Billingham Stars saw yet another hard-fought two periods undone by a shambolic last 20 minutes as they crashed to a 4-1 defeat to Solway Sharks in Sunday’s National Ice Hockey League (North) Moralee Division One clash at the Forum.
Billingham started the game brightly and had the lion’s share of possession, keeping their visitors on the back foot and testing netminder Gary Russell on several occasions.
The Stars had numerous chances to open the scoring, however it was not until the final minute of first period action that the home side deservedly went ahead when Michael Bowman shot through Russell’s pads to give the Teessiders the lead at the break.
Billingham started the middle session in much the same way as they played the first – dominating play but not putting away opportunities to put themselves further ahead.
Within the first minute Sykes shot straight at Russell with the Stars two-on-one, then the hosts had a goal ruled out in the 24th minute for high sticks.
Gradually however Solway were getting back into the game, and in the 32nd minute they got their equaliser when Richard Bentham rifled his own rebound past Stars netminder James Flavell.
More Billingham near-misses followed, with both Scott Ward and Tom Keeley hitting the post, while the Sharks also had a goal ruled out in the dying minutes of the period to leave the teams level at the interval.
The Stars started the final period on the back foot as Bowman was called on a tripping minor with just 20 seconds gone.
The Scots duly punished the infringement, Bentham getting his second in the 41st minute when he collected the puck on his own blue line and took it just inside the attacking zone before letting fly.
With Billingham looking a different team, Solway edged further ahead in the 48th minute with a well-worked goal Struan Tonnar goal and the Stars continued to labour.
In a last-gasp attempt to salvage something from the game, Billingham pulled Flavell with a little over a minute left to give them the extra man, but the gamble failed as Frazer Goldie won possession in his own zone and fired into the empty net for a 4-1 final score.
Billingham’s director of coaching Terry Ward was unimpressed with his side’s third period performance.
“For two periods we were playing really good hockey – forechecking, hassling and doing everything we should be doing,” Ward said.
“We came out for the third period and we got a penalty against us straight away, they scored on the power play and from then onwards we just totally lost our way.”
Ward said the Stars will now have to go back to the drawing board.
“Defensively we’re going to have to go back to work,” he added.
“We’ve got some inexperience at the back and we’ve got injuries to top players – we need to get them back in so we’re at full strength.”
Billingham travel to Whitley Warriors next on Sunday for the first Tyne-Tees league derby of the season (face-off 5pm).
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