The third Battle Of Sydney for 2015 on paper may have favoured the higher team on the ladder but they are always a hard & physical battle.
This time in 2014, the Ice Dogs were flying high however the Bears are the high flyers in 2015 of the two teams. This was despite the Ice Dogs winning the second Battle Of Sydney at Liverpool in a shootout 4-3.
The previous Battle of Sydney at the Penrith Ice Palace earlier in the season saw the Bears win easily by 7-2. Back then, the Bears were starting their trip to the winning circle after a slow start to the season. Come the 4th of July, the Bears at home are finals contenders while the Ice Dogs are fighting for pride.
A quick look at the 2 benches at the start of the game would be very telling. The Bears had a full bench while the Ice Dogs had a bare bones bench with one line on the ice and one line off the ice at any one time. In addition, Ice Dogs import goalie Matt Grogan was injured and out of the game. Starter Jake Burgess would be in for a difficult day at the office and without a backup.
Sheer weight of numbers and skill would see the Bears dominate the first period with goals to Tomas Landa, Joe Harcharik and Paddy Ward (powerplay goal). The Ice Dogs were playing decent hockey to begin with but faded towards the end of the period.
In front of a great crowd, the Bears kept the scoring going into the second period. Once again, the Ice Dogs started the period well but again faded as the period went on. Ales Padelek & Richard Tesarik added to their season goal tallies while defenceman Spencer Austin opened his goal scoring account for the season.
With the score 6-0 in favour of the Bears at the second intermission, the home crowd could be excused for wanting more goal scoring from the Bears in the third period and wondering what the final score would be.
Assisted by the already depleted Ice Dogs team spending long periods short handed, the first 3 goals of the period (Michael Schlamp, Joe Harcharik & Lachlan McKenzie) were powerplay goals. It was another multi goal game for Harcharik, another multi point game for captain Schlamp and McKenzie's first ever AIHL goal.
It was also another multi something game for former Bear Jarrod Smith. For the second week in a row, he was ejected from the game for a foul and for the second week in a row, the dressing room door was an unwilling victim of Smith's anger.
The game was beyond reach of the Ice Dogs well before 2.30 remaining in the third period with the score 9-0 Bears. It could be argued that the Bears let the foot off the accelerator before that point and that the score could have been a lot higher than 9-0.
To the Dogs' credit though, 3 goals in 45 seconds gave their long suffering fans something to cheer for and denied Bears goalie Kamil Jarina a shutout.
Finally, Spencer Austin doubled his season goal scoring effort with another goal with 66 seconds remaining in the game to give the Bears a well deserved 10-3 result.
More known for his big hits & powerful defence, double goal scorer Spencer Austin was pleased with the win. "It started off a bit slow. As it went on, we picked it up. Obviously you could tell that we were the more skilled team & at the end of the day, we wanted it more than they did."
Scoring twice is in the same game is a new thing for Austin. He explained that he didn't think that he'd scored 2 goals in the same AIHL season before, much less 2 goals in the same game.
The Bears now can enjoy a weekend off before facing CBR Brave twice as they only have 3 games in July (18th July away, 25th July home). The Bears currently are now in 4th place on the competition ladder and have to sit back and watch the results of other games.
Meanwhile, the Ice Dogs return home to face the Melbourne Mustangs. The Ice Dogs are fighting for their first regulation game of the season while the Mustangs are walking a fine line between pleasure and pain as they cling to a slight finals hope.
Story by Eric Brook
Photo by Injected Ideas-Photography
MUSTANGS
BRAVE
ICE
THUNDER
RHINOS
NORTHSTARS
ADRENALINE
LIGHTNING
