Leeds Knights within touching distance of NIHL National title after posting perfect weekend return

If all goes according to plan, Leeds Knights could be crowned NIHL National league champions on Saturday night, at the home of the one team who can - however unlikely - still overtake them.

For Milton Keynes Lightning’s players, they must have known coming off the ice following their 5-4 defeat after a shoot-out at Bees IHC on Sunday night knowing that their race was about run, knowing Leeds had already posted a perfect six-point, three-game weekend.

Given the Knights have come off second-best on the two occasions they have visited Buckinghamshire this year, there is every chance their title celebrations will be delayed by 24 hours this weekend.

But, on reflection, that may work out even better, going into Sunday’s home game against the Bees knowing a win will see them lift a trophy in their own barn, in front of their own fans for the first time.

Last year, they won the league title in Telford, while they were crowned play-off champions at Coventry’s Skydome Arena.

However perfect it will be, though, securing a trophy on home ice is not guaranteed by any means.

The Lightning will at the very least want to delay the inevitable on Saturday - particularly in front of their own fans - while the Bees still have plenty of work to do to secure their own play-off spot. There is still plenty at stake.

All Leeds can do is keep doing what they have done better than anybody in the second-tier - winning games consistently.

The 5-2 victory at Hull Seahawks on Sunday evening not only made it three wins from three games from what was a devilishly difficult weekend on paper - they had already won 2-1 at Swindon Wildcats and 6-4 at home to their Yorkshire rivals - it also stretched their current winning streak to 11 games, their longest of the season.

The Knights have saved their best until last. When it has mattered most, they have delivered.

But it wasn’t just the perfect six-point return that made it a potentially defining weekend for the Knights. The emergence of Harrison Walker at this level was a huge bonus for head coach Ryan Aldridge.

The youngster has found ice time hard to come by in NIHL National this season, but with No 1 netminder Sam Gospel unavailable, Walker stepped up and comfortably filled the void three nights in succession.

If a Friday night road game at Swindon Wildcats wasn’t a tough enough examination for the 21-year-old, twice getting the better of an often-dangerous Hull team was further proof of his quality.

The delight on the faces of his team-mates as they congratulated their netminder after the final buzzer on all three nights was clear proof of how popular and well-liked Walker is within the Knights dressing room.

His confidence will have soared as a result, his coach will have been hugely impressed - only helping to make the Knights an even stronger proposition going forward.

On Sunday, Mac Howlett got them off to the ideal start in Hull when he broke the deadlock in the 14th minute.

In an encounter that proved equally as tight as the previous evening’s derby duel, it wasn’t until just before the end of the second period before that lead was doubled, Jordan Buesa adding to the two goals he posted on Saturday.

Kieran Brown made it 3-0 at 46.00 and was on hand to calm nerves on the visitors bench when he struck again just over eight minutes later to make it 4-2, Hull having got back into the game through strikes from lethal duo Owen Sobchak and Emil Svec.

As Matty Davies’ team chased the game, it was left to Buesa to round off a perfect weekend for the defending champions with a late empty net strike.