Giants Come Up Short Against Braehead

Posted on Sunday, November 6th, 2011 at 2:53 pm

The Stena Line Belfast Giants fell to their first away defeat of the season after coming out on the wrong end of a 4-1 game with the Braehead Clan. As a result, the Clan now top the Challenge Cup Group A standings, enough to cement their place in the semi-finals of the competition.

A tremendous first period from the Clan seen them three in front and that was enough in the end to take the points in this Elite League / Challenge Cup double up. It could however have been a totally different story if the Giants were to net one of their early chances having dominated the opening 10 minutes of play.

The Giants came out of the blocks flying and pinned the Clan in their own defensive zone peppering netminder Jaakko Suomalainen for the opening minutes, but despite this early pressure the visitors failed to get on the board and against the run of play Kyle Bruce bundled the puck past Murphy at 6.10 to put the home team infront.

Despite the setback the Giants continued to ask questions of the Clan defense and may have well been a victim of their own fortune as former Giants Mike Bayrack latched on to a stretch pass, splitting the Giants high defensive line before squeezing the puck past Murphy to make it 2-0 at 16.37.

Just under 2 minutes later at 18.24 Jade Galbraith made it 3-0 as he unleashed a blistering slapshot past Murphy beating him low on his stick side to silence the traveling support.

Within the first minute of the second period the Giants had pulled one back with a goal from Aaron Clarke. With only 57 seconds on the clock, Clarke fired past Suomalainen with a wrist shot from between the circles on a feed from Benoit Doucet. Despite outshooting their opponents 2 to 1 in the period that was the only goal that the Giants could muster up.

Having done a great job in the first period to set up the advantage the Clan were holding their own as they saw the third period out. At 57.41 Belfast pulled Murphy and he hardly had time to sit down when Clan player/coach Drew Bannister shot from his own end into the empty net with the goal timed at 57.47

Period Scores: 3-0, 0-1, 1-0
Penalty Mins: Bra 10 – Bel 30
Powerplay: Bra 0/2 – Bel 0/2
Shots On: Jaakko Suomalainen 37 / Stephen Murphy 22 + 1 ENG
Referee: Moray Hanson