The Escadia Newcastle Northstars endured a punishing weekend at home, suffering back-to-back losses. Despite outshooting both opponents, costly mistakes and missed opportunities led to Newcastle falling 3-6 to the league-leading Melbourne Ice on Saturday, followed by a tight 3-4 defeat at the hands of Canberra Brave on Sunday.
Facing the top-of-the-table Melbourne Ice, Newcastle started strong with Yevgeni Skachkov striking on the powerplay to give the Northstars an early lead. But the ice responded quickly with two goals, showcasing the plays that have put them at the top of the ladder.
A goal from Kim Tallberg brought the game back to level at 2-2, but the momentum quickly swung back in Melbourne’s favour as they added two more before the first intermission, taking a 2-4 lead into the break.
The ice tightened their grip in the second period, adding another goal to make it 2-5. A final in the third capped off their dominant night for Melbourne, who showed their class across all zones of the game.
Head Coach Kevin Noble highlighted the level of play from Melbourne – “Melbourne is the standard, and we’re not far off. But until we learn to manage the puck for 60 full minutes, we’re not going to beat the top teams.”
Despite the score line, the Northstars showed fight until the final whistle, with Casey Kubara netting a shorthanded goal in the last seconds – a small consolation in this game.
Northstars Captain Liam Manwarring stated, “We need to score more goals, we had so many grade-A opportunities, and once again put up another 50 shots, and that’s the moral of our season. We’ve outshot every opponent so far, but if you don’t score enough goals, you don’t win games.”
Less than 24 hours later, the Northstars returned to the ice looking to bounce back, and again it was Skachkov who opened the scoring. But the Brave answered with three goals of their own before the end of the first, capitalising on Newcastle’s turnovers to seize momentum.
Canberra extended the lead to 1-4 in the second, before a late surge from the home team brought them back into the contest. Kubara and Francis Drolet each found the back of the net to close the gap, but the comeback fell short as Canberra held firm in the final minutes of the game.
After the second loss of the weekend, Noble stated, “It’s not always gonna go our way, but again we’re outshooting our opponents. Our best players have to find a way through, and we need to improve in many areas. We’ve got to coach better, get better goaltending, get more production offensively, got to get our defence being tougher in front of the net.”
He added “I think it’s time to go on the road because this homestand has been on and off again hockey, and for our group we need to get away and get to know one another and understand why we play for one another, and just need a change to shake it up.”
Manwarring remains confident in the team’s direction regardless of this weekends results “There’s a lot of good elements in our team – we’re a championship-winning team this year, I still believe it. But we need that killer instinct”. He continued, “We have a great roster, the room feels great, but we just need to get that next little bit of killer instinct down pat, and we’ll be fine.”
With the Northstars heading south this weekend for a crucial clash against Melbourne Ice and the Mustangs on July 5
th and 6
th, Manwarring stated “It’s time we went on the road.”, We need to compete harder and be better from the top down.”
With belief still burning strong in the locker room, the Northstars know there’s still plenty of hockey left – and time to turn the seasons results around.
They will return home for a highly anticipated double header against Brisbane Lightning on July 12
th and 13
th.
Tickets are selling fast – get yours at
northstars.thundertix.com
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