Coventry cough up two three goal leads for a winless weekend

A weekend probably to forget for the Coventry Blaze, they were up 3 - 0 within 10 minutes against the Sheffield Steelers on Saturday night, only to have Sheffield score four unanswered goals on their way to a 5 - 4 overtime win, thanks to a late overtime goal from Rob Dowd.

A similar story on Sunday night against the Nottingham Panthers.

Kevin Harvey put Coventry ahead with a 5 on 3 powerplay goal with 5 minutes played, then Ryan Ginand netted his 33rd of the season midway through the first to put the Blaze up 2 - 0. A rare goal from Benn Olson and his first of the year gave the Blaze a 3 - 0 lead with 5 minutes to play, to give them their second 3 - 0 lead in two games.

Rob Farmer pulled one back for the Panthers later in the first with a deflected shot, before Czech forward Petr Kalus scored again less than a minute later to go into the first break with the Blaze nursing a 3 - 2 lead.

Penalty trouble for the Blaze in the second led to two powerplay goals for Nottingham. The first came as Brandon Benedict  tied the game with Steven Chalmers in the box for high-sticking, then Chris Murray put the Panthers ahead five minutes later with Russ Cowley in the box for slashing, give the Panthers a 4 - 3 lead.

A late goal in the second, and a second of the game for Benedict gave the Panthers a 5 - 3 lead, and after a scoreless second the Panthers took the two points with a 5 - 3 victory.

Trouble in the handshakes led to Panthers Joe Grimaldi and Blaze Matt Selby receiving match penalties with Leigh Salters of Nottingham and Benn Olson of Coventry picking up game misconducts, but it made no difference on the scoreboard.

Elsewhere in the EIHL

The Belfast Giants cruised their way to a four-point weekend, handing the Cardiff Devils an 11 - 4 battering from just 35 shots to keep their 13 point lead at the top of the league.

With Sheffield not in action on Sunday night, the Dundee Stars overtook them again for second place in the league with a 4 - 2 win over the Fife Flyers, just a day after the Flyers handed Dundee a shootout loss.

The Final game saw the Hull Stingrays head to a shootout for the second day in a row, and come out victorious for the second day in a row, after the teams went into overtime tied at 3 - 3, both teams scored twice on their first three attempts, then the hero of Saturday night did it again, Carl Lauzon scored the game winner on the Stingrays 8th shot of the shootout to give them a 4 - 3 win over the Edinburgh Capitals.

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