced the arrears for a second time – again on the power play – at 56.00, the Steeldogs came off the ice empty-handed.