Two goals and two ‘man of the match’ awards for Fife Flyers defenceman as team eases to win

The blueliner was the runaway choice of the fans, and he also donned the golden helmet in the dressing room where the team has its own MoM award.

The result and performance were both much needed after a wobbly weekend of hockey. The points kept Flyers in second place in their Challenge Cup grouping, and on course for a shot at a semi-final berth in the tournament’s new, but still less than satisfactory format.

Krenzelok’s eye for goal put Flyers level at 24:12 after Stars had made a decent start, opening the scoring through Zack Tsekos at 7:14.

But the visitors then rather fell apart. As coach Marc Lefebvre noted: “We got the lead, we stopped playing, and played into Flyers hands.”

It was Krenzelok, Drake Pilon and Phelix Martineau who helped Fife find their tempo, and a 3-0 middle period turned this game firmly in their favour.

Krenzelok’s opener was a fine shot after a good move down the left created the opening, and he struck again five minutes later after a great steal from Johnny Curran teed him up to shoot home.

The chances came thick and fast for Flyers, and a third goal; at 33:49 underlined the shift in momentum Patrick Kyte’s mid ice interception set up Martineau who flew down the right, waited for a defenceman to commit, then flicked up to Pilon who fired home Lefebvre called an immediate time out but the damage had been done.

Artur Gatiyatov had two mid-air swipes at a puck as he motored across Stars’ goal, and netminder Sabol lost track of one puck behind his net, opening the door to Lucas Chiodo who came close with a lightning quick wraparound.

Olivier LeBlanc saw one shot ping Stars’ post in the opening seconds of the third, and Fynn Page was handed late ice time after Curran limped off after a check on the plexi.

Period scores: 0-1, 3-0, 1-0; PIMs: 4-6; SOGs Fife (Owen) 34, Stars (Sabol) 37; Fife scoring: Krenzelok (2+0), Martineaux (1+1), Pilon (1+0), Cichy (0+2, Curran, Chiodo, LeBlanc, Delmas (0+1); Stars scoring: Tsekos (1+0), Tongue (0+1).