Ice hockey: Sheffield Steelers’ title dream is melting into the ice after three straight league defeats

It would take a brave fan to think otherwise after weekend slumps to Coventry Blaze (Saturday, 3-5 home, Sunday 3-4, overtime, away) following a previous midweek collapse at Manchester Storm.

Before the weekend, Coventry had been a team 11 points behind Steelers which raises questions about how Sheffield will fare in the ‘must-win’ six games remaining against those clubs above them, Belfast Giants, Guildford Flames and Cardiff Devils.

Steelers fought back on Sunday after going 3-1 down and took Blaze into overtime.

But they couldn’t find a win.

Coach Aaron Fox won’t give up until the championship is a mathematical impossibility.

Yet he appeared to be writing the epitaph on the title tombstone after Saturday’s home loss when he told The Star: “This is a results-based business and we haven’t brought the results.

“I have high expectations of myself, my team… we are not getting it done right now.”

Asked if the title party was over, he said: “I am not going to say the title is slipping away.

“We play those teams six times (Belfast, Guildford, Cardiff.)

“Obviously if we don’t play winning hockey for 60 minutes we are not going to have a chance.”

Before the weekend, he’d felt they needed to win-lose ratio of W10 L3 or W11 L2 for the rest of the regular programme, so the weekend defeats have put extra stress on the squad.

The truth, though, is that inconsistent teams do not win titles.

And if there is a word to describe Steelers over the last dozen league games (seven losses) inconsistent is it.

Sunday’s match started badly.

With Niklas Nevalainen serving a tripping call, Mitch Cook put Coventry ahead on their home ice.

Within three minutes, third-line centre Brendan Connolly equalised with his fifth of the season.

Coventry responded with their second power play goal of the night, via Nathanael Halbert and then cruised into a 3-1 advantage from Kim Tallberg’s stick, on a break.

It was a topsy-turvy event, with Martin Látal reducing the deficit, after sound work from Marco Vallerand.

At 52:40 Scott Allen broke a six-match drought.

In overtime, Ross Venus’ breakaway goal gave two points to the home side.

*On Saturday, the team-illness bug took Kevin Schulze out of the line up while Brandon Whistle is missing with a lower-body injury.

While they only tied the first period, with Tomas Pitule putting them ahead and Marly Quince levelling, they showed some teeth in robust physical confrontations.

The 6,119 crowd wanted to see more of such energy in the second period.

They got it – Pitule’s hit on the boards seemed to move the Arena three inches closer to the M1, Daniel Ciampini went berserk when he suffered a facial injury from which nobody was penalised and Calle Ackered hammered the puck to on the post from centre blue line.

But they couldn’t score and had goalie Matt Greenfield to thank to remain level when Halbert flew out of the penalty box on a breakaway.

The final 20 minutes had a deja vu feeling: Steelers went ahead (Ackered long shot) and Tallberg levelled coolly on a breakaway.

But then things went wrong.

Fox called it “self-inflicted” with Sheffield squandering possession and John Curran punishing them for 2-3.

Matt Petgrave didn’t let his head drop though and slammed in a low drive to tie the game with seven minutes remaining.

Title disaster laid in store, though.

A harmless looking challenge from Danny Kristo led to a power play from which Peyton Frantti scored, followed by an empty netter from Tallberg.

Game over, and possibly league season too.