Photos: Ryan Donaldson
The Stena Line Belfast Giants lost out to the Fife Flyers on Saturday night in Scotland, 4-3. The home side came back from 3-2 down going into the final period to claim the two points, however it is the Flyers third goal that was the main talking point of the game when Referee Cowan awarded the goal with Giants players adamant the puck did not cross the line – seemingly hitting the crossbar and bouncing away from the goal.
The Giants faced an uphill battle from the start, missing Derrick Walser, Chris Higgins and Matt Nickerson through injury with David Rutherford serving a one game suspension.
Justin Fox opened the scoring at 2:17 for his 20th goal of the season before James Desmarais equalised for the visitors at 9:03 with a fine finish past David Brown in the Flyers net. Although the hosts took the lead going into the first intermission as Nicholas Rioux scored on the powerplay at 17:35.
Into the second period and the Giants came out firing on all cylinders and their dominance paid off – turing the game on its head to lead 3-2 after forty minutes, first through Colin Shields’ strike at 28:42 to tie things up and then Jonathan Boxill with the go ahead goal at 33:16.
The main talking point of this game will undoubtedly be the Fife third goal with those Giants players on the ice at the time visibly angry that the goal had been awarded when the puck seemed to strike the crossbar instead. However, the powerplay goal was given to Nico Sacchetti at 47:35 and the game was all square at 3-3.
It was Sacchetti who scored the Flyers fourth and, ultimately, the game winner at 52:22 with a powerplay strike to take the win for the hosts.
The Giants return to Elite League action with two home games in-a-row – against the Nottingham Panthers on Sunday face-off 5pm and then on Tuesday at 7pm against the Sheffield Steelers.
Final Score:
Fife Flyers 4-3 Stena Line Belfast Giants
Giants Man of the Match:
#89 Jonathan Boxill
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