Weekend Teaser: Bees look to gain more ground on playoff hopefuls

   

 What does weekend nineteen have in store for the Bees?

Season weekend eighteen review 

Last weekend saw the Bees have just one fixture against the league leaders the Milton Keynes Lightning. All eyes were on the Bees after they picked up an excellent win against the Leeds Knights the previous week and the fans were hopeful as finally the team were able to fill the bench with the return of many of the players who had been promoted from the injury balcony. Bees took a 1-0 lead into the second period as Will Stead added another goal to his season's tally on the powerplay. The only goal of the second period was to tie the game as the Lightning's Sean Norris found the net in a period where the penalty boxes were pretty busy. Going into the third it was anyone's game and the Lightning were to go ahead at 44.49 thanks to a powerplay goal scored by Harry Gulliver. Bees were not disheartened and drew level just over three minutes later as Ralfs Circenis scored a beauty of a breakaway goal. Marcel Balaz added what would prove to be the game winning goal at 50.43. The Lightning then threw everything they had at the Bees and when Marcus Mitchell was assessed a 5 + game penalty for slashing at 52.13 it looked like Bees might lose their lead but the team dug in deep. Lightning's downfall was a too many men call at 53.34, an easy call for the linesman and a huge mistake when they were pushing hard in the Bees defensive zone. A timeout for the Lightning at 58.31 saw the exit of their goalie, Will Kerlin, to the bench and at 59.14 Marcel Balaz was given the opportunity to put the game to bed scoring his second goal of the night. He skated all the way to the opposition's net to make sure of the goal. Final score was 4-2 in an exciting game where the whole Bees team performed superbly. . 

My opinion - Bees had the confidence in their game having beaten the Leeds Knights the previous weekend and their game play was assured and clinical. They were outshot nearly 2:1 but Max Wright was again phenomenal and frustrated the visitors. The Lightning's Sean Norris was camped at the back door of the goal all evening and whilst many shots were saved by Max there were some opportunities that Sean would have scored on another night. For me the biggest positive is that the Bees look dangerous going forward and are now capitalising on their chances.  

Player of the Weekend Result

Congratulations to Max Wright who is the player of the weekend, he wins thanks to your votes on Twitter with 57% of the vote. This is his 4th player of the weekend win this season, he registered a 96.55 save percentage against the Lightning last Sunday and has an overall save percentage this season so far of 90.74. 

Next: Home to the Tigers before an away trip to Leeds 

Bees welcome the Tigers to Slough on Saturday evening before making the trip to Leeds on Sunday. This is the Tigers second visit this season having beaten the Bees 6-1 in Slough back in November. Tigers currently sit 9th in the league, 7 points ahead of the Bees so this is a must win game for the Bees if they want to push for a playoff spot. The Tigers made changes to their imports a couple of months ago following their poor start to the season bringing in Eric Henderson and David Thomson and parting ways with Zachary Yokoyama. Their top scorers are Vladimir Luka and Harry Ferguson who both have 36 points each. However, the team has announced this week that Luka will be dropping down to Tigers 2 with immediate effect allowing the team to ice their remaining 3 import forwards Henderson, Thomson and Skoleski. Luka is their most senior player and may not have been having his most successful season but he is still their top points scorer and honestly I think the Bees will be relieved he is not icing against them. The Tigers team seems much improved since the early part of the season and will be boosted by a 6-5 win over the Raiders last weekend so this game should be very exciting.
 
Away to Leeds Knights is never an easy fixture and the Knights will definitely looking for revenge after the Bees beat them in Slough two weekends ago. Knights currently occupy second place in the league and there's no surprise that Kieron Brown is their top scorer with 58 points so far this season. It is the depth of the Leeds squad that is the their main threat, a goal can come from anywhere and the Bees will have to stay focused regardless of which line the Knights have on the ice.

Bees player news - Marcus Mitchell will be unavailable this weekend as he has picked up a two game suspension following the DOPS review of his 5 minute slashing penalty last Sunday. In addition, both the Slough Jets and Streatham have two games this weekend so their two-way players will be unavailable to play for the Bees. Good news is that Olly Knaggs should be back in the line up following his return from playing with the GB under 20's.


All that is left to say is safe travels to the Tigers and their travelling fans heading to Slough on Saturday and to the Bees players and travelling fans heading to Leeds on Sunday.

Come on you Bees!

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