By Dom Brown
Sheffield Steelers’ regular season resumes with the weekend’s double-header against the Belfast Giants.
The Steelers, managed by Paul Thompson, go into this match off the back of their EIHL Challenge Cup victory over the Nottingham Panthers.
Yorkshire’s own Steelers were 2-1 winners over the Panthers, who will have to overturn the deficit on February 14th at Sheffield Stadium.
This weekend’s matches against the Giants will be the 3rd and 4th meeting between the sides this year alone.
The Steelers came away from Belfast with a 4-1 victory and a 2-1 OT loss under their belts.
The two teams have also faced off three times previously in this season, where the Giants won in Belfast and the Steelers won two consecutive home games against the side from Northern Ireland by a score of 5-1.
Spirits in Belfast will be high following their own victory last week. The Dundee Stars lost by six goals to nil against the Giants.
James Desmarais contributed two goals along with a hat-trick earlier in the week and this helped the forward to win the EIHL player of the week.
Belfast Giants’ James Desmarais has been named EIHL Player of the Week: https://t.co/Ox8zGf19pZ pic.twitter.com/3FcXHoPFNC
— EIHL (@officialEIHL) 26 January 2017
Desmarais was quick to praise his fellow teammates, when talking to the EIHL he said that “everyone is playing very well… we’re a hard team to cover, we have a lot of depth in our lineup.”