Admirals games ‘do or die’ for Thunder

A FIREDUP Thunder side will approach this weekend’s two awaygame series with the West Auckland Admirals as if they are semifinals.

The Thunder sits fourth out of the five teams in the national ice hockey league and needs to quickly add to its two wins this season.

‘‘These games coming up are playoff hockey — it is do or die for them,’’ coach Jeff Avery said.

The Admirals can expect the Thunder to come at them hard in their first match, this afternoon.

‘‘We have a pretty focused game plan about how we are going to beat these guys and it is coming full throttle at them — we are coming with all guns blazing.

‘‘They have got to block shots, they have got to eat pucks, they have got to jump in front of everything and every battle in the corners, they have got to come out with the puck,’’ Avery said.

The Thunder and the Admirals won one game each in their openinground matches in Dunedin in May.

There were just one and twogoal margins in each game, showing the Thunder can match it with the Aucklanders.

‘‘We are the only team that has beaten them — they are beatable,’’ Avery said.

‘‘We have watched some game films of them and we know what they are going to do and we have got a plan to shut it down.’’

The Admirals gave the lastplaced Canterbury Red Devils 62 and 82 beatings in their two games last weekend.

The Thunder has not played since beating the competition leading Stampede 52 in Queenstown three weeks ago.

The rest period has the Thunder refreshed and fully healthy ahead of tonight’s first match against the Admirals.

‘‘Everyone is healthy, we have a lean squad going up and they believe they can do it,’’ Avery said.

Despite having a losing season, the Thunder has a respectable 6 goal differential, which shows it has been close to winning many of its games.

The difference in those close matches had been silly errors, Avery said.

‘‘The games we lost we made it because of the mistakes we made.

‘‘The effort is there. It is just the stupid things like getting a penalty when you have a powerplay.

‘‘I have said it before, five on five this team is so fast nobody can catch us.’’

The Thunder is looking to move on from its mistakes and start playing its way back into national league contention.

Its second match against the Admirals will be played tomorrow afternoon.