Stingrays find it tough as Giants take big stride towards title

But when you’re missing your top scorer, two import defenceman and two other key regulars like Hull Stingrays were on Saturday night, then your task becomes twice as hard even before the first puck is dropped.

Having five players out may not sound like too much of a hardship but, when your original squad is only 17-18 players anyway, it’s quite a gap to fill and has a sizeable impact, particularly during the latter stages of a typically physical, 60-minute game.

So there was little, almost zero expectation resting on the shoulders of Hull’s players going into the third meeting of the season against Belfast in East Yorkshire. Both previous meetings at Hull Ice Arena had been closely-fought affairs, however, and the first period - which saw the teams create 37 shots on goal between them - promised more of the same with the Giants going in ahead by just the one goal from the stick of Robert Dowd at 10.43.

But with three less imports than the 10 allowed under league rules, Hull understandably began to run out of steam as the game wore on, as had also been the case in other, recent games.

Jereme Tendler, again the team’s top goalscorer this season, remains suspended until his appeal against a positive drugs test is heard, hopefully sometime this week.

Martin Ondrej missed his third straight game due to a groin injury and, with Hull not having the financial resources to replace sacked D-man and former captain Josh Mizerek, who was released in December, more responsibility was always going to be placed on those remaining. The absence of British forwards Matty Davies (concussion) and Ryan Lake (back) merely adds to player-coach Sylvain Cloutier’s woes.

Belfast doubled their lead three minutes into the second period through

Jon Pelle, but it was when Jeremy Rebek added a third on the powerplay at 29.14 that the first heads dropped among the Stingrays’ ranks.

Those heads dropped even further when Craig Peacock made it 4-0 to the Giants at 38.34.

In an entertaining first period, Hull had managed 16 shots on Stephen Murphy’s net - but, as Belfast took control, that creativity dried up in the second and the situation got little better in the third.

The effort was clearly there on the part of the home team but Belfast - now in a two-horse race with Sheffield Steelers for the regular season championship - were relentless, creating wave after wave of attacks.

Hull managed to avoid any further setbacks until the last 10 minutes, after which the floodgates temporarily opened with four goals in as many minutes for the visitors.

Adam Keefe’s strike at 50.23 made it 5-0 before a powerplay goal from Dowd at 52.38 was followed 19 seconds later by Jeff Mason’s effort. That prompted a timeout from Hull, which saw besieged netminder Christian Boucher pulled and replaced by back-up Andy Brummitt

After play resumed, it only took just over a minute for Belfast to make it 8-0 at 54.09 through Aaron Clarke and, fortunately for Stingrays, that’s where the scoring ended with Belfast registering a remarkable 73 shots on the Hull goals, a story enough in itself.

As Belfast’s delighted players left the ice news was filtering through that the Steelers were 3-2 down at bottom club Fife Flyers.

Any boost to their title hopes was to be short-lived, however, when it transpired that third period goals from Luke Fulghum, Colt King and Jeff Legue had earned Ryan Finnerty’s team a 5-3 win in Kirkcaldy, meaning the gap between the two teams remained at seven points, with Steelers having three games in hand and three meetings still to come between the top two.

Afterwards, Stingrays forward Derek Campbell - who had to temporarily leave the ice during the third period after the puck cannoned back off the crossbar and into his face from a penalty shot - said matters needed to improve quickly in order for Hull to take some kind of momentum into the play-offs.

“Right now, things aren’t obviously going the way we want them to,” said Campbell, pictured.

“But you’ve got to take what you’re dealt with and at the moment, that’s seven imports. I’ve been on winning teams and I’ve been on losing teams and it takes big, character guys to make sure things stay positive.

“And that’s what we’ve got to do, first make sure we qualify for the play-offs and then use this next few weeks to take some kind of momentum into that first round because play-off hockey is different, it’s just two games and I’ve seen upsets happen.”

[email protected]

Twitter: @philarra