With the Whitley Warriors and the reigning champion Blackburn Hawks about to embark on a top-of-the-table four game series, I thought it might be good to focus a bit on the match up. There will be some potted history posts to come on the Hawks but to begin with I wanted to go back nearly 15 years, to 2001. Whitley had an unbelieveable side around the turn of the Millennium while Blackburn were still re-adjusting to life in ED1 as it was called. Both teams, along with Billingham were the top teams back then, and therefore it came as no surprise that they ended up facing each other several times. During the 2000-01 season Whitley and Blackburn met six teams, playing each other twice in the League, Playoffs and the Anglo-Scottish Cup, and its the latter we will be looking at here.
The cross border competition pitted the Warriors and the Hawks in the same group along with old foes Solway Sharks. In the game at Blackburn Arena, the fans witnessed a seven goal thriller. Swedish student Freddie Jonsson finished an amazing move, that saw him go coast-to-coast before finding the net while Andrew Carter grabbed an equally impressive goal before completing his hat-trick. Read on for more:
Blackburn Jan 21, 2001 (a) 4-3 ASC
Whitley claimed the points and top spot in Group A of the Anglo-Scottish Cup, in what was the best game of hockey between two ENL sides all season. Both played quality hockey and hinted towards the two sides cleaning up the trophies between them come the end of the season. Swedish-import, Freddie Jonsson put Whitley ahead at 3:28 with a breathtaking short-handed goal, as he raced up the ice shrugging off Blackburn attempts to stop him, before firing high past Colin Downie. With the Warriors taking a string of penalties it came as no surprise when the home side equalised on the powerplay four minutes later through Craig Sharman, but Whitley took the lead again at 11:14 when Andrew Carter scored a similar goal to his Swedish teammate.
Chris Cheadle then converted the Hawks second powerplay goal at 13:11 and 90 seconds from the first break a move started by netminder Downie, ended with Sharman striking his second to give the home side their only lead of the night.
Whitley were seen in a more attacking light in the second session and with the referee poised to call a rare penalty against Blackburn; Andrew Carter struck his second at 31:31 to draw us level. The visitors finally did get a powerplay chance four minutes later and with some precision passing the man advantage was made to work when Carter's deft flick completed his hat trick, with what proved to be the game-winning goal.
Although there were no goals in the last period, the excitement was intense with both sides going close to scoring on several occasions. Whitley knew another would finish the contest off, while Blackburn wanted at least a draw to preserve an unbeaten record stretching back to mid-November. That neither side managed to score was testament to both defences, although Whitley had to survive the last 37 seconds 6-on-4 after they conceded a penalty moments after Blackburn took off their goalie for the extra skater.
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