14 Oct 2023, 19:15 | Regular season | Fife Ice Arena |
Fife Flyers | 2-3 SO | Belfast Giants |
Periods: Shots: | 0-0 (10-13) | 1-0 (5-22) | 1-2 (4-15) | 0-0 (2-1) | Total: 21-51 |
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Referees: Craig/Rodger  |  Spectators: 1378 |
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Goals and assists
Belfast Giant continued their unbeaten start to the season but were
made to work hard for it, coming from two down to finally beat Fife
Flyers on penalty shots. The hosts were certainly worth of their point,
but perhaps should have got more more.
In an exciting opening
period, neither side found a way through but goalies Shane Owen and
Tyler Beskorowany were showing the kind of form that dictated this would
be a low-scoring game.
Teemu Pulkkinen gave the Flyers the lead
at 23:32 while Kohei Sato sat an Interference penalty, cutting inside
and beating Beskorowany high glove side.
Sato was responsible for
losing the puck in his own zone to Max Humitz in period three, which
allowed the Flyers' forward to find Lucas Chiodo in the slot and fire
past Beskorowany for a 2-0 Flyers lead.
Colin Shirley had an
excellent chance to put the game to bed on an odd-man rush, but missed
the target and the Giants survived to fight on. On the very next play,
Ben Lake finally beat Shane Owen to get the visitors on the boards, just
seconds after they could have found themselves three behind, with 12:07
to play. Max Humitz had an excellent chance to put the Flyers back two
ahead but opted to pass instead of shoot, and with the play back in the
Flyers zone he was called for shooting the puck out of bounds. The
Giants made the extra man count with a Mark Cooper shot that was fired
into Owen's net to tie things up at 56:10.
There was no winner in
regulation, and so the game was decided in overtime with both teams
taking a point. The Giants had the better looks, but with 33 seconds to
play the Flyers thought they'd won it - the puck stuck somewhere under
Tyler Beskorowany, the question was if it was over the line or not. The
officials consulted the video review and washed out the goal, and with
no scoring in the remaining time the game went to penalty shots. Mark
Cooper was the only scorers in five rounds to get the Giants the bonus
point.