West Auckland Admirals vs. Canterbury Red Devils

Held at: Paradice Ice Arena, Lansford Cres, Avondale Auckland

Saturday 14 July

The opening game of this round between the West Auckland Admirals and Canterbury Red Devils promised to be very exciting as the standings in the league meant this is effectively a semi final with both teams knowing that winning these games will book them a place in the grand final in September.

The Admirals stormed to a 3 nil lead in the first half of the period with goals by Jouni Kivela, Travis McMaster and Robbie Chamberlain. The Red Devils scored with 3 minutes to go in the period .

Period ending at 3:1 to the Admirals.

The Admirals seemed to let their foot off the pedal and let the Red Devils back into the game out scoring the Admirals 4 goals to 2 with the period ending 5:5.

This set up the 3^rd period to be a thriller with both sides knowing they would have to step it up to clinch victory. Each team scored 2 goals in the period with Red Devils tying the score at 1.29 to go on the clock through a penalty shot from DOnofrio. End of 3^rd Period 7 :7

The game went into 5 minutes overtime were the Admirals A. Hart scored the winning goal with 2 minutes to go in the overtime period.

This gained the Admirals a well deserved 8:7 win and 2 valuable points.

Red Devils Chris Eaden had a hand in all their goals finishing the game with 4 goals and 2 assists.

The Admirals on the other hand had the goals shared around with Jouni Kivela, and Captain Steven Huish scoring 2 each and Travis McMaster, Robbie Chamberlain, Jeremy Chai and Andy Hart scoring one each.

Sunday nights game will be even more critical for both teams with the Admirals able to clinch a place in the finals and Red Devils knowing they need to win to keep their finals hopes alive.