Steelers settle in to new format

It was during the early part of the off season that the Elite League announced they were changing their league structure and forming a new two regional conference system. The intention of this was of course to encourage and create closer competition and rivalries between teams.

Now whilst this move was discussed and debated at length in the media and online, and to be fair the jury may still be out on the long term success of the new system, if there was ever any doubt that rivalries wouldn’t be created by teams playing each other more regularly then the opening exchanges between Sheffield and Coventry ought to go some way to quelling them.

To start with a somewhat bad tempered opening pre-season game at the Motorpoint Arena between the two sides a couple of weeks ago saw Steelers’ forward Jason Hewitt sustain a broken nose after being caught by a sucker punch from Brad Leeb – the former NHL’er receiving a 3 game suspension for his troubles – and a double scrap between Matt Stephenson and Coventry’s Benn Olson. And after last weekend’s back to back league games the growing hatred between the Steelers and Blaze showed no signs of abating.

No fewer than 44 individual penalties were handed out by Messers Carson and Hicks over the two games, keeping the scorers more than busy, with a grand total of 174 penalty minutes being awarded in total. This included 6 fighting majors and 3 game misconducts.

After a chippy start to the game on Saturday evening, an incident midway through the 1st period sparked the first scrap of the game with Steelers’ Drew Fata easily dealing with Gerome Giudice in what was a one-sided affair. With tensions running high the niggles continued throughout the game until the final minute when Shawn Limpright and Coventry’s Agent Provocateur Benn Olson clashed after the Steelers’ forward appeared to strike Olson in the face with his stick. In the ensuing melee Olson went down and had to be helped off the ice, whilst Limpright received a game misconduct.

Sunday’s return game carried on pretty much as Saturday’s had finished with both Jeff Legue and that man Olson again getting involved in a high-sticking incident. Both received 5 minute majors and game misconducts. Then Rod Sarich and Lee Esders got involved with Shea Guthrie and Matt Selby in the 3rd period, with all combatants receiving a 5 minute major penalties for fighting.

The weekend wasn’t just a slugfest though, with a whopping 19 goals being scored over the two games – 11 of those for the Steelers, who ended the weekend with 4 points and an early pole position at the top of the Elite League standings.

Speaking to the media after the Steelers’ overtime win in Coventry Head Coach Ryan Finnerty was obviously pleased with his sides showing against a gritty Blaze side who, to be fair, were playing short-handed. “I’m delighted with the results, winning in Coventry is of course good and add to that Saturday’s win at home I know we are on the right road.” But he was quick to stress that this is only the beginning for the current crop of Steelers. “The expectations here are high though, especially the expectations we put on ourselves. There is a lot more, not just a bit more to come from this team.”

So having come through the tough test set by Paul Thompson’s men last weekend, there’s no let up for the Steelers this weekend as they take their first trip into the territory of their near neighbours and bitter rivals Nottingham on Saturday. This is then followed by an equally tough home game against reigning League Champions Belfast on Sunday.

With one Steelers’ rivalry already coming along nicely, I expect this weekend to reignite a couple more.