A league outing in Peterborough on Saturday proved to be trouble as a pair of Phantoms goals in the opening period set the stage for a futile night of ‘catch up’ hockey that would ultimately end in a 5-2 Flames defeat.  A fresh night 24 hours later made the task no easier on Sunday as the Flames iced their 3rd consecutive road game, this night against the league leading Milton Keynes Lighting who scored a pair of unanswered final period goals to turn a 1 goal deficit into a 3-2 win.

In the weekend opener, Brent Gough kicked things off just 72 seconds after the opening faceoff before a Maris Ziedins powerplay goal at 15:50 set up the two goal cushion at the first break.  The clubs traded 2nd period goals. Tom Duggan cut the home advantage in half at 29:35, but Ziedins re-stored the breathing room at 37:36, leaving Spectrum’s team a job to recover a 2 goal deficit with just 20 minutes outstanding.  The 3rd opened well in that regard, however, when Rick Plant brought the game to within 1 at 43:35, but it would be the last Flames marker of the night in rendering a pair of 59th minute Phantoms goals by James Ferrera and James Knight, the latter into an empty net, as mere formalities in the official game night record of a result already secured.

On Sunday, the Flames opened the scoring to take a lead with 20 minutes in the books.  Lukas Smital had the period’s lone tally at 5:51.  Matt Towalksi pulled the Lightning even in the 29th minute with a man advantage, but a Jez Lundin goal at 32:05 re-established a Flames 1 goal edge that remained on the clock to start the final stanza.  Monir Kalgoum levelled once again for Milton Keynes at 45:20, again on the powerplay, and the Swedish forward then added the game winner at 52:12 to confirm the outcome.

Paul Dixon reflected on the disappointing run of results:

“We knew heading into this little stretch of 4 consecutive road games, 1 still to be played, on March 13th, that we had our work cut out for us.  In Slough for the cup semi final, then in Peterborough then in the league leader’s home building is not the type of schedule that you would hope for during the final run into the playoffs and leading to the cup Final, but there is no doubt we would have expected more from that run.  Saturday we did not play a good game and the better team won on the night.  We were much more up for the MK game and with a bit of a break here and there could have just as easily picked up a win so our real problem is less that of winning vs losing and more a case of our readiness to play at the same level each and every night which we have struggled.  When we play our best we are one of the league’s top teams so with only a short stretch of season left it is imperative that we find a consistent base to make our best effort at laying claim to the cup and the playoff titles which is our objective in closing out the campaign.”

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