Fife Flyers crushed by powerful Sheffield Steelers comeback

It was a meeting of top versus bottom, with both teams in need of the points - but for different reasons.

And it all went horribly wrong in the second period for Flyers.

They started it 2-0 up, and ended it 5-2 down and with defenceman Scott Aarssen thrown out on a five plus game penalty for slashing.

Steelers' powerful response to losing those early goals left them with no way back.

The Sheffield side needed the win to stay top of the Elite League, and they underlined those credentials sweeping Fife aside.

They came closest in the opening minutes when Michael Davies seized a loose puck and fired a shot off Adam Morrison's post..

But it was Flyers who drew first blood in a tenth minute powerplay as Paul Crowder who latched on to a Jonas Emmerdahl pass and buried the puck past netminder Tomas Duba.

Two minutes it was 2-0 as the powerplay team, delivered again, this time James LIvingston setting up Dannick Gauthier to fire home.

Flyers took that lead into the first break, and survived a scare when Sam Jones was called for tripping, Davies struck the metalwork for the second time in the game.

Steelers then hit Fife with two killer goals back to back to tie this game to change the momentum of this hockey game.

At 26:11 Aaron Johnson found the net, to open their account, followed by the equaliser from Janne Koehmainen just 20 seconds later.

Steelers swiftly added a third to grab the lead for the first time as Nikolai Lemtyugov netted on a breakaway.

That prompted a time out from Flyers to regroup, while Steelers had to contend with the loss of key forward Brendan Connolly who departed to the dressing-room for treatment.after a check in the corner, with the game halted while blood was cleaned from the ice. No call was made by the officials.

It failed to halt Steelers' momentum as Tanner Eberle tipped the puck home off a Johnson shot for 4-2 at 31:56, and Anthony DeLuca delivered a killer fifth with a shot past Morrison after 35 minutes.

Matters went from bad to worse two minutes later as Chase Schaber sat our a minor penalty, and defenceman Scott Aarssen was thrown out on a five plus game for slashing.

Any slender hopes Flyers harboured of a third period comeback were effectively snuffed out when De:Luca rang the red light for 6-2 after 48 minutes while Connolly's backhand strike for 7-2 after 51 minutes simply underlined the gulf between the teams.

Young Sheffield skater wrapped up a solid win with an eighth strike just minutes before the buzzer.