Sheffield Steelers discover home is where the restart is to keep Elite League title hopes intact
BRETT RITCHIE likened his Sheffield Steelers’ home debut to playing in the NHL believing his new team can feed off the energy created at the Utilita Arena to reignite their Elite League title hopes.
Make no mistake, the Steelers still have work to do after losing four of their previous five games going into the weekend.
But Sunday’s rousing 6-3 win over title rivals Cardiff Devils, coming on the back of a 5-2 win over Manchester Storm the previous evening, offers Aaron Fox and his players hope that they can overturn the deficit that currently exists between themselves and their three rivals.
Defending champions Belfast Giants remain in the boxseat at the top of the standings, but they let a point slip in a 3-2 overtime defeat in Manchester on Sunday.
Nottingham Panthers, currently third and three points ahead of the Steelers with two games in hand, also slipped up in a 5-4 defeat at Guildford Flames.
As for former Dallas Stars and Calgary Flames winger Ritchie - who made his EIHL debut in Belfast the previous weekend when the Steelers were twice heavily beaten - he made himself an instant favourite with the home crowd with two goals and an assist against the second-placed Devils.
“I haven’t been here very long, but seeing how the team’s played all year, I think there’s a big difference in how we played this weekend compared to the last two,” said 32-year-old Ritchie, who boasts over 400 NHL games on his cv.
“We were doing the little things to generate offence and put the other team on their heels. Cardiff are a good team, and we made it hard on them and created a lot of chances.”
On his first experience of playing in front of a packed Utilita Arena crowd, he added: “It’s like playing in an NHL rink out there - in fact, it’s probably louder.
“I’d heard good things before coming here, but it’s a great place to play. We can feed off that energy, and it helps us a lot.”
There is still some way to go for the Steelers to repair the damage from a run of seven defeats in nine games in order to make themselves a genuine contender for the regular season crown again.
But on their Pride Weekend, a four-point haul certainly restored some faith in the team as they kept themselves in the fight.
After falling behind on 91 seconds to Josh MacDonald’s close-range strike for the Devils, the Steelers responded with an early goal of their own when Stephen Harper tipped in from Dominic Cormier at 3.09.
Cardiff restored their lead five minutes later - Macdonald again the scorer when capitalising on a mistake on the edge of the Devils zone before skating clear to beat Matt Greenfield one-on-one - but the hosts found themselves ahead at the first break when Ritchie scored his first for the club, Mitchell Heard finding him alone in front, before Harper doubled his tally from close range on the power play at 19.43.
Ritchie matched Harper’s output when he made it 4-2 at 23.39 - this time on the powerplay - and although Joey Martin made it a one-goal game again at the halfway point with a pinpoint finish, Jordon Southorn restored the two-goal cushion with a close-range shorthanded strike at 34.08 following good work by Mikko Juusola down the right.
The Devils huffed and puffed with head coach Paul Thompson even pulling replacement goalie Christian Stoever with nearly five minutes remaining, a move which they paid the price for when Mitchell Balmas made it 6-3 with an empty-netter at 56.38.