Dragon’s Kane Morin
scored away at Telford
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(Photo by Keith & Jenny Davies) |
Saturday 24th October – NIHL Moralee Division: Telford Tigers 6 - Deeside D1 Dragons 3
Sunday 25th October – NIHL Moralee Division: Deeside D1 Dragons 2 – Telford Tigers 3
The
Deeside D1 Dragons’ losing streak continued at the weekend with back to back to
defeats at the hands of Telford Tigers, losing 6-3 away in Shropshire on
Saturday and then 2-3 at Deeside Leisure Centre on Sunday.
Telford
opened the scoring on Saturday on 4 minutes but Deeside equalised with a goal
from Kane Morin 5 minutes later and the score remained at a finely balanced 1-1
at the first period break.
Telford
edged back into the lead 70 seconds into the second period and then Deeside got
into penalty trouble which saw them defending a 5 on 3 powerplay. The Tigers scored from this on 26 minutes to
double their lead but a Ross Kennedy goal on a Deeside powerplay two minutes
later brought the game back to 3-2.
More
penalties followed for both teams and Telford scored another powerplay goal to
lead 4-2 at the second interval.
The
Dragons weren’t particularly outplayed and they actually outshot the Tigers by
47 to 33 over the course of the game - but Luca Tessadri was in fine form in
the Telford goal and Deeside struggled to make their chances count.
They
managed to narrow the deficit to just one with a Colin Cromie goal on 48
minutes but Telford hit right back just 36 seconds later to lead 5-3.
Deeside
called a tactical time-out with 3 minutes left on the clock and withdrew netminder
Curtis Warburton soon after in favour of an extra attacker.
Unfortunately,
they were unable to make the extra man count and got caught out at the back
while pushing forward.
Telford
made sure of the win with an empty net goal with just 10 seconds left in the game
to condemn the Dragons to their third defeat in a row.
Jake
Witkowski got himself into penalty trouble at the final buzzer and was handed a
10 minute misconduct penalty – which may lead to further disciplinary action,
depending on the referee’s report.
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Colin Cromie in the Dragons’ Parkinson’s UK Cymru
warm up shirt (Photo by Adam Bassett)
The home game on Sunday was a special occasion to promote awareness of the Parkinson’s UK Cymru charity, who are represented on the Dragons’ themed warm up shirts for this season.
Guests
from the charity manned an exhibition stand and a Parkinson’s UK Cymru warm up
shirt signed by all the Dragons players was raffled off.
Once
again, the game was fiercely contested throughout and multiple penalties were
handed out to both sides.
For
the second game in a row, the Dragons out-shot the Tigers by a clear margin over
the 60 minutes and peppered Tessadri’s goal with an amazing 21 shots in the
first period.
The
Tigers managed to weather that early onslaught, however, somehow the score
remained 0-0 at the first period break.
In
fact, it took until the 35th minute when Telford finally broke the
deadlock with a goal from former Dragons player Brodie Jesson, on a powerplay
punishing a Dragons interference call.
Deeside
equalised with a powerplay goal of their own from Ross Kennedy on 39 minutes
and the score remained 1-1 at the second interval.
Telford
edged back in front on 43 minutes but the Dragons drew level again just 84
seconds later as Jake Witkowski fired in a another powerplay strike.
Telford
had more of chances in the third period and scored what turned out to be the
winning goal on 49 minutes.
The
last 10 minutes were especially tense as the clock ticked down and Deeside were
unable to mount any sort of late fight-back.
Ross
Kennedy – ever the most enthusiastic of players - missed the end of the game as
he picked up a 2+10+game penalty for abusive behaviour and, like Jake
Witkowski, may well face further disciplinary action as a result.
The
weekend results mean that the Dragons remain mired in mid table with 12 points
from 8 league games and have lost more ground on the teams at top of the
league.
Blackburn
Hawks are the new Moralee Division leaders after a 6 point weekend from two
wins – at home to Widnes and way to Leeds and they now have 28 points from 11
games.
The
previous leaders, Solihull Barons, lost both of their weekend games - away to
both Leeds and Widnes and now drop to second place with 25 points from 12
games.
Coming Next
The
D1 Dragons are away to Sheffield Scimitars this Saturday 31st
October. The Scimitars currently sit
rock bottom of the Moralee Division table without a win so far this season –
their only point to date coming from an overtime loss at the hands of Leeds
Knights.
The
Dragons won their first game against Sheffield 12-2 when the two teams met in
Deeside back in September, with Jake Witkowski scoring an impressive double
hat-trick.
There
is still, however, plenty of competitive ice hockey to be seen at Deeside
Leisure Centre this weekend as the Dragon’s Women’s team are at home to Whitley
Bay Beacons on Saturday 31st October (Halloween), 6pm face off.
The
day after – Sunday 1st November – the D2 Dragons will be looking to
break their recent losing streak when they take on Nottingham Lions at the
Queensferry rink, 6.30pm face off.
