Giants move to within three at the top

Photo: William Cherry

Belfast Giants moved to within three points of the league leaders with a 4-1 victory against Fife Flyers in front of 4,127 fans at the SSE Arena on Friday night.

Jackson Whistle was called into early action with a couple of smart pad saves to deny the Flyers from taking the lead. Indeed, the Giants' netminder was almost beaten on the first shift when the puck took a strange bounce off the boards when dumped in but quick thinking from Kevin Raine prevented any danger.

As the hosts grew into the game they eventually carved ut the first goal. Scott Conway's throw on net was picked up by David Goodwin in space and he steadied himself before deking past Owen and slotting home at 13:53. What had otherwise been a decent road period for the Flyers then got worse 1:40 before the end of the period when Ben Lake was left in too much space to pick his spot with a wrist shot on the powerplay.

Lewis Hook got the final touch on a bouncing puck in front of Shane Owen's net to put the Giants three ahead 2:21 into the middle period, but the Flyers were back to within two by 27:32 through Carson Stadnyk. The visitors had Owen to thank for several excellent saves during the period to keep them within touching distance on the scoreboard.

With the Flyers starting to look dangerous going forward, an excellently-timed Slater Doggett wrist shot through a screen put the giants back three ahead with 12:58 to play. That goal somewhat killed the visitors' hopes of a comeback, although they did test whistle inside the final five minutes.  Were it not for Owen at the other end, however, the Giants could have ended up winners by a bigger margin.