Final regular-season games full of milestones

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The Escadia Newcastle Northstars had a dramatic win, defeating Brisbane Lightning 11-1 on Saturday. The reverse outcome on Sunday saw the Lightning come back hard for their final home game of the year, defeating Newcastle 4-8.
 
It was a weekend of milestones, though, seeing Wehebe Darge secure his 500^th AIHL career point to open scoring on Saturday night. Shorthanded, Darge stole the puck from the Lightning’s defence on the blue line, skating up to score the first goal of the game.
 
Darge is the second player in AIHL history to reach the 500-point milestone. Head Coach Kevin Noble shared: “You can’t say enough about the guy. Five hundred points is impressive and you have to be incredibly gifted and skilled, but you also need to have a level of commitment and love for something to play that long to get those points. It’s the resume of your total body of work and how you’re remembered. He’s a huge part of our culture and our team.”
 
In period two, the Northstars would pile on the goals, with Tallberg, Darge, Kubara and Annesley adding to the Northstars’ lead. Period three would see another six goals in period three, including rounding out hattricks for Darge and Tallberg.
 
Lightning came out harder on Sunday afternoon with a 0-4 lead until late in the second period, when Newcastle would score their first two goals. Two more goals in the third would get Newcastle their four, but Tanner Hopps’ five-goal game for Lightning helped secure the win in front of their home fans.
 
Noble shared, “We were awful on Sunday. As bad as I’ve seen us all year. We were on the wrong side of battles and lost a lot of battles. We were lazy and looked like we wanted to be anywhere else.”
 
“Whether they were hoping it would be easy, or thought it would be easy, [and] a lot of individuals on our team were just not good enough and it felt like a disrespectful effort.”
 
Looking ahead to finals, “at the end of the game you try to leave it there and put a positive on it but it was the end of the regular season and it was a bitter note to go out on.”
 
“The regular season is done, and everybody wants to be the team holding the trophy. It’s the new season now. We’ve punched our ticket to finals and we’ve done the work to get into the playoffs for our chance to win.”
 
The Northstars will play Brisbane Lightning in the Preliminary Final at 7pm on Friday 29^th August.