Fife Flyers aim for clean sweep to deliver Clan knockout in Challenge Cup race
Fife Flyers could book their place in the knockout stages of the Challenge Cup this weekend with a clean sweep of the points.
Flyers – whose squad was hit last week by a sickness bug which shut down the dressing room – now go into the closing stages of the round robin qualifiers with a road trip to face Dundee Stars on Saturday, followed by a Sunday home game against Belfast Giants (face off 5:00pm).
A four-point sweep would take Tim Wallace’s team on to 15 points, one more than third placed Glasgow Clan could muster through their remaining games.
But their west coast rivals kept the pressure on by cutting the gap to just one point with a fine 3-0 shut out of Dundee Stars in midweek – the first with former NHL forward Jack Skille behind the bench as head coach following the sacking of Mike Sirant.
Anything less than four points could set up a winner takes all showdown at Braehead on Friday, November 6.
Flyers will be hoping that the aforementioned sickness bug which hit the dressing room last weekend eases.
It was a clear factor in back to back league losses at the hands of Manchester Storm and Sheffield Steelers.
On both nights they conceded early before pushing back only to come up short, and Flyers’ play lacked the fluency which has been a characteristic of their early season form.
Wallace said: “Against Manchester we outshot them 40-25 - but we have to start on time. On Sunday at Sheffield some guys did not have their legs before we started to play our game.
"Rewatching the game we had three really great A grade chances to make it 4-4, even 5-4.
"We’d previously had an intense game against Belfast and the guys laid it all on the line - I was proud of them for that.”
Wallace has lower body injury concerns over several players, including netminder Dominic Groh, defenceman Joona Vainio and forwards Mason Alderson, Michael Drabek, who will all be missing this weekend.
He has hopes of one of them returning to the line-up this weekend.
American Blake Pietila has proved to be a more than solid replacement for Groh in recent games, with Jordan McLaughlan as back-up. Michael Drabek and Joona Vainio also missed the weekend action.
Flyers certainly missed Drabek’s presence up front at the weekend - he has been one of the stand out players this season.
Meanwhile, Flyers have strengthened their off-ice team with the appointment of Sean Stroud as assistant general manager.
He will work with Wallace and chief executive John Brown, with a particular focus on supporting the club’s continued commercial growth and development.