Stingrays close the gap after ‘stealing one’ from rivals FiFe

They did it the hard way though, first relinquishing a 2-0 first period lead before then having to come from behind twice before winning 5-4 through a last-minute strike from Jordan Mayer.

Carl Lauzon had put Hull in control with goals in the sixth and 17th minutes, only for Fife to wrestle the initiative back with three unanswered second period strikes from Ned Lukacevic, Niko Suoraniemi and Jamie Milam.

Will Frederick levelled at 49.24 on the powerplay, only for Matt Reber to restore Fife’s lead three minutes later.

With just under four minutes left it looked like Hull would slip to a third straight home defeat at the hands of Fife, but Eric Galbraith pounced to level before Mayer’s last-minute heroics sealed a victory which takes them to within two points of their sixth-placed Scottish rivals with four games in hand.

“It was a huge two points,” said Pacha. “I don’t think we played our best hockey and we were lucky to get two points but it puts us two points closer to them with games in hand.

“The second period was bad but to be fair to them they came out flying and were dominating us. But we regrouped, we had a good conversation between the break and we kept it positive. We knew this game was massive and luckily for us we got the two points.

“In the last 14 games coming up we know we need to play better. We stole one from Fife to be honest. But we just had to find a way to win and we did that”