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Play-off first leg: Swindon Wildcats 2 Guildford Flames 1
Saturday evening saw the Swindon Wildcats take on Guildford Flames in the first leg of the 2015-2016 EPL playoffs. Total Sport's Ben Callaghan was on hand at a sell out Swindon Ice Arena to recount the nail biting action:
In front of a packed home crowd the Wildcats managed to earn a narrow 2-1 win to take to Guildford, thanks to a Tomasz Malasinski double in the second and third periods.
The opening period was classic playoff hockey, there was an element of nervousness among the players and the fans. No-one wanted to be the person to make the first mistake and give their opponents the edge. The Wildcats had what turned out to be the only powerplay of the game when Jez Lundin took a delay of the game penalty at 6.42.
The first period finished goalless, but Swindon had a couple of good early opportunities through Floyd Taylor and Jonas Höög but they were both unable to convert. Guildford themselves were testing Lyle when Matt Towe and Janis Ozolins.
In the middle period it was the Flames who took first advantage. Tom Duggan and Andy Melachrino linked up well behind the Cats net. The puck was fed out to Ozolins who used the screen of the D-man well and fired nearside through Lyle to give the visitors a 1-0 lead at 35.37. The Cats weren’t behind for too long and at 39.00 they had equalised.
In what was a similar goal to Guildford’s, Swindon did well on the fore-check to turn the puck over. Jonas Höög fed the puck back into the slot for Tomasz Malasinski to poke home and tie the game up, despite Guildford probably dominating the second period.
The final period was much of the same for both sides. Both teams knew there were still three periods of hockey to come on Sunday so no-one wanted to make errors that would cost their teams. At 57.52 the Wildcats managed to get their noses in front for the first time in the contest. Jonas Höög fed the puck again to Tomasz Malasinski who saw space in the top corner and converted to send the sold-out home crowd wild.
The curtains came down on another packed season at the Link Centre. There have been ups and downs but games and moments every fan who walked through the doors will never forget. Swindon now travel down to Guildford for the return leg where they’ll hope they can do what they need to do to make the Coventry Finals Weekend 2016.
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