News

Phoenix super Belfast show

Tweet

Manchester Phoenix performed heroics on Thursday to again take the points from their second visit in a week to the Belfast Giants.

Having knocked the Giants off top spot last Saturday with a 3-2 win, Phoenix knew they were in for a tough game on Thursday and so it proved as the Giants came out all guns blazing from the first face-off. The Giants got the early breakthrough after Phoenix ran into double penalty trouble with Ales Parez and KC Timmons in the penalty box. Barely had Parez returned to the ice when Curtis Huppe fired the home side ahead to the delight of the home fans. The Giants continued to press the Phoenix back into their own zone, but the defence was in fine form and prevented the home side from adding to the score.

The second period followed a similar pattern to that of the first with Belfast enjoying the lion’s share of the play and Jason Wolfe in the Phoenix goal by far the busier of the two netminders. Phoenix though had weathered the storm and gave the Giants a few uneasy moments before a fine move saw David Vychodil and Johan Molin draw assists on the equalising goal from Tony Hand just past the half way point. Stung by the goal, Belfast poured on the pressure and the Phoenix defence again had to stand strong to resist wave after wave of Giants attacking play before taking the 1-1 tie to the second break.

The final twenty minutes was more of the same as Belfast strained every sinew trying to regain the lead and Phoenix defending manfully. Inevitably, Phoenix drew penalties and the special short-handed teams worked overtime to get the team back to five skaters before hitting the Giants with the coup de grace. With less than five minutes remaining, David Vychodil fed new signing Brett Clouthier and his inch-perfect pass found Phoenix top scorer Johan Molin to beat Minard in the Belfast goal for the game winning goal. With just over a minute to play, Belfast pulled the goalie for the extra skater and Phoenix lost Vychodil on a Hooking infringement to give the home side a two-man advantage. Phoenix though, superbly coached by Man of the Match Tony Hand, held on to record their second win in a week and third of the season in the Belfast Odyssey Arena.

Debut man Brett Clouthier commented afterwards, “It’s great that the team got another big win and for me to get an assist in my first game is a bonus. It was a tough game to make my first appearance in, but I had a great time.”

A delighted Tony Hand commented, “Belfast certainly made us work tonight, but my guys defended superbly. We had a game plan to try and keep them at distance and by and large it worked. Everyone played their part tonight and despite being outshot heavily, we played the counter-attack well and got the reward for our efforts.”

Phoenix travel to Basingstoke on Saturday for a 6.30pm face-off with the Bison.