Braves effort ended in defeat against leaders

WHITLEY Braves succumbed to third successive loss in English Under 18 North Division Two after a 7-3 defeat at Hull Ice Arena against leaders Kingston Sharks.

Braves travelled to East Yorkshire without six players which included their leading scorer Jamie Ord who is in the Czech Republic on Great Britain Under-16 duty, as well as Alex Nergaard, Ross Dixon, Steve McGuckin, Jack Mccumiskey and Ryan Healy. It gave Whitley a bare minimum nine skaters and one netminder.

They began well in their quest to deny Kingston an opportunity to extend their lead at the top of the table, with Sharks netminder Dean Bowater making a couple of crucial saves.

However two goals in the space of 35 seconds around the 10-minute mark from Charlie Blissett gave the hosts a two goal cushion that they had hoped for in the opening period.

Braves had the better of the first period by having the most shots on goal but were unable to find a way past Bowater.

They did achieve that objective two minutes into the middle period thanks to a Jason Taylor strike– his first goal of the season.

Sharks gradually got a foothold in the game and once more scored two goals in a very short space of time.

Mairis Sadinovs restoring the two goal cushion at 27.50 and Blissett was on hand to complete his hattrick two minutes later, giving his side a 4-1 lead, just five seconds from the end of the period.

The visitors then fell into penalty trouble when Ross Douglass received his third minor penalty of the game after only 36 seconds had elapsed.

On the resulting powerplay Sharks went 5-1 ahead.

Whitley battled back and they took advantage of their fourth powerplay of the game at 35.18 when Douglass drove home his tenth goal of the season for the visitors past back-up netminder Kieran Timmis who had come on to replace Bowater only two minutes earlier.

While Jessica Kinghorn was keeping Sharks at bay in this final period, Braves managed to cut the deficit to two when Anthony Wetherell tucked away his seventh goal of the season with a little over three minutes remaining.

And, with 89 seconds still to go in the match, Braves being handed a powerplay.

Kingston’s Luke Chatterton and Braves Wetherell having a minor scuffle for which both players received two minute minor roughing penalties; with Chatterton also being thrown out of the game with a five-plus game misconduct penalty.

At the same time Braves opted to withdraw Kinghorn in favour of an extra attacker. This backfired on them as with 55 seconds left James Robinson made it 6-3 when he fired into an unguarded net.

Kinghorn was restored in the net and just 20 later, Robinson’s second goal of the game completed the scoring. The win saw Sharks go three points ahead at the top of the table ahead of Billingham Stars who have three games left with Kingston just two.

On Sunday, Braves were to have hosted Solihull Barons but they failed to fulfil the fixture and on the previous Thursday conceded the game which was awarded to Whitley Bay 5-0.

Solihull have been the league’s whipping boys this season, having lost all of their matches.

Braves remain fourth on 15 points, Sutton Sting are third one point ahead and have a game in hand, with Billingham in second one point further ahead.

Braves have two games to play with the short trip journey down the A19 to face Billingham on April 22, while Sutton travel to Hillheads on April 30 – agame that has been brought forward from May 7.