The Stena Line Belfast Giants opened their Continental Cup Semi-Final Group with an impressive 1-0 win against Neman Grodno of Belarus. The victory will go down as one of the most famous nights in the Giants 15 season history with a gutsy team performance against fine opposition.
Belfast began the game without Mark Garside, missing through injury, however both Mike Kompon and Mark McCutcheon returned to the line-up following multiple weeks out.
From the Puck Drop – it was clear that these were two evenly matched teams and Steve Thornton’s pre-match prediction that special teams and goaltending would be important, was true. Both Maxim Samankov in the Grodno net and Carsen Chubak for Belfast were called into making vital saves for their team with the latter only playing his third game for the organisation. The Giants could not break through a tough Grodno defence on two powerplay opportunities and the opening period ended 0-0. Right at the end of the period, Kevin Westgarth was assessed a ‘Kneeing’ penalty which saw him sit out the remainder of the game and gave Grodno a 5 minute powerplay to begin the second period.
Photo: Oxo Boxo
Indeed, the Giants put on a penalty killing masterclass to kill off the penalty despite their opponents applying waves of pressure on their first powerplay opportunity of the game, which was served by Mark McCutcheon in Westgarth’s absence. The second period was the Giants turn to go shorthanded with McCutcheon and Kevin Saurette also sitting for 2 minutes, both for interference. However, the Elite League champions were equal to it and the score remained at 0-0. Then, with 38:31 on the clock, Mike Kompon went one-on-one with Samankov and fired the puck into the roof of the net, assisted by Adam Keefe, to give the Giants a 1-0 lead at the end of the second period.
The third period was as frantic as the others with end-to-end action throughout, however with the clock ticking down – Grodno became desperate for a goal and piled the pressure onto the Giants. The newest signing, Carsen Chubak, came into his own in the final 20 minutes – making save after save to keep the Giants opponents at bay including an impressive string of stops in the final minutes as the Giants killed off a 6-on-4 penalty to close out the game an earn a famous opening win in Angers, France.
Love Belfast is Belfast and Northern Ireland’s digital home for what’s on, food and drink, sport, theatre, business and city life, with a Things to Do guide to attractions and days out across Northern Ireland. We’ve been publishing since 2012. Every story is written and edited by the people who own and run Love Belfast and published under one byline. Love Belfast has been a finalist in the Digital DNA Awards (Tourism), UK Blog of the Year, the UTV Business Eye Awards and the Eastside Awards, and our social channels get over 15 million social views per month. Contact: lovebelfastcity@gmail.com.
