Just when you thought the Giants had made their changes and could now settle down to play some hockey the team have yet another player change on the cards. Back-up goalie Hugh Smyth has resigned from the team and will be replaced by young Adam Cree. Smyth who has not played a minute of hockey for the Giants this season has been nothing more than a warm-up goalie and bench door opener as the Giants have seen a starting goalie come and go. Now on their second starter of the season the Giants have had to act quickly to replace Smyth with their second back-up of the season. Rules state that a team must have a back-up goalie dressed on the bench at all times. At this time of year back-up goalies are few and far between, especially in the Elite League where teams see them more as something the rules say they must have more than a position they wish to utilise. MORE »
It’s been a while coming, much longer than most of us would have liked but the boo birds have finally been put to rest thanks to an upturn in form by the Belfast Giants. With the player changes appearing to click the Giants put in by far their most impressive preformance of the season at a sold out Dundalk Ice Dome. The atmosphere was electric and it times it helped carry an at times tired Giants team who were extremely short benched through the game. Icing without four key players the Giants were soon down five men when star player Mark Dutiaume picked up an injury. It didn’t stop the Giants who played with two forward lines for the majority of the night from pressing on and picking up the much needed win. MORE »
An article in the Belfast Telegraph has GM Todd Kelman claiming the GIants are clean with regards to the player signing of Peter Campbell and Stevie Lyle from Basingstoke last week. Basingstoke have been doing a bit of moaning about how their players were approached but Kelman is not worried.
“This is a dead issue as far as we as a team are concerned, that is how it should remain.”
~Todd Kelman
Basingstoke have made their feelings felt to the media the past week as well as to the EIHL. It’s not yet known whether the Elite Leauge will take any action.
Maybe Basingstoke ought to stick to worrying about their finances rather than other teams signing up their players which in the end did free up some salaries for them which for a team in financial problems can only be a good thing.
With all the chopping and changing in the last week or so you would be forgiven for not having a clue what our actual current roster is or at least how many import players were now on our books. I didn’t know the exact number before making a count and it turns out it’s twelve. The league limit is ten but with three of our imports currently sidelined by injury we’re actually only icing nine imports.
Of course with Kelman ready to step out of the line-up the minute one of the injured three becomes available again it means just one player is likely to be cut come a healthy Giants squad. It’s raised questions about who that player may be and so it’s worth taking a look and doing a little speculating. MORE »
Well this weekend has been a long time coming. I’ve been as far away from the Giants as possible all week while player changes have been made and the team got its new look and spent parts of the weekend logging on to check the scores and how we got along. Imagine my surprise when yesterday I logged on to see we had won our second game of the weekend to put together two back to back wins for the first time this season. It has moved us well clear of the foot of the table, up to 7th in fact and only a couple of points back of likes of the Nottingham Panthers. MORE »
Trust the week that I’m away for the Giants to have their most news-active week of the season. Latest rumours/news suggest that struggling Giants forward Ryan Smith has left the team for the lower-German leagues were he originally came from. MORE »
It’s quite the heading but the rumours were true. The Giants indeed did snap up Stevie Lyle and Campbell upon their leaving of the Basingstoke Bison. The good news of depth to the squad was hampered with the news that top goal scorer, Scott Cameron has a broken foot and will be out for a number of weeks.
Theres a saying that when your luck is out, it’s really out and that is the case with the bottom of the league Giants. Three major injuries to import players in three weeks will mean the Giants will continue to play short benched even with these three signings. Campbell and Lyle will add some much needed depth to the team. MORE »
One of the original Giants is coming home. After two years away from Belfast after six seasons with the team Shane Johnson is back as a Giants player. I will write more about it in a day or two but right now I sit in the airport waiting to board a flight to Canada for four days.
In other quick news, the Bison have released goalie Stevie Lyle and forward Peter Campbell. Rumours suggest both are coming our way . . . Watch this space.
So the hope of starting a winning streak by getting back-to-back wins for the first time this season have been dashed in a big way with the Phoenix beating the Giants 6-1. As noted in the title, at least we ended the weekend +1 in the scoring charts! Eitherway the Giants are still a long way from being back on the right track and if we foolishly thought 24 hours ago that the two-week notice’s handed out earlier in the week were possibly going to be withdrawn, we can be reassured that surely they are still in place.
George Awada’s latest article in the Sunday Life has raised a few eyebrows. The well written piece has George Awada talking about the future of the Giants and where their hockey might be played. MORE »
.. Of the entire season! Have we ever slumped so bad? Answer: No! Still, with a win last night the Giants have a chance to get onto somewhat of a roll. Let’s check up on things so far . . . MORE »
No the headline is not a joke, I only logged onto ih-update midway through the third period and had to refresh twice as well as check I had the correct game before believing what I was reading. The Giants were leading 5-0 and went on to win 7-1 in their best performance I would imagine of the season. All that with a very short bench on ‘D’ with Gavalier AND Trevor Johnson both out of the line-up with injuries. This was the Hull team that the Giants could not score against just last weekend in Dundalk. The Giants put seven past them tonight with DeRouville only falling less than a minute shy of picking up his second shutout of the season. For all the critisism that’s came his way this season he’s certainly been keeping them out of late. MORE »
Take note of the title. The Giants fans went on a road trip yesterday evening to catch their teams home game against Hull Stingrays. It was the first time the Giants have played a home game outside the Odyssey Arena since it has been opened. Remember the first half of the 2000-2001 season the Giants played home games on the road while the Odyssey was built. The trip to Dundalk did not change the Giants fortunes however as the defeats continued. This time the Giants sank to a new low, getting shut out by a team that from pre-season we really thought we should have beat. MORE »
To many times throughout the years when the team has not been playing well we’ve heard about threats to make changes. Most of the time the players buckle down and sort out their game turning things around. That is until this season. A struggling Giants team came into this game on a winning streak of one game after a six game losing streak. It was one of the worst displays the fans at the Odyssey arena have had to put up with and it yet again had Ed coming out with axe threats. Clearly however these threats are not working and it’s time to put up or shut up with regards to changes. MORE »
I haven’t blogged in a while, I guess there has been little inspiration to do so considering how the team has been playing but if truth be told the real reason has been the trip over to London sample a different type of hockey - NHL hockey.
Below is a little taster of what we got in terms of the physical side of the game.
The Giants had been on a 6 game losing streak and were rooted to the foot of the Elite League table upon leaving for the trip the morning after the Giants went down 4-3 to Nottingham in a game that promised so much in terms of physical play but delivered so little. We had one fight between Lewis and Shmyr with the later very reluctant to fight thoughout the bout.
Heading to London for the opening two games of the new regular season we were a little more hopeful of some fast paced slick hockey with even a bout or two of fisty cuffs.
