LBM Belfast Giants – Sheffield Steelers Stat Attack

Posted on Thursday, February 18th, 2010 at 3:32 pm

The Giants currently lie five points behind Coventry in 2nd place in the Elite League standings. The Steelers, 20 points behind the Giants, are in sixth position, a point clear of seventh placed Newcastle and four behind Edinburgh, who they defeated 3-2 on Wednesday night.

So far this season the Giants and the Steelers have met on eight occasions in all competitions with the Giants having the advantage, winning five of those encounters. Belfast have won three out of their four home games against Sheffield this season, with their only loss coming on their first home game of the 2009/10 season on 12th September when the Giants lost 3-2 after penalty shots. Both sides last met on the 6th & 7th February in Sheffield where the points were shared as the Giants came out on top on 6th February, winning 3-1 and the Steelers then defeated the Giants 4-3 on 7th February. The most recent meeting between these two sides at the Odyssey Arena came on 9th January when Jeff Szwez scored the game winning goal in a 3-2 win for the Giants.

Friday’s match up points towards being a high scoring number as Giants - Steelers games have averaged over six goals per game in the 2009/10 season with the winning team having to score three or more goals on each of the eight occasions to win the game. Depending on other results this weekend, two wins for the Belfast Giants could see them move to within a point of league leaders, Coventry and for Sheffield, two wins for the Steelers could see them leap-frog the Edinburgh Capitals into fifth place.