In an unusual end to the season, Solent Devils had to take a Thursday night trip to the Isle of Wight to play a postponed fixture following the troubles with the Ryde ice rink roof.
Unfortunately for the Devils, several players are currently out injured, which includes most of their defensive players, which resulted in Mitch Murray spending the evening in defence.
File photo of Andrew Magee
Wightlink took an early lead, with Corey Watkins getting a goal inside the first minute and a half.
Devils managed to tie things up, half way through the period with Richard Brown giving the helper to George Norcliffe.
While Alex Trendall was in the penalty box following a hooking call, Ryan Webb put the home side back in the lead, with an assist from Jaroslav Cesky.
The puck dropped for the second period, Trendall and Andrew Magee getting the puck through to Richard Facey, who levelled the score again, with just fifteen seconds having been played in the period.
Less than a minute later, however, Craig Tribe picked up an assist with Alex Sampford getting the second, as Watkins got his second goal of the game.
Raiders managed to double their lead a few minutes later, Brendan Baird getting himself an assist this time, as Cesky and Webb teamed up again.
Coming out after the second break, it took less than three minutes for Raiders to score three more goals, first Daniel Rose passing to Webb, who paid back Cesky for the earlier two.  The second, Tribe and Watkins gave the assistance required to Sampford to find the back of the net.  The third, and final Raiders goal, was put away by Jeremy Cornish, who in turn was helped by Ben Paynter and Danny Ingoldsby.
Christian Cole had had enough by now, and headed for the bench, surrendering the net to Sam Calder.
While Damon Larter was in the Raiders sin bin, Facey and Murray managed to find Mason Wild in space, who managed to get a consolation goal, but with fifteen seconds left in the game, there was nothing more the Devils could do but accept a 7-3 final score.
Saturday, saw the Devils again on the ferry, heading back to Ryde.
Alex Cole suited up, and headed out for warm up, but didn’t come out for the game, his ankle still playing up from an injury sustained the previous weekend – the reason he hadn’t skated Thursday.
Cole, was not the only one missing from the Devils line up, none of the other injured players making it back either, although no one else missing from the team that had played Thursday either.
Raiders came out hard, and were 4-0 up by the end of the first period, goals coming from Damon Larter, Nick Compton, and a pair from Craig Tribe.
The second started, and within three minutes, Jaroslav Cesky and Jeremy Cornish made it 6-0
George Norcliffe clawed one back just before the half way mark, assisted by Richard Brown and Mitch Murray.
Unfortunately, Ryan Webb followed by Corey Watkins put two more in the back of the Devils net, taking it to the second break 9-1.
The third period started, and Matthew Colclough had surrendered the Raiders goal to Aaron Craft.
Another goal, in under ninety seconds from the puck drop – Webb’s second of the night, saw Christian Cole had over the Devils goal to Sam Calder once again.
Eleven seconds later, Steve Gosset put Mason Wild through for another late goal for the Devils, but as the final buzzer went the score board read 10-2.
In their last game of the regular season, the Solent Devils hosted the Cardiff Devils.
Jamie Fitzpatrick was back in the line up, but the Solent injured were almost the same number as the players who had suited up and were ready to play.
Despite sitting at the bottom of the table, Cardiff turned up ready to play, and gave as good as they got on the ice, and the puck went end to end, neither team managing to get one over the other.
Usually when the two Devils teams meet the games can be very physical, however both teams seemed to be behaving well, and while there were penalties throughout the game, they weren’t for offenses that got the crowds shouting.
One pair of penalties, given to Richard Facey and Christopher Hart, both for holding, were as the two players went in a tight turn from behind the Cardiff goal, one of the players lost their footing and banged in to the other.  As they were falling, they both grabbed each other for support and landed together on the ice.  After picking themselves up, they headed smiling to the sin bin, where they sat and even made a few jokes about it to each other.
As always, the referees decisions were questioned, but they were for calling icing when perhaps icing should not have been called, or for not calling it when everyone else in the rink felt it probably should have been.  It was during one of these times, Alex Murray was politely requested to calm down.  Still recovering from a broken jaw after the Streatham game a week ago, Murray couldn’t really make much more noise anyway.
Following a bit of a squash in the corner of the rink, Alex Trendall made the decision in the second break to get changed, and spent the third period with the injured Devils at the side.
Mitch Murray’s mistimed swing for the puck went a bit wild, and he caught one of the Cardiff players in the face.  Not only did he receive a high stick penalty, because he had caught an opposing player in the face he was given a game penalty, so he too went to stand with the injured squad.
Cardiff started celebrating shortly later, as the puck had ended up in the Solent net, but as there were two Cardiff players in Christian Cole’s crease before the puck went in, the goal was disallowed for net minder interference.
After play resumed, it was being cleared from the Devils zone, when it bounced up from a Cardiff stick and hit Fitzpatrick in the mouth, resulting in a trip to A&E, and leaving the home side another man down.
With just over five minutes left in the game, Ralfs Circenis picked up the puck in centre ice, and took it towards the Cardiff goal, being supported by George Norcliffe.  A quick pass, followed by a quicker shot, gave the Solent Devils the goal they needed to clinch the win and end their season on a high.
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