Sheffield Steelers 4-3 Nottingham Panthers
after penalty shots

Sheffield at full strength, Nottingham without David Clarke and Mike Rees, playing Paul Moran Moran up front and Ryan Shmyr on defence.

5586 saw ex-Panther Dan Tessier net the only goal in the penalty shoot out with the last shot to give Sheffield the win. Sean McAslan, Shawn Maltby, Matus Petricko, Shaun Sutter and Jan Krajicek had all seen their efforts saved before Tessier drilled the puck through Evan Lindsay's legs.

But for long periods it looked like the home side's misfiring powerplay would gift Nottingham the win. Three times the visitors took the lead and Sheffield had to lift their goalie for an extra skater to force overtime, captain Maltby lifting the puck home with 30 seconds to spare (59:30).

The scoring started when Paul Moran lifted the puck home at the back door (28:52) on Panthers second powerplay of the night. Ian Manzano levelled (30:11) after Lindsay saved from Regan Darby and Brett Clouthier on Steelers' next powerplay. Matt Myers fired home from a fine angle on the right (32:07) then Sutter squeezed the puck home from close-in (33:19).

Panthers started the final session 4-on-3 and McAslan scored from the left (40:38), though to many eyes including the goal judge the puck hit the crossbar and came back out without crossing the line. Ref Nigel Boniface had no doubts, however and as the last 2 players to question a decision had both received misconducts, nobody was inclined to query the matter further.