Stingrays’ owners urged to act fast to build on promise

HULL Stingrays’ player-coach Sylvain Cloutier has warned the club’s future needs to be resolved quickly in order to build on the success of their 2011-12 Elite League campaign.

The East Yorkshire club may have been swept aside 10-3 in Saturday’s play-off semi-final by eventual winners Nottingham Panthers, but the season is still regarded as a triumph for the simple fact they made it to the final-four weekend in the first place.

From the opening minutes in their encounter with Nottingham, however, it was clear they would struggle to match their excellent performances in the previous weekend’s shock 7-4 aggregate win over Sheffield Steelers.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

The current Stingrays ownership, who stepped in 20 months ago and also run rivals Coventry Blaze, are known to be mulling over various options regarding the club’s future.

In a season which saw Coventry suffer major financial troubles of their own, one of those options will be selling the club on, with current Stingrays’ bench coach Bobby McEwan having already made an offer.

The future of Cloutier and his players is also unclear with nobody having yet been signed up to return for the 2012-13 season.

The fear is that unless decisions on the way forward for the club are made soon, a number of those players will be snapped up elsewhere.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

“To be honest, we don’t know what’s going on, nobody does right now,” said Cloutier.

“I think it’s a key time in our franchise to move things forward, things are so positive right now and we should be taking advantage of that.

“Time is crucial and you want to keep your core guys, but teams are going to come after them – players like (Jereme) Tendler, (Jason) Silverthorn and (Derek) Campbell.

“Whatever happens, if it’s not done soon you’re going to lose key players like that.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

“Then there are our young British guys who will only get better as a result of reaching the final four.

“There is definitely something to build on here.”

Despite the heavy defeat against Nottingham a clearly emotional Cloutier afterwards emphasised how proud he was of his players having made the final four – the first time a team outside the top six has managed to do so in the various post-season formats used during the league’s nine-year history.

“We are disappointed with the way it turned out,” added Cloutier. “But I’m still proud of those guys and what they’ve accomplished this year after nobody gave us a chance.”

As expected, the Panthers came out flying but, despite facing 15 shots, Hull netminder Christian Boucher only allowed the one past him, David Clarke firing home at 8.41.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Two goals in less than a minute at the start of the second from Marc Levers and Sami Ryhanen could have signalled a collapse by Hull then, but they rallied to make it a two-goal game at the halfway point after good work round the back of the net by Campbell set up Silverthorn.

But it was two more quickfire goals again from the Panthers – courtesy of Clarke and Rhett Gordon – that eventually did for Hull, who found themselves 6-1 down when Matthew Myers got a lucky deflection six seconds before the end of the period.

Campbell made it 6-2 early in the second but the dominant Panthers hit four more. Clarke, David Beauregard and Robert Lachowicz all found a way past Boucher but it was Jordan Fox’s strike to take Nottingham’s tally into double figures that was met with the loudest cheer from the home fans.

Cloutier grabbed a late consolation and then led a touching applause by the team for the Stingrays’ fans who had made the trip to the East Midlands.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Nottingham went on to seal a second successive play-off triumph, winning 2-0 against a Cardiff Devils side who had advanced to yesterday’s final after defeating regular season champions Belfast Giants 4-3 after a shoot-out in Saturday’s first semi-final.

After a tense opening 40 minutes the final erupted into life in the third with end-to-end hockey.

But it was Nottingham who got the crucial breakthrough at 52.57 through Beauregard, with Clarke adding an empty-netter in the dying seconds in front of a sell-out crowd.