Leeds Knights, Hull Seahawks and Sheffield Steeldogs - how they fared on NIHL National opening weekend

A double-header against Bristol Pitbulls was always going to throw up difficult moments and post plenty of questions for Ryan Aldridge’s team, but they had an answer for everything that was thrown at them.

An impressive 7-3 win on the road on Saturday night was enhanced by Sunday’s 5-0 win on home ice - Sam Gospel no doubt delighted to get his first shutout so early in the campaign.

Elsewhere, Hull Seahawks ensured they matched their Yorkshire rivals’ efforts when they edged out Swindon Wildcats 4-3 after a shoot-out, adding to the 6-5 win they enjoyed at Peterborough Phantoms on Friday night.

Sheffield Steeldogs saw the start to their season delayed by 24 hours after Swindon’s rink suffered flooding earlier in the week.

After returning the #21 shirt of Alex Graham, who tragically died aged just 20 in the summer, they went toe-to-toe with last season’s league runners-up Milton Keynes Lightning before listing out late on 5-3.

While pleased to see his team post a maximum return, Knights’ head coach Ryan Aldridge admitted they were below par when they returned to ‘The Castle’ on Sunday.

“I didn’t think we were at our best tonight,” said Aldridge. “I thought we were tired and made some tired mistakes and our power play looked tired, but we logged a lot of ice time and some of the guys have probably never had as much ice time in a game in their whole careers.

“But there were lots of positives, obviously a 5-0 win, the goaltender was outstanding.”

Matt Barron opened the scoring at 6.33 on the power play which is how it stayed until early in the second when captain Kieran Brown doubled the lead.

Coming into the third, Bristol would have fancied their chances of a comeback, only for Lewis Baldwin to fire through traffic at 41.27 to leave them with a bigger mountain to climb.

At 47.03, Josh Adkins fired home a rebound to make it 4-0, Barron completing the scoring at 56.40.

On Saturday, Finn Bradon opened the scoring after just 77 seconds before Adkins doubled the lead just before the break.

Brown made it 3-0 just after the halfway mark, only for Bristol to hit back and make it a one-goal game after 40 minutes.

Dylan Hehir made it 4-2 early in the third, Bristol again made it a one-goal game through Adam Harding just a minute later.

But Brown proved once again he is capable of leading from the front when, first, he made it 5-3 at 47.24 before setting up Ethan Hehir to establish a three-goal lead just over two minutes later and then registering a hat-trick for himself to round off the scoring at 55.46.

Buoyed by their win at peterborough, Hull fell 2-0 behind against Swindon before Finlay Ulrick halved the deficit at 18.56.

Lee Bonner levelled just after the halfway point, the hosts edging ahead for the first time through Emil Svec at 42.02 and on course for victory until an equaliser from Tomasz Malasinski with just 73 seconds of regulation remaining.

Overtime couldn’t separate the two teams, either, and it was Svec who proved the shoot-out hero as the only player to score.

Having seen a large crowd pay tribute to the tragic Graham in a pre-match ceremony, the Steeldogs opened their campaign in promising style against the Lightning at Ice Sheffield, Jonathan Phillips putting them ahead on the power play at 15.41.

But the Lightning were level just 17 seconds later through Toms Rutkis and took the lead just past the 30-minute mark through Robert Herrman.

The Steeldogs’ task got harder when Callum Field made it 3-1 at 34.26 but they rallied impressively in the third, Matt Bissonnette making it a one-goal game at 43.00 before doubling his tally and levelling for the hosts just over 10 minutes later.

But, with less than two minutes remaining, the Lightning produced a killer blow through Rutkis, the points being secured with 13 seconds remaining when Ross Venus scored an empty-netter to seal a 5-3 win.