On we go...straight into another look back at the weekend...
Even though you know it's acting, you get the feeling you won't see Sean McMorrow run over often: The Belfast Giants were on Top Gear yesterday...watch from 52:30 here for the segment, which, as well as containing proof that hockey players are not born actors, does contain the sight of Sean McMorrow doing the worst "oh my God, I'm been flattened" fall known to man. The sport looks good though, and I surely can't have been the only one hoping, just for comedy purposes, for the Belfast hard-man to stand up and over the not-inconsiderable-in-stature Jeremy Clarkson with a killing stare on him, just to see the face on the Top Gear legend...
Speaking of the Giants...
Player of the Season already has a front-runner:...and it's Belfast's Jeff Szwez. Despite having a nearly-unpronounceable name, the big Ontarian forward has been in phenomenal form recently, continuing his goalscoring run over the weekend with a contribution of three goals in Friday's 8-2 win against Edinburgh to take his total to 16 in 15 games. For comparison, the league's top scorer, his linemate Colin Shields, has 21 in 29.
It's obviously far too early to predict such things, and I'm sure Belfast fans wouldn't want me to jinx him-but surely David Beauregard's scoring record from last season couldn't be under threat already...could it? If I were a betting man, I'd probably stick a few quid on it being so...after all, what are the odds?
Yorkshire pride seems to be a decent motivator: Sheffield, meanwhile, did their chances of salvaging the season no harm at all with a four-point weekend despite the absence of their coach Dave Matsos, who was at the bedside of his seriously-ill son, beating Hull 5-1 on Saturday with a hat-trick from Brad Cruikshank, and outlasting Newcastle 5-4 on Sunday after penalty shots.
And, in further good news for South Yorkshire hockey families both real and imaginary...: George Matsos, too, is showing strong signs of recovery according to the latest reports in the Star today...which is a wonderful bit of news...
Three games, two points:...for the Edinburgh Capitals is seemingly not a great return, until you bear in mind that two of those games were trips to a seemingly-unstoppable-at-the-moment Belfast at Fortress Odyssey, followed by a similarly tricky trip to Fortress-by-the-Bay in Cardiff on Saturday. After those two, playing a Hull side who'd not won away in ten tries back at Murrayfield must have been something of a relief...
"We're gonna need a bigger bag of press releases": Hull, meanwhile, are fast running out of things to say during the week after their eleventh loss on the trot away from home...
Just to prove they can be beaten: Belfast played an uncharacteristically quiet offensive game against the stifling systems of Newcastle at Whitley Bay on Saturday, and grit beat flair as the Vipers left with a 2-1 win before losing to Sheffield the following night...
Honours even. Or, at least, hostilities in stalemate for now...: The derby double-header between Coventry and Nottingham, meanwhile, saw both teams thrill their home crowds by winning, Nottingham with a clinical 6-2 performance at the NIC on Saturday (with three of the goals in the last four minutes) and Coventry with a not-so-clinical-but-hugely-thrilling 6-4 win at the Skydome on Sunday, which included a contender for scrap-of-the-year between Derek Campbell and Dominic D'Amour...have a watch of Sky on Friday if you missed it, and look out for an absolute hammer-blow of a Campbell uppercut too-the fight ended in a draw but only thanks to D'Amour seemingly being able to take punches as well as he throws them...
They're two assists he won't be claiming: Lost in the sound and fury, maybe, was the fact that the Panthers went to the box twice in quick succession after the Panthers' opener, and both times Greg Chambers profited...the first goal seeing Chambers feed off the energy created by the Campbell-D'Amour fight to dangle his way beautifully past Dave Clarke and shoot high-glove past St.Pierre, and the second, after Clarke had petulantly slashed the Canadian, a crisp finish from between the circles...both times you could argue the Panthers sniper was most culpable...
And just in case no-one has noticed: The Devils are still quietly amassing point after point...both Cardiff and their style-twins, Newcastle are still lurking just behind the top three, waiting for a slip to capitalise on...
And there you go...that, in a nutshell, is your weekend.
And, in further good news for South Yorkshire hockey families both real and imaginary...: George Matsos, too, is showing strong signs of recovery according to the latest reports in the Star today...which is a wonderful bit of news...
Three games, two points:...for the Edinburgh Capitals is seemingly not a great return, until you bear in mind that two of those games were trips to a seemingly-unstoppable-at-the-moment Belfast at Fortress Odyssey, followed by a similarly tricky trip to Fortress-by-the-Bay in Cardiff on Saturday. After those two, playing a Hull side who'd not won away in ten tries back at Murrayfield must have been something of a relief...
"We're gonna need a bigger bag of press releases": Hull, meanwhile, are fast running out of things to say during the week after their eleventh loss on the trot away from home...
Just to prove they can be beaten: Belfast played an uncharacteristically quiet offensive game against the stifling systems of Newcastle at Whitley Bay on Saturday, and grit beat flair as the Vipers left with a 2-1 win before losing to Sheffield the following night...
Honours even. Or, at least, hostilities in stalemate for now...: The derby double-header between Coventry and Nottingham, meanwhile, saw both teams thrill their home crowds by winning, Nottingham with a clinical 6-2 performance at the NIC on Saturday (with three of the goals in the last four minutes) and Coventry with a not-so-clinical-but-hugely-thrilling 6-4 win at the Skydome on Sunday, which included a contender for scrap-of-the-year between Derek Campbell and Dominic D'Amour...have a watch of Sky on Friday if you missed it, and look out for an absolute hammer-blow of a Campbell uppercut too-the fight ended in a draw but only thanks to D'Amour seemingly being able to take punches as well as he throws them...
They're two assists he won't be claiming: Lost in the sound and fury, maybe, was the fact that the Panthers went to the box twice in quick succession after the Panthers' opener, and both times Greg Chambers profited...the first goal seeing Chambers feed off the energy created by the Campbell-D'Amour fight to dangle his way beautifully past Dave Clarke and shoot high-glove past St.Pierre, and the second, after Clarke had petulantly slashed the Canadian, a crisp finish from between the circles...both times you could argue the Panthers sniper was most culpable...
And just in case no-one has noticed: The Devils are still quietly amassing point after point...both Cardiff and their style-twins, Newcastle are still lurking just behind the top three, waiting for a slip to capitalise on...
And there you go...that, in a nutshell, is your weekend.
