Telford Tigers bounce back with crucial victory over Swindon Wildcats

The Tigers' head coach had seen his side beaten 7-4 by play-off rivals Solway Sharks on Saturday night - cutting the gap between the two to just a point in the race for the top eight.

But eighth-placed Tigers re-established a three-point cushion thanks to a Sunday night win over Swindon at Telford Ice Rink, while ninth-placed Solway were going down 4-2 at Sheffield Steeldogs.

“That was one of those nights where you couldn’t ask any more of the team," said Watkins. "We came to play tonight - every player in the room set the tone, played hard every shift and played with real quality and smarts.

"An excellent first period where we moved our feet, moved the puck with low risk hockey and were able to play fast, turning a lot of pucks over on the forecheck.

"Despite the short bench, despite this being the fifth game in eight days, despite getting home at 3am this morning, we were able to sustain the level and the energy levels.

"A tremendous effort and a big result against one of the top teams in the league."

The Tigers had only got back from Dumfries, Scotland, in the early hours of Sunday morning - but made a fast start as they took the lead.

Scott McKenzie combined with Rhodes Mitchell-King to send Fin Howells in on goal and Howells cooly dispatched the puck low past Swindon netminder Renny Marr.

Telford were dominant for much of the first period with Marr in particular busy, keeping the puck out and the only surprise was that the period featured only one goal.

Lucas Price was ejected from the game after being given a game misconduct penalty for going too far in his argument against some controversial refereeing decisions

During the second period, Swindon were much better and were unlucky not to score when Jake Bricknell hit the crossbar, while Brad Day in the Telford goal was in top form to keep the Swindon attack at bay.

With the game finely balanced at the start of the third period, Tigers scored on the power play as Mitchell-King’s long range shot flew past the unsighted Marr.

A few minutes later, Telford had a third goal - with Mitchell-King  again on target as he smashed it towards goal, catching out Marr, who allowed it to go through his legs and trickle into the net.

Marr was so annoyed with the concession of the goal that he skated towards the Swindon bench and was replaced by Tyler Perre.

Swindon were soon back in the game when Bricknell scored from long range with Day unsighted.

With two minutes of the third period remaining, Perre was pulled from goal, which allowed the Wildcats to take advantage of their numerical strength when Tomasz Malasinski scored from close range to set up a grandstand finish.

Despite Swindon playing out the remainder of the game without Perre in goal and playing with six attacking players, Telford held out resolutely to hold on to two huge points.