The Excel Hull Stingrays again fell short against Yorkshire rivals the Sheffield Steelers tonight, losing out by seven goals to five despite coming back from 3-1 down to lead 4-3.
Without Lee Esders, Craig and Lee Mitchell, Aivars Gaisins and Drew Bannister, the Rays started the game with just two regular blueliners as Jason Silverthorn and Jozef Sladok dropped back to help out remaining defencemen Kurtis Dulle and Trevor Read.
The match pit an understrength Stingrays D against a Sheffield side minus league leading netminder Ervins Mustukovs as they started with backup Geoff Woolhouse for just the second time this season. The battle would ultimately come down to which side could cope better given their deficiencies.
After a very scrappy opening five minutes, the visitors from South Yorkshire got off to the better start, taking advantage of an inexperienced Stingrays third line of Ryan Lake - who otherwise had a brilliant game against his former side - Andy Hirst and Chris Sykes, who iced in his second game on a two-way contract from Sheffield Steeldogs, to score through Tom Squires on an decisive 3-on-2.
Jeff Legue would then double the Steelers lead with a simple finish after the Rays defensive corps failed to pick up the Canadian nearly nine minutes in before Andrew Coburn got the home side on the board with a scrappy but much needed powerplay goal.
Sheffield hit back through Ashley Tait, who clinically finished off the bar after yet another 3-on-2, to extend their lead to 3-1.
However, Sylvain Cloutier then kickstarted his sides comeback, winning a face-off straight to leading scorer Jereme Tendler - who clinically fired home a one-time shot, top shelf breaking the water bottle on the Steelers net and leaving Woolhouse with little chance.
With Steelers defenceman Steve Munn seemingly more interested in taking Dulle out of the game in the corner, the Rays player-coach then levelled the scores 11 seconds later, forcing home for his tenth of the year to end the scores of an eventful first at 3-3.
Much like Sheffield suffered penalty trouble at the end of the first, the Stingrays began the second under the cosh with five penalties in the first six minutes, none of which could be argued with.
Despite losing defenceman Dulle to a ten minute misconduct penalty for his choice words to referee Andy Carson reducing them to just three defencemen with Trevor Read the only regular defenceman, the Stingrays came out of the opening five minutes unscathed and turned the game around for a short while..
Taking the lead for the first and only time in the game, Tendler tipped home his second of the game and 39th of the year on a tame wristshot from Read on a 5-on-3, netting the teams second powerplay marker of the game.
The momentum appeared to be in the Stingrays favour, however, that all changed less than two minutes later as Derek Campbell admirably out muscled Sladok and finished a fine individual effort with a high finish past Christian Boucher to level the scores once again.
With the Stingrays D seemingly all at odds, the Steelers built off the momentum gained from Campbell's goal to regain the lead less than 90 seconds before the end of the second with Neil Clark scoring another agianst the Rays after losing his marker.
The home team had had their moment and two further Sheffield goals from Rod Sarich and Joey Talbot, after an awful blueline-to-blueline pass in the offensive zone from Silverthorn, all but settled the tie in favour of the Steelers and backup Woolhouse.
The Rays weary four man defence was, in the end, no match for the sheer depth the nearly £10,000 a week Steelers possess and, although captain Dulle forced home a late consolation and gave a solid home attendance hope, the game would end 7-5 in favour of the South Yorkshire side.
The loss, yet another that could have potentially gone in their favour, is another kick in the teeth on the Rays mission to beat Braehead to 6th place in the Elite League. That said, fixtures against Dundee at the Hull Arena on Saturday and Coventry in the East Midlands on Sunday, may yet give Cloutier's side a much needed boost.
Rays Rating
7
FBB Three Stars
1- Ryan Lake (0+0)
2- Sylvain Cloutier (1+1)
3- Jereme Tendler (2+1)
