Evening Telegraph (First Edition)
Pacha: Huge gives play-off
DunDee Stars ice hockey team had a mixed weekend.
They suffered a 3-1 defeat at the hands of Nottingham Panthers in Dundee Ice Arena on Friday.
However, they staged an excellent comeback 4-3 win against Braehead Clan in Glasgow on Saturday to put themselves right to the fore of the play-off places.
In Braehead, Stars got themselves off to a flying start when Chris Lawrence gave them the lead after only 50 seconds.
They then passed up a powerplay chance on four minutes before Adam Bruce pulled the home side level.
Brace grabbed his second counter of the game to give Clan a 2-1 lead.
However, Jimmy Jensen levelled the game at 2-2 on 27 minutes before Brace completed his hat-trick with two minutes left in the middle session to give Braehead a 3-2 lead.
Stars failed to convert two powerplay chances at the start of the third period but, on 46 minutes, Marc-Olivier Mimar pulled the game back to 3-3.
The visitors were in the ascendancy at this stage and Mimar grabbed his second goal of the night to give Stars a 4-3 lead.
Braehead were given two late powerplay chances when Emerson Hrynyk and Lawrence were awarded two minute minors but the Dundee defence were resolute and held on for an excellent win and two valuable points in their push for the play-offs.
Coach Omar Pacha said: “The game against Panthers was disappointing in as much that, for the most part, I felt we were the better team but just didn’t seem to get the bounces to go our way.
“We created a lot of chances but made a few mistakes that cost us. I thought it was a good game but felt we should have taken something from it.’
“We played a really good first period but faced a very hot goalie and, in the second, we still created the chances. The final period saw us have a lot of net presence but we just couldn’t get the breakthrough.
“In Braehead, we played a really good game, especially when it was five on five.
“Our powerplay was off but we stuck at it and fully deserved the win.
“We got an unlucky bounce for their first goal and then went behind. However, we recovered and, although we went behind twice, I felt we were still capable of getting the points.
“In recent games we have scored the first goal and have had trouble closing