Match Previews - Devils Vs Stingrays

27th Jan 2012 | Posted by Simon Rafferty

This weekend see’s the Devils in action against the Hull Stingrays in back to back games first off at home on Saturday and then away on Sunday. This will be the fifth time the meeting between the two teams so far this season with the Devils winning two to the Stingrays one, the other result being a tie in the Challenge cup.

The Devils have a brilliant track record at home to Hull having lost just two games to them since 2006, one game in overtime and the other loss this season 2-3. The Stingrays are pushing hard to hold onto their playoff place and will been keen to take as many points as they can from this weekend’s games.

Speaking about the upcoming games Hulls Jereme Tendler had this to say

 “The season is far from over. It is starting to get exciting and every game is a play-off game, you cannot afford to take a night off.”

“We have a good enough team to make the play-offs and then anything can happen.”

Last weekend saw the Stingrays in action twice first up against the Dundee Stars on Saturday at home. The score line standing at nil all after a goalless first period it was the Stingrays who opened the scoring with a power play goal from Player/coach Sylvain Cloutier just before the middle of the period. Dundee got back on level terms with a strike from Mark Holanos not long after leaving the scores level going into the third period.

Brennan Turner put the Stars in front at the midway mark of the period. However, that was short lived as Jason Silverthorn leveled the game at two-apiece shortly after. Within a minute, the visitors regained the lead as Jeff Hutchins fired home again.

Hutchins got his second of the game going into the last ten minutes to open up a two-goal lead. The scoring was completed by John Dolan with under a minute to go as he found the empty net after Hull had pulled goaltender Boucher.

Final score Hull Stingrays 2 -5 Dundee Stars

Sunday saw the Stingrays in action in Edinburgh where yet again the opening Period was scoreless despite the sides firing some 23 shots on goal between them.

The Stingrays took the lead inside the opening minute of the second period with Dominic Osman scoring after 56 seconds (Hull’s opening goal was their 400th competitive EIHL goal scored on the road) and this was the only goal of the second period.

That was the way it stayed until Stingrays went 2-0 ahead at 52.13 thanks to an effort by Andy McKinney.  The Capitals got one back via Rene Jarolin shortly after on a delayed penalty.

The Stingrays sealed a win with a third and a fourth at 5 both from sniper Jereme Tendler last in the period before conceding a late consolation with just 26 seconds remaining as player/coach Richard Hartmann netted for the Capitals.

Final Score Edinburgh 2 – 4 Hull

Speaking after the weekend’s games Stingray Jack Watkins said:

“We were disappointed with what happened against Dundee but Clouts [player-coach Sylvain Cloutier] changed it around in Edinburgh and we got a really good win."

He added this on the upcoming Cardiff double header.

“Cardiff are doing really well at the moment and have picked up some good results.”

“They are tough to beat in their own rink. It is the toughest rink in the league to play in. They are built for that rink.”

“But we won there last time and we know we will have to stick to the game-plan again and do what Clouts tells us to do. If we do that we will be fine.”

“The aim for any team is to win your homes games but especially at this stage of the season. It will be another tough game but hopefully we can get the result we want.”

The last Hull game in Cardiff they clearly arrived with a game plan and stuck, which paid off for them as they got their first win in Cardiff in years. The plan seemed to be as always to grind out the win and let’s be honest I can’t see that they will differ much from this on this visit, expect a strong fore check, defensive hockey and attempts to score on the breakaway and turnovers.

Offensively the Rays are led by Ex Devil Jason Silverthorn (54 points), Jereme Tendler (48 points), Derek Campbell who’s racking up the assists when he’s not in the penalty box on 38 points, Dominic Osman (28 points) and Player Coach Sylvian Clouiter (22 points). These really are the ones to watch for the Stingrays with the majority of the scoring coming from five players.

In nets Hull are back up by Christian Boucher with  a 90% save percentage and an average of 3.88 goals against much of any success the Stingrays have will rest on his shoulders this weekend ( our tip for Man of the Match on Saturday).

The Devils go into the weekends games off the back of a Challenge Cup win in the first leg of the Challenge cup semi-final over the Belfast Giants midweek. The game saw the return to the Squad of Brad Voth (although he didn’t Ice) and the early departure of Phil Hill after what some fans described as a Cross Check to the back of the head from a Giants player.

Barring any after effects to Phil Hill the Devils should only be missing Mark Smith from the roster altogether and Voth will hopefully see limited Ice time.               
             
As always we'll look to run the “Childish and amazingly Biased” Match Night Live service at the usual location of www.theinferno.co.uk/mnl for both of these games if you'd like to help out or chip in with some comments on the night please contact us at matchnightlive@gmail.com. Should anything go wrong (which it shouldn’t) we will move over to Twitter for updates so follow us there on @InfernoMNL

And don’t forget if you’re looking for somewhere to have a pint and a bite to eat while the Devils are out of town the Pilot in Penarth is only a short trip away and has a great Hockey friendly atmosphere, directions to the pub can be found here - http://www.the-inferno.co.uk/where-to-eatdrink