Coventry Blaze boss Danny Stewart praised his players’ spirit despite seeing them fall to two narrow losses against Sheffield Steelers over the weekend.

A goal a minute from time condemned Blaze to a 6-5 defeat at Sheffield on Saturday and they were out of luck the following day, falling to a 4-3 loss after overtime on home ice.

Stewart said: “I couldn’t ask for anymore from my players – it was a hell of an effort.

“Did we deserve more than a point from this weekend? Absolutely no question in my mind, but that’s out of our control right now. We just have to focus on how we performed.

“If there was ever a weekend to unite a group this would be it, because we had everything that could possibly happen thrown our way and we dealt with it and we just kept going.

“On Saturday we found a way – we kept tying the game all the way. We got beat by outside influences and I’ll leave it at that.”

(Image permission: Scott Wiggins)