Sheffield Steelers 4-0 Glasgow Clan (aggregate 9-1): Comfortable victory seals cup final spot

At Sheffield Arena, they comfortably saw off Glasgow Clan (4-0 on the night, 9-1 on aggregate) in the Challenge Cup semi final, second leg.

The last time Sheffield won the trophy was in the final season of the Superleague, 2002-3, when they pipped Nottingham Panthers.

They had gone into Wednesday night's semi final with a healthy 5-1 advantage from the first leg.

And Clan didn't do much to threaten that in the first period in which they had chronically few scoring chances.

Matt Stanisz's shot after 15 minutes was the first time home goalie Tomas Duba had to break sweat - although Sheffield were fortunate that Scott Pitt made a hash of a pass with a team-mate open.

Before that the 7,296 Arena crowd, enhanced in size by a £5-a-ticket offer, could watch in relaxed mood as fourth-line young guns Cole Shudra and Alex Graham had plenty of ice time.

Glasgow had been penned in for much of the session, Patrick Killeen being pounded by shots from Tanner Eberle, Lucas Sandstrom and others.

The break-neck speed of the early session suited Ben O'Connor who is always happy to turn defence into attack.

Killeen kept Janne Kolehmainen at bay on a one-on-one, but the goalie couldn't perform miracles for much longer.

The first goal was a thing of beauty, a training-ice power play goal banged in by Sandstrom.

Mikael Lidhammar crosschecked Sandstrom off the play after he'd scored, got sent to the penalty box, where he had a grandstand view of the same player scoring again.

Zack Fitzgerald's team had ended a six-game losing streak by beating bottom club Fife Flyers last Sunday, but now they were in big trouble.

Fatally, they allowed Marco Vallerand time to pick his spot with a wrist shot for 3-0 at 38:11.

The chances of the Scots scoring eight late goals to win the tie looked pretty remote.

Liam Stenton was easily saved by Duba and Craig Moore should have done better with a chance at the start of the third.

Cole Shudra tries a near post shot against Glasgow

Linden Springer's temper-driven indiscretions saw him in the box as John Armstrong slotted in number four from an acute angle.

Coach Aaron Fox was able to give Will Kerlin the last seven minutes of the game, in goal, giving Duba some well-earned rest.

*Steelers now play Cardiff Devils in the final, at Cardiff, on March 8.