Cardiff Devils 1, Newcastle Vipers 0

Jan 19 2009 by Peter Adams, The Journal

(After overtime penalty shots)

THE 12th penalty shot did what 60 minutes of regulation time and five minutes of sudden death, four on four, overtime failed to do last night – separate the Elite League’s sixth and seventh teams.

The first round of three penalties each proved inconclusive with both sides scoring one apiece and after the Vipers scorer, their player-coach Rob Wilson, had missed his second attempt, Jay Latulippe won the extra point for the Devils.

Defenceman Tyson Teplitsky had put the Devils ahead with the second attempt of the shoot-out.

Despite the fact that a penalty shoot-out loss earned the Vipers a point they lose ground to the Devils, as the points gap between them grows from six to seven.

In the one and only game previously played between the two sides this season, there had been a lot of ill feeling and it took just 46 seconds for the gloves to come off.

The scorer of two goals in Saturday’s 7-3 away defeat against the Coventry Blaze, Derek Campbell, showed the pugilistic side of his game by picking a fight with Mike Prpich. Both players received five minutes fighting penalties after they had been pulled apart.

The Vipers then found themselves defending against a two minute five on three powerplay and during this examination netminder Andrew Verner stopped the majority of the 19 shots he faced.

The previous night against the Blaze the Vipers had only been awarded one powerplay throughout the whole game. Last night they got three in a row but failed to capitalise on the advantages.

For the first 10 minutes of the game against the Blaze the Skydome was a very quiet place to be as the Vipers had quickly established a two-goal lead.

But the second period was a disaster for the Vipers who conceded five goals in the 20 minutes of play.

Verner, who made 31 saves, was replaced by Ritchie Lawson for the final period and the young back-up went on to make 12 saves. He was beaten just the once by Weaver who made it 7-3 on 52 minutes after Campbell had struck his second of the night five minutes from the start of the period.

BLAZE: Weaver 2+1, Calder 2+0, Watkins 1+1, Lewis & Moore 1+0, Forsyth 0+2, Deschatelets, Cowley & Hjalmarsson 0+.

VIPERS: D Campbell 2+0, Hutchins 1+1, Andersson, Courtenay & Longstaff 0+1.

DEVILS: Latulippe 1+0.