Billingham Stars fought valiantly against the top two in National League (North) Moralee Division One, gaining two points and snatching second place from Solway Sharks in the process.
They beat the Sharks 5-2 away but despite leading 3-1, were beaten 5-3 at home by league leaders Blackburn Hawks the following night.
Against Solway in Dumfries the visitors got an early breakthrough when Michael Elder opened the scoring with less than two minutes played.
The home side tried to get back into the game and pinged the post but the Stars held on and it was all Billingham in the second period.
With Sharks’ Ross Murray sitting a roughing penalty, Matthew Campbell let go a bomb from the blue line to make it 2-0 in the 24th minute.
Less than a minute later it was three with Jack Emerson shooting straight through the keeper, then in the 34th minute a lovely pass from Michael Bowman teed up Thomas Stuart-Dant to shoot high into Jordan Boyle’s net for a four-goal second interval lead.
Sharks netted through Pavol Melichercik and Richard Bentham to narrow the gap but just eight seconds after their second goal goal Solway’s Bob Chalmers was called for high sticks.
Billingham went back on the front foot on the resulting power play and were rewarded in the 53rd minute when Boyle was beaten by a wrist shot from man-of-the-match Richie Thornton.
At the Forum the following night the hosts were rocked when Blackburn scored after just 13 seconds through Adam Brittle.
From that point the Stars ramped up the pressure and with three minutes gone Stuart-Dant bagged the equaliser when he fired home from just inside the blue line.
Just over a minute later Stars’ man-of-the-match James Moss let a shot go from the face-off circle to make it 2-1 and four seconds from the interval buzzer, Bowman collected his own rebound to score between Brittle’s glove and the post.
But the second session was a hard-fought affair and the Hawks narrowed the gap in the 27th minute while short-handed, Brittle again the scorer.
Then as the hosts faded in the final session, Blackburn equalised through Jordan Bannon in the 47th minute, then quickly moved ahead when Daniel Mackriel fired home from just outside the face-off circle.
Tom King got the visitors’ fifth in the 53rd minute, and despite a late Stars attempt to rescue the game by pulling Flavell for the final two minutes, the visitors hung on.
“We can’t knock the lads,” said Billingham director of coaching Terry Ward.
“We gave everything we had in Solway, the guys won the first and second periods (against Blackburn) but in the third period we just had no legs at all.
“We were out of key players in defence so the defence have got to be commended on the way they’ve battled.
“We asked the lads to give 100% and that’s what they gave us.
“We knew the Hawks would be coming for three periods, that’s what they’ve done all year, they did it again and we just ran out of steam.”
Next up the Stars host Sheffield Spartans on Sunday (face- off 6.30pm).
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