Giants double up on Panthers

Photo: William Cherry

Belfast Giants made it a four-point weekend with their second victory over Nottingham Panthers in 24 hours, coming out 4-2 winners at a sold-out SSE Arena with over 7,000 fans.

"Sometimes it can be harder, sometimes it can be easier," said Giants' Ciaran Long on playing the same team twice in quick succession. "I think the way you start a game is a huge thing, I think no matter what team it is, or if you play the same team back to back, I think you need to start well and build from that. "

Build from that the Giants did. It was an electric atmosphere again in the SSE Arena when the puck dropped, and they took the lead through Pierre-Olivier Morin. Kyle Osterberg picked out Morin, who lifted the puck high into the net to give the Giants the lead at 7:43. 

The Panthers equalised on the powerplay after Bobo Carpenter was penalised for slashing. Mitch Fossier found Kristoff Kontos with an excellent back-handed pass from behind the net. Kontos finished well past Whistle to get the Panthers on the scoreboard at 16:09. The visitors then grabbed a second just over two minutes later, again on the powerplay. This time it was Fossier with the goal as he was found by Matt Alfaro at 18:37. Fossier's shot beat Whistle with the help of a deflection off a Giants defender to give the Panthers a lead going into the interval.

Belfast got themselves level at 32:53 through Bobo Carpenter. Josh Roach fired the puck across the front of goal, and Bobo Carpenter was lurking to get the Giants level. Neither team could capitalise on powerplay as the score remained level going into the third period.

The next goal was likely going to decide the game, and it was the hosts that got it. Ciaran Long was sent through 1-on-0 on Grande by Josh Roach, and made no mistake with a neat finish to put Giants back ahead at 46:58. 

"t's always nice getting the winner. It's a nice little bonus, but winning the game is the most important thing, and that's what we got," added Long. "Even being down one, the opportunities we gave them were just on the powerplay. I felt like we just had to stay out if the box and keep doing what we were doing on five-on-five, and eventually it was going to pay off and it did."

Grande was pulled with 1:57 to play as the Panthers searched for an equaliser, but with 11 seconds remaining they had to watch on as Scott Conway fired into the empty net from his own zone to settle the game.