SOLIHULL Barons suffered their first defeat of the 2016/17 season after slipping up 6-3 at home to newly promoted Dragons on Sunday evening.
The ice had barely been marked by the players’ skates before the scoreboard was registering goals by both sides.
The Barons opened the scoring with only 31 seconds on the clock with Joe Henry finding Josh Bruce waiting on the Dragons’ back post for a simple opener.
Within a minute the Dragons had pulled things back as Filip Supa came round the goal to shoot low and through the legs of Josh Nicholls in the Barons net.
By ten minutes the Barons were back on top after Matt Maurice barged the Dragons defence off the puck in front of their own net before calmly slotting home.
This was quickly countered however by Markus Kankaanranta to bring the Dragons level once more and by the end of the period it was the visitors on top and a quick breakaway goal by Kankaanranta saw them hold a 3-2 at the end of the first period.
A series of minor penalties meant that the Barons played most of the second period with a man down and the Dragons made them pay with Filip Supa scoring once more to extend the visitors’ lead to two goals.
However a Joe Henry shot from just outside the crease with two minutes of the period to go brought Barons back into touching distance going into the final third.
The final period started badly for the Barons with James Parsons once more returning Dragon’s advantage to two goals within a minute of the restart.
The hosts continued to push but in reality most of the play was happening at the wrong end of the ice for them.
With the deficit still at two goals and with a couple of minutes to go, Solihull pulled their netminder in favour of another attacker but with the puck finding its way to the Barons end of the ice and the Dragons getting hold of the rubber, a sixth goal was inevitable to give a disappointing result for the Barons.
The Barons now face a long weekend away travelling up to Dumfries on Saturday to take on league high-flyers Solway Sharks before battling last season’s champions, Blackburn Hawks, on the way back down on Sunday.
